News

Open morning

Thank you to the parents who visited us this morning. Each parent watched the teaching and learning in two classes (30 minutes each), then discussed what they’d seen with Mrs Weekes and me. The feedback was really positive and very useful. Here are some of the comments:

• “This was a great opportunity to visit the school and see lessons taking place.  Great behaviour in classes.  Nice mix of teaching styles.”
• “Great teaching and behaviour and lots of learning… All the children were on task and knew what they were doing.”
• “In Year 4, there was excellent rapport with kids who were on-task and motivated.”
• “The varied teaching methods, the engagement of the classes, the level of knowledge all impressed me.”
• “In Year 2, lots of support and the children knew what they were doing.”
• “Everyone was involved in Year 1 – all the children were concentrating despite being so young.  There were lots of methods to teach.”

Parents raised some points for us to consider:

A happy and healthy AND EFFECTIVE place to learn!

A recent survey says that parents don’t find performance tables especially helpful: “Fewer than a third of parents check league tables when choosing schools for their children, suggests a UK-wide survey for a teaching union.” (BBC, 09.01.15). However, we find lots of parents and prospective parents are interested to know how we’re doing and do check out the league tables which the Department for Education publish each Autumn term.

They are very detailed, covering such aspects of performance as pupil progress and attainment, attendance, three year averages and how disadvantaged pupils (those in receipt of pupil premium) perform – they even cover finance and workforce characteristics. We find it’s best to start by looking at just primary schools and Leeds.

Here’s an overview of learning in 2013-14 for Moortown Primary compared to the 62 other primary schools (or those which include primary pupils) in a three mile radius, based on 2014 Key Stage 2 results.

• the proportion of pupils reaching Level 4 or more in reading, writing and maths combined is 93% – joint 4th of schools in a three mile radius and 14 percentage points higher than nationally (79%)
• the proportion reaching Level 4B (a mid Level 4, which the current government describes as a level indicating a pupil is ‘secondary ready’) or more in reading, writing and maths combined is 93% – joint 2nd and significantly higher than national (67%)
• 100% made expected progress in reading, writing and maths – one of only seven schools in a three mile radius to achieve this and about 10 percentage points higher than for England as a whole
• the average level for our pupils was a 5C, which matches quite a few schools in Leeds, but only two schools had a higher level (5B)
• 57% of pupils attained a Level 5 in reading, writing and maths combined – 3rd in a three mile radius and 4th highest across all 255 primaries Leeds

Well done to the 2013-14 Year 6 class (and their parents), to Mr Owen, Mrs Raseta and to all the previous teachers who have supported the class.

Looking at results for just one year group is only a snapshot. The league tables also allow you to look at three year averages:

• the proportion reaching Level 4 or more in reading, writing and maths combined is 93% – with just ten schools across the local authority’s 255 primary ahead of us (the average in England is 76%)
• for disadvantaged pupils (those in receipt of pupil premium funding), our performance is even better: proportion reaching Level 4 or more in reading, writing and maths combined is 94% – this is 5th in the local authority (average in England is 64%)
• this shows the difference between disadvantaged pupils and others is just 1% – nationally, the ‘gap’ is 17% and in the local authority it’s 20% – indicating that we invest pupil premium money very effectively

If you’d like to know more about how we’re doing, please ask… and equally, please ask if you want more information about how your child is performing.

New SEAL theme - Good to be me

Our new SEAL (Social and Emotional Aspects of Learning) theme for this half-term, Good to be me, focuses on three main areas of learning:

•Self-awareness – feeling good about yourself, taking risks.

•Managing Feelings – understanding feelings, and why and how they lead us to behave the way we do – particularly the feelings of being excited, proud, surprised, hopeful, disappointed, worried and anxious and standing up for yourself –assertiveness skills, standing up for your views.

•Empathy

This theme explores feelings in the context of the child as an individual, developing self-awareness and helping the child to realise that it really is ‘Good to be me’. The theme is about understanding our feelings as well as considering our strengths and weaknesses as learners.

The key ideas and concepts behind this theme are:

Building emotional resilience

Children need to become resilient if they are to be healthy and effective life-long learners.

Coping with anxiety and worrying

Worry and anxiety are major features in many children’s lives. Many children have good reasons to be anxious. Exploring worries is important.

Calming down

Although getting stressed, anxious or angry are important and useful emotions, sometimes these feelings can be overwhelming.

Assertiveness

The theme encourages children to become assertive – that is, able to recognise and stand up for their rights while recognising and respecting the rights of others.

Understanding feelings and how they influence behaviour

The theme explores the relationship between ‘thinking’ and ‘feeling’ and the way each impacts on our behaviour. It looks at Flight or Fight rapid response to situations of threat and our responses to feeling threatened /under stress.

‘I respond to difficult situations in a positive way’ is the first SEAL statement for the theme of Good to be me.

Be safe on-line

At this time of year, many parents, carers and relatives will have purchased technology (iPads, games consoles, mobiles) for children as gifts for Christmas.

On this basis a series of simple, easy to follow instructions have been produced for parents to set privacy settings on the most popular technological devices and apps. The idea being that the parent can enable the settings prior to the child or young person receiving the gift and therefore helping to keep their child or young person safe when their online. The instructions can be found on the LSCB website.

This is part of Leeds Safeguarding Children Board’s work around the implementation of the Leeds Child Sexual Exploitation action plan. Within this plan is an action to raise awareness of the dangers of online grooming with parents and carers.

