Weekly Newsletter

Have a lovely half term holiday! School is closed tomorrow for a training day, and there will only be cleaners and contractors on site. All staff will be attending the STAR MAT Student Wellbeing Conference at Tadcaster Grammar. School opens again on Monday 20 February.

Governor vacancy: can you help? The STAR Multi-Academy Trust is a thriving community trust based in the Selby area, with 11 schools in both primary and secondary phases serving nearly 4500 students. Our mission is simple: to deliver an outstanding education for every young person such as they can flourish and achieve their full potential.

Now, more than ever, community schools and community Trusts such as STAR need the skills, insight and knowledge that governors from the wider community can bring.

The Governors at Brayton Church of England Primary School are looking to recruit a new member of their Governing Body and would be delighted to hear from our wider community, most especially those who may have backgrounds in finance, education, or HR.

Support and training for the role is provided: no experience of governance is needed

For more information please visit: https://web.starmat.uk/governance/governor-information/ or contact our Co-Chairs, Anna Pearce and Wendy Thompson, at cofg@bp.starmat.uk to arrange an informal discussion.

Please do share this information with family, friends and community contacts—unfortunately, the Board are unable to accept any applications from parents/carers but wider family members are welcome to contact us for more information

World Thinking Day 22 February We have had contact from Margaret Seager, one of the local Brownie leaders, about World Thinking Day, which is an important celebration for all members of Guiding and Scouting. The day always falls on 22 February (usually in half term) but this year we will be in school on that day (it is the Wednesday after half term).

Margaret has asked if all pupils who are part of Rainbows, Brownies, Guides, Beavers, Cubs or Scouts would be able to wear their uniforms instead of their school clothes on that day. We have replied that this is a great idea: often children show us badges and neckers from their group in our Superstar Worship on Fridays, and we look forward to seeing them in their full outfits!

If your child would rather wear their usual school clothes, or just a part of their Guiding/Scouting uniform, they are welcome to do this too.

Contractors on site Work continues over the school site while we wait for the new fecing delivery. Access around the site has been challenging at times and we are doing our best to manage this so thank you for being patient.

Job vacancy We are looking for a teaching assistant to join our team and will be advertising after half term. If you know anyone who may be interested, please ask them to get in touch.

Winter illnesses update from the DFE UKHSA advice remains clear that children can continue to attend as normal unless they are unwell and have a high temperature. Further information on when a child is too ill for school or nursery is available. There is no requirement to be absent from school on a precautionary basis. Schools should continue to maintain their high expectations for face-to-face attendance.

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/

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: 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.

What a fantastic improvement in whole-school attendance over this half term: every single week our attendance has been above the national sample! Thank you again to all of you for supporting this: it is having a massive impact on the children's learning, progress and social and emotional wellbeing. Historically attendance has been on the lower side at Brayton and we are all working hard to challenge that.

The legal duties around attendance for both schools and local authorities are being strengthened, and North Yorkshire have assigned us a designated Attendance Enforcement Officer who will be liaising with us where we have concerns around this area.

At the end of last term we sent out letters to families where attendance was below 90% and, as we monitor attendance regularly, we can see that in almost all cases this has improved, which is a real positive. Because attendance is so important for learning and friendships, we monitor attendance every week so we can pick up any patterns and follow these up.

Thursday 9 February - School closes for half term

Friday 10 February - STAR MAT training day at Tadcaster Grammar School (school closed to children)

Monday 20 February - School opens

Wednesday 22 February - World Thinking Day: children can wear their Guiding/Scouting group uniforms

Friday 31 March - School closes for Easter

Monday 17 April - School opens

Rio Helstrip

Sofia Nunnari

James Smith

Jaxson Noble-Burns

We have explored the story ‘Goldilocks and the Three Bears’ this week. Through sensory play, we have filled, poured, mixed and measured porridge oats, whilst through role play we have retold the story. We have loved singing songs linked to the story too. Oma taught us some new songs about Goldilocks and the Three Bears in our music session on Tuesday and we loved dancing along to the music too.

