Golfing - after school club

Look at this action shot!

For part of the session, the children played

what looked like crazy golf today!

What a shot!

FUN, FUN, FUN, LEARN, LEARN, LEARN!

En Garde!

It was a real privilege to watch our children take part in a Fencing Competition tonight. Children from Kilburn and Smalley joined together to put the skills they have learned at Fencing Club into practice. 

The children demonstrated a huge amount of skill and sportsmanship which was great to see. 

The competition was incredibly close but Kilburn pipped Smalley to the title and have a lovely cup to display in school.

There was a great turnout from parents and grandparents and everyone had a fantastic time. Thank you all for your support.

Thanks also to Premier Sport for organising the event. 

Enjoy the pictures below! 

First Aid

Thank you so much Mr Barwise for running the after school First Aid course for some of the Year 6 children.

I have been so impressed with how the children have risen to the responsibility of learning these important life skills.  Thank you Mr Barwise for resourcing and running this club - your passion for the subject is very evident.  Thank you for sharing your knowledge.

Fancy a game of Chess?

Mr Barwise, one of our students from Derby University, has set up a fantastic Chess Club.  It runs every Tuesday and Thursday lunchtimes in Class 2.  There's such a buzz for the game.

Thank you so much Mr Barwise - how exciting!

Basketball practice with our Embark friends at Kilburn!

It was a privilege to watch children from both Embark schools practice their Basketball skills earlier in the week.

Thank you Mr Whiteman and Mrs Shaw for making this happen and to all parents for helping with transport.

Handball practice for Embark Federation!

I was lucky to watch a fantastic Handball session after school which was our first inter-school session for children at Smalley and Kilburn. 

This was a great chance to link together as two schools and practice before the competition in a couple of weeks time. This will hopefully give the children a slight advantage over the other schools attending but more importantly have fun and make friends with others from the Embark Family.

A huge thank you to Mr Whiteman and Mrs Shaw for organising this and we are looking forward to the next inter school sports session in December. 

Well done children and good luck in the competition. 

Grubby Club - week four finale!

What fun! Thank you everyone!

Grubby Club - week 3!

A lovely evening to be outside!

Smalley's Summer Show 2017

Well done children, what a super show.

Thank you for all of your hard work and effort.

Tag Rugby 2016!

It was a privilege to attend tonight's Tag Rugby competition and watch the skill, determination and teamwork of our year 5 and 6 pupils. They played really well, scored some wonderful team tries and came third in their group.

A huge thank you to Mrs Shaw as always for organising the team and to our parents and grandparents who braved the cold to support the team!

Well done to all, I hope Wales show as much skill this Saturday!

Kicking off this term in style !

Kicking off this sporting year in style, our Smalley boys Y5/6 football team attended our Amber Valley cluster football event at Eyes Meadow in Duffield last week . 

Finishing  second overall in our group , we went on to play in a nail biting game, , which went to extra time and penalties, the boys valiantly gave their all but lost out on a golden goal shoot out.  

Finishing 7th overall out of 12 teams,  the boys linked some great play together, and as always showed excellent sportsmanship throughout. 

A big thank you to our sports coach Mr Wildig , for pre - tournament training and his constant support,  and to Mr Strode for his support on the day. 

Apologies for the delay in this post, as we wanted to show everyone our new football strip , supplied  to us by Mr Riggott. Think you will agree , the boys look impressed. 

Go Ride - Team Smalley!

Some of our pupils competed last week in a Go Ride competition for pupils across Amber Valley.

They rode brilliantly and represented our school really well.

We're happy when we're singing!

On Friday 17th June Mrs Mason took a group of children from the Performance Club to sing at Smalley Hall Care Home she was accompanied by Miss Williams and Mrs Evans. They sang a selection of Disney songs and a medley of wartime favourites. The residents thoroughly enjoyed listening to the children sing and also joined in with a few!It was a wonderful afternoon and we left the residents with a smile on their face. Thank you for having us.

SATs breakfast!

After our early morning yoga sessions the Year 6 children enjoyed a lovely breakfast each day.

Toast tastes better at school apparently!

For our final day this morning the children enjoyed bacon baps which went down a treat!

A huge thank you to Mrs Drury, Mrs Boole, Mrs Shelton, Mrs Annabel and all other staff who helped this week. It was very much appreciated and the food was lovely.

Thank you also to our staff who swapped and covered gate duties and gave our children such support this week. It was a real team effort and I'm so proud.

Enjoy the pictures!

SATs Yoga 2016!

