Active travel update
Here’s an update on our latest active travel initiatives for this half term.
Living Streets WOW Travel Tracker
Meltem from Living Streets visited school for an assembly today to launch a new challenge for our WOW active travel tracker.
Currently, children record how they get to school on the WOW daily online travel tracker and those who complete at least one active journey per week to school (bike, scoot, walk or park and stride) are rewarded with a themed monthly badge.
As this has been a big success, with increased active journeys and less journeys by car, from March, we will be challenging children to make at least three active journeys per week to earn their monthly badge.
There were some queries that were raised at the assembly.
Can your three active journeys be different?
Yes – active journeys include walking, biking, scooting and park and stride so as long as your journeys are any of these three in a week you would qualify for a badge.
What can be included as park and stride?
Ideally park and stride is where you park away from school and walk the final 5-10 minutes to school. This ensures that areas close to school are free from traffic. Marks and Spencer has many spaces available for families to park and walk the final part of the journey to school.
Sustrans Big Pedal 2019
Get set… the Big Pedal is back! We’re taking part in Sustrans Big Pedal 2019, the UK’s largest inter-school cycling and scooting challenge, that inspires pupils, staff and parents to choose two (or three) wheels for their journey to school. We would love everyone to be involved. For the first time, walking (and park and stride) will be counted alongside cycling and scooting.
This year’s Big Pedal will run for five days, from 25th March to 29th March.
On each day, schools compete to see who can get as many of their pupils, staff and parents cycling or scooting to school then our results will determine our final position in the national league table.
If you need the car to bring your child to school, perhaps you could park and stride the last part (our suggested park and stride site is Marks and Spencer car park).
The Big Pedal will run alongside our year round Living Streets WOW sustainable travel initiative where the children record how they travel to school on our daily travel tracker.
Why we’re taking part
It’s a great way to get more of our pupils travelling to school in an active way. Also, schools will be entered into a daily prize draw for rewards including equipment and accessories if over 15% of our school community cycle, walk or scoot on that day of the challenge.
What do you need to do?
All you need to do is encourage your child(ren) to cycle, scoot, walk or park and stride to school every day during the event, and join them on their way.
Living and Learning: Being me
- I cover my mouth (when I yawn, cough, sneeze). Get your child to demonstrate the ‘vampire’ method to family members at home.
- I can say something good about myself. It’s important that your child can confidently talk about themselves in a positive way.
- I pay and receive compliments in a sensible way. Try paying compliments each day to each other! Some children struggle to hear positive words about themselves, but this is important for self-esteem. Try paying (and listening) to praise and compliments.
- I recognise my talents. Talk to your child about talents, whether academic, physical, social or emotional. Some of us may have a natural talent, but most have talents that derive from lots of practice.
- I know the difference between being proud and showing off. We encourage compliments to be paid – but encourage your children to know the balance between being having self-esteem and showing off.
Living Streets (Moortown group) update
An update and a call for support (by Friday 15 March) from our local Living Streets group.
WE HAVE GOOD NEWS!
Back in autumn we submitted a response to the ‘Connecting Leeds’ consultation for improvements in Moortown. The feedback you provided in our survey helped us to share a number of ideas with Leeds City Council to help make the routes to school safer and more pleasant for all members of the community.
It’s very pleasing to see that a number of suggested improvements have been incorporated into the revised proposals, including:
• Priority for pedestrians at both the entrance and exit of the parade car parks (kerbs to run through with visual priority for people on foot so drivers know to give way).
• Replacing the badly positioned concrete bollards on the northern parade with a continuous low-level fence (to match the south parade) to prevent vehicles blocking the footpath.
• Low-level fencing at Manning Stainton to allow access only via the official dropped kerb and not across the full length of the footway.
• Planters adjacent to the road outside Manning Stainton to enhance the area and prevent HGVs and other vehicles driving and parking on the footway.
• Improved crossing times for pedestrians at the main M&S lights.
• A widening of the public footpath/reduction in road space adjacent to the south parade to allow for the future introduction of a pavement at the shops (not in the scope of this project).
Existing proposed designs for this future work can be found in Moortown Community Group’s Neighbourhood Design Statement (available at moortowncommunitygroup.org.uk).
BUT IT’S NOT A DONE DEAL YET. HERE’S HOW YOU CAN HELP…
Although the public consultation for Moortown is now complete, there will still be some local targeted consultation with residents and business owners directly affected by the proposals. They will hopefully support the revised proposals too, but there’s also a chance some won’t, particularly if it affects current parking arrangements.
We want to ensure that the improvements for pedestrians many of us have been campaigning for are delivered and a great way to demonstrate your support is to post a comment about the revised plans on Twitter, tagging both Connecting Leeds and Moortown Living Streets Group, or email Connecting Leeds directly if you don’t use Twitter:
Twitter: @ConnectingLeeds + @MoortownLSG
Email: connectingleeds@leeds.gov.uk
Follow this link to see the updated Moortown plans as well as a number of other local schemes which are now open for public comment (including Alwoodley, Scott Hall Road and Chapel Allerton).
