February half term holiday clubs in school
PE Partner are back in school this half term with their School Holiday Kids Clubs.
They’re running clubs across multiple schools… the coaches are buzzing to get started, and they’re putting the final touches on an action-packed itinerary full of sports, games, challenges, creativity, and plenty of smiles. Every session is designed to help children stay active, build confidence, make friends, and have an amazing time — whatever their ability.
To book your child’s place, please follow this link: https://pepartner.coordinate.
The clubs at Moortown, Scholes, and St James’ are OFSTED registered, meaning childcare payment schemes can be used.
FREE Taster Days…
If your child (or a friend’s child) is new to PE Partner and a little unsure, they offer free taster days so they can try a session before committing. Email kidsclubs@pepartner.co.uk to book a taster place.
Refer a friend and earn £6.50 credit…
If a friend hasn’t used the clubs before, they can use the code RAF5 to save £6.50 on their first booking. If they mention your name, you’ll receive £6.50 credit too.
Refer more friends, earn more credit, it’s that simple.
PE Partner can’t wait to deliver another brilliant school holiday club in our schools, helping children be more active, more confident, and happier, more often.
Our weekly message: Friday 06 February 2026
Don’t forget the parent-teacher meetings happening next week on Tuesday and Thursday after school – we’re looking forward to seeing you there.
Also next week…
Number facts challenge
Does your child know their times tables and other number facts?
On Wednesday next week, we’ll be doing the challenge for the first time with no preparation. (Year 3 and 4 children will do this on Thursday because of a class trip.) After this, your child will bring home the challenge, their score and sponsor forms.
Please help your child improve their score for the next part of the challenge which will be on Wednesday 25 February. Help us raise lots of money for our school charity and for PTA – funds raised will be split 50-50.
Safer Internet Day 2026
Next Tuesday (10 February) is Safer Internet Day. This is an annual, global awareness day that encourages children, young people and adults to think carefully about how we use the online world and digital technology.
At home, it can be a powerful annual prompt to refresh conversations about online safety, wellbeing and responsible digital behaviour. Use these top tips for parents and carers from the UK Safer Internet Centre.
Sticking with the staying safe theme…
Blue lights
This week’s Living and Learning theme has been ‘I know the importance of the emergency services’.
Children in Key Stage 1 should watch this BBC Bitesize clip called “The different people who help us’. Have a chat about what they’ve watched. Can your child name any other people who help us?
Children in Key Stage 2 should watch an alternative BBC Bitesize clip: ‘How to make a call to emergency services’. On the same page are lots more short clips in the same series – how to deal with burns, choking, bites and stings… Aim to watch them over the next few weeks.
History
Yesterday, children in Key Stage 1 had a visit from some grandparents to talk about their experience of toys as a child as part of our History Topic. The children showcased really well their oracy skills, using clear voices and good voice projection when asking their questions.
Cross country
We were very proud of our five Key Stage 2 children who took part in the Leeds Cross Country Final at Temple Newsam on Wednesday.
In muddy, slippy conditions, they all put in 100% effort into their races and were a great support for each other. The children should feel proud of competing against the best runners from across Leeds.
We’ll wait to hear if we have any qualifiers for the next round, the West Yorkshire Final.
Thank you to parents who helped with transport and supported at the event.
Have a happy and healthy weekend.
Our weekly message: Friday 30 January 2026
We’re fast approaching the end of half-term, marking the half way point of the school year. Despite the dark and cold mornings (this morning being one of them!), it’s lovely to see our children coming in happy and healthy with a smile on their faces. The positive energy in school was noticed by our Chair of Governors who paid us a visit recently.
2026-27 training days
Last week, we let you know that the 2026-27 holidays are in our school calendar. We can now confirm the five training days are all confirmed and in the calendar, too. They are:
- Tuesday 01 September 2026
- Friday 02 October 2026
- Friday 23 October 2026
- Monday 07 December 2026
- Friday 28 May 2027
There are three in Autumn 1 half-term because this is a long half-term (eight weeks), giving children a chance to have a couple of longer weekends to rest.
