Weekly Newsletter
Friday 16th December 2022
This week in school
End of the term and the year! Despite Scarlet Fever throwing us some challenges through December, we have made it through this very long and busy term. We are so proud of the children, especially those who have just joined the school, for how well they have settled into the routines and expectations with us. From the very first day of term right up to now, the staff have not wavered in their determination to do their very best for all the children we are so lucky to work with: they frequently go well above and beyond in their work to make Brayton the very special place it is. We wish them a very very restful break.
We are also so grateful for the support of our families and the wider community: not just in supporting fundraising and big events, but also in the day-to-day life of the school, which always helps us to help your children. The number of families who came along to the parents' evenings this term was greater than ever, with teachers also making sure that they could catch up with all those who couldn't make it. For us to be able to share your children's successes, and support where there are challenges, is really powerful for everyone. The term has been such a positive start to this school year, and we hope you have felt this too.
Have an amazing Christmas and we will see you all in January!
Christmas church services Rev Pete said his words of thanks in the church on Tuesday, and we would just like to echo those: thanks so much to the staff who have worked on putting things together; to Mrs Watson for her musical and organisational skills; to the people who helped with walking (including the staff who made 4 journeys!) and to Pete for welcoming us as warmly as ever. We hope you enjoyed this thoughtful side of our Christmas events and preparation.
Staffing update We have said our goodbyes today to Mrs Burnell as she heads off to her new role at the Read School: she will be very much missed and we hope that she will stay in touch. Good luck Mrs Burnell!
Yesterday the children in Galaxy Class got to meet Mr Jake Warner, who will be joining us as their teacher in January. He is looking forward to meeting everyone properly and becoming a key part of the school team.
Next term the new permanent teacher for Mars class, Mrs Amy Beadnell-Bevan, will be joining us as soon as she is released from her current school and we will keep families updated about this. Until then, Mars class will be in the very capable hands of Mrs Howard.
Starting school in September 2023 If you have a child who turns 4 before 31.8.2023, you will need to apply for a school place in the Reception year from September 2023. Applications should be made online at www.northyorks.gov.uk/apply-place-primary-or-secondary-school
The deadline for applications is January 15 2023: applications after this are treated as 'late' which means they are considered after all the others and you may not get your preferred school.
Even if your child attends our Nursery, you still need to apply for a primary school place.
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/
Year 6 SATs tests 2023 Due to the additional bank holiday on Monday 8th May, the Y6 SATs Test week will run from Tuesday 9th May to Friday 12th May. Details about the timetable and which tests are taking place on which days will be shared by Mr Close and Miss Rushworth after Christmas.
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.
Leave of absence during term time & attendance Please can we gently remind you that, unless the circumstances are genuinely exceptional, holidays in term time will not be authorised. Lower prices are not an exceptional circumstance, and the guidance is very clear that Headteachers would not be expected to class any term time holiday as exceptional.
Where our replies to requests for holidays have included reference to Fixed Penalty Notices, the paperwork for these can only be sent through when you have returned from the holiday and after a certain number of weeks have passed. We send through summaries to North Yorkshire County Council who then make the decision around proceeding with fines.
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
Our attendance picked up again last week, and was higher than the STAR MAT and national figures: thank you for working with us around this.
If your child's attendance is below 90% they will have missed at least 20 days over the year: this is like missing a whole month of school. Letters are going out this week to families where we have concerns over attendance, with a 10-day monitoring period which means that we will be expecting to see 100% attendance from the start of next term.
DIARY DATES
Friday 16 December - School closes for Christmas
Tuesday 3 January - Staff training day
Wednesday 4 January - School opens for spring term
Sunday 15 January - Deadline for primary school applications for September 2023
Happy Birthdays!
Many many many many happy returns this week to.....
Alfie Jessop
Niamh Jones
Willow Wood
Caiden Mahon
Ellie Cooper
Luca Grafton
Jenson Riley
This week in classrooms
Nursery - Stars
What a full fun week we have had! We have continued preparing for Christmas, making decorations and cards, re-telling the Christmas story and singing Christmas songs. The highlight of our week was our Christmas party. We had lots of fun, dancing and playing games and of course eating party food.
In phonics this week we have been using the musical instruments to accompany our singing and dancing. We enjoyed taking it in turns and performing songs to the other nursery children. We have also explored a trumpet and violin and listened to how they sound. In maths we have been using the language of ‘heavy’ and ‘light’ to compare objects.
Star of the Week: Zaine Hartnell
Reception - Moon and Mercury
What a busy week! The children really enjoyed their walk to church, to take part in their first whole school event. It was really wonderful to hear other teachers comment on their amazing behaviour.
We’ve had a really creative week, making cards and calendars to share with families. The children have all created their own independent ideas and we are sure you’ll agree, they look gorgeous.
We used our super phonic knowledge this week, to write about our nativity characters. There were some fantastic sentences!
In maths we have been using positional language, to describe where a soft toy was hiding. The children were able to use the correct vocabulary.
We all celebrated in style on Thursday at our Christmas party. Lots of dancing, games and yummy food.
We are so proud of all the children, they have completed a full term in reception and have done so with so much enthusiasm, kindness, resilience and joy.
