February Family Fun
Throughout half term, Harrogate Theatre are running a Heroes and Villains Activity Week. On the Thursday and Friday, there are activities aimed at 6-8 year olds. Workshops including puppetry and mask-making are on offer with the theme of Heroes and Villains. Tickets can be purchased from Harrogate Box Office.
Our homework policy
Our Homework Policy was written to support and engage as many learners as we can, and to provide opportunities for others – family, friends – to support in a positive, constructive way. It’s great to see more and more children are putting more and more effort into their homework. Recently, a few parents have asked about expectations. I hope the following will clarify what we can expect and what you can expect:
Talk Time
Teachers have noticed that, in some instances, a lot of time has been taken on the presentation of the Talk Time homework. Children are welcome to do this although it is not necessary. The purpose of Talk Time homework is to encourage a conversation around their current learning. Any notes made in their homework book should simply be there to aid them as a prompt when it is discussed in class the following week. For this reason, teachers tend to give verbal feedback during their talk time session in class. We want our children to be expert talkers, using a variety of sentences and expressions, and able to back up their points or disagree with others in a polite way – this is more important than written notes for Talk Time. Simply: it’s hard to be a good writer if you’re not a good speaker, so Talk Times using ambitious words, useful phrases, interesting sentences is the best way to support your child.
Creative
This is where your child’s creative juices can flow! Creative homework is an opportunity for your child to choose whatever they want to demonstrate some learning. For example, the Y3 and Y4 homework this week is Creative: I can show what I know about food chains. Your child could present all their learning in so many different ways, from a diagram with notes to a story or comic strip. Parents’ and carers’ role is to support, encourage, help but (obviously) never to take over and do the homework! Teachers always look forward to seeing how creative children can be. If you notice the work has not been marked, please don’t worry. Teachers will have looked at and celebrated the homework in another way – the work might have been viewed by the whole class using a visualiser which allows the work to be projected to the whole class and a discussion of ‘stars and steps’ will happen. Peer assessment is also effective – children are very able to share what’s good and what needs improving! These sorts of verbal feedback strategies are often more effective than a written comment because it’s more instant and it makes sure the child understands (and their work is praised publicly!).
Practice makes Perfect
This is similar to what you might consider traditional homework: it may be a worksheet or a writing task (such as Y5’s current homework: I can write instructions). Practice Makes Perfect is useful homework when something has been taught in school but needs consolidation. The work should be fairly straightforward for the child as there should be no need for new learning, so just some encouragement from you is needed. However, it would be a great time to get your child to teach you – they should be able to explain the key points or processes! We use this type of homework less often because usually the best practice is where a teacher can keep feeding back and presenting new challenges when they see it as appropriate. Teachers mark these activities in line with our marking policy.
As always, please ask if you’ve any questions or concerns.
Great effort from everyone!
This is just one of the comments that was made about the Year 1 assembly on Thursday 19.01.12.
Well done to all of the children for making a great effort in the assembly; the confidence and pride was very evident throughout the assembly.
“Really well done, a confident, happy and relaxed class and it showed!”
Another parent commented: “Excellent confident voices. Well done! I’m scared of the wolf.”
We would like to say a special well done to…
- Manya for learning a lot of words: she was so confident and took the responsibility of learning her words.
- Haider showed that he can stand up in front of people and speak confidently and he has asked for more words next time!
- Luke and Owen for their very clear speaking voices.
“Another great example of all the children participating with great confidence and such positive peer review.”
Well done to Year 1 and thank you to all the friends and family who came along to share our assembly.
Class Assembly
Quick reminder for you:
Class Assembly on Thursday 19.01.12 at 2.40 pm.
Hopefully see you there.
Who can be a hero?
This will be one of the questions your child will be asking in our Big Topic this term.
- Is it a sporting hero?
- A historical hero?
- A comic book hero?
All of these questions will be investigated and the children will be able to decide who they think is a hero. There will be opportunities to think about local, national and worldwide heroes. Are all heroes the same?
Talk about your family heroes with your child.
How can you be a hero?
It’s Party Time
On Thursday 15 December it will be the Christmas party for Reception, Year 1 and Year 2 after lunch. The children must come to school in their school uniform but are welcome to bring some party clothes to change into for the party.
Please ensure that the clothes are easy for the children to put on themselves and that they are in a named carrier bag. Please remember that they will be playing party games and dancing so make sure that the shoes that they bring are sensible.
Thank you.
999
We were lucky enough to have a visitor on Friday. Richard Gale (Indi’s dad) is a paramedic and he came in to talk about his job. As you can see we had great fun using bandages, oxygen masks and stethoscopes! It looked like there had been an awful accident at one point but I can assure you that no-one was hurt at all!
Thank you Richard for taking the time to visit us.
Eureka!!
As you know, Year 1 and Year 2 went to Eureka museum in Halifax on Tuesday 15 November. The main focus of our day was in the learning area known as “Me and My Body.” Our learning included the way our mouths work, how fast we breathe and how our skeletons move.
What a tiring day…
…just time for a snooze on the way home.
Super Sculptures!
It is not only children who are involved in learning. On Tuesday, all of the teaching staff were involved in a Art workshop and some super sculptures were produced.
Check out the new member of our school community, Sebastian.
Mrs Burke, Mrs Weekes, Mrs Maver and Miss Hewson worked together to sculpt using newspaper and modrock and this is the result.
Look out for him in the middle building.
Hobby Half Day
Check out our fantastic photos of our first Hobby Half Day!
Children from Year 1 to Year 6 had the opportunity to participate in an afternoon of learning something new. The activities ranged from everyday baking and cooking to the unusual: creating their own carbon footprint.