A happy and healthy place to work
As well as welcoming helpful constructive questions, comments and concerns, every year we invite you to complete a survey. We do the same with staff – sometimes just teachers and sometimes all staff. Here are a few comments from this year’s survey of teachers:
- ‘It’s great to work with such supportive colleagues.’
- ‘I am very happy at Moortown and appreciative of the opportunities that have been given to me over my time here.’
- ‘I feel extremely supported by school leaders at Moortown and have had them regularly check-in.’
Moortown Primary is a happy and healthy place to learn and also to work!
Charging, remissions and outstanding payments
We’ve recently updated our policy. Check this out, especially if your child attends wraparound care, after-school clubs or Nursery, or has tuition for an instrument. Main updates are around what we do if we’re waiting for a payment for these services.
Happy, healthy and safe
Do you have to use a car to drop off and collect your child? The best way to travel to and from school is to walk, scoot or cycle. If you do drive, here’s a reminder of a recent message we emailed to you all…
1. If you park on the double yellow lines or zigzags anywhere round school, this causes danger to our children, pedestrians, and other drivers. Please don’t park on them or across the road from them. Read more about these road markings and the law.
2. Allerton Avenue (the road next to school) is access only. This means that you can only drive down this road to visit a residence or if you live there.
As well as this, there’s no parking in this street (between 08.30am and 4.30pm) unless you have a permit. This road is being used so much for parking that residents can’t get out of their own driveways, emergency vehicles would not be able to access if needed, and it is very dangerous for families who are walking down the pavements.
3. Cars shouldn’t be waiting, or dropping children off, in the entrance to the flats opposite school – this is the entrance to a private residence and is not safe.
4. The car park next door is private property and none of our families should be parking there – there’s a risk of you being clamped if you do this.
5. Please make sure you park in a legal and safe manner. There’s always space in Marks and Spencer car park – you can leave your car there and walk over to pick up your child.
We know that the lack of parking is frustrating but please help us to keep the environment safe, our children safe and show that we consider the residents who live around school. Thank you for your cooperation and support.
You might want to report a problem to Leeds City Council – the more who do so, the more likely something will be done. We suggest using the link to Report a Traffic Management Issue – it only takes a minute.
Have a happy and healthy weekend.
Our weekly message: Friday 23 January 2026
This week’s message is a busy one. However, most of the sections are short and the last two sections are just suggestions…
Online safety Zoom
Did you attend Monday’s Zoom session – Online Safety Workshop?
- If you did, thank you. We welcome your feedback
- If you didn’t, you can watch a recording
Watch us while we work
Talking of feedback, thank you for the feedback following our recent Watch Us While We Work session.
- ‘Really nice to see the classroom dynamic. The kids were all very well behaved.
- The discussions about feelings gave me ideas about how to support my children with talk time homework at home – how to start a discussion and develop it.’
2026-27 school holidays
Leeds school holidays can be found here, and they’re now also in our school calendar. What’s missing at the moment is the dates of the five training days which schools take – we’ll be confirming these shortly and we’ll let you know.
Absences in term time
You all know we don’t authorise holidays or trips away in term time. You can be fined or face legal action for taking your child on holiday during term time. Since September 2025, there have been 1,841 penalty notices issued to families in Leeds.
We’re able to authorise an absence if it’s unavoidable or exceptional:
If your child is genuinely ill, that’s unavoidable (check the NHS Is my child too ill for school?). However, if your child has had numerous absences, we can ask for evidence of an illness or simply not authorise the absence.
If you need to be absent for something exceptional, like a wedding of a close relative, please ask for a form to request the absence is authorised. We may ask for more details so we can be clear about the absence. (And please remember – the absence must be exceptional, so a second absence is unlikely to be classed as exceptional, even if it’s for a different reason.)
