Staying Safe themed week 04 February
Our next whole school themed week, based around Staying Safe, will be taking place from Monday 04 February 2019. The key message is how to be safe in a range of situations – at home, at school, online and in the environment.
A variety of events and visitors are planned to help us deliver this key aspect of education including road and scooter safety (Leeds City Council); water safety (Canal and River Trust and RNLI); bike maintenance (Edinburgh Bicycle Co-operative); staying safe around dogs (Dogs Trust) and e-safety (One Day Creative and d:side). Some of the events require parental permission and these letters have been sent out separately. There are also some opportunities for parents and carers, from all year groups, to get involved in the week. Please contact the office to reserve places.
*THIS WEEK* Thursday 24 January 2:30pm – 3:15pm d:side drug education information session
A representative from d:side, a health education provider, will be running an information session about drug education.
Monday 04 February 2:30-3.15pm One Day Creative, creative education provider, e-safety workshop
Wednesday 06 February Edinburgh Bicycle Cooperative Dr Bike event
Bring your bike for a free bike safety check, from 8:30am – no need to book.
Thursday 07 February 2:30-3.15pm First aid workshop
A representative from Leeds Beckett University, will be running a first aid workshop for parents and carers.
The themed week is a good opportunity to continue to think about healthy, active ways to travel to school. Children are encouraged to travel to school in a sustainable way, keeping safe along the way.
Finally, can you help? Does your job involve an aspect of safety? If you are able to support our Staying Safe themed week by coming into school, please contact Mrs Taylor via the school office.
We will keep you up to date about events during the week through Twitter and the class news pages on our website.
Thank you for your support to keep Moortown a happy, healthy and safe school.
After-school club availability
There’s still time to sign up to our Spring term after-school clubs starting next week.
Please contact the office if you would like to book a place on any of the following clubs which currently have spaces available.
Monday
| Love of reading club
Do you enjoy stories? Join Mrs Charlesworth and delve into books, get into the characters and listen to stories. Share your own favourite stories too. This club finishes at 4.15pm. There are no sessions on Monday 28 January 2019 or Monday 11 February 2019. |
Y1, Y2, Y3 | £12 |
| Netball
Come and learn the skills and techniques of netball in this fun club. Organised by Mrs Taylor and Miss Rushbrooke. This club finishes at 4.15pm. There are no sessions on Monday 11 February 2019 or Monday 04 March 2019. |
Y3, Y4,
Y5, Y6 |
£6 |
Tuesday
| Dance
Join Miss Marsden to learn fun dance routines to perform at a dance festival in April 2019. This club finishes at 4.15pm and continues until Tuesday 23 April 2019. There is no session on Tuesday 12 February 2019. |
Y1, Y2,
Y3 |
£9 |
| Basketball
Come and learn the skills and techniques of basketball in this fun club. Organised by City of Leeds Basketball Club. This club finishes at 4.15pm. There is no session on Tuesday 12 February 2019. |
Y3, Y4, Y5,Y6 | £7 |
Wednesday
| Gymnastics
A fun way to keep fit while learning new skills. Organised by Leeds Gymnastics Club. This club finishes at 4.15pm. |
Y1, Y2,
Y3, Y4, Y5 |
£8 |
Thursday
| Mindfulness
Join Miss Marsden and try a range of mindfulness techniques, both creative and physical. This club finishes at 4.15pm. |
Y1, Y2, Y3 | £8 |
What is a drug?
In Living and Learning, as taken from our long term plan, we will be focusing on drug education for the next two weeks.
Our first statement for this learning is, I know what a drug is.
Our definition of a drug refers to a substance people take to change the way they feel, think or behave. The word ‘drug’ includes:
- All legal drugs, including tobacco, alcohol, solvents and volatile substances, misused medicines and legal highs
- All illegal drugs
- Prescribed and over-the-counter medicines
On Thursday and Friday of this week, we welcome d:side, a health education provider, to school to deliver drug education workshops to each class as part of this learning.
Parents and carers are invited to come to an information session, led by d:side, on Thursday 24 January from 2:45-3:15pm. Please inform the office if you would like to attend.
Homework
Last week the children were asked to get creative and show what they know about the water cycle.
During our homework review, it was clear to see how much the children have remembered about this learning. Lots of our class members had correctly used the scientific vocabulary within their piece of work. Well done Year 4!
Please feel free to pop in and have a look at our ‘Water Cycle” display.
Can we make it rain indoors?
Many thanks to all who came to watch our assembly on Wednesday. The children showcased their learning impressively. Despite a technical hitch, the children remained calm and were able to sing their song without the backing track.
In Science, we’ve been learning more about the water cycle and some tricky scientific vocabulary. To help secure good understanding of the new words, Year 4 created their own glossaries. After putting the words into alphabetical order, the class then added definitions.
Question: How can you make it rain indoors?
This afternoon, we thought about this question and came up with some ideas of how we could go about finding out whether or not we could make it rain inside.
