696 journeys on foot
As we come to the end of Walk to School Week, there have been 696 journeys to school on foot and the class competition was very close.
- Reception 118
- Year 1 107
- Year 2 80
- Year 3 111
- Year 4 107
- Year 5 100
- Year 6 73
So, winning by just seven journeys, Reception will receive the martial arts session with John from White Rose Martial Arts, who runs one of our after-school clubs, after the half term break.
Here are some comments made by children about their journeys to school on foot:
- ‘The walk made me feel happy and energetic.’
- ‘We enjoyed meeting friends on the way and looking at different types of houses.’
- ‘We felt safe because there were safe places to cross and a lolly pop lady too.’
- ‘I felt fresh, awake and ready to learn.’
- ‘We enjoyed talking about the day ahead.’
- ‘There was no cost involved and we picked up litter on the way.’
- ‘We made a difference by leaving the car at home.’
- ‘We had fun by learning spellings and times tables.’
- ‘It was quicker and we didn’t get stuck in any traffic.’
- ‘We had great talking time, time to plan the day and after-school activities.’
We’re sure you’ll agree these are all great benefits of walking to school. Have a look at our walk to school video for some more facts to persuade you to use a sustainable method of travelling to school, in turn reducing congestion at the school gates.
Well done to our Where’s Wally? competition winners, too.
Let’s hope these numbers increase over the summer months along with journeys by bike and scooter.
Walk to School Week
Walk to School Week will run alongside our themed week where children are encouraged to take a walk in the community on their way to school, maybe even picking up a piece of litter on the way.
Two walk to school competitions will run over the week – firstly, the return of our Where’s Wally challenge (using our walk to school website video) and also a reward for the class who make the most journeys to school on foot during the week.
Each day your child walks to school they should put a counter in their class’ totaliser jar. Even by parking further away from school your child could then to do the final part of their journey by foot. By Friday, the class with the most journeys to school on foot will win a martial arts session with John Weatherall, White Rose martial arts.
We hope you will support this initiative in helping children make a healthy start to their day and also helping towards reducing congestion at our gates.
Who do you think you are?
Our next whole school themed week, based around identity, diversity and community, will be taking place next week, from Monday 18 May 2015.
A variety of events and visitors are planned to help us deliver this key aspect of education.
Events during the week will include looking at our own identity including belonging and body image, diversity of people around us – this might include race, age, religion, disability, sexual orientation and gender. There will be various visitors to support this. Classes will also be getting out into the community working with local organisations such as our local charity, St Gemma’s Hospice; local care homes; Moortown Community Group; and taking pride in the local community by litter-picking.
Identity day
Following a suggestion from one of our school councillors, Friday 22 May will be a non-uniform identity day. Children are invited to dress in clothing that represents part of their identity, for example uniform from a club they attend; a team they are part of or support; or traditional dress to represent their heritage. We invite a £1 voluntary donation and proceeds will be shared between St Gemma’s Hospice and the Nepal earthquake appeal.
Who do you think we are?
Do you think you’d recognise some of our staff in their early years? This photo competition will run throughout the week with details to follow separately. Again, proceeds will be shared between St Gemma’s Hospice and the Nepal earthquake appeal.
We’ll keep you up to date about events during the week through Twitter and the class news pages on our website. It’s going to be a busy week!
Our website and Twitter continue to keep you up to date with key community events. Upcoming events include the Roundhay Park Fun Run on 20 June and the PTA Summer Fair on 04 July. We hope you can support these.
Keeping safe and fit
John, from White Rose Martial Arts, demonstrated in the assembly today some of the skills that can be learnt at the karate after-school club, running again this term.
Pupils who have already attended the club confidently showed their karate techniques alongside some key messages about self-defence from John.
There was a lot of interest from the children so please contact John directly to secure a place for your child. Information can be obtained from the office or your child’s teacher. There is a free taster session on Tuesday 05 May but places are limited.
Our new SEAL theme for this half term is…
…relationships.
This theme explores feelings within the context of our important relationships including family and friends.
It aims to develop knowledge, understanding and skills in three key social and emotional aspects of learning: self-awareness, managing feelings and empathy.
There is a focus throughout the theme on helping children understand the feelings associated with an experience that we all need to cope with at some time: that of loss – whether of a favourite possession, a friend, a family home, or a loved one. Although relatively few children are bereaved, most will experience losses of other kinds during their childhood; losing a home, losing friends because of moving house or changing schools, or losing a pet are examples.
We would therefore ask for parents / carers to alert us to any experiences your child has had that might make this area particularly difficult for them – for example, a bereavement.
Variety is the spice of life!
If you ask your child what they’ve done today, you may be surprised! From learning Mandarin to finding out about geysers, it was all going on. All the children were mixed up for the morning and took part in four different lessons – there are eight different lessons altogether so there will be some more mixing up going on tomorrow. These lessons have been part of our Enrichment Week where children have thought about a variety of subjects in lots of different ways. Here are some photos to give you a taste of what has been happening: learning Urdu or Mandarin, art work, music, PE, geography, programming and DT.
Time to learn your times tables
Practising times tables at home is really important. Knowing times tables facts really helps your child to feel confident in Maths, and enables them to make progress in areas such as calculating, fractions… even shape work can involve times tables – when we think about angles, for example.
The National Curriculum sets out expectations for times tables knowledge:
- Year 2: recall and use multiplication and division facts for the 2, 5 and 10 multiplication tables, including recognising odd and even numbers
- Year 3: recall and use multiplication and division facts for the 3, 4 and 8 multiplication tables
- Year 4: recall multiplication and division facts for multiplication tables up to 12 × 12
If your child is in Year 5 or 6, they need to know all the tables facts so they can start thinking about prime numbers, factors etc. Knowing the tables facts (including division) means having rapid recall – being able to say the answer within about five seconds, not counting through the times tables to work it out.
Each week, your child is asked to learn a particular times table. We might also work on a pair of tables which are related, such as x4s and x8.
Please make sure your child practises as home: in the car, in the bath, on the way to school, straight after school as a matter of routine. Your child needs to know that something like this involves effort and there aren’t any easy solutions!
It’s really helpful to test them two or three times during the week to make sure their ‘score’ improves, and also try to build in some multiplication and division games and references:
- play ‘tables ping-pong‘, where you and your child counts through a times tables forwards and backwards, alternating the counting: 0, 4,8, 12, 16, 20…
- look out for arrays, where you see a grid of something: eggs in a carton is a simple 2 x 3 or 3 x 2 array, and there are arrays on your mobile phone (to log on to mobile phones, you might see a 3 x 3 array – a square number), on buildings (the window panes of a block of flats are useful for larger numbers), tiles in your bathroom, chocolate and other food products…
- download an app to practise on a phone or tablet (there are loads of free ones)
- talk about when you use times tables knowledge
School council elections
Our current school councillors held their final meeting recently as we prepare to elect our new school council.
Children from every class, including Reception, are encouraged to prepare a speech to present to their class as part of the election process. Our whole school homework before the election date will give children the chance to plan their speech.
Thank you to our existing school council who have been involved with many decisions and discussions throughout the year. Most recently they have selected books for our library and pupil prizes as rewards in class.
We’re learning about history.
We enjoyed a visit from Time Striders today and learnt lots about the history of Britain.
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.
