Newsletter Issue 21 |
Friday 24th February 2012
|
Dear Parent/Carer,
Welcome back to a new Half Term at Robin Hood. I returned to school ‘late’ on Monday morning, having first attended a Headteacher Briefing. Three things struck me immediately on my arrival at half past ten. The first thing was how fantastic the school grounds look. Mr Reynolds spent much of last week hard at work with his pressure washer, and the school environment looks truly fantastic as a result… a testament to his hard work and dedication. I then went into the Key Stage One area, which is beautifully dressed for the new London Topic. Our Year One and Two children were in the Hall solving the problems caused by the Great Fire in 1666. The enthusiasm of our staff and our children, all dressed in role throughout the week to create a rich and immersive learning experience, is truly impressive. We have an incredible team of people with fantastic energy and imagination who are creating wonderful learning opportunities for our children. I am certain that parents of children in Reception are hearing lots about Traditional Tales, our Year 3/4 parents are hearing all about our Mysterious World topic, and our Y5/6 parents are hearing all about Japan.
My thanks to all parents… The Home Learning you are sharing with your children is superb. Special thanks to our Year 1/2 parents this week for entering the spirit of the Topic, which the children have really loved. Dressing in character all week has without doubt deepened their connection with the Topic. All of those I have spoke with have been able to describe in detail large chunks of the learning this week.
International Week of lunches
We are having an International Week of Lunches during the week commencing 27th February. Children taking School Dinners will be treat to a menu from around the world, a different country every day.
Date for your Diary
On Monday 30th April we will be hosting a community event after school for which the School Hall will be open to all children, parents/carers and grandparents, uncles and aunties to help make as many pom-poms as we can! The event will be led by Sarah Barton, Educational Officer for the Leeds Industrial Museum, who will be helping us create enough pom-poms to make our very own life-sized sheep! The Robin Hood Primary School sheep will be part of an exhibition celebrating British wool and will feature in the Museum over the coming year. Sarah will be holding an Assembly first thing in the morning for children. We will be making our first pom-pom during the day. Please help us to make the most pom-poms… and to make the biggest pom-pom sheep we can. If you have any wool to donate, or can just turn up to take part – please play your part in helping us to make this a really fun community event. Likewise, if you can make pom-poms at home with your child and then bring them into school… the more pom-poms, the better!
Community Role
A great school, of course, aims to be at the heart of its’ community. I am delighted with the community activity that we are involved in as a school. Our end of Topic celebrations are incredibly well supported by our community – my thanks to you, as are our Topics themselves… with children dressing the part, etc. Our children are absolutely clear and very proud about the contribution that they are making to their community. Following are two further stories about our community engagement…
Art on display at Rothwell Library
Rothwell Library is currently hosting an exhibition of Artworks by pupils at Robin Hood. The Art on display has been inspired by Spanish painters. The Artworks showcased are mosaics from Key Stage 1, Spanish towns by Lower Key Stage 2 and beautiful paintings inspired by Miquel Barcelo by Upper Key Stage 2 artists. Foundation Stage are exhibiting work based on the Elmer series of books. Please do visit the Library to view the exhibition and see the fantastic Artworks. The Library is open Mon-Fri 9.00am-7.00pm, Sat 10.00am-4.00pm, Sun 12.00pm-4.00pm. The exhibition runs until Tuesday 27th March.
Artwork from Robin Hood is now being displayed in an incredible nine separate locations around the city. Pupils from Robin Hood can truly be said to be contributing to making Leeds both beautiful and great.
Parent Forum
Our next Parent Forum will be held in the Community Annexe – Friendly Faces building – from 9.00am, Friday 2nd March. Come along for a coffee and a chat with Mrs Dale (Deputy Head teacher) and Mrs Ann Parker (Governor) about any aspect of school life that you like. The Parent Forum is designed as an opportunity for you to share your thoughts about school in an informal atmosphere with Governors and School Leaders.
Have a lovely weekend,
Mr Wilson
Nursery Newsletter
NEWS ROUND UP
The children have returned to Nursery full of enthusiasm and ready to roll with our new topic of Traditional Tales. Thank you for the home learning that came with them this week, it has beautifully enhanced our new areas in the classroom and the children have thoroughly enjoyed using the props in their play.
