Friday 16 December 2011

Issue 14 2011-12

Newsletter Issue 14 Friday 16th December 2011

Dear Parent/Carer,

Christmas is upon us! I must say I have never known a term go by quite as quickly as this one.

It has been my delight and privilege to enjoy brilliant Christmas Performances by our children, Nursery to Year 4 this week. I am certain that our staff and talented performers have between them produced the best ever Nativities at Robin Hood. Highlights have included Lily in Nursery who fully explored the emotional depths of her part as Mary and a costume mix up in Reception where one Wise Man arrived on the day in a donkey costume… meaning that our performance uniquely featured two Wise Men and a very full stable. Like our Nursery and Reception, Key Stage One were magnificent – and had the most beautiful costumes I’ve ever seen – and Year 34 once again maintained their exceptionally high performance standards. Mrs Comstive’s Drama Club gave performances of equal professionalism and quality. The performances have been yet another demonstration of the quality, depth and range of exceptional Arts provision at Robin Hood.

The events this week have been fabulously supported by our community. It has been great to see so many parents and grandparents supporting both their children and our school. Our afternoon performances were undoubtedly the best attended ever. These have been great community events and my thanks to everyone who has attended. It is your participation that makes these magical moments for our children.

Our Nursery and Reception classes video conferenced with Santa in Lapland this week and I was amazed to see a Christmas Advent Calendar, created in Powerpoint as his Home Learning, by Elliot in our Reception class. Truly amazing!

Look back on the year
This year in brief included our Ofsted inspection in April, saying goodbye to longstanding colleagues Mrs Bailey and Mr Simpson, the creation of a new Leadership team at the school, the welcoming of Mrs Moore and Miss Snowden to our teaching staff, Miss Johal, Miss Beckwith and Miss Boyes to our Support Staff, welcoming Sara Jackson, Lofthouse Children’s Centre Manager, to our Governing Body, and the remodelling of our Hall. We can look back on 2011 with a great deal of pride and satisfaction and look forward to 2012… which is already shaping up to be a very busy and a very interesting year for us.

Parent Governor
We are also delighted to be welcoming Julie Newell to our Governing Body in her capacity as the newest of our Parent Governors. Julie’s candidacy did not need to go to vote and thus she joins our Body in the New Year. I would like to welcome Julie aboard and look forward to her input as a Governor.

Training Day
The first official day back at school is Tuesday 3rd January, which is a Training Day at Robin Hood. Children return to school after the Christmas break on Wednesday 4th January.

Friendly Faces
A reminder to everyone that Friendly Faces will operate as a term time only provision from Christmas onwards.

Clubs
As usual, there will be no Clubs in the first week after the holiday.

Best wishes for Christmas and the New Year and we look forward to seeing you on 4th January,
Mr Wilson

Friday 9 December 2011

Issue 13 2011-12

Newsletter Issue 13 Friday 9th December 2011

Dear Parent/Carer,

Only one school week left before Christmas! Over two hundred children joined us for the cooked Christmas Dinner this year… served by Mrs Dale and I, alongside our lunchtime staff. With the tree in the Hall, turkey and stuffing and Jingle Bells playing over the speaker system, it certainly felt very Christmassy. My thanks to Mrs Dale, Mrs Smith, Mrs Holland, Mrs Hick, our lunchtime staff and everyone who made our Christmas Dinner enjoyable for the children.

I must say I have never known a term go by quite as quickly as this one. Proof, surely, of the old adage ‘time flies when your having fun!’

The Robins
Just a reminder to everyone that we will be hosting The Robins Awards Ceremony this year on Thursday evening, 22nd March. The Robins will be a celebration of films that have been made this year and of some of our spectacular curriculum creations. We will also be sharing our submissions to the Golden Owls Film Competition. The Golden Owls are a new film competition for children launched by Leeds City Council celebrating the best of young people’s film making across the city. Deadline for entries is 10th February. Robin Hood, of course, intends to submit a number of entries. Children can make films at home and submit their entries via the school.