Peshawar, Pakistan

The Lord Mayor of Leeds will lead a one minute silence tomorrow to show support for those affected by this week’s tragic events in Pakistan. The event will take place in front of Leeds Art Gallery tomorrow at 11.00am and will be attended by elected members, city partners, multi-faith leaders and community representatives.

Members of the public are invited to attend and join the one minute silence, which has been organised to mourn the deaths of more than 140 people, including at least 132 children, at a school in Peshawar on Tuesday.

Lord Mayor of Leeds councillor David Congreve said: “People in Leeds and across the world have been deeply moved by the reports and images we have seen following these appalling events. It is fitting that as a city that promotes diversity, tolerance and peace, we gather to pay our respects to those who have had their lives cut so tragically short and I would invite the public to attend and show their support.”

Equally, as a school which promotes diversity, tolerance and peace, we will also gather to pay our respects at 11.00am tomorrow.

KS2 tuck shop free portion

As an incentive for selecting the pre-pay option, we’re able to offer you one week free. Therefore, the cost for one portion of fruit from 06 January to 31 March 2015 inclusive (12 weeks) is £2.20 (11 x 20p) and the cost for two portions is £4.40 (11 x 40p). Please note that if you choose to pay in advance, your payment is non-refundable and must be made in cash with the exact money.

If you prefer your child to continue paying in cash on a weekly basis, that’s fine – we’ll continue to operate this system.

If you would like to pay in advance for your child to visit the tuck shop, please return the slip and money to the office by Monday 15 December 2014.

KS2 fruit tuck shop takes place every Tuesday morning playtime.

Show Racism the Red Card

Here’s some more great feedback following our recent Healthy Bodies, Healthy Minds themed week, this time coming from the team who lead Show Racism the Red Card workshops in schools.

The over-riding message that we are trying to instill is the understanding of equality for all regardless of appearance, differences and pre-conceived perceptions. The school children’s understanding of the subject matter was of a standard so high (prior to input) that it was a two-way educational process and a pleasure to deliver. A pleasure to attend and I thank you on behalf of ‘Show Racism the Red Card Team’ for giving us the opportunity. (Staff are amazing, too.)

Attendance matters

Despite a lot of illnesses last week, our average attendance so far this year (up to 28 November) is great: 97.1%.  This year’s Reception class attendance is the highest ever for this period, compared with any previous Reception class – a magnificent achievement!

• Reception: 97.6%
• Year 1: 97.1%
• Year 2: 97.7%
• Year 3: 98.6%
• Year 4: 96.0%
• Year 5: 96.8%
• Year 6: 96.1%

Some great feedback...

At Moortown Primary, we don’t like to rest on our laurels. This morning, a headteacher visited our school in order to carry out, alongside me, lesson observations to evaluate the quality of teaching and learning. This is useful for one main reason: to check my judgements about the quality of our provision, so we can be confident that our ‘self-evaluation’ is an honest and accurate assessment of our strengths and areas to get even better.

The headteacher (from another outstanding school in Leeds) visited all the classes, spending around 15-20 minutes in each class. This may not seem a lot, but you can get a ‘snapshot’ of standards in a class quite easily in this amount of time. (Any judgements need to then be backed up with pupil progress at the end of the term/year – this is the crucial.)

From the whole-school point of view, the headteacher was impressed by:

• the displays
• the Class Novel Big Topic which has just ended
• the high quality teacher – teaching assistant interactions
• the children’s learning behaviour
• the consistencies around school

In each class, she was impressed by various things; here I list just a couple of examples from each classroom:

• YR: very calm children in a purposeful environment; loads of great shape learning in many of the areas
• Y1: reading on iPads; the support of the teaching assistants
• Y2: encouraging pupils to check and help each other; the extremely purposeful, calm learning
• Y3: confident, clear support for learning; checking pupils’ responses
• Y4: good mix of teaching and pupil activity; the active role of the teaching assistant
• Y5: quality small group work; all children could talk about their writing, and the focus on ‘implicit mood’
• Y6: exciting, vibrant learning environment; the teacher closely checking that pupils are learning and feel comfortable about their learning

There are always ‘next steps’ to try out new or different teaching strategies, but the overall conclusion from the headteacher is that teaching is good and outstanding.

Well done to all staff – what a great team.

Several times on purpose

Alongside our Healthy Bodies, Healthy Minds themed week it has been national anti-bullying week.

Our school definition has been discussed by the School Council and has been amended, 10.11.14, to incorporate the stop message.

‘Bullying is when you hurt someone, physically or emotionally, several times on purpose.’

Following a whole school assembly, Leeds Anti-Social Behaviour Team have delivered Show Racism the Red Card workshops across school and in class children have discussed these aspects of bullying:

• Our revised definition of bullying (above)
• Types of bullying – cyber-bullying and prejudice-based bullying related to gender, sexual orientation, race, religion and belief, special educational need and disability
• What to do if children experience bullying. The key message is to tell someone (start telling other people)

Bullying resources can be found at…

• http://www.childline.org.uk/explore/bullying/pages/bullying.aspx
• http://www.bullying.co.uk/advice-for-parents/
• http://www.youngminds.org.uk/for_parents/worried_about_your_child/bullying

Children tell us what they would do if they were bullied ‘…I would tell an adult, teacher or someone I trust.’

All classes have access to their class SEAL box or a whole school worry box where they can tell an adult any concerns about bullying or any other issues.