Goodbye, Year 3
Wow. That went quickly!
I can’t believe where the time has gone. It has been an absolutely brilliant year. The children have shown such an enthusiastic and mature attitude to their learning this year. They are a fun and caring bunch who always want to do their best. I couldn’t have asked for a better class in my first year at Moortown.
The children have all made good progress this year, but I’d like to single out a few people who have made exceptional progress. Jaspreet, Archie and Loraine stand out for the progress that they’ve made in writing. Amit and Sami have made brilliant progress in reading and Bevan and Harry Boulton have both made super progress in maths.
Every week I looked forward to marking the homework books. There are a few children who deserve a special mention for their brilliant and creative efforts this year: Jake, Harry B, Tom, Sara and Koujiro. Well done.
There have been countless highlights this year so I’ll just mention a few:
- The improvement in Neyah’s writing has been great and it has been fantastic to watch her grow in confidence.
- The visit to the National Railway Museum was a great trip and all the children really enjoyed it. None more so than Zaki, who revelled in giving me my own personal guided tour!
- The street dance performances that some of the class were involved in were really impressive. Much respect goes to Sami, who was the only boy in the group.
- We made alien hand puppets in DT during our space topic and it was great to see most of the children enjoying it although there were one or two who got into a bit of a mess – you know who you are!
- Harry Boulton and Zaki Qurayshi were great androids in the production – Harry’s android walk was a highlight!
- We’ve had some really interesting show and tell items this year. My favourite was when Yasmin brought in the shed skin of her brother’s snake!
- The blissful silence in the space dome!
- Holly nearly taking my head off with a fierce rounders shot!
Have a fantastic summer and a great year with Mr Redfearn in Year 4.
The Really Big Summer Adventure
Change4Life have launched their new campaign to run throughout the six week summer holiday to inspire children and their families to increase their physical activity and healthy eating.
Year 3, 4 and 5 will be receiving their Really Big Summer Adventure maps this week full of daily activities, weekly challenges and gold medal rewards to keep active all summer long.
However, all children, parents and carers are encouraged to use the Change4Life Fun Generator with over 100 fun activities to keep children up and about during the summer holidays.
Have a happy and healthy summer!
Bike Week
Last week, during Bike Week, over 120 journeys were made to and from school by bike.
All the names of children who cycled to school have now been entered in the Leeds City Council prize draw to be held on Monday 04 July with tickets drawn by the Lord Mayor.
Good luck to all those children.
It’s great to see children continuing to use their bike after bike week has finished as a healthy way to travel to school.
Alien Hand Puppets
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vmXQkRf3DGs
Bike Week 20 – 24 June
Next week is Bike Week. Why not use our cycle rack and bike to school during this week?
Throughout the week each time you cycle to school you will be entered into a prize draw from Leeds City Council to win lots of cycling related prizes. Let your class teacher know each time you come to school on your bike.
Year 5 and Year 6 have both recently had their cycling training and what a better way to put these new cycling skills into practice than to bike to school during Bike Week.
For more information about Bike Week visit www.bikeweek.org or www.leeds.gov.uk/bikeweek
For more information about cycling in Leeds visit www.leeds.gov.uk/cyclemaps
Moortown In Bloom
A piece of land between Stonegate Road and Scothall Road has been prepared to be part of Moortown In Bloom. We were asked to go and help with some of the planting in partnership with the Moortown Group. Off we went on Monday morning; we were given high visual vests (very fetching!), gardening gloves and a spade. Several holes were dug and plants were planted and the results will be evident in a few months when the flowers are blooming. Nine pupils from Year 6 represented Moortown Primary School very well; they worked well as a team and dug holes very well! Abdul and Sanna were demon diggers!! Look out this week in the Yorkshire Evening Post as we may appear along with our plants!
Relocation, Relocation
‘Relocation, Relocation‘ is our final topic in Year Four.
We’ll focus on reasons for relocating and we will learn a little bit about the Vikings and their movements. The topic, as always, will be cross-curricular and therefore will incorporate art activities (printing), history and geography. Our SEAL theme of ‘Changes’ also fits well with this topic.
Thank you to Mrs Jaber for volunteering to speak to the children about her experiences of relocating. If any other parents or relatives are interested in sharing their experiences, please see me to discuss a convenient time.
Celebrating our goals!
Well done to all our children for taking part in the sponsored Hot Shots event, raising money to help victims of the earthquake in Japan as part of My Community themed week.
Please return money raised as soon as you can – at the latest the first Friday after half-term.
Thanks.
More success at Moortown!
The Quality Mark is a recognition that some schools choose to work towards to help them monitor what they do for their learners and to celebrate successes within school. Because Ofsted chose not to inspect our school this year due to our continued good provision, we welcome feedback from other external bodies. This year, therefore, we decided to be re-assessed for the Quality Mark.
The re-assessment visit happened on Monday 16 May 2011. I’m delighted to say we’ve yet again been recognised for the great teaching and learning at Moortown. Here are some extracts of the visiting assessor’s report:
“The assessor felt that this was one of the most impressive visits he has ever made in nine years of visiting Quality Mark schools. David, the head, has lots of plans – he needs no points of action or areas to develop suggested from us. It was a privilege to visit.”
“Since the monitoring visit, the school has accomplished an impressive amount of progress.”
“The school has radically reshaped the intervention programme it operates with pupils… It has put into action what many other schools are now realising – that the huge weight of strategies that have been recommended to schools over the past ten years are of limited effectiveness unless they are tailored to exactly what the pupil needs at the time that s/he needs it.”
“Classrooms all show consistency of approach in teaching – learning objectives visible, use of speaking and listening partners, learning walls for each class… Consistency in marking of writing is assured through a detailed and very clear marking policy. The Year 6 pupils who showed the assessor around school were at pains to draw his attention to these features and kept up a running commentary of how pupils learn (including telling the assessor that in the Reception class it’s ‘learning through play, you know!’).”
“Moortown has successfully devised and implemented a curriculum and teaching methodology that involves pupils in their own learning, is rigorous and demanding whilst at the same time makes learning an enjoyable experience for pupils.”
Thanks to the dedication and support of staff, parents / carers and children, I know we do a fantastic job at Moortown. It’s great to know that visitors to school are struck by this great work, too.
I’m grateful to the five parents who spoke with the Quality Mark assessor, and to the two Y6 pupils who provided a tour of the school.
Year 3 / 4 after-school TAG rugby starts this Tuesday – places still available!
We have some places left for the after-school TAG rugby club if you would like to take part.
Please return your form to the office or ask at the office for a new form.