Christmas Week
I look forward to seeing many parents, families and members of our community at our Christmas events next week. Full details appear on our newsletter blog and Facebook page.

Training Day
In the New Year we have a Training Day on the first day back, Tuesday 3rd January. Children return to school on Wednesday 4th January.

Christmas Disco
Many thanks to everyone who got involved for the PTA Christmas Disco last week. The Hall was certainly rocking and rolling and we had a great many of our children involved. Our newly re-formed PTA needs your help and support. It has real potential to become a very vibrant social and community group that adds real value to our school. The more supporters, helpers, advocates and interest it has… the more effective it can be, the more value it can add to the life of our school and the more important it can become in supporting additional things for our children to enjoy in school than would otherwise be the case. Please get involved in the conversation. Please support our PTA.

Graduate Teacher Trainees
The applications round for the Graduate Teacher Trainee Programme 2012-13 is now open. Robin Hood works in partnership with Teach Leeds – a consortium of nine Primary Schools in Leeds - to provide high quality teacher training. If you know of anyone interested in Teacher Training, please refer them to our website where they should click on the Apply for GTP 2012 button.

Friendly Faces
As of the New Year Friendly Faces will be operating as a Term Time Only Club. This means that we will no longer be offering Holiday Clubs or childcare on school Training Days.

Have a fantastic Christmas Shopping weekend,
Mr Wilson

Nursery Newsletter

NEWS ROUND UP
We have had a very busy and exciting week in Nursery that began with the snow storm on Monday morning!! After the excitement of the winter weather the children were set well on their way to embark on their Christmas preparations! We also had our second celebration afternoon of the school year and would like to say a huge thank you to those parents who came along to share in the children’s successes so far!!

THIS WEEK
The children have been retelling the Nativity story as well as preparing for our very own Nativity performance. We have been busy making gifts, and using our cutting skills to make our very own wish lists for Christmas! The children have also been showcasing their fabulous writing skills as we replied to our very own letter from Santa!!

NEXT WEEK
Will be our last week together before Christmas is here! The children will be involved in a whole heap of festive cheer including our Nativity Performances and our Christmas Parties!

DATES FOR THE DIARY

The TipToe Nativity (Mon, Tues, Wed chn): Tuesday 13th December 10am school hall

Group 1 Christmas Party: Tuesday 13th December 1.45 -2.45

The TipToe Nativity (Wed, Thurs, Fri chn): Thursday 15th December 10am school hall

Group 2 Christmas Party: Thursday 15th December 1.45 -2.45

Please make sure your child’s costume for the Nativity is given to the Nursery staff the day before the performance.
On the day of the Christmas party please provide just a small packed lunch for your child as there will be food including sandwiches available.

HOW YOU CAN HELP US
•Sharing stories and reading regularly
•Playing games (board games, dominoes, I spy etc) to support turn taking, counting etc.
•Spotting numbers, letters and words in the environment
•Practising writing our own names
•Practising putting on our own coats, shoes and socks.

Thank you for your continued support, have a wonderful weekend.
Miss Bradshaw and the Nursery team.


Reception Newsletter
NEWS ROUND UP
Thank you all for the amazing home learning we received on Monday. Miss Abbey has put them on the blog and our ladies have displayed them in the classroom. Thank you too for all the fabulous costumes you have supplied for our Nativity performance.

THIS WEEK
We have had another super week in Reception with high levels of excitement on Monday morning when the snow arrived! We have had to stay inside during the early part of the week as it was very icy, but there have been lots of fabulous activities going on and the children have kept themselves very busy! The children have been working very hard on their performances and we hope you have lots of wonderful memories of your child's part in the nativity.

NEXT WEEK
Will be another really busy one! On Monday we will be watching the dress rehearsal of the Nursery Christmas production and on Tuesday we will be having a sneaky peak at Santa at his home, getting ready for Christmas! We will be having our Christmas party on Thursday afternoon and have asked for your help in providing food (see this week's home learning). The children will be having lunch as normal that day. If you want to send in party clothes for your child, please can you send them in a named carrier bag and we will help them get changed after lunch. Thank you.


