Newsletter
Issue 4
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Friday 27th September 2013
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Dear Parent/Carer,
I would like to start this week by extending my
thanks to those who are able to give some time to read with our children. It is
lovely to have parents in school and the reading practice is invaluable for our
children.
The week got off to a great start this week,
with Reception and Nursery dressing up as their favourite book characters as
part of a special themed day; I was greeted in the hall during Monday’s
assembly by a multitude of princes and princesses, superheroes, pirates and
animals. It was smiles all round!
Industrial Action
You are all no doubt aware that
several teacher unions are holding strikes on Tuesday October 1st.
To my knowledge at present, the school will remain open. Please assume that if
you do not hear anything, it will be business as usual. Thanks.
Comenius projects
Plans are under way once more to
continue our collaboration with colleagues in Finland and Sweden as we look
forward to phase 2 of our “Developing Outstanding Schools” and “Welfare and
Health in School Education” projects. We look forward to welcoming our visitors
from Finland on October 9th, where they will observe how we put
provision around children with special educational needs and look at teaching
strategies for our foundation (non-core) subjects. Please visit the Comenius
section of our website for more details about the projects so far.
Another polite request
Please be reminded that parking
on the zig zags outside school is prohibited, as is using the disabled space
without a badge. Once more, I am receiving complaints about the careless
behaviour of parents who are not dropping their children off safely. I am
shocked to discover that some parents are using the entrance to the staff car
park as a place to carry out ‘U’ turns during peak times when children and
parents are crossing. Cones are now in place to stop this. The safety of our
children and their families should be everyone’s priority.
The Big Draw is coming!
October is the month of The Big Draw;
The Campaign for Drawing’s month long national drawing event, which (as the
name suggests) aims to get everyone drawing. We are huge supporters of the
campaign at Robin Hood and are now about to embark on our third year of being
involved with the event. Mrs Mistry and Mrs Chin, two of our highly gifted
support staff, are finalising the plans for our day of activities. We want to
give you plenty of advance notice to come and join us after school on Tuesday
15th October to see the works of art on display as our hall is
transformed into an art gallery. Doors will open at 3:00 p.m. Please come and
join us if you can.
PTA News
Just a quick reminder that Bag2school day is on Friday 4 October. Please fill your blue bag with good quality second hand clothing, paired shoes, belts, bedding etc. This will really help the PTA to raise some extra cash for school as Bag2School pay us for everything they can re-use. Unfortunately, due to a lack of storage space, we cannot accept the filled bags until the actual date. Clare, our chair, will be available on the day to direct you where to leave them ready for collection (please do not hand them to the ladies in the office as they will already be busy at that time!!!). Please have a sort through your wardrobes and see if you can help us!!!
Also our AGM is next Friday on 4 October. Please meet us at 3:30 outside the school office and support your school.
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Don’t forget to keep your non perishable food
donations coming in as part of our harvest celebrations.
Have a great weekend!
Mrs Dale
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Next Parent’s Coffee
Morning
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Agenda
for discussion
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Monday
7th Oct 9:00am- 10:00 am
Email
your views:
gaynor.dale@robinhood.leeds.sch.uk
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·
Communication with parents- update on how we aim to
improve and what measures have already been put in place. Your views.
·
Spanish pupil exchanges- a good idea? Your views
·
Residential trips for Y56 abroad- a good idea? Your
views
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Nursery newsletter
NEWS ROUND UP
The children looked
fantastic on Monday and Thursday dressed up as their favourite book character
and it was great to see their big, excited smiles as they came into the
classroom. They had an amazing time role playing with their friends and it was
a super way to start off their learning for the week.
THIS WEEK
This week our literacy has
been based around the children’s favourite book. We have focused on the
characters in the book and the setting. Whilst the children were decorating a
mask for their favourite story character, they were also telling the adults
what they knew about the different people that appear in their favourite
stories! We used the book ‘We’re going on a Bear Hunt’ as a stimulus too and
the children were encouraged to act out the story using rhyming language and
then work collaboratively to make a super class display. In numeracy we have
continued to count to 10 and back and the children have been spotting numbers
around the indoor and outdoor classroom and playing shape dominoes which was
lots of fun!
NEXT WEEK
Next week we are learning all about our families. In
literacy we will be watching clips of ‘The Incredibles’ and thinking about all
the different super things our families can do. We will be making superhero
puppets of either Mum or Dad and we will be encouraging the children to hold
their pencils correctly using the tripod (three fingered) grip and drawing on the
correct facial features. In topic we will be making something special to bring
home. In numeracy the children will be ordering two members of the Incredible
family by size and talking about smallest and largest groups of objects.
