Weekly Newsletter
Friday 7th July 2023
This week in school
Summer Fair Thank you so much to everyone who supported our Summer fair on Thursday: we hope you and your families enjoyed the stalls and games. Huge thanks to all the stall holders, including the children and staff, and the PTA fo arranging the bouncy castle and raffle prizes. When all the money has been counted we will confirm the final total.
Further thanks to the PTA for their support with the gardening club through funding equipment. compost etc; and for their generous donation of £750 towards reading books for the Early Years.
Staffing update As well as saying our goodbyes to Mrs Berzins and Miss Rushworth on their retirement, it is 'see you later' to Mr Matty Pooley, our sports coach. He is going off to begin his teacher training in September, and will return on his second placement in December so we won't be without him for too long. When he comes back in December, Matty is hoping to pick up football training again if he is not too busy with his studies!
Transition day Next week will be our whole-school transition day, when the children will join their new classroom staff for the day, and spend time in their new classrooms. We will also be joined by our 2 new teachers, Mrs Rebecca Rowley (Y1) and Mrs Victoria Goodall (Y5).
Dojo posts Class Dojo is intended to be a tool for sharing and celebrating things that are happening in school, and for families to message teachers easily. Unlike Facebook or Twitter, it is not a place for negativity or for venting and where we see these types of comments, they will be removed. If you have a genuine concern or worry, please contact your child's class teacher.
Ear piercing If you are thinking of letting your child have their ears pierced, please make sure this happens at the start of the summer holiday so they have time to heal before coming back to school. Children cannot wear earrings or have tape/plasters over them for PE and sport so please also make sure they are removed on PE days, or that your child can take them in and out themselves.
Preloved/worn uniform If you are looking to replace uniform or get hold of new sizes ready for September, please take a look at the preloved uniform Facebook group: Brayton C of E Primary uniform sale/giveaway page.
Children's health Reminder that we have had a small number of confirmed and/or suspected cases of scarlet fever in school. If your child is unwell, please make sure you get medical advice if they show any of the scarlet fever symptoms https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/scarlet-fever/
Parking around school The Parish Council have had some complaints about parking around the area, and are liaising with the police around them carrying out some spot checks. The main issues are around parking on the yellow zip-zag markings and some drivers making 3-point turns on Brayton Lane. Both of these cause a hazard to pedestrians and other road users.
Updated RSE Policy You should have recieved the school's updated RSE policy, which was approved by the governors at their last meeting. If you would like to give any feedback, please use our Google form https://forms.gle/kTuLhnzBTLVp3uH1A
OMG Healthy Start Scheme for families This is a scheme to support families who are expecting a baby or have a child aged under 4. It includes financial support to help with buying healthy foods and milk. You can find out more at https://www.healthystart.nhs.uk/what-youll-get-and-how-to-shop/
Term dates 2023-24 The term dates for the next school year are now on the school website at https://brayton-cofe-primary-school.secure-primarysite.net/term-dates/
Jewellery No necklaces, bracelets, rings or other jewellery should be worn to school. If your child has earrings, these must be removed for PE sessions, or earrings can be left at home on PE days. Earrings for school should be small stud types so they don't get caught and cause any injuries.
Free School Meals
Free school meals: save up to £450 a year With so much in the news about the cost of living and now energy prices going up, you can check whether your child could be eligible for a free school meal, whatever school year they are in. All the information is on the NYCC website at https://www.northyorks.gov.uk/free-school-meals Some of this information may be out of date, especially around eligibility, so please get in touch if you are unsure.
If you would like any advice or support with this, please contact the school office. We treat these matters with complete confidentiality and are always happy to help if needed.
Thank you for your continued support.
Allyson Buckton (Headteacher) & Mel Walmsley (Deputy Headteacher)
Whole School Attendance
Attendance last week had a big jump back up again, in contrast to the national figure: thank you for your help with this. Whole school attendance to date is still hovering below 95%, around a combination of holidays being taken and some illness in the younger years of school.
The DfE's attendance target for schools is 96%, and as a school we need to be working towards this. With your help there have been massive improvements in attendance over this year and this is now better across school than it has been in a very long time!
As we get into the summer term there has also been an increase in requests for leave due to holidays: we will be putting a much higher number of these forward for Fixed Penalty Notices in May and June than any months so far. We would also remind you that, according to the new guidance for schools, ANY leave for holidays should be unauthorised: there is no longer the 'up to 5 days/10 sessions' which can be authorised at the Headteacher's discretion.