Big Garden Birdwatch
The RSPB’s Big Garden Birdwatch starts today. It’s the world’s largest garden wildlife survey. It’s simple: spend an hour watching the birds in your patch, between 23 and 25 January, and record the birds that land!
Half-term suggestion
We can’t believe there are only three weeks left of this half-term before the half-term holiday. Fancy something different? Maybe consider something new, like climbing – there are sessions in Leeds and Harrogate – or something more traditional, like football.
As with all clubs and holiday activities, we strongly recommend you check out the provider’s safeguarding policies and practices. Check out the four questions you should ask – they’re at the foot of our Our extra-curricular activities page.
Our weekly message: Friday 16 January 2026
At Moortown Primary, we treat everything around health and safety seriously. One aspect of this is to make sure we do regular fire drills. Similar to this is to practise lockdowns and invacuations. Put simply, a lockdown is when people must stay where they are and an invacuation is when people must all go inside, possibly to the same space. We’ll be doing one of these practices next week. We explain to children reasons in a child-friendly way – for example, that this might be if there’s been a report of an angry dog or if there’s a building on fire and there’s too much smoke.
On Monday, Year 2 welcomed Jodi from Skipping School to show us lots of new skills. The children were fantastic: every child was resilient and determined, giving the skipping 100% effort.
The rest of this message is about this half-term’s topic…
What is this half-term’s topic?
This half-term, we’re historians. We’ll be developing our understanding of Britain’s past and the wider world. Children will use enquiry skills to answer questions about the past that require opinions. They’ll be ‘time detectives’, using sources of evidence to help them answer these questions. Each phase has age-related specific knowledge, skills and vocabulary that they’ll learn, use and apply across the topic. See pages 23, 24 and 25.
Years 1 and 2
In this topic, children will learn about how toys and games have changed over time. They’ll develop chronological understanding by sequencing events in their own lives before learning about how toys and games were different during their parents’ and grandparents’ and great grandparents’ childhoods. They’ll look at similar toys from different times and try to sequence them chronologically using logical reasoning. They’ll use photographs and other sources of evidence to identify changes and similarities.
The key historical concept which we’ll explore in this topic is innovation. An innovation is an improvement or replacement for something
Years 3 and 4
In this topic, children will learn about the Roman Empire and its invasion of Britain. It will examine how life changed for the people living in Britain at the time of the invasion. They will learn about the Celtic warrior, Boudicca and how she resisted the Romans. Children will also consider what we know about Boudicca, how we know it and whether we can trust it.
They’ll learn about the amazing inventions and advances that the Romans brought to Britain. Finally, they’ll find out why the Romans left Britain and who the Anglo-Saxons were.
There are two key historical concepts which we’ll explore in this topic: empire and invasion. An empire is a large group of countries or states ruled by an emperor or empress. An invasion is when a country or region is invaded by an armed force.
Years 5 and 6
In this topic, children will learn about Viking Britain and an Early Islamic Civilisation centred around the city of Baghdad around 800AD.
During this period of time, Baghdad was the largest city in the world and was the centre of the world’s trade routes. Trade between Vikings and Baghdad happened and provides a real link between these two societies.
Through studying the Vikings, children will again learn about how people invaded and settled in Britain. Invasion is also relevant as it brought an end to the Islamic Golden Age.
The Islamic Golden Age was a period of great innovation. Learning and knowledge was key to their success. They built the world’s first hospitals, universities and observatories, as well as studied writing from scholars around the world. The contrast with Viking Britain during the Dark Ages is stark!
There are three key historical concepts which we’ll explore in this topic: trade, invasion and innovation. Trade is the exchange of goods and services, initially for other goods and services, and then for money. An innovation is an improvement or replacement for something. An invasion is when a country or region is invaded by an armed force.
Help at home
Talk to your child about what they’ve been learning in class. The class news page of the school website is a good place to go to find out more about what the children are doing.