Stars of the week:
Mercury: Jacob Howley
Moon: Jaxson Booth
Year 1 - Galaxy and Venus
Well that’s a wrap. We have had such a busy week finishing our Christmas decorations, cards and crafts. We’ve been to church and fitted in our Christmas party. We have continued to recap Phase 5 sounds in phonics and finally finished our DT project - sewing baubles and evaluated them.
We would like to say how proud we are of all the Year One children and how hard they have worked this term. We would like to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.
Stars of the week:
Venus: Esme Senior
Galaxy: Tom Loose
Year 2 - Earth and Mars
What a busy, Christmassy week it’s been! We have been following and writing instructions to help us make Christmas tree decorations and snowman biscuits.We completed our DT project of designing and making vehicles and we finished our Christmas cards and calendars to bring home for you. In maths we have been focussing on 3D shapes, counting faces, vertices and edges.We had fun in RE thinking about what some of the main characters in the first Christmas story might have been thinking at certain points in the story and we loved our trip to church for the Christmas service. We also loved reading Jesus’ Christmas Party by Nicholas Allen and have been using our reading skills to sequence, infer and explain. We had a fantastic Christmas party and enjoyed opening the final days on our Advent calendar.
Thank you, Year 2, for working so hard this term. Have a wonderful Christmas everyone.
Star of the week
Earth: Benjamin Turner
Mars: Jaxon Lamb
Year 3 - Jupiter and Saturn
Our independent write about ‘The Extraordinary Crayon Eating Girl’ reached fruition this week; all the children have worked tremendously hard to write a story, in what has been a very busy final week, that demonstrated both sentence fluency and creative flair. In Maths, the children practised counting in 8s, and completed fluency and problem solving questions involving the 4 and 8 times tables. In DT, the children sampled and critiqued the wartime soup they’d designed previously using only the produce from an autumn vegetable patch - some of the children enjoyed the flavours and texture of the soup, others were not so keen! During our Christmas service at St Wilfrid’s, the Year 3 children confidently presented part of the nativity story and read class prayers of thankfulness. The Christmas party on Wednesday afternoon was a great success and the movie afternoon on Friday was a welcomed treat for both staff and pupils! We would like to end this newsletter by saying how incredibly proud we are of the children for the hard work and determination that they’ve put into their learning this term. Well done Year 3s! Have a very merry Christmas and we’ll see you in the new year. :)
Star of the Week
Saturn: Finnley Swift-Lampitt
Jupiter: Kian Bird
Year 4 - Neptune and Meteor
I cannot believe it’s been a whole term already! In such a quick period the children have grown and achieved so much as well.
We kick started the week by creating our D.T project, pizza! The children thoroughly enjoyed the experience and it was great to see everyone mucking in with the dough and getting their hands all sticky. Thankfully, our baking has provided the best kind of inspiration for the children writing instructions on how to make the perfect pizza. Each step has included a range of imperative verbs and time adverbials to keep the reader on the right track, well done everyone. On Friday, as an end of term treat, we watched the motion picture inspired by our reading text. How to train your dragon, they all enjoyed laughing at Toothless’ and Hiccup's witty humour throughout the term in guided reading so it’s not hard to imagine how much they’re going to enjoy watching the dynamic duo.
Finally, the year 4 team would like to wish everyone a Merry Christmas, have a lovely relaxing break and we can’t wait to see you next year!
Star of the week:
Meteor: Sam Short
Neptune: Freddy Tonks
Year 5 - Asteroid and Pluto
Despite it being the last week of school, the Year 5s have continued to work throughout the week. Pluto may have been swimming in the mornings, but everyday they have managed to squeeze in English lessons. The swimming instructors have been impressed with Asteroid’s and Pluto’s attitude to swimming and the willingness to challenge themselves in the pool. Well done to all the children! Both classes have also been writing up their last assessed piece in English. We have spent the last couple of weeks building up to this piece of writing, whether that is in Guided Reading or in English. The punctuation in direct speech is hard, but they all learnt a song that should help them in years to come. Ask them to sing it to you! The children’s final piece of writing had to be about one of the ghosts from A Christmas Carol. Asteroid’s DT projects have looked amazing! The attention to detail they have put in is amazing, and they look fantastic! We both want to wish the children and parents a Merry Christmas, a Happy New Year and we look forward to seeing you again in January!
Star of the week:
Asteroid: Ella Larner
Pluto: Evie-Mae Hanson
Year 6 - Nebular and Constellation
Are we nearly there yet? It seems like a bit of a theme recently but finally we have made it to the end of a very busy term and therefore have enjoyed a creative, Christmassy sort of week. Despite many battling through the week with colds or coughs we have put in lots of work as well as having lots of fun.
We have been adding and subtracting fractions with different denominators in maths. In English we have written up our findings from the Titanic disaster inquiry and found out who was held accountable for the tragic loss of life. In geography we continued to look at British trade in 1912 compared with imports and exports of goods in 2022.
We have concluded our week by making calendars and mini bobble hats and of course, the highlight of the week, our Year 6 Christmas party afternoon - a great deal of laughter, dancing and fun party games too.
Have a fantastic Christmas holiday season and a well deserved break everyone. See you again in 2023!
Stars of the week:
Nebular: Tom Donoghue
Constellation: Lucas Richardson