SATs at Smalley means the return of yoga again for our children. Every year for the last five years our children have took part in a four week programme led by Naomi Smith from YogaBeamz. A huge thank you to Naomi as always for her expertise and hard work.

During SATs week Mrs Shaw and Miss Hill led the children with great skill and ensured the children got their day off to the best possible start! A huge thank you to them both.

The children worked through a series of yoga postures, breathing techniques and positive affirmations which helped them to remain calm in class.

Well done to the children for taking it so seriously and learning the techniques well.

All together......."I am fearless, I am confident, I am special, I am calm and relaxed!"

Cross Country - Team Smalley!

Team Smalley, this Thursday, attended the Amber Valley Large Schools Cross Country event at a new venue, Alfreton Park .
We had four teams of Y3/4 girls, Y3/4 boys, Y5/6 girls and Y5/6 boys, all of which gave 100% commitment throughout. The course was quite challenging and difficult underfoot, due to the recent weather but all our children ran with a smile on their face and enjoyed their individual races. We ran against teams from 13 other schools so there were at least 60 competitors in each race to run against and almost everyone completed the course with some excellent individual performances from William T (4th), Heidi T (6th), both in Yr 6, and Mason C (7th) from Yr 3.
Well done to all our children who did us proud as always and showed great sportsmanship. A big thank you to our parents who came to support us and to Mrs Shaw, Mrs Rawlings and Mrs Boole for their help.
Congratulations to Mundy Juniors who ran out overall winners.

Smalley Dream Team are County Basketball Champions!

Following from our previous success in the Amber Valley Cluster basketball competition, we took our team to the Derbyshire County Large School Finals at Anthony Gell School, Wirksworth this afternoon to compete against 10 other schools.

We won all our league games, with a 24-0 game being one example.

We then went one to win our semi final , to be put through to the final against Oakwood Juniors and after a very closely fought game, we ran out the winners 8-6.

All our children were amazing and showed impeccable sportsmanlike behaviour throughout.

Our friends at Loscoe Primary also won the small school County Finals making it a clean sweep for Amber Valley.

A big thank you to Mrs Shaw for all the support she has given the team and to Miss Hill for all her help this afternoon. Also a massive thank you to our wonderful supportive parents for all their help .

A first for Smalley and Mrs Shaw, I'm so very proud of you all!

2 Mar 2016

Wow! What a fantastic attendance at our first Lego Club! We had a room full of excited and creative builders from Class 2! We look forward to seeing your creations develop next week too!

123......Dodgeball!!

As part of our Sports Premium funding our children benefit from excellent coaching from Miss Elizabeth every Tuesday afternoon and Mr Willdig each Wednesday. We also have access to a wide range of clubs and competitions.

Part of the coaches role is also to up-skill staff so as well as staff joining them for lessons each week we were also lucky enough to receive staff training from Mr Willdig yesterday which ended with a few games of Dodgeball.

The staff demonstrated amazing skill and teamwork and we also had lots of fun!!

A huge thank you to Mr Willdig for a wonderful staff meeting, we appreciate your expertise.

We have been challenged to a match by the staff from Loscoe Primary and after seeing the talent on display last night we are more than happy to accept!

Enjoy the pics below!

What a brilliant afternoon!

What a lovely afternoon! I was taking one of our year 6 pupils to see his buddy and class R were having a brilliant time working on their Earth and Beyond topic.

Whilst in Class R I could hear our year 5's having their brass lesson! They sounded amazing so I just had to go and listen for a few minutes.

I also saw some of our year 3 children in the hall having great fun doing an experiment with our two student teachers Miss Brooks and Miss Dunford.

That was all in addition to year 5's doing art with talented illustrator Lucy Truman and a whole range of other exciting lessons across the school.

Then after school there was a wonderful buzz as children were leaving Dr Shelton's science club!

It makes me so proud to be Headteacher of our wonderful school and I would like to say a huge thank you to all our staff who provide such brilliant, creative opportunities for our children.

Dance Champions!

On Monday our Year 6 children attended a dance competition for schools in Amber Valley. This was hosted by Amber Valley School Sports Partnership and Katie Elizabeth's Dance Academy.

Our children did an amazing performance to the Little Mix song 'Black Magic' and won first prize for best group dance from the judges!

We are so proud of our children, especially when they supported a boy from another school who got stage fright and was upset. They were given a special badge for their sporting behaviour.

Thank you to Mrs Shaw for taking the children and to Katie Elizabeth for the excellent tuition she provides in our school. We are very lucky to have her here at Smalley every week.