Dates for your diary
Thursday 15th December - Reception Party (pm)
Friday 16th December - Carols round the tree 2.30 pm
Friday 16th December - break up day
Tuesday 4th January - staff training day
Wednesday 5th January - children return to school

How you can help us
Please continue to listen to your child's reading for a few minutes every day over the next few weeks to ensure they retain their confidence and enthusiasm.
Please also spend some time reading and writing the tricky words and keywords that were sent home for last week's home learning - we will be moving on to our new words in January.

Thank you for your continued support.

Key Stage 1 Newsletter

How quickly the week has gone! The children all thoroughly enjoyed the Beauty and the Beast Performance. It was a fantastic show for them to watch and we would like to say a massive thank you to all of the children for their outstanding representation of Robin Hood School!

Christmas Production
The time is nearly upon us!
We ask all costumes to be in no later than Monday 12th December.
In case you weren't sure on the times:
Wednesday 14th December 2pm -3pm
Thursday 15th December 6pm - 7pm.

Home Learning
We would also like to say thank you to all of the parents and carers in their support with the children's home learning. We have seen a vast range of super castles, interesting stories about castles, trips out to castles, using ICT to show off learning about castles and even our very own Castle cake which Year 1/2 had the pleasure of eating! It is absolutely fantastic how much support goes in to the home learning and we appreciate your feedback on how you have found the tasks that have been set.

Reading Records
It is really important to continue to log in your child's reading record any reading or other learning your children do at home. Over the Christmas period the children will take home books to read but also any other learning you feel you would like to share with us, please let us know! Your communication is extremely important to us and we want to know about any fantastic learning!

Next week
The final week of term is here and how quickly time flys when you’re having fun! The week will have a Religious Education focus where the children will learn about Christmas around the world. The children will be using a range of skills to make Christmas cards and calendars. We are sure you will like them!

Key Stage One Party
The Key Stage One Party will take place on Thursday 15th December during the afternoon in the hall. MEAL ARRANGEMENTS ARE AS NORMAL. Please supply your children with party clothes and where possible some food or drink for the party. This could be anything from sausage rolls, crisps and dip, cakes and squash. No fizzy drinks or nuts. Thank you!

We hope you have a lovely weekend!

The Key Stage One Team

LKS2 Newsletter

We have had a fantastic week in 3/4 full of lots of exciting fun filled learning! During ICT the children have been continuing with their amazing trainer video adverts and we can't wait to see the finished outcomes next week. During RE we have finished publishing the Christmas nativity story in the style of a comic strip!

Literacy
This week the children have been writing a persuasive letter to Santa outlining all the reasons as to why he should not strike this Christmas. The children have used lots of persuasive features such as rhetorical questions, quotations and statistics to support their writing. They have also grouped their fantastic ideas and summarised these in a concluding paragraph.

Numeracy
In Numeracy, the children have been practising their mental strategies for subtraction by taking away multiples of ten and adjusting. We then used all of our mental and written strategies for addition and subtraction to plan a party for the 'I'm A Celebrity' contestants as they left the jungle.

Reminders

Christmas Party
Our Christmas party is on Thursday 15th December so please can all children bring some party clothes to get changed in to. As our party is after dinner (MEAL ARRANGEMENTS ARE AS NORMAL), please could all children bring a small food or drink contribution such as crisps, buns, biscuits etc.

Production
Our dress rehearsal for our Christmas Production ‘Santa’s on Strike’ is on Monday 12th December at 1:30 pm. Please can everyone bring their costumes in to school on Monday ready to get changed into after lunch. If your child has not been given a speaking part, they will all be participating in the production through singing and dancing. Each class will be performing their own dance.

Mrs Moore’s class = ‘Reindeers’. Please can they wear brown tights / leggings or track suit bottoms and a brown T – shirt. Please can they have ‘antlers-on-an-aliceband’ headpiece.

