Autumn Newsletter 7

Dear Parents & Carers

Our Y5&6 children have been taking home books from the new reading scheme for the last few weeks. These books are high quality, cover a range of genres & will help to develop our children’s understanding at the level expected for their year groups. They are designed to develop the children’s vocabulary, as well as their fluency & understanding, in order for them to be able to access the wider curriculum. I’d like to thank FOWSA for providing the funds for this. Which means, in turn, I am actually thanking you for your generosity in supporting the fundraising efforts of the marvellous people of FOWSA.

The staff at Woodlands have asked me to remind you about the importance of reading to your children whatever their age. You will be share higher level vocabulary & more intricate texts than they will be able to access on their own. It will also help them develop their love of reading further.

This week, our children from nursery to Y6 have been studying the book Here We Are [notes for living on Planet Earth], by Oliver Jeffers. It’s thought-provoking & I’m sure our children will really enjoy immersing themselves in this text over the next couple of weeks.

“Our world can be a bewildering place, especially if you’ve only just got here. Your head will be filled with questions, so let’s explore what makes our planet and how we live on it. From land and sky, to people and time, these notes can be your guide and start you on your journey. And you’ll figure lots of things out for yourself.”

“People come in many shapes, sizes and colours.

We may all look different, act different and sound different...

...but don't be fooled, we are all people.”

A plea from our wonderful office staff: when you are reporting your child absent (either directly to them over the phone or by leaving a message on the answer machine) please let us know why your child won’t be in school. If you simply tell us that “Alphonse won’t be in today”, they will be marked as ‘unauthorised absence’, whereas if you tell us that “Alphonse has been up all night with a stomach bug” they will get an ‘illness’ mark in the register.

Here’s this week’s ‘nudges’ to help you start a conversation about your children’s learning.

Nursery

Are we all the same?

{‘Here We Are [notes for living on Planet Earth]’}

Reception [Red & Blue]

What planet do we live on? What is it like?

{‘Here We Are [notes for living on Planet Earth]’}

Y1&2 [Green, Yellow & Purple]

What is wonderful about our world?

{English topic: ‘Here We Are [notes for living on Planet Earth]’}

Y3&4 [3A, 3/4M & 4G]

What positive impact has lockdown had on the environment in the UK & around the world?

{English topic: ‘Here We Are [notes for living on Planet Earth]’}

Y5&6 [5D, 5/6P & 6R]

Can you name four of the themes we discussed after reading Here We Are?

{English topic: ‘Here We Are [notes for living on Planet Earth]’}

Still no classes achieved 100% in their attendance this week & our overall attendance has fallen to 94.9%. Ideally, we would want our attendance to be well above 97% each week.

We had 5 classes who had no late marks this week: Green Class, Yellow Class, 3/4M, 5/6P & 6R.   There were 16 late marks across the whole school.

Next week, we’re holding our first parents evenings of this academic year on Tuesday (Y3&4), Wednesday (reception + Y1&2) & Thursday (Y5&6). These will be carried out by telephone – don’t forget, the call should come from an unknown/withheld number.

At the end of next week, we will also be sending out a parent survey via Google Forms, so please keep an eye out for the ParentMail with the link.

There is an INSET day on Friday 22 October, so the children will not be in school.

Have a lovely weekend

KD Williams

Headteacher

Last word

What breed of dog can jump higher than a double-decker bus?

Any dog –

double-decker buses can’t jump.