What a brilliant start to the week!

Smalley Bake Off!

Ozzy the Octopus starts a Flash Dance

Lots of fun was had yesterday when our sports cluster mascot Ozzy the Octopus from Opengate arrived in school.

Inspired by Shonette Bason-Wood who is going to replicating the 'Perth Train' flash dance on YouTube Ozzy started dancing and everyone else soon joined in!

There were some brilliant dance moves as we are very lucky to have Miss Elizabeth with us who has recently graduated from a New York University after studying dance for three years.

We wish Shonette the best of luck in her latest venture from all her friends at Smalley!

A massive thank you to Miss Elizabeth for her skill and brilliant coaching and to Ozzy of course. What a brilliant way to end the half term!

Enjoy the video link and pictures below!

Jiving in Class 5!

It was great to walk into the hall this afternoon and see our Year 5's dancing the jive together. They showed off some fabulous moves and I was glad to pick up some tips.

A massive thank you to Miss Elizabeth from Opengate for her wonderful coaching.

Opengate training at Smalley!

We were proud to host an Opengate Training session this morning for the coaches that come into school.

Our Year two and four classes were able to receive specialist coaching and it was lovely to have all the fabulous coaches from Opengate in school with us all at once.

Our children had two brilliant lessons and we are very grateful to Mr Ozenbrook and the coach Ant.

Draughts Club!

Alex W and I both share a love for the game of draughts! After a conversation a few weeks back we came up with the great idea of a draughts lunchtime club.

Today was our first one and around 30 children turned up! We had a great time and I am pleased to say that I am still undefeated!

Ozzy the Octopus comes to Smalley!

Ozzy the Octopus, mascot for Opengate came to our assembly on Monday. Opengate provide all sports coaching, clubs and competitions for the nine schools in the Heanor Cluster.

It was a fun assembly and Ozzy reminded the children how important it is to exercise and participate in a variety of sports to keep fit and healthy.

Enjoy the pictures below!

Singing Summer School

Brilliant opportunity for our pupils from the music partnership. Please see poster below for more details.

Singing al fresco - wow!

It was a real pleasure today to go outside at playtime as the children were singing beautifully ready to open the Summer Fayre this Saturday.

I could have sat and listened to them all day and it is no surprise that the sun has come out this afternoon!

If you get the opportunity please do not pass up the chance to hear the lovely singing this Saturday! They will open the Summer Fayre at 12:00 noon.

I think it may be a good idea to have singing outside every day Mrs Mason?

Beautiful children, it made my day. thank you.

Our Last Climb

We've had a fabulous few weeks climbing. I hope everyone has taken something from our time there.

Climbing Club

Climbing Poetry

Elyse climbs first, Heidi secures her on the wall,

Harness’s checked, she climbs so tall.

Mark shouts, “Where’s your sports car steam?”

Here we all are, working in a team.

Heidi climbs second, she climbs so high,

She tries so hard she can touch the sky.

Amelie makes sure she checks her rope,

She’s nice and warm in her purple coat.

Leonie pulls hard on the belay,

“I’m going to get to the top!” she might say.

Max keeps the helmet on his head,

When they reach the bottom they all look like they’re dead.

Matthew checks his harness is secure and tight,

It definitely is, to get out is such a fight.

James grabs the bright, colourful hand hold,

Nearly time for home before we get cold.

Today is over, we’ve enjoyed our lesson,

We can’t wait for next week’s session.

Knots and things

This week we began by learning about the figure of eight knot.

We learnt how to tie it and how to follow it back through.

Then we learnt how to make a stopper knot, this stops our eight knot from coming undone.

Then we climbed some pretty big walls...

Thank you to our photographers, Luke and Elyse.

Climbing Club is Back!

Well done to all of our climbers today, you all did a fabulous job!

Our last climb...

Happy times! I will definitely miss climbing on a Tuesday. It has been one of the highlights of my career. Thank you all for being so enthusiastic. 

It's nearly come to an end...

We have had another wonderful time climbing today. Everybody is an absolute wizz at their knots and belaying now, they'll be pro soon! If you see any of the climbers around school I would like you to give them a clap because today was the first day that everybody got to the top and I'm extra happy tonight because of it, it's jolly high up there! Only one more week to go...

Climbing Club

We've had another fabulous week at climbing. Everybody proved they could easily remember how to put the equipment on so they were safe, and everyone even remembered how to tie their 8 knots! Mrs Flynn even joined in with the knots at one point, we'll have her up there on the wall next week. Here are a few photos of our lovely evening...