Miss Thackeray’s class =‘Carol singers’. Please wear Christmas clothes, hats, scarf’s and gloves. Lanterns are optional.

Miss Nicholls’ class = Domestic jobbers. Please wear Christmas clothes, an apron, rubber gloves, hairnets and have a duster or feather duster at hand.

Rudolph = Please can they wear brown tights / leggings or track suit bottoms and a brown T – shirt. Please can they have ‘antlers-on-an-aliceband’ headpiece and a red nose.

The elves = Colourful tunics/tabards, tights, pointed cloth hats and shoes, aprons etc are a good start, but feel free to experiment.

People playing the part of family members = Pyjamas, dressing gowns, coats and normal casual garments are all that is required. A bit of tailoring or borrowing from parents may be required for those playing adults.

To remind you our production dates are: Tuesday 13th December 2:00pm and Wednesday 14th December - 6:00pm. Both productions will be taking place in the school hall. No tickets are required.

Look forward to seeing you there,
3/4 Team

UKS2 Newsletter

News Roundup:
•Congratulations to Phoebe Millard, Megan Spafford, Millie Reynolds and Chloe Jackson who are our Achievers of the Week. They have worked collaboratively this week to design, plan and build a prototype for a new seat in the school playground. Their design was well thought out, cleverly designed and beautifully presented -a very purposeful design. Well done girls.
•The Year 5/6 Christmas Party will be held on Thursday 15th December.MEAL ARRANGEMENTS ARE AS NORMAL. The children should come to school that day in uniform but bring party clothes to change into in the afternoon. For the party, we would appreciate contributions on the day of crisps, biscuits and buns as well as sugar free drinks.
•Year 5/6 will be leading the Christmas service at church on Friday 16th December at 10am. We hope to see you there!
•Reminder: Payment is due by Friday 16th December for the Year 5/6 trip to the West Yorkshire Playhouse, which will take place during the first week back after Christmas. Thank you.
Numeracy:
•The focus this week has been interpreting the data collected from Mario Kart on the Wii and DS. We collated Yoshi, Mario, Donkey Kong's and Toad's trial times to establish the overall winner and have then calculated average lap times as well as modal positions.
•Home Learning: The Times Tables Challenge will take place on Thursday 15th December. Ahead of this, please practise ALL times tables! Useful websites include http://www.teachingtables.co.uk/bingo/caller/caller.html as well as http://www.woodlands-junior.kent.sch.uk/maths/timestable/interactive.htm
Literacy:
•'Christmas in Leeds MUST be cancelled' was the message we received from the Lord Mayor this week! We've considered the points he made but have gathered reasons to persuade him to change his mind. In our letters, our focus has been on developing links between paragraphs.
Other areas of the curriculum:
•In DT, we've been designing and making kites, including diamond kites, box kites and sail kites. We've been learning about the different parts of a kite and are using this technical vocabulary with super accuracy.
•In Music, Mrs Brook’s class have continued to practise Silent Night on the recorders ahead of the service at church next week. Miss Darroch's class have been continuing to learn the words to Little Donkey in sign language. Miss Gascoigne’s class have been continuing to create mash-ups of popular Christmas songs using Garageband.
•In ICT, we've been navigating robots around our Mario Kart themed tracks, with a particular focus on including a sensor in procedures.
Visit our blogs!
•5/6B http://robinhood56b.blogspot.com/
•5/6D http://robinhood56d.blogspot.com/
•5/6G http://robinhood56g.blogspot.com/

Friday 2 December 2011

Issue 12 2011-12

Dear Parent/Carer,

It’s December already! Only two school weeks left this year…

Positive Feedback
I have had the pleasure of showing a number of prospective parents for our Reception class 2012 around our school during the past few weeks. It has been lovely to hear lots of positive feedback – even from those families who know they have little chance of securing a place with us for their child. It remains a source of frustration for us that we are unable to satisfy more of our average of 75 First Choice Preferences for our 45 Reception spaces.