Find some books from the library which match what the children are learning. This will be quite easy for children in Key Stage 2 as there will be plenty of books about Roman Britain and Viking Britain. You should also be able to find some about the Islamic Golden Age. For children in Key Stage 1, look for some books about toys over time. However, any book that looks at how an aspect of life has changed over time will be good. For example, you may find books about shopping, houses, transport, holidays. These will all help your child to sequence chronologically and explore similarities and differences.
Watch television shows about history. Horrible Histories is great – regardless of your age!
Finally, don’t forget on Monday, we’ve an online session to support you to help your child stay safe online. This is important: very frequently, we’re made aware of unsafe behaviour amongst children when they’re online at home. Join in the Zoom session using the link that has been emailed to parents/carers.
Our weekly message: Friday 09 January 2026
It’s a little late, but we wish everyone a happy new year.
New year, new details? If there are any new contact details for you or other contacts, please remember to let us know. We need up-to-date details for the people on our lists in case of emergencies. (The people on our lists are the ones you gave us when your child school – in most cases, this will be three different people.)
Attendance
Our attendance so far this year is 96.1% – this is a higher than the national figure for primary schools (95.1%) and higher than our attendance rate for Autumn 2024 (95.9%). This is great news – thank you for helping to ensure your child is a happy and healthy learner at Moortown Primary!
Please continue to check the NHS site, Is My Child Too Ill For School.
Positive home-school relationships
Have you read our Positive Home-School Relationships Policy? It sets out reasonable expectations for meetings or emails with teachers and – occasionally – what we might do if we encounter unreasonable communications or unacceptable behaviour.
Staying safe online
Here’s an extract from an email from, Dame Rachel de Souza, the Children’s Commissioner:
I have recently published a new guide, What I wish my parents or carers knew: A guide for parents on managing children’s digital lives.
Supporting children’s safety is a shared responsibility between families, schools and wider society. For parents and carers, this responsibility has become increasingly complex as children’s lives are now deeply intertwined with the digital world. Many parents face difficult decisions about how to balance protecting children from online harm with enabling access to spaces that are now central to learning, socialising and play.
This guide…focuses on the challenge of managing children’s everyday online habits.
This guide was written with the direct involvement of children in England. It is a reflection of their views.
When I speak to children about what they would do differently when it comes to being online, with the benefit of hindsight, I ask them: would they give a smartphone to their own teenager? Almost unanimously, they tell me no. They want to be protected from it as long as possible.
As parents, carers, and educators, our job must begin and end with our children’s care and safety. It’s what they expect and what they want from you.
As one young person told me: “Don’t be afraid to be firm… If you are worried [that] your child is seeing harmful content and you don’t know what they’re watching and it’s affecting the behaviour, just take it that you know best – they don’t.
School dinners
In January 2025, 7,724 pupils entitled to a free school meal missed out on a free, hot lunch. School meals can be cheaper than a packed lunch. Think of the time you could save, too! All of our school meals are cooked on site and freshly prepared. Find out if you’re entitled to free school meals by applying online.
Forest school
Your child may have noticed some recent changes to The Green. These are part of our exciting plans to develop a Forest School area.
Forest School is an approach to learning that takes place outdoors. It supports children’s holistic development through regular sessions that encourage play, exploration and supported risk-taking. Through hands-on, learner-led experiences in a natural environment, children build confidence, resilience and self-esteem.
We’re pleased to be working with experienced Forest School practitioners, Børn of the Forest. They will deliver Forest School sessions to pupils across the school. Our intention is for all children to experience Forest School as they move through the school. This year, pupils in Year 4, Year 5 and Year 6 will attend sessions led by a Børn of the Forest practitioner alongside a member of school staff.