THIS WEEK
We have been sharing the story of Little Red Riding Hood. The children have been using puppets and story cards to retell the story and have been engaging in role play, acting out the events and taking turns to be the different characters, making the most of our new woodland cottage home corner.
Within number we have been looking at simple division. We have been making buns with the playdough and sharing them with our friends, making sure we all had the same so it was fair!
NEXT WEEK
We will be continuing with our traditional tales and sharing the story of the 3 little pigs. We will be putting on our creative hats once more to explore different media and materials to make a fabulous display. We will also be enhancing our construction site, encouraging the children’s imagination around planning and building models.
The children will also continue to learn about simple division, number recognition and shapes.
How you can help us
· Build simple models with Lego, empty food boxes at home.
· Share stories and rhymes, engaging in conversation about characters and events
· Practise writing your child’s name – naming the letters in their name as they write them.
· Draw simple pictures – people, a house, flowers etc to help develop your child’s pencil control.
Many thanks for your continued support
Have a super week.
Miss Bradshaw and the Nursery team
RECEPTION NEWS ROUND UP
We've had another brilliant week in Reception. The children came back full of energy and enthusiasm and have had a fantastic time immersing themselves in our new topic of Traditional tales! Thank you too for all the amazing home learning which we are delighted with!
THIS WEEK
We have been sharing the story of Little Red Riding Hood and then retelling using 'Pie-Corbett which is an exciting way of storytelling - adding actions to the words. Ask your child to show you what they have learned and we are sure you will be impressed! In our literacy sessions we have been creating story maps and adding the characters narrative to our maps using speech bubbles. We have been practising using different voices for each character and the children have really enjoyed using the puppets too.
NEXT WEEK
We will continue our Traditional Tales theme but will be learning about the Three Little Pigs. The children will be sharing the story and then we will be asking them to re write the story adding their own ending, drawing on the pattern of traditional story language (Once Upon a Time, and Happily Ever After) so do watch this space! In numeracy we will be continuing with our theme of sharing (division) by sharing out food amongst the three pigs and thinking about what we can do if we have any left over.
PLEASE note that next Thursday is World Book Day and we would love all the children (and staff!) to come to school dressed as their favourite traditional tale book character. Our home learning task this week will support this event.
HOW YOU CAN HELP US
- By listening to your child's fabulous reading for at least five minutes every day
- By learning the words of the week which are: I'm, don't, old, by, house, time
- By sending in your unwanted boxes etc for our junk modelling activities
- By completing the home learning and sending in with your child on Monday morning
- By sharing the story on line - Ipad LITE 3 Little Pigs or .http://www.kizclub.com/storytime/threepigs/pig1.html
Thank you for your support.
KS1 Newsletter
Well what a fantastic way we have started our new topic all about London
Topic
The children started the week as soon as they entered the building! The Key Stage One mall was a sight to behold and all the children were 'wowed' by all that they could see. Then they enjoyed a visit from William Petty who explained to the children in great detail about the Great Fire of London and what happened. The children took part in experiments to feel what it was like to be part of the Great Fire and how they could help to put it out! They gained an enormous amount of knowledge from this experience and showed great enthusiasm to the tasks. Well done to you all!
Numeracy
This week the children have been doing lots of dividing! They have spent the week using arrays to divide rats in to different amounts of groups. This has included 2's, 3's, 4's, 5's, 6's, 7's, 8's, 9's and 10's. The children have also been using their mental skills of counting forwards to quickly solve division problems such as 10 divided by 2. We are very impressed by how much the children have been challenging themselves in their learning. Well done to you all!
Literacy
The children have used their William Petty experience to start the new unit on 'Recounts'. They have produced a recount all about what happened on Monday and how much fun they had! We are very impressed with the detail that they put in to their writing and they have shown great enthusiasm towards showing off their best writing!
Next Week
World Book Day
This will take place on Thursday 1st March. Please feel free for your children to wear the costumes that they have worn this week as we will be linking our day to the past. However, if you still want to dress up in your favourite book character we look forward to seeing these outfits too!
Numeracy
The children will be continuing to understand how to solve division problems. Any counting at home, particularly in 2's, 3's, 4's, 5's and 10's will support the children in their learning. In particular the Year 2 children will be understanding the concept of remainders and they will be solving word problems all about the Great Fire of London.
Literacy and Topic
These will be linked together next week. The children will be playing the role of the 'Mayor' and writing a diary about his experience of the Great Fire of London. The children will also be creating their own London Gazette' as another opportunity to show their understanding of the Great Fire of London.
