Weekly Newsletter

Attendance update from the DFE As you will know, we have been working hard on promoting school attendance,in line with the DFE target of 96%. This week we received an official communication which was also sent to healthcare practitioners, around supporting families in judging when an illness is enough to keep a child from school:

There is wide agreement among health professionals and educational professionals that school attendance is vital to the life chances of children and young people. Being in school improves health, wellbeing and socialisation throughout the life course. The greatest benefits come from children and young people attending school regularly.

It is usually appropriate for parents and carers to send their children to school with mild respiratory illnesses. This would include general cold symptoms: a minor cough, runny nose or sore throat. However, children should not be sent to school if they have a temperature of 38°C or above. The NHS ‘Is my child too ill for school?’ guidance (https://www.nhs.uk/live-well/is-my-child too-ill-for-school/) has further information.

In addition to respiratory illnesses, we are aware that more children may be absent from school due to symptoms of anxiety than before the pandemic. Worry and mild or moderate anxiety, whilst sometimes difficult emotions, can be a normal part of growing up for many children and young people. Being in school can often help alleviate the underlying issues. A prolonged period of absence is likely to heighten a child’s anxiety about attending in the future, rather than reduce it. DfE has also published useful guidance on mental health issues affecting a pupil’s attendance (https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/mental-health-issues-affecting-a-pupils attendance-guidance-for-schools)

Parking Please park with consideration for local residents. earlier this week we had a call to say that a carer could not reach her patient due to cars blocking access in the area around Dawson's. Thank you.

A message from the Parish Council:

We need your voices and your input to make our community even better!

Join us for a Public Meeting on Thursday, September 28th 2023, at 6:30pm at the Brayton Community Centre.

Let's come together to address Anti-Social Behaviour concerns that have been affecting Brayton Community Centre and playing field, as part of a community conferencing approach.

Your opinions matter, and we want to hear from YOU!

This meeting is a fantastic opportunity for us to:

Share our concerns

Exchange ideas

Collaboratively find solutions

Strengthen our community bonds

Light refreshments will be available to keep us going as we discuss the way forward! Your presence can make a real difference. Let's make Brayton an even better place to live!

RAAC Following on from my Dojo message about the school buildings, please see this further communication from the STAR central team:

Following the widely reported issue of reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete (RAAC) in schools across the UK, as the Responsible Body we wanted to communicate and provide an update regarding the status at our Trust.

Earlier this year the Department for Education (DfE) requested that all Trusts with buildings constructed between 1930 and 1990 complete a questionnaire. This was fully completed and returned on time.
On receipt of our completed questionnaires, external surveys for relevant STAR MAT schools were commissioned through Hibbert Smith Consulting Ltd, concluding that the ‘likelihood of RAAC panels being utilised as part of the building structure at the schools in question is considered to be very low.’ The DfE confirmed that no further action was required by the Trust. Despite this response from the DfE we have conducted additional inspections in our schools during training day closures - all of which concluded with the same outcome.

We continue to monitor the situation and the ongoing risk assessment in line with all guidance around this and all other aspects of compliance, Health and Safety. The safety and welfare of our students, staff and families is paramount.

If you have any questions regarding this matter please contact enquiries@starmat.uk.

Y5 & Y6 children If you feel that as your child is getting older, they are able to either walk home independently or meet a family member on the Green, please let us know at the school office so that we can update your consents and let staff know.

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 this school year are on the school website at https://brayton-cofe-primary-school.secure-primarysite.net/term-dates/

We have had to make a slight change to the training days in 2024: children are now expected back in school on Monday 8 January 2024 after the Christmas break, and there will be a training day on Friday 24 May 2024 instead of this.

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: 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.

No up to date regional or national attendance figures are available until next week, attendance this week has been 95.5% across school. With your help we made massive improvements in attendance over last year and this is now better across school than it has been in a very long time!

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.

Monday 2 October - Open classrooms 2:45pm-3:30pm

Wednesday 11 October - School photographs (individual and sibling)

Thursday 26 October - School closes for half term

Friday 27 October - Training day (school closed to children)

Monday 6 November - School opens

Friday 22 December - School closes for Christmas

Monday 8 January - School opens

Friday 9 February - School closes for half term

Thursday 21 March - School closes for Easter

Friday 22 March - STAR MAT training day (schools closed to children)

Monday 8 April - School opens

Monday 6 May - May Day Bank Holiday

Thursday 23 May - School closes for half term

Friday 24 May - Training day (school closed to children)

Monday 3 June - School opens

Friday 19 July - School closes for summer

Monday 22 July - Training day (school closed to children)

Lily Smith

Ronnie Spowage

Samuel Short

Oliver Dockray

Alfie Longhurst

Alex Yesil

Ben Ingham

Piper Hartley

Ellie Graley

This week we have looked at the story ‘Owl Babies’ by Martin Waddell. The children have enjoyed acting out the story in our tuff tray, making their own owls using natural materials and making nests for our baby owls. They have also drawn a self portrait to go on their individual boards in Stars.

In phonics this week we have practised being a good listener and have played lots of games to develop our listening skills. In maths we have been sorting and matching objects and identifying things that are the same.

The children have continued to explore the provision and are starting to learn each other’s names and make new friends.

Star of the Week: Harley Berridge

We have all continued to settle into the daily routines of school life, taking turns and sharing fairly. We have discussed classroom expectations and the children have contributed to the rules and boundaries in Early Years.

On Monday, we introduced the phonics programme ‘Essential Letters and Sounds’. This week the children have been taught ‘s, a, t, p’. Look out for a log in to Oxford Owl, where your child can read a decodable book matched to their phonic knowledge. This gave us the perfect opportunity to focus on fine motor control and to help the children to hold a pencil correctly.