Sessions will take place outdoors and will run in most weather conditions, unless conditions are particularly extreme. Children will therefore need suitable clothing to keep them warm, dry and comfortable, and clothes that they do not mind getting muddy. Guidance about this will be shared well in advance of your child’s first session.
If you’ve any spare waterproof clothing or wellington boots that you would be happy to donate, we would be very grateful. We also welcome donations of items such as pots, pans, sieves or spoons for use in our mud kitchen.
Our second Watch Us While We Work session for parents of children in Key Stages 1 and 2 is next Wednesday at 9.00am. As always, there will be two parts. One will focus on a feature of our Living and Learning curriculum that we call Feelings First, and one will focus on Reading. See you then!
Our weekly message: the last in 2025
Thank you for all your support this term. This week’s message has a mix of articles…
Christmas productions
Thanks to everyone who came to one of our Christmas productions this week – we hope you enjoyed The Wriggly Nativity!
The production raised £152 for our current school charity, Martin House Children’s Hospice. Thank you for all donations.
Move to Arbor
Our management information system move to Arbor is well underway. Thank you to the 88% of parents/carers who have logged into the parent portal. You should have noticed that most of the communications now come through Arbor. If you have not seen any emails for a while, please check your spam box and make sure you mark emails from school as safe.
From January, all payments should be made on Arbor. Reception, Year 1,2 and Year 3,4 all have trips coming up next term. Emails have been sent out about these, and payment can be made on Arbor.
Also, just a reminder to download the Arbor app and set up your phone so you receive notifications. Quick/short messages will be sent in-app rather than by text message (as in-app messages are free for us to send).
Get out and about over the holiday…
Over the holiday, it can sometimes be good to get out and about. There’s lots going in Leeds – check out the Child Friendly Leeds Winter Guide.
…and stay safe online
2 in 5 parents more relaxed about children’s online safety over Christmas according to this article. This might be at a time when children are even more online than normal. Check out this guide: the 12 Days of Online Safety.
You have to get up early to capture the wonderful sunrises at this time of year. Here’s a pic from Mr Shine, who helps to look after Moortown Primary’s buildings and grounds…
And another from a parent…
Have a very happy Christmas and we’ll see you again in the new year – Monday 05 January 2026.
Our weekly message: Friday 12 December 2025
It might be cold, but one of the highlights of our day is to stand by the gate at the start and end of the day – it’s always good to see happy and healthy faces!
Living and Learning
This week’s Living and Learning theme has been about giving and receiving compliments.
Spend a week giving compliments to each other at home each day. Try to make sure the compliments are about what we’ve done and not just how we look – we’ve got more power to change what we do than how we look so these compliments can be much more effective.
Some children find it hard to receive compliments, so this week of giving compliments might help, too.
How we communicate with you
After-school club – early closing
Next Friday is the last day of term. If you use our wrapround care on Fridays, please remember it closes early: 5pm.
Have a happy and healthy weekend.
Our weekly message: Friday 05 December 2025
At this time of year, there’s a recurring theme to school: the sound of younger children rehearsing for their Christmas production! The build up to Christmas is an exciting time, but it can mean children are tired – sticking to routines and getting plenty of sleep is needed to help everyone.
DT Food
Each year, we ask for a voluntary donation to support our DT Food lessons.
This week, Year 6. children have prepared and cooked their own tomato and lentil soup. Pupils practised key kitchen skills including careful chopping, safe grating, and working confidently at the hob. They followed their recipes step by step, and produced a delicious, hearty soup to be proud of.
A fantastic hands-on lesson building independence, teamwork, and real-life cooking skills!
Topic review
Did you come to our Topic Review session last Friday? If so, thank you!
And did you manage to find a couple of minutes to leave us some feedback? Again, if so, thank you. Here are some of the comments we received…
- ‘Really enjoyed and benefited from learning about the topics my child has learned. The demonstration in front of parents was really good as parents got to participate.’
- ‘Miss Newman is clearly an excellent teacher who kept the class engaged throughout. I enjoyed the visit today and am very pleased with my son’s progress.’
