This week’s message is from Mr Wilks, who leads on Science and foundation subjects. Before that, a quick heads up…

Next Friday is Identity Day. This day links to our learning on identity, part of our Living and Learning provision. We invite children to come to school wearing something that demonstrates their identity. This could be linked to a particular club or sport, it could be traditional clothes, or even just a badge to show belonging. (We’re keeping windows open for ventilation, so plenty of layers, too!)

Now, let’s find out more about the current topic your child is learning from Mr Wilks…

What is this half-term’s topic?

This half-term, we’re historians and we’ll develop our understanding of Britain’s past and the wider world.

I love history. It’s one of my favourite subjects to teach. There are so many amazing stories and characters from the past and although the people and events we study can be separated from our own lives by thousands of years, there are lots of relevant connections we can make with the world today. Children will use enquiry skills to answer questions about the past that require opinions. They’ll be ‘time detectives’, using sources of evidence to help them answer these questions. They’ll learn that certain things that they learn about may or may not be true and that history can be interpreted in different ways.

Each phase has age-related specific knowledge, skills and vocabulary that they’ll learn, use and apply across the topic. See pages 27, 28 and 29.

Years 1 and 2

Your child will learn about how shopping has changed over time. They’ll develop chronological understanding by sequencing events in their own lives before learning about how shopping was different during their parents’ and grandparents’ childhoods. They’ll look at similar products from different times and try to sequence them chronologically using logical reasoning. Your child will use photographs and other sources of evidence to identify changes and similarities on the high street over time. They’ll learn about the history of a local shop, Marks and Spencer, and how it has changed over time.

The key historical concept which we’ll explore in this topic is trade. Trade is the exchange of goods and services, initially for other goods and services, and then for money.

Years 3 and 4

Your child will learn about the Roman Empire and its invasion of Britain. They’ll examine how life changed for the people living in Britain at the time of the invasion. They’ll learn about the Celtic warrior, Boudicca, and how she resisted the Romans. Children will also consider what we know about Boudicca, how we know it and whether we can trust it. Your child will learn about the amazing inventions and advances that the Romans brought to Britain. Finally, they’ll find out why the Romans left Britain and what happened after they left.

There are two key historical concepts which we’ll explore in this topic: empire and invasion. An empire is a large group of countries or states ruled by an emperor or empress. An invasion is when a country or region is invaded by an armed force.

Years 5 and 6

Your child will learn about Viking Britain and an Early Islamic Civilisation centred around the city of Baghdad around 800AD.

During this period of time, Baghdad was the largest city in the world and was the centre of the world’s trade routes. Trade between Vikings and Baghdad happened and provides a real link between these two societies.

Through studying the Vikings, children will again learn about how people invaded and settled in Britain. Invasion is also relevant as it brought an end to the Islamic Golden Age.

The Islamic Golden Age was a period of great innovation. Learning and knowledge was key to their success. They built the world’s first hospitals, universities and observatories, as well as studied writing from scholars around the world. The contrast with Viking Britain during the Dark Ages is stark!

There are three key historical concepts which we’ll explore in this topic: trade, invasion and innovation. Trade is the exchange of goods and services, initially for other goods and services, and then for money. An innovation is an improvement or replacement for something. An invasion is when a country or region is invaded by an armed force.

How can you help?

Talk to your child about what they’ve been learning in class. The class news page of the school website is a good place to go to find out more about what the children are doing.

Find some books from the library which match what the children are learning. This will be quite easy for children in Key Stage 2 as there will be plenty of books about Roman Britain and Viking Britain. You should also be able to find some about the Islamic Golden Age. For children in KS1, you may find it more difficult to find books about shopping over time. However, any book that looks at how an aspect of life has changed over time will be good. For example, you may find KS1 history books about toys and games, houses, transport, holidays. These will all help your child to sequence chronologically and explore similarities and differences.

Watch television shows about history. Horrible Histories is great (regardless of your age!).

If it’s a rainy weekend and you’re looking for something to do, why not spend a morning or afternoon in a museum? Abbey House Museum in Kirkstall is a great museum, perfectly suited to the Year 1,2 topic as it has a recreated Victorian Street with lots of different shops and even a pub! It also has a great exhibition of toys over time. A visit to Leeds City Museum would be great for all children but especially for Y3,4 children as it has some exhibits linked to the Romans in Leeds. It’s free to enter. Though more expensive and further afield, the Jorvik Viking Centre and Jorvik Dig are both excellent days out and especially relevant for the Year 5 and 6 topic.

Happy new year! We hope 2022 has started well for you. Our first message of the year has three parts: an attendance update; some information about books we’re sending home for children in Reception and Key Stage 1; and some information about forthcoming workshops.

Attendance matters

It’s difficult deciding whether your child should attend school if they’re poorly. It’s even more difficult in these Covid times. Children have missed out on so many days of learning in school because of lockdowns and isolating, and yet we know you’re careful that your child isn’t attending school if they’re displaying any Covid symptoms.

• Thank you for taking care to look after your own child – and everyone around them, too.
• Equally, thank you for making sure that your child gets to school as much as possible, and on time, when it’s been safe to do so.

Our whole-school attendance figure for the Autumn term was 96.2%. Over a quarter of children have 100% attendance so far this year – that’s brilliant! Here’s an update on the attendance for each class:

• Reception: 93.6%
• Year 1: 96.9%
• Year 2: 97.8% – the highest in school, so well done!
• Year 3: 97.6% – a close second!
• Year 4: 95.3%
• Year 5: 95.8%
• Year 6: 95.5%

Reading at home

This section is for parents and carers of children in Early Years and Year 1. Something similar may be happening for Year 2 children – check with your child’s class teacher.

Earlier this week, we sent some information home about a change to what books we’ll send home. Since then, a few parents have asked for a bit more information about why we’re now asking you to read e-books at home.

It might help to be clear that there are two types of book.

The practice books are short books with simple words that your child will be able to ‘decode’ (to read). In school, these are physical books; at home, it’s the same text as an e-book. Your child will have read this book at least three times in school across the week. They’re for children to practise the phonics that they’ve learnt in school – matching letters to sounds. They’re also for you to celebrate your child’s increasing phonics skills. Reading the book won’t take more than about 10-15 minutes.

The sharing books are physical books (not e-books), typically chosen by your child. They’re likely to be longer. These books are to read together and enjoy. Your child is unlikely to be able to read all of the text independently. You’ll probably spend more time over a few days reading together the sharing books than the practice books.

Here are some of the reasons we’ve chosen to use a web-based approach for the practice books at home:

Workshops

Coming up next week is a Zoom session for parents and carers of children in Year 6, although others are welcome to attend, too. It’s to provide you with information about the end of Key Stage 2 assessments (the ‘SATs’) that will take place in the week beginning Monday 09 May.

The session is on Thursday 13 January and starts at 6pm. It’ll last around 30 minutes, and there’ll be opportunities to ask any questions that you might have.

We’ll send to Year 6 parents and carers the Zoom link. For other parents and carers, if you’re interested in attending, please either send us a message on the School Gateway app or email the school office. We’ll then email the Zoom joining details out to all those who have expressed an interest.

Talking of workshops, there are also some coming up about special education needs and disabilities (SEND). These come from Leeds Special Educational Needs and Disabilities Information and Advice Support Service (not us) – read more about the workshops here.

Next week’s message comes from Mr Wilks, who leads on Science and topics across Sphere Federation. He’ll provide an overview of the History learning that’s happening in Key Stage 1 and 2, and how you might help at home. In the meantime, have a great weekend.

The last message of 2021 comes from Mrs Weekes, the Head of School…

We’ve finally made it to the end of term! As always, our children have shown great resilience and have proved themselves to be happy and healthy learners. Just recently, when Mr Roundtree and I were both standing at the school gate one morning, we both commented, at almost exactly the same time, how happy the children are when they come to school in the morning. They skip in with a smile on their face, radiating happiness. It really is a pleasure to be at the school gate every morning.

When you look at our land behind school, I’m sure you must be wondering what on earth we’ve been doing all term and why it looks so neglected. I can assure you we’ve been incredibly busy but the green space stays looking the same. With a lot of priorities at this time of year and with staff turnover, we seem to be having to juggle many balls while trying not to drop any!

Some communication from the PTA, earlier this term, highlighted the need to carry on raising money so that the land can be developed into an area that is purposeful and pleasant – this is the bit that takes the most time.

We’re still working with a company to develop plans of what the area could look like. Early in 2022, we’ll meet with them again to decide what happens next.

Talking about the back of school, we’ve decided not to open the back gate in January and February. It’s been getting very muddy over the past few weeks and this isn’t going to improve any time soon. We’ll review the state of the park in March.

As you’ll know, we made the difficult decision to move Year 1 to remote learning this week because of an increase in positive Covid cases. We want everyone to be safe over the Christmas break. Please make sure you stay safe and follow any updated guidance so that you and your families can enjoy a well-deserved rest.

As always, thank you for your support.

From Mrs Weekes and me, and from all the staff at Moortown Primary: have a happy and healthy Christmas break.

This week’s message has a couple of reminders, but we start with a ‘Plan B’ update on Covid precautions…

Since the early days of the pandemic, the Department for Education has been sending regular emails to schools. Yesterday’s came with an introductory sentence: ‘Today’s email includes an urgent update for all education and childcare settings on implementing Plan B of the COVID-19 Response: Autumn and Winter Plan’. Here are some extracts:

school attendance remains mandatory and all the usual rules continue to apply

settings are strongly encouraged to ask parents, guardians and other visitors to take a lateral flow device (LFD) test before entering the setting

all staff and students should test over the holidays in line with national guidance. This means that they should test if they will be in a high-risk situation that day and before visiting people who are at higher risk of severe illness if they get COVID-19

We were also asked to ‘revisit…existing outbreak plans to ensure [we] are well prepared for any future changes’ – let’s hope we don’t get to the same situation as we were in last January.

Next, a couple of reminders…

Next Tuesday, learning updates will be sent home. These are short reports that we send home at the end of the Autumn and Spring terms; they complement the parent-teacher meetings which take place earlier in the same terms. We started doing these a few years ago following your feedback in our annual surveys.

Also coming up is a non-uniform day at the end of the term on Friday 17 December (and for Y3 and Y4 pupils, on their party day, too). Our Uniform Policy contains the following:

Pupils should dress appropriately and respectfully for school, even on non-uniform days. Clothes are inappropriate if they, for example, glorify violence, feature bad language, are very short (eg crop tops), or relate to age-inappropriate topics (eg computer games)… Make-up (other than face paints as part of a specific costume) is not allowed. Flip-flops or high-heeled shoes are not allowed, even on non-uniform days, because they’re dangerous when running.

Have a happy and healthy weekend.

This week’s message is a short one. The main part is an important reminder about Covid, and we end – less seriously – with a link in case you’d like some stocking filler ideas…

Two weeks ago, we told you about a website with up-to-date Covid information for Leeds. The heatmap (the second graphic) shows that there’s still a high number of positive cases of Covid for children of primary school age – in fact, if you scroll across the second row up (children aged 5-9), you can see numbers are rising. We’re noticing this, too – in fact, we’ve had to return to remote learning for one class in Sphere Federation.

Please be alert to the signs and symptoms of COVID-19 infection:

• a high temperature
• a new continuous cough
• a loss of change to your sense of taste or smell

If your child has any of these main symptoms, even if they’re mild:

1. Get a PCR test (test that is sent to a lab) as soon as possible.
2. Keep your child at home and not have visitors until you get the test result – they can only leave home to have the test.

We’re seeing children showing various other symptoms such as sickness, colds and headaches, too. Please keep you child at home if they’re not feeling right for whatever reason.

Thank you for continuing to support us to keep our school as safe from Covid as we can.

On a lighter note, if we’re all being as cautious as we can right now, Christmas should be a better one for many this year. If you’re on the look out for some ideas for pressies, check out this Christmas book guide. Giving a book at Christmas is a great way to keep children reading!

This week’s message is in two parts. The first part relates to Ofsted inspections; the second part comes from Paula Allaway, who’s the Maths Leader across Sphere Federation…

Ofsted inspections

This extract is taken from a news bulletin that circulates to some schools:

There are currently 4,133 ‘outstanding’ schools in England, representing around one in five schools. All ‘outstanding’ schools last visited before 2015 [this includes Moortown Primary] will get a full inspection… Ofsted’s chief inspector has said halving the number of ‘outstanding’ schools to one in 10 is a ‘more realistic starting point for the system’… Some ‘outstanding’ schools which have improved since their last inspection may still be downgraded because the bar has been raised under the latest Ofsted inspection framework. Ofsted’s national director of education said if a previously ‘outstanding’ school receives a ‘good’ grade it ‘doesn’t mean that the school has declined in recent years, in fact the opposite can be the case’. He said this was because the top grade is a ‘challenging and exacting judgment to achieve’ under the new education inspection framework (EIF). Watch this video about inspections for more details.

Support your child with number facts

Is your child engaging with the number fact fluency homework?

Number fact fluency – the quick recall of addition and subtraction facts, and multiplication and division facts (times tables), is really important for all children. The ability to recall these facts quickly (rather than taking too long working them out) helps children to answer questions in lots of areas of Maths much more easily.

If these facts are learnt and stored, rather than being calculated or counted, they require less activity from the brain. Essentially, memorisation frees up working memory space to allow children to focus on learning new mathematical ideas and applying mathematics to solve problems, and not the facts themselves.

Addition and subtraction facts

For younger children, the crucial numbers facts are simple addition and subtraction facts. We want children to know facts like bonds of ten (eg 3+7 and 4+6) without having to count on or back using their fingers. How fluent are your child’s number facts? Regularly accessing NumBots will help with this.

Multiplication and division facts

For older children, number facts also includes times tables up to 12 x 12. By the end of Year 4, children should know their times tables without having to count through to reach the answer. Times Tables Rock Stars will help with this. In June 2022, Y4 children will take part in a statutory national assessment – the Multiplication Tables Check. They’ll be tested on 25 randomly selected facts.

Without secure knowledge of times tables facts, many future Maths topics are more difficult to learn. In Y5,6, for example, progress in column methods, fractions, area, ratio and proportion can all be hampered because they involve recall of facts.

Children who do well in our assessments are the children who are spending more time practising on NumBots and Rock Stars. Likewise, the children who need to learn these facts more aren’t using this resource at home.

We know that being fluent with number facts leads to high confidence in maths generally. To support this, we’ve slimmed back what we ask for homework to help make sure our children’s Maths (and also Reading) skills are strong. Your child should spend about 10 minutes practising number facts each day. Look out for the focus on the homework sheet we send home.

If you need help accessing these, please contact your child’s class teacher.