Packed lunches
At Moortown Primary, our packed lunch guidance includes:
- information about the different food groups
- how to put together a healthy, balanced packed lunch
- links to recipes and ideas for healthy packed lunches
This week, our packed lunch guidance will be emailed to parents and carers and sent home to children who have a packed lunch in school.
Packed lunches should be in a secure named container. No sweets are allowed – instead, we encourage lots of fruit or vegetables. Water is available on all tables for children who choose a packed lunch. However, your child can bring their own drink in a non-breakable container – please avoid fizzy drinks.
Change4life provides lots of ideas for healthy packed lunches including suggested swaps.
As an alternative to packed lunches, school meals, including a vegetarian option, are a great choice and are prepared daily in our kitchen. Children are offered a choice of main courses and desserts and they select their main meal choice at the start of the day. Catering Leeds provides food which meets national Food Standards criteria. School meals can be combined with packed lunches.
Free school meals are available to all children in Reception, Year 1 and Year 2. They are also available to some older children according to family income. It’s important to register for entitlement to free school meals, even if your child has a packed lunch or is in a younger class – this is so we can receive additional funding (called the pupil premium) which we can use to help your child. Please check if this is something you might be entitled to.
Living and Learning: Takeover Challenge Day
Takeover Challenge is a fun engagement project which sees schools and organisations across England opening their doors to children and young people to take over adult roles.
It puts children and young people in decision making positions and encourages schools and organisations to hear and act upon their views and ideas. Children and young people gain an insight into the adult world and schools and organisations benefit from a fresh perspective about their work.
School Savings Club
The next School Savings Club paying in date is 09 December 2019 at 3.15-3.45pm.
The account is open to all children and it is free to set up. As there is not minimum deposit requirement, it is a great way for your child/children to begin to manage their own money and understand the importance of saving. We offer paying in sessions every half term where you can bring along any savings to be paid into your child’s account.
As an extra incentive, Year 3 pupils who open an account, or who currently have an account, will be credited with £10.
If you’re unable to attend in person, please hand in any money to be deposited to the office in a sealed envelope addressed to Mrs Tiffany.
Here are the remaining paying in dates for this year (the penultimate Monday of each half term).
- 03 February
- 23 March
- 11 May
- 06 July
To find out more about the accounts or if your child would like to open account, please enquire at the office.
Living and Learning: My Community week so far
This week, we are enjoying our ‘My Community’ themed week based around these themes.
- Who am I? (identity)
- Who are we? (diversity)
- Where do I live? (community)
- How do we all live together? (equality)
There have been lots of events, visits and visitors so far.
- School community coffee morning and Wake Up Shake Up on Monday
- Bulb planting with Friends of Moortown Park
- Visiting Allerton Grange drama department for a community themed drama session led by Year 12 pupils
- A visit from Linda Gledhill from the deaf and hearing impairment team
- A visit from the RNIB to raise awareness of visually impaired members of our community
- JustDifferent disability workshops
- Litter picking in the local area
- Hate Crime workshops led by West Yorkshire Police
- Visiting Donisthorpe Hall
- A visit from Moortown fire service
- A visit from our PCSOs
- Learning carousels across different classes
Still to come is a visit to a group run by Moor Allerton Elderly Care; Greek language sessions led by a parent; a visit to St Gemma’s Hospice and choosing our new school charity.
The week will culminate with Identity Day on Friday 29 November.
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 donation for the PTA Christmas fair.
Thank you for all the entries we have received for the active travel in the community competition.
We encourage families to get out in the community in an active way on the way to and from school. Email (moortownoffice@spherefederation.org) a picture of your active travel, maybe by a landmark on the route to school, for the chance to win one of five £10 vouchers. The winners will be drawn in the assembly tomorrow afternoon so please ensure your entries are sent by 12 o’clock tomorrow.
Thank you for supporting the themed week and please discuss the week with your child to reinforce this important learning.
OS Maps
Recently, Y5 have been using Ordnance Survey maps in order to locate places using six figure grid references.
We really enjoyed using real OS maps. Thank you Miss Rushbrooke for letting us borrow them!
Challenge your child by asking them to locate places using six figure grid references at home or when you’re out and about!
Living and Learning: My Community
We’re looking forward to lots of learning about identity, diversity and our community in our next whole school themed week, My Community.