HOW YOU CAN HELP US
·
Please listen to your child read for at least
5 minutes every day. Encourage them to hold the books and turn the pages by
themselves and if you can ask lots of questions to support their comprehension
skills that would be fabulous.
·
Please bring books and reading records into
Nursery every week so that we can change the books and let you know how your
child is getting on in Nursery.
·
Please continue to encourage your child to
put on and take off their own coats, shoes and socks (I know this is time
consuming but we would really appreciate your support!)
Thank you very much and we hope you have a lovely weekend
Mrs Steel, Mrs Chin and Miss Fox
Reception newsletter
NEWS ROUND UP
The children looked
fantastic on Monday dressed up as their favourite book character and it was
great to see their big and excited smiles as they came into the classroom. They
had an amazing time role playing with their friends and it was a super way to
start off their learning for the week.
THIS WEEK
This week our literacy has
been based around the children’s favourite book. We have focused on the
characters in the book and the setting. On Wednesday we took our literacy session
out of the classroom and into the hall where we drew all the different settings
in the story we’re going on a tiger hunt. The story ended with us seeing a real
tiger in the hall and having to quickly run back to the classroom. In phonics
this week we have been practising recognising and writing the sounds; g, o, c and k and reading our key words of the week which were dad, back, had, and, get and big. It was great to see how many
children got 100% and got to visit Mrs Dale for a Headteacher’s sticker. In
topic we started the week off by listening to an audio track about the setting
of a story which the children had to act out and really imagine that they were
there. Then at the end of the week the children used a variety of materials
including play dough, glitter feathers, leaves, wood and sand to create a 3D
model of a story setting with a partner. They also made some fabulous character
masks and spent time outside role-playing various different stories. On Tuesday
the wicked witch had left us a chest of her things and a note to tell the
children to have a go at making her a special potion. The children really
embraced the learning experience and there were some super recipes for the
witch written in our witches den. In maths we were learning the concept of 1
more and 1 less and the children have now really started to understand what the
word less means.
NEXT WEEK
Next week we are learning
all about our families and the people we love. In literacy we will be watching
clips of The Incredibles and thinking about all the different super things our
families can do. We will be making superhero puppets of each member of our
family and writing repeated sentences underneath e.g. My mum can… In topic we
will be making our families a special secret present which the children will
bring home for you towards the end of the week. In numeracy the children will
be ordering The Incredibles family from smallest to tallest. In phonics we will
be learning to recognise the sounds ck,
e and u and learning to read the
words; him, his, not, mum, up and got.
HOW YOU CAN HELP US
· Please listen to your child read for at least
5 minutes every day. Help them spot the sounds we have been learning and help
them sound out and blend simple words. Don’t forget bug club!
·
Please have a look at your child’s name
writing book and practise their target with them.
·
Please encourage your child to show you their
wonderful learning at home and engage with the home learning that is been sent.
·
Have a go at the ICT games we have been
playing in class.
Have a lovely weekend
Miss Lambert, Miss Pyatt & the rest of the Reception
team
Key Stage 1
Home learning
This
week we have been learning all about the importance of a healthy, balanced diet
to ensure a healthy body and mind. We have tasted food, researched the food
groups, learnt about hygiene and even put together our own exercise video!
For
home learning this week we would like the children to design their dream meal
(one, two or three courses – it’s up to you!) To ensure a balanced diet, the
meal must contain something from each of the food groups: carbohydrates, fruit
and vegetables, dairy, protein and a smidgen of the fatty foods section. Try to think about the food pyramid and
discuss the fact that it’s so important to eat large amounts of carbohydrates,
fruit and vegetables. The children will be able to tell you why.
Juice bottles
To continue the theme of health
and wellbeing we’ll be designing and making our own smoothies next week. If you
indulge in any smoothies or juice over the weekend, please can you save the
bottles for us to have a look at? We would like to gather lots of ideas to make
our labels both authentic and original.
Trip
Our trip to Morrisons is fast
approaching and we haven’t received many permission slips. If you haven’t
completed your slip please can you do so as soon as possible and post it
through the letterbox outside the school office. Without written permission the
children will not be able to come with us and it would be such a shame for
anyone to miss out. If you need a new letter just call into the office and they
will be more than happy to help you.
Jumpers
With the changeable British
weather unable to make its mind up, one minute we are hot and the next we are
cold. Consequently, we are finding more and more discarded jumpers and cardigans
in class at the end of the school day. Please
can you ensure your child’s name is written clearly on the label so we can make
sure the right jumper/cardigans go home with the right people. Thanks.
