Local press
Our new multi-use games area (MUGA) featured in the Yorkshire Evening Post this week.
Scoot the Route
We’ve had a great response to the Scoot the Route scooter promotion this week with lots of names in the draw for one of our five prizes tomorrow. There is one more chance tomorrow.
We’d love to see the children continue to use their scooters, alongside walking and biking to school, to prevent congestion, improve safety and have a happy, healthy and active start to the day!
Yorkshire's Rio Heroes
Welcome back Yorkshire’s Olympic and Paralympic athletes with a special homecoming parade! On Wednesday 28 September, a carnival atmosphere will take hold of Leeds as the athletes are welcomed home in true Yorkshire style.
A host of athletes have confirmed their attendance, including triathletes Alistair and Jonny Brownlee; World, European and Paralympic champion Hannah Cockroft, MBE; diver and gold medallist Jack Laugher; and rowers Andy Triggs Hodge and Paul Bennett who both claimed gold.
There will be a lively parade, with samba bands, brass bands, colourful performers and of course open top buses and vehicles carrying the athletes. Parade celebrations will start at 5.15pm, and we would love to see the people of Yorkshire come out in force to line the city centre route and cheer on these inspiring men and women.
Wonderful website
A really thoughtful email arrived in our in-tray over the weekend…
Just want to say thank you for a great school website with lots of learning resources.
I came across your website when I was searching for spelling tests for my 5 year old daughter. I am very impressed with the extensive range of learning tools on your site. This will help me teach all my children.
I am from London and will be sharing your school website with my children’s school, hoping they can improve their current webpage.
Thanks once again and keep up the good work.
We’re happy that children, parents / carers and sometimes teachers benefit from using what’s on the website, whether they have a direct connection with our school or not.
'Scoot the Route' 26 - 30 September
Next week, we’ll be supporting Leeds City Council’s ‘Scoot the Route’ initiative to promote scooting to school to help reduce congestion at the school gates and encourage pupils to lead more healthy active lifestyles.
We will be running a competition throughout the week whereby children will be issued a ticket (below) at the gate if they come to school on their scooter. They need to complete the ticket and hand it in to the office. All tickets will then go in to a draw on Friday 30 September where children have the chance of winning one of five £10 Love2Shop vouchers.
Don’t forget you can park your scooter near the bike storage area using one of our new scooter storage pods.
It's Gold again!
The School Games Mark is a Government led awards scheme launched in 2012 to reward schools for their commitment to the development of competition across their school and into the community. Schools in England are able to assess themselves across bronze, silver and gold levels of the mark based on participation in competitions, extra-curricular sporting activities, sports leadership and local club links.
Once again, we’re proud to receive a Gold award!
Thank you to all pupils, parents and staff who continue to have such enthusiasm for participation.
Great learning behaviour
I’ve enjoyed spending the morning looking around all the classes. I’ve seen some great teaching and some great learning!
In Reception, children are very settled and already displaying some really good characteristics of effective learning. These are really important – more than simply being able to count to really high numbers, for example – because they are the foundation stones on which future achievements are built. There are a lot of siblings in the class, so I already know quite a few of the children. One child has even offered to teach me some Irish dancing – being Irish myself, it’s a skill I’m particularly looking forward to acquiring!
The Year 1 classroom looks great. The door has been removed (by the caretaker from one of the federation schools – thank you, Robert); this means we have a smooother transition from the areas of provision in Reception to a slightly more formal environment in Key Stage 1. The children made so much progress last year and, based on what I’ve seen this morning, will do equally well this year.
Year 2 pupils were busy finding nouns in their reading books. Someone gave me a really helpful definition – it’s something you can see, hear or touch. (You can sometimes smell or taste them, too!) They were enthusiastic about finding as many as they could. Why don’t you spot some on your journey to or from school next week!
Mrs Wells and the Year 3s were concentrating on their multiplication tables – they played ping pong, a quick game you can try at home or in the car: starting from zero, just count as confidently as you can in 2s, 5s or whichever table is being learnt, but the challenge is to alternate between each person. It was good to see the children concentrate hard.
When I visited Year 4, the children were all engaged in a carousel of different activities: reading (and talking about their reading) with Mrs Freeman, enjoying some comics, reading silently, playing a flag game (it’s the Where in the World topic, after all!), and reading with Miss Hale (the teaching assistant). It was good to see so much concentration with so many different things going on – clearly, Mr Owen and Mrs Freeman have got some good routines in place.
Mr Catherall’s classroom looks amazing, with lots of learning prompts for the Where in the World topic and for Maths and English. His class was also busy, taking part in another learning carousel. I was especially impressed by Pohnum and Pavan, whose learning behaviour was impressive and were very much engrossed in a dictionary challenge. I was also pleased to see a large group busy reading and analysing First News. (It’s a great newspaper for children; we subscribe at school, but why not subscribe and receive a copy at home, too!)
Finally, Miss Rushbrooke and the Year 6 children have all entered their second year working together – a smooth and productive transition. Always a mature, enthusiastic cohort, this year looks like being even more impressive for them as they work so well together. The classroom looks impressive, too.
What a great comment!
It was great to read this recent Facebook comment:
First day back I noticed the basketball courts in the main playground, look great, the first thing my 2 kids (in separate classes) said to me at home time on the first day was “mum you have to see the back playground” it looks fantastic! & my son explained the MUGA meaning! We love it & it’s a fab edition to this awesome little school.
We’re all very excited about the new equipment. The back playground will be even better when we get a bit of extra land from the old field – this will happen hopefully next year.
Sport England Primary Spaces award
You may have noticed some playground changes since we have returned to school. If not, ask your child to take you to the back playground and this is what you’ll see.
The installation of the MUGA (multi use games area), nets in the main playground and playground markings outside Year 5 are as a result of a successful application to Sport England under the Primary Spaces fund to help primary schools who have little outside space. We were awarded £30,000 to create a multi-sport area and our School Council were part of the decision-makers for the final designs.
The new facilities will provide vital facilities for curriculum PE and physical activity across the school day including playtime, lunchtime and after school. They have proved to be a hit in the first week back with children eager to use the new facilities and also watch (in a safe manner).
Thank you to Playscheme, the contractor responsible for the installation.
New SEAL theme - New Beginnings
As we start the new school year, our SEAL (Social and Emotional Aspects of Learning) theme focuses on New Beginnings.
We begin the theme with a manners SEAL statement, I can greet someone politely.
New Beginnings allows children the opportunity to discuss and reflect on how they or others may feel in a new situation or setting. This SEAL theme offers children the opportunity to see themselves as valued individuals within a community, and to contribute to shaping a welcoming, safe and fair learning community for all.
During the theme, the key areas of learning are empathy, self-awareness, social skills and motivation.
Through discrete SEAL lessons, circle times and across the curriculum, children will explore feelings of happiness and excitement, sadness, anxiety and fearfulness, while learning (and putting into practice) shared models for calming down and problem-solving.
New Beginnings supports the development of a learning community in each classroom where all members feel that they belong. Class contracts, produced at the start of the year, allow children to contribute to how they feel they can achieve a safe and fair learning community.