Christmas Dates
Parents, families and community are welcomed to join us for our Christmas Productions. Here is the full schedule of events this Christmas:

Friday 9th December 10:00am Reception Production

Tuesday 13th December 10:00am Nursery Production
1:00pm Nursery party
2:00pm LKS2 Production
3:30pm Drama Group Production

Wednesday 14th December 2:00pm KS1 Production
6:00pm LKS2 Production

Thursday 15th December 10:00am Nursery Production
11:00am LKS2 Christmas party
1:00pm Nursery & Reception parties
1:45pm KS1 & UKS2 parties
6:00pm KS1 Production

Friday 16th December 10:00am Christmas Service at Lofthouse Church
2:30pm Carols Around the Tree


Christmas Lunch is next Wednesday, 7th December. Unfortunately, we’re up to capacity, so no more orders can be taken.

In the New Year we have a Training Day on the first day back, Tuesday 3rd January. Children return to school on Wednesday 4th January.

Christmas Disco
Our PTA will be hosting Christmas Discos for all children tonight. I’m sure that everyone will have a wonderful time. This is the time for you to bring your input as our PTA re-formulates and grows. Our PTA raises much needed funds that enhance the quality of our children’s experience at Robin Hood. Your support, help and donations are vitally important to helping the experience at Robin Hood be the best it can possibly be.

Friendly Faces
As of the New Year Friendly Faces will be operating as a Term Time Only Club. This means that we will no longer be offering Holiday Clubs or childcare on school Training Days.

Bags 2 School
There will be a Bags 2 School collection on 5th December.

Photographs
Also a note to say: Don't forget to get your photograph orders in by Tuesday 6th December for Christmas delivery.

Have a fantastic weekend,
Mr Wilson

Nursery Newsletter

NEWS ROUND UP
Christmas has finally arrived in Nursery - the children returned to school on Thursday to our super new areas. (Thank you to the support staff for their hard work in getting everything ready!) Once we receive your home learning decorations next week we really will have created a magical place.

THIS WEEK
As well as sharing the Nativity story with the children, we have been rehearsing our own Nativity production. It has been great to see the children retelling the story and making the links between their own performances and the original Nativity story. Well done to everybody who has been practising the songs and rehearsing their lines. Please keep up the hard work as we are nearly ready to impress you with our star quality!

NEXT WEEK
In Literacy we will be creating and writing some secret things which we will be sending home before Christmas (but ask no questions!) as well as printing our own gift wrap! We will also be practising our Nativity production and we will be performing a dress rehearsal. Please make sure costumes are in Nursery for Monday 12th Dec for the first group of children and again Wednesday 14th for the second group of children. Thank you.

The performances will be on Tuesday 13th December at 10am and 15th December in the school hall at 10am. We look forward to seeing you there.... don’t forget your tissues!!

HOW YOU CAN HELP US
The children are making fabulous progress as the year moves along, and we are very proud of all the children. Please continue to support your child at home, sharing stories regularly, playing number games, singing songs and rhymes and also practising to write their own names.

Thank you for your continued support

RECEPTION NEWS ROUND UP
Christmas has finally arrived in Reception - the children returned to school on Thursday to our super new areas. (Thank you to the support staff for their hard work in getting everything ready!) Once we receive your home learning decorations next week we really will have created a magical place.

THIS WEEK
As well as sharing the Nativity story with the children, we have been rehearsing our own Nativity production. It has been great to see the children retelling the story and making the links between their own performances and the original Nativity story. Well done to everybody who has been practising the songs and rehearsing their lines. Please keep up the hard work as we are nearly ready to impress you with our star quality!
In numeracy we have been writing the numbers for our own advent calendar and creating our own baubles to put on our tree.

NEXT WEEK
In Literacy we will be creating and writing some secret things which we will be sending home before Christmas (but ask no questions!) as well as printing our own gift wrap and tags. We will also be practising our Nativity production and we will be performing a dress rehearsal on Thursday to Key Stage one.
Please can you make sure that all named costumes are in school for Monday 5th December. Thank you.
The performance will be next Friday(December 9th) in the school hall at 10am. We will positively be encouraging you to sing along with the songs!