Have a lovely weekend!
The Key Stage One Team
LKS2 Newsletter
We have had a very fun and eventful week back in year 3/4 and would like to congratulate all the children for their sensible and mature attitudes towards their learning. Thank you to everyone for the amazing home learning we have received, it's really kicked off our exciting topic 'Our Mysterious World'. We were blown away by the fantastic posters, radio broadcasts, news paper articles and models of different mysterious phenomena!!!
Numeracy
In Numeracy, the children have been developing their mental multiplication and division skills through doubling, halving and finding quarters, eighths and sixths of a given number. The children have also been finding the related division facts when multiplying by 10 and 100. Next week we will be focussing on the 3 and 6 times tables and developing our written strategies for multiplication using arrays and the grid method.
Here are some great activities to support your child's learning:
http://www.topmarks.co.uk/Flash.aspx?f=dartboarddoublesandhalves (A great revisit for the doubling and halving we've used this week)
http://www.fieryideas.com/tnt-tables-46-c.asp (TNT Tables - an addictive activity to practise times tables)
http://www.topmarks.co.uk/Flash.aspx?f=gridmethodpvcardsv3 (A resource we plan to use in class to support place value when multiplying)
Literacy
To start off the week we watched a mystifying news report about Bigfoot being sited at
This is the last week of our 'Reading Around The World Challenge' and we encourage the children to read as much as possible in order to get lots of air miles and travel around the world. Each 10 minutes of reading time is 500 air miles. Some children are already on their second attempt.
RE
The children have watched an animated version of the Easter story which they will be representing during their ICT sessions using comic life. We will also be capturing scenes from the story in mural paintings. These will be used in our Easter service on Friday 30th March at Lofthouse church.
PE
This half term our PE unit is basket ball where we will be learning lots of skills from dribbling to shooting. The children will then put these into a dance routine in the style of 'High School Musical'.
Reminders
Next Thursday March 1st is World Book Day. Everyone is encouraged to come to school dressed as their favourite book character. Please could children also bring an art shirt with them as well.
Spellings
Group 1
(/or/, /ar/)
1. born
2. fork
3. short
4. morning
5. forget
6. park
7. shark
8. yard
9. parcel
10. garden
Group 2
1. quicker
2. quickest
3. colder
4. coldest
5. taller
6. tallest
7. closer
8. closest
9. bigger
10. biggest
1. born
2. fork
3. short
4. morning
5. forget
6. park
7. shark
8. yard
9. parcel
10. garden
Group 2
1. quicker
2. quickest
3. colder
4. coldest
5. taller
6. tallest
7. closer
8. closest
9. bigger
10. biggest
Thank you,
Team 3/4
UKS2 News Roundup:
- Our achiever this week is Kian Wade! He has created an amazing wave picture this week, based on the Japanese artwork of Hokusai. The techniques he has used are truly outstanding and he should be extremely proud of himself. Well done, Kian!
- Please can we ask that the children bring back their permission slips for the Wagamama's trip by Monday- Thank you.
- Can children from Mrs Brook's and Miss Darroch's classes please bring in a plain pillowcase in preparation for making the Japanese Koiniboros. It does not necessarily have to be white but it must be plain.
- Thank you everyone for the fabulous home learning that we have received. We really appreciate the engagement from parents in supporting this. The quality has shown a marked improvement and we are very grateful for that.
- World Book Day will be on Thursday next week. Please carry on reading to try and get as far around the world as possible.
Numeracy:
- This week in Numeracy, our focus has been on 2D and 3D shapes. We've been revisiting the language and properties of shape and carrying out investigations to explore nets.
- Home Learning: Please complete the sheet looking at and studying Tangrams.
Literacy:
- This week, the children have been creating news reports around an annual event in
Japan Tokyo - Home Learning: Please read regularly and record the number of minutes you are reading for the Global Reading Challenge! Please learn the spellings, which prepare the children for spelling accuracy in next week's writing activities.
Other areas of the curriculum:
- We have kicked off our
Japan Japan Mount Fuji . Next week, each class will rotate to carry out one of these areas of learning. - We have also given the children opportunities to look at Japanese artefacts and objects, promoting rich discussions. The children have also eaten Japanese snacks and marvelled at the unusual tastes and bright packaging!
- Our blogs:
