‘Power for good’
Next week is national Anti-Bullying Week.
The theme this year is ‘Power for Good‘ with the following key aims:
- To support children and young people to use their Power for Good – by understanding the ways in which they are powerful and encouraging individual and collective action to stop bullying and create the best world possible.
- To help parents and carers to use their Power for Good – through supporting children with issues relating to bullying and working together with schools to stop bullying.
- To encourage all teachers, school support staff and youth workers to use their Power for Good– by valuing the difference they can make in a child’s life, and taking individual and collective action to prevent bullying and create safe environments where children can thrive.
Our school definition has recently been reviewed by the School Council and remains unchanged.
‘Bullying is when you hurt someone, physically or emotionally, several times on purpose.’
We also encourage children to use their ‘Power for Good’, if they were to experience or witness bullying, by using another STOP message, start telling other people.
In class, children will discuss these aspects of bullying:
- Our definition of bullying (above)
- Types of bullying – cyber-bullying and prejudice-based bullying related to gender, sexual orientation, race, religion and belief, special educational need and disability
- What to do if children experience bullying. The key message is to tell someone (start telling other people)
Recently the School Council responded to this question, ‘What would you do if you were bullied‘?
- ‘Start telling other people – tell someone who I trust and who I can talk to.’
- ‘I would tell someone I trust (family member, member of staff or friend).’
- ‘If I were bullied, I’d tell my parents, a friend, a teacher and if nothing changed I would phone ChildLine (08001111).’
- ‘I’d tell a teacher, maybe a friend and put in a worry in the ‘worry box’. Also, I’d tell a parent.’
- ‘I would tell anyone I trust: my friends, my mum or dad or a member of staff. They could sort it straight away.’
- ‘I’d tell my mummy and daddy.’
All classes have access to their class SEAL box or a whole school worry box where they can tell an adult any concerns about bullying or any other issues.
For further support, bullying resources can be found at…
- http://www.anti-bullyingalliance.org.uk/resources/disablist-bullying/resources-for-parents/
- http://www.childline.org.uk/explore/bullying/pages/bullying.aspx
- http://www.bullying.co.uk/advice-for-parents/
- http://www.youngminds.org.uk/for_parents/worried_about_your_child/bullying
Gymnastics
Today, Reception class had their first gymnastics lesson. The children demonstrated some great moves, balances and some super teamwork.
Have a look at what we’ve been up to.
Christmas dinner themed menu
Catering Leeds, our school meal provider, will be running a special Christmas themed menu on Thursday 15 December.
Please contact the office, by 30 November, if your child would like a school dinner on this day.
8 Rs for learning – our new SEAL theme
This half-term, we’re thinking about the ‘8 Rs for learning’. This theme is about promoting good learning behaviour for your child.
Each week, we’ll focus on different ‘Rs’. We use an animal to symbolise each ‘R’, which might help your child remember all eight – can your child remember which animal matches the correct ‘R’?
You can support your child at home – we’ve listed a few ideas to help you below. Ask us if you’ve any questions or comments.
Download top tips for promoting the 8Rs for good learning behaviour.
I take a safe risk.
Talk about the difference between a safe and unsafe risk. At school, we want your child to take a safe risk by having a go at answering, even if unsure; trying something new and attempting harder learning.
I take responsibility for my own learning.
Provide time and space at home so your child is able to organise themselves: their PE kit, reading book, homework, spellings and tables… Don’t organise everything for them!
Make a link between rights and responsibilities: your child has the right to a great education, but needs to be responsible for their own learning.
I respond to feedback.
Ask your child if they remember their ‘stars’ and ‘steps’ in English and Maths.
I can show I am ready to learn.
Make sure your child is at school for a prompt start of 08:50.
Make sure your child has had plenty of sleep so they are alert and ready to learn at all times.
Encourage your child to ask lots of questions – that shows they want to learn!
I am resourceful.
Encourage your child to be organised so they can play with a range of different toys.
Encourage your child to try new ways to solve a tricky problem.
I am resilient.