What You Need:
• An empty glass jar with a metal top
• Hot tap water
• Ice cubes
Tip: Be patient. It takes about 15 minutes for water drops to form.
1) First, fill a glass jar with very hot tap water.
2) Then, place a plate over the jar and fill it with ice.
3) Now, wait and watch. In about 15 minutes you will see “rain” fall inside the jar .
What will happen?
“The hot air will rise and cool down.”
“When the water vapor reaches the cold plate, I think we will see droplets of rain.”
“The hot water will turn into steam.”
“The ice will cool the steam and turn it back into a liquid.”
” This process is called condensation.”
Were we correct?
YES!
Inside the bowl, we began to see water droplets falling . 
Question your child about these images. Can they tell you what is happening using some scientific vocabulary?
Topic – solids, liquids and gases
We have a started a Science based mini-topic called ‘What’s the matter?’ The children are learning about different states of matter and their properties. Understanding matter is an important part of science.
We began by discussing how everything is made up of matter. Matter can be in these different states: solid, liquid or gas. If you look around, you can see all sorts of objects, these are solids. Ice is solid water. Drinks are liquids. Air is the invisible matter surrounding us. Air is a mixture of gases – oxygen and carbon dioxide for example. Steam, or water vapour, is water in the form of a gas.
The children noted that particles in a
gas are well separated with no regular arrangement.
In a liquid, the particles are close together with no regular arrangement and in a solid are tightly packed, usually in a regular pattern. Solids have a fixed shape that is difficult to change.
Then, we went on to sort items into groups. Ask your child what type of diagram we were using in the picture.
After grouping items into the 3 types of matter, the children began to ask questions and challenge some of their classification decisions.
“Water can be solid.” stated Sami.
“Can the shape of some solids be changed?” questioned Kashif.
Throughout our lesson, the children were learning some new, scientific vocabulary. Can your child remember any?
Below, there are a few quiz questions for you to ask your children at home.
1, Which of these is not true of solids?
The shape of a liquid does not change
A liquid takes the shape of its container
Liquids are runny and can be poured
The volume of a liquid does not change
Themed menu
Catering Agency, our school meal provider, will be running a special themed menu on Friday 18 January. Please contact the office, by Friday 11 January, if your child would like a school meal on this day (no action needed if your child normally has a school meal on this day).
Welcome back
Welcome back and Happy New Year!
We’d like to thank you for all the lovely Christmas gifts and cards.
This term is set to be yet another busy one filled with exciting learning.
‘What’s the Matter?’
This will be a Science based topic. Matter makes up our physical universe. The children will learn about the matter on Earth, which exists in one of three states: solid, liquid or gas. We will study how the state of some matter can be changed and reversed.
Reading
A lot of our reading activities will cross over and link to our class novel. On a Friday, the children will have a ‘Reading for Pleasure’ session. Each group will continue to be heard read from a guided book, focusing each week on a different skill necessary to aid comprehension and fluency. It is very important that your child had read to the given target page each week. During this session, we encourage the children to bring in a book from home. They are welcome to keep this in the reading area for others to enjoy should they wish to.
Maths
Multiplication, division and fractions are all on our maths agenda. Alongside this, there will be daily counting and times tables practise. It is an age related expectation, in Year 4, for all children to be able to recall multiplication and division facts for multiplication tables up to 12 × 12. (aim for rapid recall within five seconds)
How can you help?
Talk about maths every day! We use our English skills on a daily basis but sometimes maths is confined to school maths lessons. Talk about the time, chant tables and pose challenges that encourage your child to become more fluent in maths.
Living and Learning
Each week we will have a specific focus for our sessions. The lessons are delivered in various different ways. These can range from a circle time or a forum, to a drama based activity. We begin with a focus on ‘Manners.’ (not interrupting)
I don’t interrupt (with my hand or my hand)
Following this, we link the theme with our mini-topic – What’s the matter? Problem solving and showing how we can make things better, being the focus.
Please feel free to pop in should you have any questions or queries relating to your child or their learning.
Living and Learning
- Drug, alcohol and tobacco education (DATE)
- Keeping safe and managing risk
Here are the weekly Living and Learning statements, for this half term, to support this learning.
- I don’t interrupt (with my mouth or my hand).
- I can make things better.
- I know what a drug is.
- I know how to seek help.
- I make safe choices, including online.
- I can assess my own risks.
Keeping active
As part of our commitment to being a happy and healthy school, we’re always looking at ways to increase our pupils’ physical activity both in and out of school.
The government’s childhood obesity plan has set out the ambition for all children to achieve 60 minutes, or more, of physical activity every day (30 minutes in school and 30 minutes outside of school).
In response to this aim, we’ve compiled a physical activity guide suggesting out-of-school physical activities available to families in our local area.
The information on the guide is correct as of November 2018. Keep an eye out on our news and class news pages where will promote any new activities throughout the year.
We’d love to hear feedback about any activities you or your child try based on this guide.