Climbing Week 2

Climbing definitely got harder this week, the climbs were bigger and preperations were quicker. I think everybody deserves a round of applause at school tomorrow for the amount of effort every single person put into each climb. I don't know about them, but I'm absolutely shattered!

Adventures at Alter Rock

I am so proud of all our budding climbers today that I can't even put it into words! They did an absolutely fabulous job of everything they'd been asked to do.

On their first lesson they learnt:

1. How to tie an eight knot
2. How to tie a stopper knot
3. How to belay their partner 
4. How to climb

 Then we ditched the ropes and we went onto a little bit of bouldering, where everyone really showed what they were made of.

 We'll have a little practise one dinner time to see what you can remember from today. Roll on next Tuesday!

Y3/4 Athletics Finals 2013

I was lucky enough to attend the Y3/4 Athletics Finals after school at Alfreton Leisure Centre. There were 12 schools that had come either first or second on their regional heats.

Our fantastic team of 9 children were amazing and showed great determination, skill and teamwork as they took part in various field events before the races. Our children were so fast during the races if you blinked you would miss them.

When the results were announced we were all very proud to have come second amongst such stiff competition.

A massive thank you to Mrs Shaw and Mrs Evans for accompanying the team and their hard work.

Also, thank you to all our parents who gave great support as always.

Thank you to Amber Valley SSP for organising the event and to the sports leaders. What a fantastic event to end the half term.

Well done team!

Thriller!

I was privileged to be invited to watch a fabulous dance performance alongside family and friends after school today.

The children have been working hard each Monday at their dance Club with their specialist coach as part of our Opengate Sports Sessions in school.

They performed a dance to thriller and I was amazed at their skilful moves in what was an exceptional performance. The thing that pleased me most is the children always look like they are enjoying themselves so much during the sessions.

It certainly put a smile on my face at the end of a long half term. Thank you once again children and keep up the groovy moves!!

A Thursday Treat!

Wow - what a treat! It was wonderful to hear the sounds of 'Hot Shots' after school on Thursday afternoon.  The children and staff were working so hard to create some magical music (I think the Party Rings at breaktime helped!). It was a real privilege for me to stand and listen - thank you.  Our classroom door will certainly be open every Thursday afternoon - looking forward to hearing lots more awesome sounds! A special thank you to the tutors, Stuart and Tim, for providing such a wonderful experience for the children.

 Please have a listen.......

Smalley Hotshots

Not content with thrilling us with two brilliant shows and sports day skills this week, our children decided to carry on entertaining everyone at the weekend.

I have just arrived home from the Hot House concert where six of our children showed amazing talent, playing in a big band of amazing musicians from across the Midlands.

Smalley Hotshots meet at school every Thursday and if you'd like further information please contact the office.

Thank you Amber, Maddie, Rose, Heidi, Alfie and Billy for putting a big smile on my face, even on a Saturday! A big thank you too for looking out for my little girl, Sophie on the bouncy castle and inflatable slide! What talented, caring children we have at Smalley.

Smalley Stars-Athletics Final

Our superstars competed tonight in the Amber Valley Athletics Finals. The skill and determination on display made me incredibly proud to be headteacher of such an amazing group of children. They also were ambassadors for our school because of their sporting attitude.

The children came 3rd, a fantastic effort and won a beautiful trophy. Who needs Usain Bolt, Mo Farrah or Jessica Ennis?!

A massive thank you to our wonderful staff Mrs Shaw, Mrs Evans and Mrs Bacon for giving up their time to train and take the children after school.

Also thank you as always to the parents for your support. I am sure you are all very proud.

What a fantastic event.

Great Game Playing!

Thank you to the group of Year 1 children that attended the Board Games Club this half term - you all played so well.

Football Finals

Our Year 6 team played brilliantly tonight at the football finals. We lost the first game against a Horsley Woodhouse team 3-1 but managed to beat another team from Horsley Woodhouse 3-0 in what will be the boys last game for the school! The boys showed great teamwork and determination to finish on a high.

Well done also to Daniel who won a trophy for being the best sportsman of the whole tournament, a brilliant achievement considering the amount of players that were there.

Pride Park Tournament-What a team?!

Today children from Class 2 and 3 had the wonderful opportunity to play at Pride Park Stadium with 38 other teams from all over Derby and Derbyshire. The children played 8 games each in the 30,000 plus seater stadium and enjoyed using the home dressing room and dugout. Thank you to all our parents and grandparents that took the time to cheer the children on. We certainly had the best fans there! Watch the short video below to see what an amazing day we had!