DIARY DATES
Monday 10 July - Y6 transition week at Brayton Academy
Tuesday 11 & Thursday 13 July - New Reception starter visits (morning only)
Thursday 13 July - Whole school transition day
Friday 14 July - STAR MAT Student Wellbeing conference
Monday 17 - Wednesday 19 July - Y6 residential visit
Tuesday 25 July - School closes for summer holiday
Happy Birthdays!
Many many many many happy returns next week to.....
Ellise Catton
Oscar Johnston
This week in classrooms
Nursery - Stars
The children have looked at different types of transport this week. They have listened to and watched the story ‘The Naughty Bus’. They have enjoyed finding out what mischief he has been up to each morning as they enter nursery. They have made their own buses in the box craft and enjoyed playing with the vehicles in the Small World. They rolled the dice and added the correct number of animal passengers in the maths area and they have drawn and painted their own buses, cars and roads.
In Phonics we have focused on rhyming. We have listened to rhyming poems and stories and spotted the rhyme and made rhyming silly soup too. In maths we have looked at capacity. We have encouraged the children to build on their understanding of full and empty and the children have had lots of opportunities to explore capacity with different materials such as water, sand, rice and loose parts.
We have also been very busy baking and decorating buns for our stall at the School Fair. Thank you to everyone who brought things in too.
Star of the Week: Logan Firth
Reception - Moon and Mercury
This week we have been getting prepared for the school summer fair so we decided to choose a text to support this. We have therefore been reading ‘Dogger’ by Shirley Hughes which is a classic story that displays characters showing kindness and compassion. There are also some great images of a summer fair that we have looked at, to give us some idea of what our own will look like.
In maths we have looked at repeating patterns. We followed the pattern of ABBC and to rehearse this, we made paper chains. These will be on display at our cake stall! We have also been practising our map drawing skills, sketching out ideas of how our summer fair might look.
Of course we have been very busy baking! We are so excited to share our yummy treats with you.
Star of the Week
Mercury - Alfie Penrose
Moon - Poppy Berridge
Year 1 - Galaxy and Venus
This week we have been reading Sir Charlie Stinky Socks and the Really Big Adventure, written by Kristina Stephenson. This has been our focus across Writing and Guided Reading. In Writing, the children have absolutely loved looking at this book and have been constantly giggling throughout reading it. We have focussed on writing a story retell and the children have been brilliant at identifying the five key story points from the book. It has been amazing reading some of the adjectives and similes they have come up with to describe these different story points. In Maths, we are starting to consolidate our learning and going back over stuff we have previously found tricky. We have explored these different topics in a number of different ways and have really focussed on cementing the skills needed to succeed with these tricky areas. In Music, we have continued looking at the use of instruments, but specifically the different instruments used in a variety of different musical genres. Again, the children have been fantastic at identifying a wide range of instruments by listening and by watching video clips. They are now confident on which instruments are used in the different genres. In History, we have looked at the ‘Battle of Hastings’ and the ‘Battle of Stamford Bridge’ and the impact these had on the future of the English monarchy back in 1066. In RE, we looked at the Muslim welcoming ceremony of ‘Aqiqah’ and have focussed on the similarities and differences to the Christian welcoming ceremony of a ‘Christening’.
Well done Year 1, you have all had another fantastic week! There is not long now until the end of the year, so make sure you keep up the fantastic work we know you are capable of!
Stars of the week:
Venus- Cooper Glover
Galaxy- Riordan Hawe
Year 2 - Earth and Mars
This week we have been learning all about humans. In Science we had a special visit from someone’s very cute, little baby brother, to observe and measure how humans grow. whilst in PSHE we have been learning about our different body parts and using their correct names. In Guided Reading we have started our new text - George’s Marvellous Medicine. We made predictions about what we think is going to happen and made links to other Roald Dahl books that we know. We also had fun hot seating as George and answering questions about what he thinks about Grandma. In RE we have been thinking about “The Golden Rule” and what might happen if people followed this more. We designed some beautiful pictures showing our understanding of this idea. In English we have continued with our sentence stacking lessons around the text The Day the Crayons Quit, in readiness to write our letters to the felt tip pens next week to persuade them to come back! In Music we have completed and performed the piece of music we created last week, even performing it as a round. We had a very exciting moment when we released our butterflies into the wild. We’ve loved watching them grow and develop.
Another highlight of the week was of course using our entrepreneurial skills to create our Treasure Map Game and raise money at the School Fair on Thursday - Well done everyone!