Encourage your child to keep going! Set a tricky challenge or puzzle for your child to do.
Encourage your child to think of different ways of doing things.
Don’t let your child win when they play a game – they need to experience losing, too!
Celebrate mistakes as opportunities to learn – be happy that your child found some learning hard and encourage them to ‘bounce back’ and learn from the experience.
I remember.
Make sure they have time to learn spellings, number bonds and times tables – a little practice daily is best.
Play memory games:
Kim’s game: show them objects for 30 seconds… can they remember all the objects?
Can they build up the sequence, ‘I went to the shop and I bought an apple’… ‘I went to the shop and I bought an apple and a bike.’… ‘I went to the shop and I bought an apple, a bike and a cucumber.’ etc … Take turns!
I reflect about my learning.
Talk with your child about what they’ve learnt, asking questions about:
how they learnt
why they learnt it
when they’ll use their learning
how they would teach this to someone else
what learning might link with what they’ve learnt today etc
Phonics
This week, we will begin Phase 2 of the Letters and Sounds phonics programme.
In this phase, children will continue practising what they have learned from Phase 1, including ‘sound-talk’ (orally blending and segmenting words). They will also be taught the phonemes (sounds) for a number of letters (graphemes), which phoneme is represented by which grapheme and that a phoneme can be represented by more than one letter, for example /ll/ as in b-e-ll. Your child might use pictures or hand movements to help them remember these.
Children will learn 19 letters of the alphabet and one sound for each. They will blend sounds together to make words and segment words into their separate sounds. They will begin to read simple captions.
The 19 phonemes are:
- set 1: s a t p
- set 2: i n m d
- set 3: g o c k
- set 4: ck e u r
- set 5: h b f/ff l/ll ss
VC and CVC words
C and V are abbreviations for ‘consonant’ and ‘vowel’. VC words are words consisting of a vowel then a consonant (e.g. am, at, it) and CVC words are words consisting of a consonant then a vowel then a consonant (e.g. cat, rug, sun). Words such as ‘tick’ and ‘bell’ also count as CVC words – although they have four letters, they have only three sounds. For example, in the word bell, b = consonant, e = vowel, ll = consonant.
In Phase 2, children will be seeing letters and words, as well as hearing them. They will be shown how to make whole words by pushing magnetic or wooden letters together to form little words, reading little words on the interactive whiteboard and breaking up words into individual sounds, which will help their spelling. These will be simple words made up of two phonemes, for example, ‘am’, ‘at’, ‘it’, or three phonemes, for example, ‘cat’, ‘rug’, ‘sun’, ‘tick’, ‘bell’.
Tricky words
Your child will also learn several tricky words: ‘the’, ‘to’, ‘I’, ‘go’, ‘no’.
Children will still be practising oral blending and segmenting skills daily. They need plenty of practice at doing this.
Bonfire Celebrations themed menu
Catering Agency, our school meal provider, will be running a special themed menu on Wednesday 02 November: Bonfire Celebrations. Please contact the office if your child would like a school dinner on this day.
School Saving Club
Does your child have a School Saving Club account in association with Leeds Credit Union?
If so, our next paying in date is this Thursday 13 October 3.15-3.45pm. If you can’t make this date, then the next one will be on Thursday 08 December at 3.15-3.45pm.
Children must be accompanied to the sessions.
If you can’t attend the date, you can bring money to the office in a sealed envelope marked School Saving Club for the attention of Miss Hale.
School Saving Club accounts can still be opened. Please ask at the office for an application form.
Children who are in Year 3 will have their account credited by Leeds City Council with £10 once opened.
Maths learning
This week the children have been learning to recognise, write and order numerals by finding missing numbers around school.
Scoot the Route
We’ve had a great response to the Scoot the Route scooter promotion this week with lots of names in the draw for one of our five prizes tomorrow. There is one more chance tomorrow.
We’d love to see the children continue to use their scooters, alongside walking and biking to school, to prevent congestion, improve safety and have a happy, healthy and active start to the day!