In Phonics this week we have been looking at rhyme and identifying words that sound the same at the end. We are going to continue with this after half term. In maths we have continued with number 2. The children have been identifying representations of 1 or 2 by subitising and counting. They have also been matching the numeral to quantity.

We have also had our Art Afternoon this week. This term we have looked at the artist Pablo Picasso. We have learnt a bit about him and also looked at some of his paintings. We have produced our own faces in the style of Pablo Picasso, look out for these on ClassDojo.

We hope you have a lovely half term.

Star of the Week - Tommy Morgan

Year 1

In Year 1 we have been exploring the many physical and human features which can be seen in Scotland and finding out about the landmarks in the capital city of Edinburgh. Our guided reading was based upon ‘Katie goes to Scotland’ and we retrieved the answers to questions and sequenced the order of events.

In maths we have been adding and subtracting and finding the missing number.

In English we designed a wanted poster for Nessie and looked at the features of poetry. From this we created our own poems.

We have been continuing with our computing sessions and we enjoyed our Highland dancing in PE.

Stars of the Week:

Galaxy - Albert Heslop

Venus - Louis Robinson

Even though it is the last week, the Year 2 children have worked hard at independently writing a description of our missing dragon using the language we have learnt from our guided writing. In guided reading, we have learnt more about castles using our reading Vipers to answer questions. We have also painted our dragon sculptures in Art which was tricky as they are a little delicate.

We had an added bonus of our whole school art afternoon where we enjoyed learning about Pablo Picasso and produced self portraits in his style.

In Maths this week, we have been exploring the 2 and 10 times tables as well as halving, doubling and odd and even numbers.

The children wrote some beautiful prayers in RE which expressed the good news that Jesus brings of peace, forgiveness and compassion. In PSHE, the we have learnt about the film age ratings to keep us safe.

Stars of the Week:

Earth- Joshua Littlewood

Mars- Emilie Knight

Time certainly flies when you’re having fun! Another half term completed! On Tuesday, we had our Pablo Picasso art afternoon. The children explored the key features of Picasso’s cubism art, then created self portraits inspired by his style using a variety of interlocking, geometric shapes. Photos of the children’s beautiful portraits will be posted on Dojo soon! We have almost reached the end of our current unit of ‘Length and Perimeter’ in maths, this week focusing on adding and subtracting lengths in metres, centimetres and millimetres and how to calculate the perimeter of shapes. In English, the children finished writing their versions of ‘Erin Returns to Black Rock’ then improved the story content further through editing and reimagining one of the plots. In RE, the children learnt about the Jewish festival of ‘Passover’ and what each section of the seder meal plate represents. In French, we have continued to build our conversational skills, this week learning how to say our age. All the children in Year 3 have worked incredibly hard this term - we are extremely proud of their determination to succeed and improve. Well done, Year 3. :)

Star of the Week -

Jupiter - Noah Whittaker-Doherty

Saturn - George Dunnington

Can you believe that we’re half way through the year? Time has really flown by! This week all of our hard work has paid off. The children used a wide range of grammatical features to write a persuasive letter that we’ll send to Michael Morpurgo. The children have thought of plenty of convincing reasons as to why he should come and visit Brayton. On Wednesday, we had our art afternoon. The children explored Pablo Picasso, most well known influence on modern art, Cubism. With a blend of this term’s pencil skills and last term's collage work we recreated some self portraits. We have lots of beautiful artwork that you’ll need to keep your eyes peeled for. Also, how could I not mention the end of our Science unit. The children were so excited to venture beyond the school gates and share their findings on how sound changes over distances. It’s been so great exploring sound practically so far this term. I know I can’t wait for the next half term, hearing more about Beowulf’s battles, continuing with our new unit of maths perimeter and length, more about animals and pets in French as well as all our new learning points to come!

Stars:

Neptune: Eryn Mansell

Meteor: Ellie Graley