Another fabulous, hard working week - keep going Year 2!
Stars of the week:
Earth: Hazel Smith
Mars: Alfie Fisher
Year 3 - Jupiter and Saturn
This week in English we have begun sentence stacking for our new unit of work which involves the children producing their own Non-Chronological Report on a natural disaster. In these lessons the children have been using a range of different time adverbials as well as technical vocabulary and precise verbs.
In Maths, we have continued our new topic ‘Statistics’ and the children have been interpreting and drawing bar charts and collecting and representing data in a variety of ways.
On Tuesday afternoon in Geography the children investigated the five deadly features of an earthquake and in computing on Wednesday they started a new project ‘Branching Databases’ which involved them choosing a suitable background for their databases as well as giving it a title and dragging different objects onto their templates.
Star of the Week
Saturn: Emily Richardson
Jupiter: Sebastian Spooner
Year 4 - Neptune and Meteor
This week, Year 4 have continued sentence stacking for our ‘water cycle guided tour’. They have been using lots of scientific vocabulary as they are writing as if they are a tour guide taking a group of people on a journey through the water cycle. It’s so lovely to see the children apply their scientific knowledge and use their descriptive language from English, we’ve even seen some writers adding their sense of humour into their writing by including puns! Speaking of the water cycle, in Science the children evaluated their water cycle experiments. They compared what they had predicted would happen to their findings. They used their understanding of the water cycle to explain what had happened to the water. Hopefully by now, they have explained why Year 4 have had ziplock bags taped to the windows. In Maths, we have come to the end of our unit - ‘shape’. We finished it off by looking at lines of symmetry and completing symmetric figures. It required a bit of thought but we’ve been able to look for patterns to help us carefully calculate how to reflect the shape. Also, the children have been able to lend a helping hand in preparing for the Summer Fair, hopefully you will be able to see all their hard work in the posters and stalls that the children set up on Thursday, great team work all. Next week, we have our Greek workshop day which we are all looking forward to!
Stars of the week:
Meteor - Alyssa Mitchell
Neptune - Isabel Jakowyszyn
Year 5 - Asteroid and Pluto
Another packed week in Year 5! We have completed another big write in English. This time, we have researched, drafted, edited and presented a non-chronological report on the origin of the Arabian Nights. There is a wealth of interesting information and a range of writing skills on display. In Maths, we have moved into another unit of learning- converting units of measurement. Children have had the opportunity to consolidate their learning from last week as they have needed to multiply and divide by 10, 100 and 1000 as they convert between different units. There was a multi-step problem (5 to be exact!) in Tuesday's lesson that was not for the faint hearted. This problem was a challenge for the adults in class and we were so proud of the children’s determination, resilience and perseverance to solve it! In RE, we have come to the end of our Islam unit and made connections between the 5 Pillars and what they could mean for the children in their life- what they believe, what they will do to demonstrate that belief daily, yearly and in their lifetime. The beliefs of the children show how truly kind and thoughtful they are and how they really will make the world a better place in the future. We have also finished our Biology unit on Living Things in Science by initially researching and then communicating a flowering plant’s life cycle. The children enjoyed preparing for the Summer Fair. Thank you to our families for any donations of bottles Miss Goddard received and thank you to our children, who volunteered their time at the fair. Still lots of exciting things planned, including our trip to Harlow Carr, so keep up the energy and effort.
Stars
Asteroid - Charlie Winn
Pluto- Roma Tate
Year 6 - Nebular and Constellation
The start of the week truly marked the start of our children beginning their transition to ‘big’ school, with some of us enjoying 2 days at Selby High or a day at Holy Family or Sherburn High while the rest of the team were busy working on their ‘bakery project’ in maths and devising the ‘lost chapter’ of the plane crash in the book The Explorer. We had a science focus too - continuing our learning about classification in the animal kingdom as we created fact files about part of the species for our science wall display. We thoroughly enjoyed our rounders games in PE and had a successful netball friendly against Cliff primary too. Once everyone in year 6 were back together again, it was time to fully turn our attention to the small but important matter of the Year 6 Leavers Production! Oh my, what fun we have had with learning our lines and our lyrics - you are really in for a treat. Next week, we lose the majority of our year group, who will spend the week at Brayton Academy. Have a fabulous time everyone, we’ll miss you but we know this is such a special time of year for you, be the best you can be and make those good first impressions. We can’t wait for our residential and final few days together at primary school.
Stars:
Constellation: Jessica Jaise
Nebular: Harrison Eames