Changing books
I know there have been a few
questions about changing books and whether there are set days for children to
do this. The children can get a new book to take home whenever and as often as
they like. You are welcome to come into the classroom with them after school to
have a look at our books and pick some together. There is no set day and we
encourage the children to take responsibility for changing their own books
whenever they have finished one. The more they read the better.
Numeracy
Our numeracy learning has been
all about place value; getting to grips with units, tens, hundreds and even
thousands. We use the ‘malteser system’ to help children grasp the concept of
place value. Ask your child and I’m sure they would be more than happy to share
it with you. In a nutshell – a unit is one malteser, a bag of maltesers
represents one ten, a box represents one hundred and a bucket represents one
thousand. It’s a useful visual representation of what each column means. When partitioning
the children can either draw maltesers or progress to numbers. To embed this
learning it would be useful to ask you child simple questions like “How many
tens are there in 76?” or “What is the value of 2 in 321?” Next week we will be
building on the children’s knowledge of place value by progressing into
ordering numbers. If you do practise any ordering at home, try to include
numbers with zeros in lots of different places. It’s the tricky zero that
catches people out for example 709 and 790.
Literacy
Literacy has been action packed
this week. We kicked off on Monday by going on a tour of KS1, tasting different
food types in each room. Needless to say this was a very exciting morning and
the children pushed themselves to taste some things they had never seen before.
Their faces whilst sucking a lemon were extremely entertaining! Alongside
learning about all the different food groups, our main focus has been
adjectives. The children have generated some incredibly impressive and
appropriate adjectives which they will be able to use in their very own healthy
food booklet next week. To help generate and share even more ideas we
facilitated some peer led learning by sending adjective spies into different
classes for the morning.
Topic
The children will no doubt be
ready for the weekend because we have been very active this week. In addition
to planning and filming our own exercise videos we also experimented to find
out what happens to our bodies when we exercise. This helped to consolidate our
learning from last week about all the different parts of the body. The children
seem to be really enjoying the topic and we are very excited to see what they
will produce next week.
Have a lovely weekend.
The KS1 Team
Lower Key Stage 2 Newsletter
Wow
what a fantastic week we have had in LKS2. It’s been full of great learning and
super sensible attitudes. We are particularly impressed with the amount of
reading the children are doing at home and would like to take this opportunity
to thank you for all of your support with this. To ensure we can reward all of
the children for the amazing reading they are doing at home, please ensure they
bring their reading record signed on a Monday morning. Our achiever of the week
this week is the extremely talented Amisha
Teeluck for always going the extra mile with her home learning and
impressing Miss Snowden every day.
Numeracy
This
week, we have been learning how to round to the nearest 10, 100 and even 1000.
The children have really impressed us with then rounding different coin values
to the nearest 10p and pound. Next week
we will be learning lots of different written and mental strategies in order to
solve addition problems. Home learning:
your child will have received a selection of questions and problems from this
week’s learning as a means of embedding and securing the learning that has
taken place. Please also continue to support your child with their learning of
their times tables and basic number bonds to 10 and 100. These basic number
facts underpin almost everything that we cover during numeracy lessons. Thank
you. Next week’s time’s table focus will be the 4 X tables…get practising!
Literacy
This
week we have been learning all about how important it is to use a variety of
adjectives in our writing to make it more interesting and exciting for the
reader. We have then been using these to write exciting diary extracts as a
Viking, describing all of the jobs we do and our roles in a Viking village.
Next week we will be learning how to use adverbs in our writing to describe how
people move and speak. We will then be using these to write a diary entry as a
Viking child, detailing all of the events of their day.
Spellings
These
Spellings will be tested on the 7th October. Please support
your child in practicing their spellings every day to help them achieve 10/10
in their spelling test every week.
Group One
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Group Two
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hay
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familiar
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clay
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choose
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tray
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forward
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play
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forget
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pray
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explain
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say
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captain
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hooray
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elbow
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runway
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empty
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crayons
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sugar
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holiday
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pattern
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Other areas of the
curriculum:
In
PE we have taken inspiration from
Olympic gymnast video footage and have been continuing our gymnastics by
practising our rolls and balances and putting them into sequences.
In
Topic we have been continuing our
studies about the Vikings. We have spent some time finding out about the jobs
the Viking women and children did and have begun our own weaving for a school
display.
In
music, 34B have continued looking at
the instruments available in garage band using the iPads. 34T have been
learning a new song on the recorders and 34S have been learning how to play
percussion instruments.
In
Science we have been looking at the
investigation process involved when carrying out experiments and have focussed
on how to turn data into graphs and charts.
Reminders
· Please can all Year 4 children remember to
bring their swimming kit and goggles if needed every Friday in a bag large
enough to fit their entire uniforms and shoes in – we don’t want to lose any
belongings. Children may also bring a snack to eat on the coach on the way back
to school. This can be a cereal bar or a piece of fruit – no crisps.
