KS2 Cross Country event
This weekend is the final Saturday cross country race of the season. Please sign up online or inform the office ideally by tomorrow Thursday 29 February if your child would like to take part.
LSAA Cross Country race Saturday 2nd March Woodhouse Grove school, Apperley Bridge, BD10 0NR
We are pleased to invite KS2 children to compete in an upcoming cross country race as part of the Leeds Schools Athletics Association cross country programme of Saturday morning races. Children will compete against pupils from other Leeds schools.
The race will take place on Saturday 2nd March Woodhouse Grove school, Apperley Bridge, BD10 0NR.
This race is an afternoon race at 1pm. Limited parking is available so please car share where possible.
Please note, parents/carers are responsible for taking and supervising their child/children at the event. There will be a parent representative at the event.
There are opportunities for Year 3 and 4 girls and boys (under 9) to race 900m and Year 5 and 6 girls and boys (under 11) to race 1500m. Once your child has completed their race, you are free to leave the event.
We look forward to pupils representing our school at this event.
Big Walk and Wheel
We are taking part in the 15th year celebration of Sustrans Big Walk and Wheel, the UK’s largest inter-school cycling, walking, wheeling and scooting challenge. The challenge runs from 11-22 March 2024. It’s free to take part and we would love everyone to be involved.
Last year, in our category of small primary schools, we finished in 24th place out of 514 schools with an average of 91.14% of our journeys to school being active. We achieved the highest national (24th) and Northern England (5th) ranking out of those schools in Leeds taking part.
What do you need to do?
Encourage your child(ren) to walk, scoot or cycle to school on as many days as possible during the event. Park and stride can also be included if you park at Marks and Spencer or further away from school and walk/scoot or bike the final part.
Why we are taking part
Sustrans Big Walk and Wheel is a great way to build physical activity in children’s daily routine which is important for their physical health and mental wellbeing.
Active school journeys also help to reduce congestion and air pollution outside the school gate. A 2021 YouGov study showed nearly half of UK children worry about air pollution near their school. And that children thought active travel was the best away to bring down these pollution levels.
Plus there are some great prizes to be won every day if we get enough children taking part!
Useful resources
To help you prepare, Sustrans has developed a handy free guide to walking, cycling or scooting to school. It is packed with advice to help you have hassle-free journey to school.
Download your free family guide using this link: https://www.sustrans.org.uk/sign-up-to-receive-your-free-school-run-guide/
For more information about the event go to www.bigwalkandwheel.org.uk . Enjoy the challenge!
Cross country star
Congratulations to our Year 3 runner who represented Leeds today in the West Yorkshire cross country final. Competing against pupils from Calderdale, Bradford, Wakefield, Kirklees and Leeds, he ran a fantastic race at Temple Newsam and should feel very proud of achieving a top 15 finish.
Group reading!
Hello!
This week, Year 3 are beginning their second round of group reading!
The class have been divided into groups and each group has been given a book to read at home. This will last for this half term.
During our Book Club sessions each Friday, each group will discuss what they have read so far and share their reading record activities related to their book. This will be a fantastic opportunity for the children to explore characters and storylines more than they might do normally!
Every Friday during Book Club, each group will be given a new page to read to for the next Friday.
What to remember:
- Your child has a book that they need to read every week (up to a chosen point marked with a post-it notes).
- The reading record activity needs to be completed using their new book.
- A comment from a grown up needs to be written in their reading record.
- Group reading books and reading records need to be brought in every Friday.
Help at home by listening to your child read their new book and ask questions about the book to help prepare them for class discussions.
I look forward to hearing the children’s discussions next week!
Thank you,
Miss Birch
Living and Learning – Being safe
Hello!
Being safe is a key part of our Living and Learning curriculum including a Staying Safe themed week coming up next term in July.
Year 3 learnt about being safe around the concept of consent (giving and receiving permission).
We realised that ask for permission to do things quite a lot… especially at school! Please may I go to the toilet? Please can I get a tissue? Can I have some help?
We discussed how asking for consent or permission is important in other scenarios too! For example, asking to be in a group with a friend, asking a friend for a hug or asking consent to take a photo of a someone.
In this learning, we had some different permission scenarios to decide whether they would need to ask for permission or not.
Bob would like to play his brother’s game. Bob should ask his brother for permission as the game doesn’t belong to him!
Sasha wants to go for a sleepover at her best friends’s house next weekend. It depends how old she is but she needs to ask a grown up for permission so they know where she is and that she’s safe!
Help at home and discuss this scenario with your child:
Alex would like to go to the park with his friends.
Does Alex need to ask for permission? Why?