We also shared ‘The Colour Monster’ by Anna Llenas https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=68Ta6crRe4Y and we have been discussing emotions using the colour monsters to help us talk about how we are feeling. In worship we met Jack and sang some fun songs set to well-known tunes and shared our first Bible story about Creation.

Star of the week

Moon - Elsie Skade

Mercury - Mason Corbally

We’re back to full weeks and the children are doing a brilliant job of settling into Year 1 and working hard. The children have been working fantastically in their White Rose maths books and applying their reception knowledge to help them organise, group, count and represent different objects. It’s been great to see them using manipulatives and begin to work visually in their books. In English, we’ve been enjoying our new book Juniper Jupiter! The children have learned some fantastic new vocabulary and been exploring the range of adjectives that people could use to describe the Super-sidekick that Juniper wants. We’ve also begun exploring our senses, this week it’s been hands on as we look at how our bodies sense touch and sight. This has involved placing our hands in the feely box to sense what object is hiding within using our sense of touch before revealing the answer to see if our prediction was correct! Well done everyone for their first full week in Year 1, I can’t wait to see what wonderful learning we’ll get up to next week!

Star of the week:

Venus- Connie Lonsdale

Galaxy- Elliott Tweddle

We have worked so hard in Year 2 this week. In maths we have been continuing our work on place value, and have been partitioning larger numbers. In English we have started our unit to create a non chronological report about pirates. We have learnt what a non chronological report needs and been researching information which we will put into our final piece of writing. We continued thinking about pirates in music this week, learning a sea shanty and practising keeping the pulse whilst we sang. Our geography has been learning about and locating on a map the world’s oceans and we even had a go at putting a jigsaw of a map of the world back together. In RE we recapped our knowledge about Muslim places of worship and drew some fantastic pictures of a mosque. Well done everyone! Another fantastic week!

Star of the Week

Earth: Isla Sheldon

Mars: Louis Robinson

Our second week back has absolutely flown by and we’ve had another really busy week in year 3. In English the children have continued their sentence stacking and written sentences linked to the next four plots of the story, focusing on the use of complex sentences, time adverbials and alliteration. In maths the children have been using the base 10 resources to help them represent and partition numbers to 1,000.

In Science our big question this week was Why is a balanced diet needed in order to stay healthy? The children investigated how a range of different foods help us to have a balanced diet. We also found out looking at a range of foods made us all quite hungry.

Our History focus this week was understanding the chronology of Stone Age to Iron Age. The children created some fabulous timelines highlighting important historical dates, terms, figures, and events in a chronological fashion.

Stars of the week

Saturn: Connie Lonsdale

Jupiter: Alfie Longhurst

Year 4 have had another fantastic week! We have really enjoyed getting to know your children even more and have loved their bubbly personalities. In writing, we have continued to look at ‘The BFG’ and have completed our different learning chunks in the style of the main character. It has been amazing getting to hear all the amazing gobblefunked language they have used in their writing. In Maths, we have continued looking at Place Value and have had a particular focus of partitioning numbers up to 10,000. They have absolutely breezed through this and have not really struggled at all! In Geography, we have started to look at what a county is and naming a few key ones in the United Kingdom, whilst also being able to place them on a map of the UK. In RE, we have continued to look at Hinduism and have specifically focussed on the Hindu place of worship, attempting to name and identify the many different features of a Hindu place of worship. In Music, we have looked at the different sections of an orchestra and have started to identify specific instruments in the Woodwind section.

We have been so impressed with the amazing start all of the children have had to Year 4 life. Keep up the good work!

Stars of the week:

Meteor: Finnley Swift-Lampitt

Neptune: Oscar O’Driscoll

We have continued working on Place Value in Maths, and after next week will be moving onto addition and subtraction. The children have done really well with learning numbers up to a million and having to write them out with words as well. Over the past two weeks, we have been using different objectives in our writing to create a setting description. It was the first time the children have had to draft their work first, and then learnt how to improve their writing. While this was difficult for some of the children, they will get used to this process and we promise it will get easier! It is ok to write a paragraph more than once to get the best of their writing. We are moving on from our recap of the Anglo-Saxons and have started looking at the Viking raiders. We have learnt why they have the reputation of being brutal and unforgiving, but next week the children will find out if they were cruel the whole time they were in Great Britain. We have started our new Science topic, States of Matter, where the children have completed a quick recap of the different characteristics of solids, liquids and gases. Keep up the good work Year 5, you are all doing really well.

Stars

Asteroid - Alyssa Mitchell

Pluto - Freddy Tonks

Year 6 have had a fantastic week and are beginning to show their mettle. In Maths, we have been working on our number lines, comparing numbers rounding and negative numbers. It was wonderful to see so many children applying their knowledge to the reasoning and problem solving tasks. In English, we have continued our pursuit of grammar perfection by working through tasks which will then be shown as features of our persuasive texts, selling tickets to potential passengers for the world’s greatest cruise liner. We have delved deeper into the world of guided reading, and our text, Dangerous Waters. The children are enthused and thoroughly enjoying the class text and have already pieced together important aspects of the plot. In RE we have detailed things that exist in our world that we marvel at; in history we have looked at the different classes of people on Titanic, what they would bring with them on the trip and how this reflected their social standing. Who would have thought that a pack of cards would inspire such conversation! Our science topic of Light has also commenced with the children understanding how light helps us to see!

A hardworking week everybody!

Stars:

Constellation: Emily Smales

Nebular: Elias Smart