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Does your child have a School Saving Club account?

If so, here are the paying in dates for this year (one each half term).

• Thursday 13 October 2016 3.15-3.45pm
• Thursday 08 December 2016 3.15-3.45pm
• Thursday 02 February 2017 3.15-3.45pm
• Thursday 23 March 2017 3.15-3.45pm
• Thursday 18 May 2017 3.15-3.45pm
• Thursday 13 July 2017 3.15-3.45pm

Children must be accompanied to the sessions.

If you can’t attend the dates, you can bring money to the office in a sealed envelope marked School Saving Club for the attention of Miss Hale.

Also, it’s not too late to open a School Saving Club account.  Please ask at the office for an application form.  

As an added incentive for children moving to Year 3, their account will be credited with £10 once opened.

To poll or not to poll

Typically, one of our training days in the school year has to be in May. This is so that it fits with polling day, which is nearly always the first Thursday in May. It’s not ideal for us because it follows the May Day bank holiday and is just before the Key Stage 2 SATs week.

The Leeds City Council Electoral Registration Office has provided this information to schools:

2017 is a fallow year,  therefore no local elections are due to take place. However, schools should be aware that the school may still be required for polling if any unexpected elections occur, such as a general election or a by election.

The local elections in 2018 are due to take place on Thursday 03 May.  Your school remains on the list to  be used as a polling station for the elections that will take place on Thursday 03 May 2018.

Because we’ve been told that there are currently no scheduled elections, we’ve decided not to have Thursday 04 May 2017 as a training day. Instead, we’ve moved the training day to Friday 12 May – this is the Friday of the SATs week – a welcome treat for our hard-working Year 6 pupils!

Does your child suffer from asthma?

Every year, there’s a peak in admissions for children having an asthma attack in September. The cause of this is not clear, but it’s believed that when children return to school they’re exposed to a number of new environmental factors that can trigger an asthma attack. Children are also exposed to new viruses which can be another trigger of an asthma attack.  If children with asthma return to school with their lungs in the best possible condition, then an asthma attack maybe prevented.

NHS staff encourage children with asthma to attend their GP practice for an asthma review during the school holidays. This gives the nurse or doctor the opportunity to review their medication, check their inhaler technique and give them a personal asthma action plan. Pupils will then be able to bring a copy of that updated asthma action plan into school in September; this will give us the information we need to support pupils with their asthma in school – this could prevent an asthma attack.

Heading to secondary school in 2017?

Pupils who have just finished Year 5 are due to go into Year 7, the start of secondary school, in September 2017. Parents will be able to apply for a place between 01 August 2016 and 31 October 2016.

All applications need to be made via the online application system. This site also contains a YouTube video giving parents a step by step guide to completing their online application. The online application form and the video will be available from 01 August 2016.

Parents will need a valid e-mail account in order to set up and create an account in the online system. Free computer access and help with setting up an e-mail account is available in Leeds City Council libraries and One Stop Shops. If parents need help applying online for a secondary school place they can come to one of the drop in sessions outlined below for support with their online application.

• Armley One Stop Centre – 13/10/2016, 10:00-12:00
• Beeston Library – 04/10/2016, 10:00-12:30
• Bramley Library – 11/10/2016, 12:00-14:00
• City Centre One Stop Centre – 10/10/2016, 11:00-13:00
• Headingley Library – 03/10/2016, 13:00-15:00
• Middleton Library – 06/10/2016, 9:30-11:30
• Seacroft Library – 12/10/2016, 10:00-12:00
• The Compton Centre – 07/10/2016, 11:00-13:00
• The Reginald Centre – 05/10/2016, 13:30-15:30

If you’re still having difficulty with completing an application online, you should contact the Admissions Team on 0113 222 4414 to access individual support including alternative methods of application if required.

Have a happy and healthy holiday

It’s the summer holidays at last, so there are no homework or spelling activities. Enjoy the holidays instead!

Does your child spend less time outdoors than prison inmates? A survey suggests three-quarters of children do, as the time spent playing in parks, woods and fields has shrunk dramatically due to lack of green spaces, digital technology and parents’ fears.

Research shows that playing outdoors promotes social skills, improves vision, reduces stress, increases attention span and provides vitamin D.