Many thanks once again for your continued support!
Dom Jacques
E: moortowngroup@livingstreets.org.uk T: @moortownlsg
World Book Day school dinner menu
On World Book Day, Thursday 7th March, there will be a special themed menu for school meals.
Please contact the office, as soon as possible, if your child would like to have a school meal on this day.
Our artwork is on form!
This week’s art lesson has centred around form. Challenge your child to define this key term! We have been drawing wooden figures.
It was important to keep looking back at the figure to understand its shape.
Once we’d done a light sketch for the outline, we added curved lines to give the illusion of shadows and shade. Ultimately, we wanted our figures to look 3D.
Et voila!
“The hardest bit was probably getting the right proportion for everything. You wanted to avoid a big head and tiny torso.” – Maggie
Challenge your child! Ask them to define the other art term we’ve been learning about and spot one of our words of the week – both of which Maggie said!
Homework – I can stay safe.
Our weekly homework celebration showcased a very creative batch of I can show different ways to stay safe.
There were comic strips, cartoons, posters and presentations showing lots of important points about how to stay safe in lots of different ways.
A-maze-ing Games
Inspired by our Fighting Fantasy class novel, we made some games where players had to conquer a maze. We had to think about symmetry, straight lines, interesting paths and the right level of challenge.
Once we’d decided on a maze design, in teams we made the aim of the game and added coins, other players and objects to avoid.
We used feedback from other teams and our own evaluations in order to debug our mazes. Ask your child what this means and how they debugged their own maze.
Next week, we will take our learning online and use Kodu to create virtual maze games!
Living and Learning: Staying Safe week comes to an end
The final two days of our Staying Safe themed week continued to be filled with visitors, visits and more great learning.
Thank you to Allerton Grange who supported our themed week by hosting two of our classes. Year 6 had to be very safety conscious when attempting to scale the climbing wall. The technology department allowed Year 5 to safely investigate and explore a variety of different equipment.
Rachael from the Dogs Trust visited all classes on Thursday to talk about keeping safe around dogs. The children were taught to always check with an owner to see if it is safe to stroke a dog and what to do if a dog runs towards you. Have a look at Year 3’s class news post to find out more.
Jane Cusworth from Leeds Beckett University also joined us on Thursday to cover some basic first aid with different classes. Thank you to those parents and carers who joined her for the first aid workshop at the end of the day.
On Friday, Steve from British Military Martial Arts gave some great self defence tips to the children. BMMA run a martial arts after-school club at school every Monday so contact the office if you’d like more details.
There was also a water safety theme to the day with a visit from the Canal and River Trust to help to keep us safe by rivers and canals. Key water safety messages were given such as lying down on the floor when pulling someone out of the water.
Finally, thank you to Catering Leeds, our school meal provider, who gave hand hygiene sessions to Reception and KS1 classes. Keeping our hands clean and safe from germs will protect us from becoming sick and passing on germs to others.
There have been some great safety messages across the week from all our visitors. Ask your child/children what they have learnt across the week in respect to staying safe
- online
- at home
- at school
- in their environment
Living and Learning – Police Community Support
As part of staying safe in our environment, Year 5 were visited by some Police Community Support Officers.
“If you’re worried about things at home, you can speak to these people and they will help.” – Nayaab
“If you’re being bullied, you can speak to them.” – Enas
“If people go missing, they can help find them and make them feel better.” – Poppy
Living and Learning – drug education
As part of staying safe at home, Year 5 used iPads to research different types of drugs, including different types of smoking and drinking alcohol.
We researched cigarettes, e-cigarettes, shisha and alcohol to find out about the risks associated with health, cost, the law and other people. We presented our findings to the rest of the class.
Peer pressure was something else we discussed…
“Peer means someone on your level and pressure means they are persuading you to do something but no means no.” – Gurnoor
“Consent means when you give your permission to do something.” – Rabiya
“If your partner says to you, ‘I smoked so you have to as well!’ you should say no and no means no.” – Nayaab
What if all my friends are doing it and I’m the only one left out?
“You could say that you won’t do it because it’s no good for your health and you shouldn’t care that you’re on your own.” – Sam
What if my friends say they won’t speak to me if I don’t?
“If your friends tell you that then get rid of those friends and find new ones because real friends wouldn’t say that to you.” – Darien
What if someone in my family does it and they’re healthy?
“They probably haven’t smoked for long and haven’t got the full effects of it yet. You still shouldn’t smoke.” – Dan
What if my favourite celebrity says it’s cool?
“You still don’t smoke because you might have another favourite celebrity that says it’s bad for you.” – Zara
You should always do your own thing and be an individual – don’t be a mindless sheep. Year 5 have done lots of research and know for themselves about the risks involved with these choices so they are mature enough to make the right decision for themselves. Well done, everyone!