· Please ensure your child’s PE kit is kept in
school from Monday-Friday every week.
· As the weather begins to turn that little bit
cooler and wetter, please ensure your child has a suitable outdoor coat/jacket.
Have a fabulous weekend!
Don’t forget to check out our blog: http://robinhoodprimaryyear34.blogspot.co.uk/
Team 3/4
UKS2 Newsletter
News Roundup:
Splat the SATs:
Well done to group 1 and group 2 Year 6 children
this week. These children have been very organised for their Splat the SATs
sessions with Mrs Dale and shown great enthusiasm and maturity. Group 1 and 2 will continue next Tuesday
October 1st and group 3 and 4 will continue on Tuesday 8th
October. Once again, each group will attend every other week during this half
term. Please ensure you have your SAT packs in school the entire time, they can
stay in your tray until your session.
Leeds Children’s Mayor
Just a reminder to the Year 6 children who are
interested in entering the Leeds Children’s Mayor competition. Manifestos,
posters and slogans need to be handed into school by Wednesday October 2nd
so the Year 5/6 teachers can choose one entry to be submitted to the final on
Friday October 4th. The teachers need to enter the winning manifesto
electronically, therefore time is needed for us teachers to type it up and have
it submitted electronically before the deadline. www.breezeleeds.org
Achiever of the Week:
Our Achiever of the Week must go to Alex in 5/6G for
his absolutely amazing handwriting this week, he has been trying so hard to
take care with his presentation and all his determination to succeed has really
paid off… Keep it up, Alex, well done!
Core Subjects:
Numeracy:
This week we have been learning about rounding and
estimating length, mass, capacity and time. The children have been handling
equipment used for measuring and have been very competitive when estimating the
weight of various items. Next week, we will be learning how to add and subtract
using written methods to support our calculations; this includes increasing and
decreasing fractions and percentages of amounts.
Literacy:
This week pupils have been continuing to apply their
skills in writing a successful recount. Our writing has focused specifically on
the 49ers and hardships they experienced in the quest for gold. Next week our
writing concentrates on diary entries. Pupils will be identifying the key
features of a good diary entry and applying their skills from the perspective
of different individuals on board the Titanic.
SPELLINGS: Next week, the
spellings are: guidance, knew, environment, knight, thistle, conscience, gnat,
wreckage, knife, rhythm.
Your child has received a copy of these spellings which have been glued
into their planner. They will be tested on these words on Friday October 4th.
Other areas of the curriculum:
PE:
This week, 5/6G have been furthering their street
dance moves… the children in 5/6G may bring in their street dance clothing next
week for our PE session on Tuesday if they wish, to get into character! 5/6M
have now combined the electric slide with a full sequence of line dancing steps.
We are continuing to perfect the timing and quality of our steps before our
final performance towards the end of term. 5/6MO have revisited the key rock
& roll moves from previous learning. Pupils are currently choreographing
their own whole class rock & roll performance.
Once again, please ensure that your child comes to
school with the appropriate PE kit each week. PE this half term is indoors;
therefore the children will need to wear black shorts and a white t-shirt,
indoor pumps or bare feet too. Miss Gascoigne’s class may wear long tracksuit
bottoms or leggings for our street dance sessions as we may need to use our
knees at times.
5/6M and
5/6MO PE sessions are on Mondays and 5/6G PE sessions are on Tuesdays.
Spanish:
In
Spanish, the children have been enjoying continuing to learn about different
objects and places in the school. This week, they practiced their
conversational Spanish to describe where objects were using the sentence
starter ‘Alli esta’. Why not see if your child can remember what that means?
Science:
This
week in Science, the children re-capped some scientific terms and vocabulary.
We have been learning about making sure an investigation is a fair test and
understanding what independent, dependent and constant variable means. The
children also practiced their graph drawing skills by presenting information in
a bar chart, line graph or scatter graph. Next week, we will be learning how to
draw conclusions from our scientific investigations.
ICT:
In
ICT this week, the children have been carrying out research for the theme for
their motion ICT collage, using Smart Notebook. They have been encouraged to
find images and quotes which support this theme and next week will be starting
to combine these with the motion techniques they’ve learned in previous weeks
to create very effective outcomes!
BLOG
As
you know, we have re-launched our blog this year. However, we are currently
awaiting the link to replace the old link on the school website. In the
meantime, you can find it at the web address below. We plan on building this up
over the year so the children can show off their learning in school, as well as
it being a place for parents to find the newsletter, spellings and information
about the achievers.
Visit our blog: http://year56rhps.blogspot.co.uk