Here are some key events taking place next week.
Christmas themed menu
Catering Agency, our school meal provider, will be running a special themed menu on Thursday 12 December. Please contact the office, before 28 November, if your child would like a school dinner on this day (no action needed if your child normally has a school meal on this day).
Living and Learning: My Community themed week
Themed week – My Community
Our next whole school themed week, based around identity, diversity and community, will be taking place from Monday 25 November 2019. A variety of events and visitors are planned to help us deliver this key aspect of education.
Events and learning during the week will include looking at our own identity including belonging and self-esteem, diversity of people around us including race, age, religion, disability and gender. Classes will also be getting out into the community working with local organisations and taking pride in the local area for example by litter picking.
Active travel
We encourage children to get out in the community in an active way on their way to and from school, with prizes available as part of the themed week. By walking/scooting/biking to school, families will be keeping our community safer and healthier by reducing congestion at the school gate. Maybe even pick up a piece of litter on the way. Even by parking further away from school your child could then to do the final part of their journey by foot, bike or scooter. Bike and scooter storage facilities are available beside the Year 3 and 4 classrooms.
Email us (moortownoffice@spherefederation.org) a picture of your active travel, maybe by a landmark on your route to school, for the chance to win one of five £10 shopping vouchers. Entries to be submitted by Friday 29 November 2019.
New school charity
During the themed week, children will be researching local, national and international charities and a new school charity will be chosen at the end of the week to replace our current charity, WWF. Children will have chance to consider and suggest charities in the upcoming whole school homework (Friday 22 November 2019).
Identity day
Friday 29 November 2019 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 donation for the PTA Christmas fair.
SAVE THE DATE Community coffee morning Monday 25 November 2019 9-10am
As part of the week, we welcome parents and carers to an informal coffee morning to meet other members of our school community including representatives from the PTA, our governing body, Moortown Community Group and Friends of Moortown Park. There will be chance to hear about proposed plans for the new land to the rear of school. A whole school community Wake up Shake up will follow at 10am in the main playground.
Can you help?
Pupil feedback from our previous My Community themed week was to ‘learn more languages that other people speak’. Do you speak another language and would you be happy to speak to children about this? If so, please contact the office to pass on your details. Also, do you have any local community links that may support our week?
Our website and Twitter continue to keep you up to date with key community events as well as our community noticeboard with lots of information about the themed week too. It’s going to be a busy week!
Living and Learning: STOP bullying
This week, all classes have been learning about different aspects of bullying during national Anti-Bullying Week.
Thank you to those families who supported our Odd Socks Day on Tuesday, celebrating that we are all unique.
Classes have been considering the following during this week.
- Our school definition of bullying.
‘Bullying is when you hurt someone, physically or emotionally, several times on purpose.’
- 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 or witness bullying. The key message is to tell someone (start telling other people)
STOP can stand for two key messages: the definition (Several Times On Purpose) and the solution (Start Telling Other People).
Our new child friendly anti-bullying policy has been launched this week and this was shared, by the four Year 6 authors, in assembly.
All classes have access to their class Living and Learning box or the whole school worry box where they can tell an adult any concerns about bullying or any other issues.
Please discuss this important learning at home (our whole school homework this week).
For further support, here are some resources and advice that can be found at…
- https://www.anti-bullyingalliance.org.uk/tools-information/advice-parents
- https://www.kidscape.org.uk/resources/
- http://www.bullying.co.uk/advice-for-parents/
- https://www.internetmatters.org/hub/news-blogs/get-involved-in-anti-bullying-week-2019-change-starts-with-us/
- https://www.nspcc.org.uk/preventing-abuse/child-abuse-and-neglect/bullying-and-cyberbullying/keeping-children-safe/
- https://www.childline.org.uk/info-advice/bullying-abuse-safety/types-bullying/
- https://youngminds.org.uk/find-help/feelings-and-symptoms/bullying/
- https://esafetyoffice.co.uk/resources/
Digital Mapping
Our geography topic for this half term is: Where in the world am I?
We kicked off our topic in Moortown Park with a treasure hunt.
The children learnt lots about map reading, compass reading, using a trundle wheel, teamwork and more.
This week we have been focusing on digital mapping through the use of Digimap.
The children have been able to locate places of interest and map their routes to and from school!
