Big Pedal

Thank you to all pupils and families who took part in the Big Pedal initiative over the past two weeks by scooting or cycling to school.  It’s great to see children continuing to make these active journeys to school to reduce congestion, increase physical activity and improve mental health.  We’ll be awarding the Big Pedal prizes in our assembly on Friday.

Well done to Reception class who made the most journeys by bike and scooter, followed by Year 4 and Year 3.

We’ll also be getting involved with Walk to School week, 21-25 May.  Watch out for a whole school homework all about our local area and routes to school.

Tennis open days this weekend

This weekend, is the Great British tennis weekend.

There are some great, free local opportunities to take part in tennis activities including David Lloyd, Alwoodley tennis club, Chapel Allerton lawn tennis and squash club and Adel tennis club.

Cycling opportunities

Have you been inspired by the recent Tour de Yorkshire and our Big Pedal bike and scoot to school initiative?

Here are some cycling opportunities coming up locally.

Children’s Beginners Learn to Ride Sessions
Wednesday 30th May – Carr Manor Community School (Secondary Phase)
Times: 9am, 10:30am and 12:00

Children’s Improvers – Skills, Circuits & Games!
Wednesday 30th May – Carr Manor Community School (Secondary Phase)
Time: 2:00pm

Booking is essential for all sessions and can be done by clicking on the appropriate link above.  For any additional questions, please contact mary.kelland@cycleleeds.co.uk.

Let’s Ride Pop up Brownlee Centre

Sunday 13th May 2018 12:00pm

Brownlee Centre, Bodington Playing Fields, Leeds, LS16 6HE

This free monthly pop-up event gives you the chance to ride a traffic-free cycle circuit as many times as you want, at a pace that suits you.

The event is open to all ages and abilities and the circuit is easy to ride, with volunteers on hand throughout, ensuring peace of mind and safety for all cyclists.

For those wanting to take things up a gear, British Cycling Go-Ride coaches will also be available to help you improve your cycling skills, and local Ride Leaders and Breeze Champions will be there on the day to tell you more about other cycling opportunities in Leeds with HSBC UK Guided Rides and HSBC UK Breeze.

Bike hire: No bike, no problem! Bike hire is available on the day, including a fleet of tandems, trikes and hand-cycles. Simply register your free place and turn up on the day.

Your views matter!

At Moortown Primary, we’re always keen to hear your views. Most parents and carers are happy to let us know at any point if something’s gone wrong – and even sometimes when things have gone well! However, it’s always useful to collect your views on some standard questions – the same questions that Ofsted use during inspections.

We ask that you visit the survey site and respond to a series of statements – either agree / agree strongly or disagree / disagree strongly (or say that you don’t know). The statements include:

• My child is happy at school.
• My child feels safe at this school.
• My child makes good progress at this school.
• My child is well looked after.
• My child is taught well.

There’s also the opportunity to add any comments you may have. The survey should take you about five minutes – maybe a bit longer if you add lots of comments. The survey is open until 11 June.

The results of the survey are used by school leaders, including the governing body, to shape what we do in the future – your views do matter.

As always, if you’ve any questions, comments of concerns, do let us know.

Big Pedal - our best day so far!

Today, we’ve recorded the highest number of active journeys by bike and scooter for the Big Pedal – 64 pupils (30%).

It would be great to increase these figures for the last few days of the Big Pedal.

Netball

Well done to our Year 5/6 netball team who took part in the Leeds North East High 5 netball competition at Allerton Grange today.

There was some great netball skills and teamwork from the children in all their matches.  The team were proud to be complimented on their play by one of the umpires.

If you’d like to improve your netball skills, our after-school club starts next Tuesday and there are a few places available.

Term-time absences

In the summer term, the number of parents / carers requesting term-time absence increases a little. We do not authorise term-time absence for holidays or other reasons that are avoidable. This follows our Attendance Policy which the Governing Body agree, and follows the recommendations from the Department for Education.

If a child has unauthorised absences, there is the likelihood that parents will be issued with a penalty notice from Leeds City Council.

The National Association of Headteachers has produced some guidance recently, extracts of which are shown here:

The Education (pupil registration) (England) (amendment) Regulations 2013, which came into force on 1 September 2013, made it clear that head teachers may not grant any leave of absence during term time unless ‘exceptional circumstances’ prevail.

The fundamental principles for defining ‘exceptional circumstances’ are that they are ‘rare, significant, unavoidable and short’.

Term times are for education. This is the priority. Children and families have 175 days off school to spend time together, including weekends and school holidays. Head teachers will rightly prioritise attendance. The default school policy should be that absences will not be granted during term time and will only be authorised in exceptional circumstances.

If an event can be reasonably scheduled outside of term time then it would not be normal to authorise absence for such an event – holidays are therefore not considered ‘exceptional circumstances’.

Do you need wheels for the Big Pedal?

Big Pedal Day 3

MORE PRIZES announced for The Big Pedal!

School dinner consultation

Thank you to all parents and carers who provided feedback on the recent school dinner consultation of meal choices for the September menu.

Catering Leeds, our school meal provider, can offer an alternate jacket potato and sandwich option alongside the meat and vegetarian daily option and we welcomed your feedback on whether this would work for you and your child(ren).

There were a number of parents/carers who were interested to try this option but the majority of responses expressed an interest to keep the options as they currently are. The main feedback was for children to have a hot meal for their school meal rather than a sandwich.

As a result of this, we will continue with the existing daily meat, vegetarian and jacket potato option. 

The September menu is currently in the planning stages and we have liaised with Catering Leeds to ensure the menu is tailored to our children’s preferences, while still meeting the national school food criteria.  Once finalised, this new menu will be made available to parents/carers at the end of the summer term.

Our current menu can be viewed in the Health section and is displayed around school.

Thank you once again for your feedback on our school meals.