Who could he ask?
How could he ask?
We also thought about which grown-ups would be good to talk to in school and out of school (start telling other people) if we ever feel unsafe. Brothers, sisters and friends would also be good to talk to and discuss feelings but telling a grown-up (over 18) would be the best thing to do to get help.
Living and Learning – Safer Internet Day!
Today is Safer Internet Day!
It was a chance to think about any worries we might have about using technology and the internet, but it’s also about celebrating all the fantastic things technology can help us with.
I know that some things online may not be true.
We discussed ‘fake news’ and what this means. We decided that if something is ‘fake’, it is not real and ‘news’ is information that is important. Fake news can be misleading and can give people the wrong impression or information.
We worked in groups to decide based on a ‘gut feeling’ whether a news headline was real or fake. A gut feeling is when we see or read something that just doesn’t feel right.
We then thought of other ways we could check if something is real or fake:
- Where has it come from?
- Who has posted this information?
- Is it a reliable news source like Newsround or First News?
- Can we see it across multiple reliable sources?
I know it’s important to check with a trusted adult before sharing personal information online.
Personal information is any information that is about who you are and what you do.
Websites and apps can collect our personal information and data and use it to provide services to us. For example, supermarkets might need your address if they are delivering your food or an app might need to know your age to know that you are old enough.
We need to keep this information safe whilst online and not give it to just anyone! We must always speak to a trusted adult before sharing any information online.
Help at home: Can you think of at least 4 pieces of personal information that we should keep private?
Trip to York!
Today, Year 3 and 4 visited York to go to the Yorkshire Museum and to see the flood defences.
Yorkshire Museum had exhibitions that were perfect for us to link to our History and Science learning; Roman York and Mary Anning Rocks and Yorkshire’s Jurassic World!
Here’s some pictures of us exploring and learning about the artefacts!
Our second reason for visiting York was for the flood defences. York gets flooded quite easily after periods of heavy rainfall so they have built many flood defences around river to help the houses and buildings near. We’ll be learning about this during our Geography topic after Easter.
To no surprise, there were floods when we visited! Here’s what we saw:
We made sure to stay safe while walking through York and around the river by walking in pairs and behind the railings.
Help at home by asking your child one new fact that they learnt while at the museum! For example, I learnt about the different under water dinosaurs that existed millions of years ago.
Science – What are soils made of?
In Science, we have been chemists because we are learning about rocks, fossils and now soils!
So, what are soils made of? We spent the lesson using secondary sources of research (research done by someone else) and our own primary research (research done by us) to answer this question.
Soil is made of:
- tiny rocks
- humus (dead and rotting plants and animals)
- water
- air
We went out into the playground to find some soil to see if we could see these things! After we’d done this, we made lots of careful observations.
Here’s some of what we said:
- Some of our soils are wetter and darker than the others.
- I can see little roots (humus) in the soil.
- We’ve got a tiny worm in our soil!
- Our soil looks very similar to loam soil.
Help at home by trying to find all of those ingredients for soil at the park or at home! Can you see the air?
History – We are the Celts!
In our History lessons, we have been learning all about the Iron Age.
The Iron Age came before the Romans and the Celts, who lived in Britain at the time, led a very quiet life. They were farmers and lived in small tribes until…
43AD when the Romans invaded.
When the Romans invaded, the Celts had a choice:
Give in to the Roman rule which meant having to pay taxes but they got to stay on their land.
or
Resist and rebel against this and possibly end up dying.
It might sound like an easy decision but it wasn’t! As a class, we thought of all the reasons for and against and then had a class debate. We tried our best to be respectful by using sentence starters like, “I see what you’re saying but…” and “That’s a good point but I disagree because…“.
Here’s some pictures of us!
Help at home by having a respectful debate about what you might have for dinner! “I think we should have pesto pasta with chicken because it has protein and carbohydrates…”
Living and Learning – I know some drugs that are harmful and how to stay safe.
Over the last 2 weeks, we have had a focus on drugs, how they can be harmful and how we can be safe around them.
Drugs can come in all different shapes and sizes but they all do change the way the body or mind works.
We had a focus on medicines like Calpol and household items like cleaning products. We discussed when we might need to take or use medicines and how we might use these items.
We decided that:
- We should only take medicine if we are unwell and need it.
- We should always ask an adult before we go near a medicine or cleaning product as they can be dangerous if not used correctly.
- Even adults need to read the instructions on the medicine or cleaning product.
- These items should be kept out of reach of young children.
For example, dishwasher tablets could look really like a sweet to a baby and they might put it in their mouth! Help at home by asking your child to help you keep these products in a safe place.
