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.
Vote Bronwen for Leeds Mayor!
We’re very proud that Bronwen, a Year 6 pupil here at Moortown Primary, has been selected as one of ten finalists for the Leeds Children’s Mayor competition. All the Year 6 children completed a manifesto of what they would like to change if they could become Mayor for the day and Bronwen was chosen as our entrant for the competition. Her manifesto is brilliant, meeting all the criteria set (see below).
Vote for Bronwen! Voting has now opened for the finalists and anyone with a Leeds Learning account can vote. If you know of anyone who has one, please encourage them to vote.
Voting will remain open until midday on Friday 04 November.
Representatives of Leeds Children’s Services and Leeds Council undertook the difficult task of short listing the twenty Children’s Mayor entries they received down to a final ten. In order to make the short listing a fair and transparent process, they used score cards and scored the manifestos individually against four criteria:
- How clear and focused the manifesto idea was
- How practical, achievable and affordable the manifesto idea was
- The number of children and young people who would benefit from the manifesto idea
- The extent to which children would work alongside adults to make the idea a reality
As well as Moortown Primary, the schools whose entrants made the final this year are Allerton Bywater Primary School, Bramley St Peters Primary School, Calverley C of E Primary School, Hill Top Primary School, Kippax North Junior & Infant School, Queensway Primary School, Shire Oak Primary School, Strawberry Fields Primary School and Whinmoor St Paul’s Primary School
This whole programme is about encouraging children to show an interest in democracy and to get them into the habit of voting on issues that affect them.
We know children at Moortown Primary already make a positive contribution to the school and their community through the School Council, litter-picking, raising money for charity etc. It’s great individuals like Bronwen want to go the extra mile to have their views heard!
Cycling and Buddies
Year Six have had a great week.
Monday saw many of the children continuing the cycle training that they started in Year Five. The instructors told me how impressed they were with the attitude and enthusiasm exhibited by the group. This made me very pleased. It’s always great to have such positive feedback! (Mr Roundtree was pleased to hear that Angel didn’t fall off this time!)
Many of your children have been buddies to the new reception children and have given up their lunchtimes to show their new friends the routines and expectations in the canteen and dinner hall. Again, it’s really pleasing to see how the class has volunteered to help out the new children and make their first day at Moortown a success.
Well done Year Six. You’ve made a fabulous start to being in the oldest age group in school.
Staying Safe themed week 26 September
We are looking for parents / carers who have a job related to safety.
If you can spare some time, during our Staying Safe themed week (26 September), to come in to talk to the children about how safety affects your work please speak to your child’s class teacher or leave a message at the office.
Thank you.
Hello from Mrs Hazell
Hello there and welcome to Year Six’s Class News, 2011-12.
It’s been an excellent start to the year with everyone showing a positive attitude to their learning. The children are already focused and committed to being the best they possibly can.
Here’s just a few reminders and some information to start the year off:
Reading
I read with every child in a small group once a week. Other staff in the class may read with them too, but it’s really important that children read at home as well. It doesn’t have to be story books – factual books, newspapers (children’s ones are available if you look), comics, magazines or websites are all good, too. This year, we’re going to be concentrating on understanding the meaning behind the words authors use and why characters behave and react as they do. You can help your child by asking questions about characters’ plots and settings rather than simply hearing them read.
Homework
Homework is due nearly every week, just like the rest of the school. It’s given out on Fridays and is due on Wednesdays. This gives children three evenings and two whole weekend days to do the homework, which should be plenty of time. At Moortown, we expect each piece of homework to take around 30 mins – 1 hour. This could be done in three 15 minute sessions or one long fun session. One of the Year 6 team will mark the homework and feedback to the children their stars (things they have done well) and their steps (things that need a little more work). This will either be done verbally or in writing.
Spellings
Spellings are given out on Fridays and tested the following Friday. Children should practise them by whatever works for them, but I recommend the tried and tested method: READ IT> COVER IT > WRITE IT > CHECK IT.
Times Tables
Each week children are asked to practise their times tables. By Year 4, children should know their tables, so by Year 6, they should be really quick and accurate with all tables (and division facts) up to their 10s. If your child isn’t up to speed, I can’t stress enough how important it is for them to spend more time practising. Children’s ability with number affects loads of their maths and times tables is a vital part of that. 5 – 10 minutes every day is perfect. Don’t forget division facts too.
If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to pop in and see me.
Write away!
Did you know we have two published authors in our school community?