Hand Puppets

Thank You

Mrs Maqbool and I want to thank all of the children for a fantastic year in Year 1. They have been fantastic learners and happy children! This was my first year of teaching and it has been a brilliant one thanks to the brilliant attitude which the children have – we will miss teaching them next year!

We also wish to thank you, the parents, for your continued support throughout the year. Thank you for the work that you put in to help your children become good learners by cultivating positive attitudes in them. We really appreciate the things you do at home which help us and you should all be proud of the wonderful children you have!

Thank you also for the very generous gifts which we received. We really appreciate it and it is lovely to hear how happy you have been with your child’s progress throughout the year.

So thank you very much and enjoy your summer holiday.

Mrs Wells and Mrs Maqbool

Goodbye and good luck!

The end of the year is here! And what a year it’s been!

At the beginning of the year, we quickly came to realise that it would be a joy. Children have worked really hard and should feel really proud of what they’ve achieved. We’d like to share some of our thoughts about the successes in the class.

I’ve been particularly impressed with Ethan, Lennox and Bella’s writing this year. It’s been creative, well thought through and technically great. Brandon’s writing in recent months has also shown a great improvement. Keep it up! Similarly, Olli, Bailey, Yahya and Jenni‘s knowledge of grammar and punctuation has amazed us all year spot the squashed sentence, guys! Molly, Arran and Linda all made leaps and bound with their reading, finishing the year with great inference skills and a mature understanding of texts. Having identified spelling as something he wanted to work on, Archie made an enormous effort to improve. And it paid off – keep up the hard work, Archie.

In maths, Rav, Lanas, Henry, Ahmed, Jawaad, Zack and Rayhaan have stood out due to their resilience, problem-solving and overall improvement.

Despite being new to the country this year, Laurielyn and Gloria settled in quickly and became vital members of our class and school. Every adult in school has heard of their great attitudes to learning as well as their amazing progress. Great stuff!

Shahban, Ibrahim, Simran and Levon have grown in confidence over the year and, while quiet, have a great sense of humour and maturing attitude. Standing out for their relentless determination to improve this year are Pavan, Jaskirat, Jahneil and Sophia. Keep this up guys and you’ll go far… Tayshaun has improved well in all manner of different subjects. He’s kept us laughing throughout the year, too! Young Sam came to us a fresh-faced boy and leaves a new man – he’s more mature, has a great sense of humour and has learnt loads. Well done, Sam!

It’s been a real pleasure to get to know you all and we wish you the very best of luck at high school.

Mr Owen, Mr Catherall and Mrs Raseta.

Changes to training day dates 2016-17

We try hard to communicate well in advance training dates and other significant events. However, sometimes this backfires and dates need to be changed. Next year, we had told you the provisional dates for training dates. However, we now need to re-arrange three of the dates:

• 21 October
• 25 November
• 20 February

These three training days are now on the last three days of the school year: Monday 24, Tuesday 25 and Wednesday 26 July 2017.

We hope you can see some benefits in this, a main one being that children will break up a little earlier at the end of what could have been a very long term.

Whilst we know it is not helpful to change dates, we hope we have given you enough notice and apologise in advance for the inconvenience and confusion caused.

What healthy changes are you making?

Last week, our SEAL statement was I can make a healthy change.

It was great to hear all the changes that children were making and also encouraging their family to take part in.

Here are some examples from Year 3.

Children were also encouraged to travel to and from school on foot, by bike or scooter.  The class with the most healthy changes and sustainable journeys were Year 5 with over 200 counters!

Here are some suggested healthy changes for over the holidays.

• Try tennis for free – these sessions continue monthly during the summer and are held locally at Roundhay Park tennis courts.
• Local leisure centres offer a range of holiday activities.
• Maybe you took part in the recent Sky Ride event and want to know how to maintain your bike? Halfords are running free bike maintenance sessions.
• The Little Gym is now open locally at the Moor Allerton Centre offering classes and summer camps.
• The Change4Life Sugar Smart app allows you to check levels of sugar in foods. How much sugar is in your snack? Is it time for a change?
• Change4Life and Disney have teamed up again with a 10 Minute Shake Up summer adventure, inspired by Disney Pixar’s Finding Dory.

We hope you have a happy and healthy active break.