HOW YOU CAN HELP US
Miss Lambert and I have done one to one reading assessments with the children and are thrilled at the progress that the children are making. Please keep reading for at least five minutes every day to ensure we maintain their confidence and the momentum. We are also sending home a list of tricky words and keywords to practice reading and writing before we move onto our new words in January.
If you haven't yet completed and returned the ICT questionnaire, please can you spend a couple of minutes doing that for us too?

Thank you for your continued support

KS1 Newsletter
Key Stage 1 have had a fantastic week of treats and fun! The children have been showing off all their learning so far and taken part in key assessments in Reading, Writing, Numeracy and Phonics. The staff are VERY proud of every member of KS1 for the amazing effort and dedication they show towards their learning.

Beauty and the Beast
The children are all very excited about the upcoming trip to The Carriageworks to see Beauty and the Beast. The children will need to wear their school uniform as normal on Tuesday 6th December. We aim to be back at school for 4:45pm. If there are any delays, school will be informed and a message will be passed on to parents.

Numeracy
This week the child have completed assessments in addition and subtraction, showing the strategies they use when adding/subtracting:
• a single digit number to a single digit number(7 + 9 = ) (8 - 3= )
• a two digit number to a single digit number (27 + 6 = ) (37 - 9 = )
• a two digit number to a two digit number ( 34 + 46 = ) ( 73 - 12 = )
The children have continued to show their skills when adding three numbers together
( 5 + 6 + 5 = ) (31 + 12 + 4 = ). Progressing onto adding and subtracting within the same sum (13 + 6 - 3 = ) (45 - 14 + 5 = ).

Please continue to support your child at home, developing their addition and subtraction skills by giving them sums to complete. Your child can bring these into school so we can celebrate the learning too!

Next week the children will be applying their knowledge of addition and subtraction to word problems such as:
• 12 children are on a bus.
8 children get off.
Then 4 more get off the bus.

How many children are left on the bus?

There are 29 children. 5 children are painting. How many children are NOT painting?

• There are 1000 pieces in a puzzle. 12 of then go missing. How many pieces are left?

Why not provide your child with some word problems ahead of next week....

Literacy
This week concluded the block on Narrative writing with the children writing their final Julia Donaldson style story. The children have particularly enjoyed reading the amazing stories written by Julia Donaldson and they have also had the opportunity to watch the Gruffalo DVD, which has helped to further develop their understanding of the book. The KS1 team are very proud of the stories which include, CAPITAL LETTERS, full stops, text effects (bold text, CAPITALIZATION, .........., !!!!!!!) developed ideas using (so, if, but, because, and, when), adjectives (describing words), verbs (doing words) and even adverbs (describes what the verb is doing, walking quietly, running quickly).

Next week the children will be looking at reading and writing instructions to make Christmas decorations, Christmas Cards and Calendars. The children will look at the structure, organisation and language used within instructions in order to support people following them correctly.

Topic
This week the children have been busy investigating different materials and discussing their properties. They have looked at wood, plastic, glass, brick, cotton, silk and discussed which materials would be good for different aspects of a castle building and why that material would be good to use. The children have also looked at investigating how to test which material would keep Belle warm and dry during a snowy/rainy Christmas at the castle.

Why not ask your child what their predictions were and what they found out from the investigation.......

LKS2 Newsletter

We have had a very busy week in Year 3/4! The children have been applying all their new learning this week and blowing us away with the progress that has already been made this year!

We have also begun practising this year's production "Santa's on Strike!". Please ensure that if your child has been given a speaking part that they are practising at home as much as possible. We are aiming to practise our performance (without scripts) next week as the production will be taking place on Tuesday 13th December 2:00 - 3:00pm and Wednesday 14th December 6:00 - 7:00pm. Both productions will be taking place in the school hall. No tickets are required.