Year 3 parent, Emma Barnes, has a new book out for children called How (Not) to Make Bad Children Good. Aimed at 7-10s, it’s the story of naughty child, Martha, who is so bad that an Interstellar Agent, Fred, is sent to Earth to try and sort her out. Emma will be appearing at Waterstones on Saturday 24 September.
We’re all very proud that Carolyn Hazell, our Year 6 teacher, is also a published author. Her book, Pav the Plumber Saves the Day, is popular amongst our children, and a great resource in school to promote reading and writing. Our current Year 6 pupils are being inspired to write great character descriptions, and a former pupil described Miss Hazell as ‘inspiring’ as a teacher and writer.
Find and compare schools’ performance
The following information is an extract from a recent email from the Department of Education to schools. Parents / carers who need to consider what school their child should move on to after Moortown Primary might find it helpful. Please note that the most up-to-date 2011 exam or test results may not yet be available.
The Department for Education has launched a new web tool helping parents / carers find and compare local schools’ performance. It significantly improves parents’ ability to choose the right school for their child.
The ‘compare schools’ tool brings together a wide range of performance data in a single place.
Parents can find schools by name, keyword or location or browse via an interactive map. Each school has its own mini-site with a range of useful information such as spend per pupil and test and exam results. Parents can also compare their school with others nearby – or with any other school in England.
For the first time on the Department’s website, parents can:
- select the schools that interest them and compare performance side by side
- view a full list of schools in England and filter to find schools with similar characteristics
- use an interactive map to view local, regional and national averages for school performance.
For more information, visit http://www.education.gov.uk/schools/search
New SEAL statement and theme
As we start the new school year, our SEAL (Social and Emotional Aspects of Learning) theme focuses on New Beginnings and ‘I can make someone feel welcome‘ is the statement for this week.
New Beginnings
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.
The key areas of learning throughout this theme 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.
Goodbye, Year 6
What a lovely message from Miss Hazell! I totally agree – this class have been an asset to Moortown Primary! As a whole, they gel together brilliantly. Each child brings something different to the team and they are an absolute delight to teach. The production was amazing and the Leavers’ Assembly was hilarious. An excellent combination of good directing and naturally witty children. I wish all of the Year Six children a successful time in secondary school!
Miss Hewson
Wow! What a Year!
Wow! What a year!
This year has been memorable from beginning to end with loads of learning, so many highlights, successes and fun times.
All the children should be very proud of their achievements and progress this year in all their learning. Huge congratulations to Amana, Yutaro, Rosie, Arjun, Farhan, Max, Sean, Ben and Nahid for achieving straight Level 5s in Maths, Reading and Writing SATs. As you know every single child in the year group achieved Level 4 or 5 in the English and Maths tests. This is down to the positive attitude to learning that the children exhibit and how they, as a group of children, push themselves to be the best they can. They have been a pleasure to teach as they have been so keen, enthusiastic and committed to their learning. I would like to say a huge well done also to Jahmar, Simran, Sanna, Angel and Abdul who have made vast amounts of progress this year.
All the children who went on the residential to Dobroyd Castle have been given a DVD of photographs taken during the visit. If you came to the Leavers’ Assembly, you will have seen some of the photographs. Mr Roundtree and I had positive comment after positive comment from all the Robinwood group leaders about the children’s behaviour, attitude, enthusiasm and teamwork during our stay. I can honestly say the children were a credit to themselves and a credit to school. Millie, Bethany, Sally, Theo and Ellie were ‘stars’ with their unfailing effort and wholehearted endeavours to give everything a go, despite some of the activities being challenging and a little scary.
Another highlight of the year was the Year 5 and 6 production of Bugsy Malone. Ethan did a cracking job as Bugsy; Daniel and Shoaib were outstanding as the inept police officers; Karina was a heroic Baby Face; Hafsa danced beautifully; Isa was a fantastic Cagey Joe. The whole year group again gave everything 100% and learnt songs, scripts and dance routines with gusto. I think they should consider entering Britain’s got Talent next year!
The Leavers’ Assembly was another exemplary performance with bags of laughter and not a tear in sight. Chanda was very impressive with her confident and expressive public speaking, Raheem did an excellent Mr Roundtree impression and Jonathan was an inspiration with his wild and wacky dancing during our singing.
I’ve been a teacher for over twenty years and teaching this group of Year Sixers has been a joy and a pleasure. They are responsive, mature, hardworking and good fun. I wish them great success at secondary school.
They will be missed!