- ‘Lovely to see the classroom environment and show children we are partners with school in their learning.’
Thanks to the parents who got stuck in, too – here are some pics from the Year 5 Topic Review session…
Best start in life
The Best Start in Life website brings together trusted advice, support and guidance for parents of younger children.
Check out ‘The Story of You’, which celebrates the journey of early childhood, highlighting the vital role they play in their child’s lives and the support available.
Subscribe to the newsletter or personalised weekly emails for tailored
updates, tips, and guidance.
Chat Health (for older children and young people)
The Chat Health service is for people aged 11 to 19.
It offers support on a range of issues such as exam anxiety, self-harming, family dynamics such as parental separation, bullying, healthy eating and general health.
This is a universal service provided by Leeds Community Healthcare NHS trust. It’s available Monday to Friday between 8.30am and 4.30pm, excluding
bank holidays.
Have a happy and healthy weekend.
Our weekly message: Friday 28 November 2025
If you came along to our Topic Review session this afternoon, thank you. We hope you enjoyed the session. If you’d like to leave some feedback, we’d love to read it. We pass compliments on to teachers and take on board suggestions.
Next up is some news from the PTA…
The current PTA is having a break this year due to the demands of work and family life but also because we don’t have enough parents on the committee. As well as help at events, we also need volunteers to attend PTA meetings and help organise the events. There are specific roles within the PTA that need to be filled (eg treasurer and chair person) but initially, we just need you to be part of it!
Over the years, the PTA has raised a lot of money. Because of this, we have been able to purchase things that our budget wouldn’t normally stretch to eg stage lighting; trim trails; and The Green. Your children would continue to benefit if you’re able to be part of the PTA so that it can carry on. If you’re able to be part of the PTA, or would like more information, please register your interest at the school office.
Please speak with Mrs Weekes or someone from PTA if you’d like to volunteer. In the meantime…
School Lottery
Tickets for School Lottery cost just £1 a week. There’s a guaranteed cash winner for our school every week and the chance to win £25,000 jackpot. Join our personalised school lottery. If you’re able to join, we’d really welcome any support. For every £1 spent, the school earns 40p.
Easy fundraising
Do you shop online? Did you know that every time you shop, you could be raising money for Moortown Primary PTA? Shop with any of over 3000 well-known retailers listed on easyfundraising.org.uk and a percentage of what you spend is passed to Moortown Primary PTA. Retailers include Amazon, Marks and Spencer, eBay, Tesco, Waitrose, and many more. It’s like ‘Nectar’ but instead of earning points, each purchase generates a donation. So, instead of going directly to a retailer’s website, go to easy fundraising first and choose the retailer you want to shop with – then everything you spend earns a free donation to us. It’s free to use and your shopping won’t cost you a penny more. On average, each retailer donates 5% of the cost of your shopping – those donations soon mount up. Please register to support us while you shop!
Finally this week, a competition from Active Leeds…
We’re inviting children and young people across Leeds to get creative and celebrate their local leisure centres! 
At Active Leeds, we believe our leisure centres are more than just places to swim or work out… they’re spaces where memories are made, friendships grow, and confidence builds. From learning to swim to trying gymnastics for the first time, or simply spending time with friends, there are so many amazing experiences that happen every day in our centres.
We’re asking young people to share an experience they’ve had at their local leisure centre through art, writing, animation, or any creative way they like. It could be a drawing of their swimming lesson, a collage of their favourite activity, or even a short animation showing what makes their centre special.
The winning creation will receive a £50 Amazon gift voucher and be featured in our upcoming MADE IN LEEDS campaign, seen right across the city!
We want to highlight the joy, energy and sense of community that our centres bring to young people and their families. Who better to show that than the kids themselves?
Entries are open until 01 December 2025.
Simply send a photo or video of your entry to sport.webupdates@leeds.gov.uk.