Literacy
The children have been writing an engaging magazine article, targeting families and their need for a fun, stress-free day out. We have been impressed with how the children have been using all the persuasive features we have been learning this half term. Next week, the children will be using their persuasive skills to write to Santa and hopefully persuade him to return from his strike in time for Christmas.

Numeracy
In Numeracy, the children have been applying their written and mental strategies for addition and subtraction. Next week, the children will be continuing to apply these strategies within multi-step problems, including money.

Reminders

Last week we started to learn the songs for this years Christmas production ‘Santa’s on Strike’. All the children have been given the song words so please continue rehearsing at home!

If your child has not been given a speaking part, they will all be participating in the production through singing and dancing. Each class will be performing their own dance.

Mrs Moore’s class = ‘Reindeers’. Please can they wear brown tights / leggings or track suit bottoms and a brown T – shirt. Please can they have ‘antlers-on-an-aliceband’ headpiece.

Miss Thackeray’s class =‘Carol singings’. Please wear Christmas clothes, hats, scarves and gloves. Lanterns are optional.

Miss Nicholls’ class = Domestic jobbers. Please wear Christmas clothes, an apron, rubber gloves, hairnets and have a duster or feather duster at hand.

Santa = Santa should be portrayed in his traditional red suit and beard.

Mrs Santa = wearing red too, or perhaps a ‘homely’ costume including an apron, big slippers and a headscarf.

Rudolph = Please can they wear brown tights / leggings or track suit bottoms and a brown T – shirt. Please can they have ‘antlers-on-an-aliceband’ headpiece and a red nose.


The elves = Colourful tunics/tabards, tights, pointed cloth hats and shoes, aprons etc are a good start, but feel free to experiment.

People playing the part of family members = Pyjamas, dressing gowns, coats and normal casual garments are all that is required. A bit of tailoring or borrowing from parents may be required for those playing adults

Thank you,

Team 3/4

UKS2 Newsletter
News Roundup

•This week’s Achiever of the Week goes to Rosie Soroka, for her excellent letter of invitation to her favourite band, in an attempt to persuade them to attend our school disco! Well done, Rosie!
• The children have brought home details about the Year 5/6 trip to the theatre during the first week back after Christmas. We will be spending the whole day at the West Yorkshire Playhouse taking part in drama based activities in the morning and then watching a performance of Annie in the afternoon. Payment for the trip must be returned to school by Friday December 16th. Thank you.

Numeracy:
This week, we have been collecting data using Mario Kart on the Wii and DS. From this, we're calculating the time it's taken to complete each lap as well as calculating our speed for each lap. Next week, we'll be continuing our analysis of the data as well as finding the average, mode and range for data collected from Wii Mario Kart.

Home learning:
The Times Tables Challenge will be taking place on Wednesday 14th December. Please practise ALL times tables ahead of this!
Try the following website to get you up to speed with your times tables... for a real challenge, why not try this at zero seconds!!!!:
http://www.teachingtables.co.uk/bingo/caller/caller.html

Literacy
This week, we have been writing to a Mario Kart driver of our choice to persuade them to drive for our team. There were lots of very tempting offers made such as heated seats, a car which had low air resistance etc. We focused on including lots of 'stars' in our writing including superlatives and literary features.

Home Learning: This week’s spellings are linked to our Literacy next week which is based around the statement Christmas should be abolished: abolished, merrily, festivities, celebration, nativity, traditional, cancelling, Santa Claus, Bethlehem, ceremonies
This weekend, gather some reasons for and against Christmas being abolished

Other areas of the curriculum:
In DT, we've been exploring flight and have been making prototypes of kites. We're evaluating the kites to help inform the design. Next week, we'll make the kite.

In Music Mrs Brook’s class have been perfecting their performance of Silent Night on the recorders.
Miss Gascoigne’s class have been continuing to create mash-ups of popular Christmas songs using Garageband.
Miss Darroch’s class have been learning sign language to the first verse of Little Donkey.

5/6D http://robinhood56d.blogspot.com/
Visit our Blogs! 5/6G http://robinhood56g.blogspot.com/
5/6B http://robinhood56b.blogspot.com/