Dear Parents and Children,

Happy New Year to you all! We hope you have had a wonderful Christmas break and are ready and raring to go with lots of new learning. 

Terms 3 and 4 Experiences

‘California Dreaming’ - We will be learning about California as a location to visit and working on our non-fiction writing skills to produce tourist leaflets.  In our Geography lessons, we will be learning about where California is and what it is like there in terms of climate, including information about earthquakes.  We will learn about California as part of The Ring of Fire and how tourism impacts the area, specifically the National Parks.  Through our computing work, we will be using Scratch to create an interactive quiz for our parents to complete.

‘Raiders, Traders and Settlers’ - This experience is all about The Vikings.  We will be focusing on the validity and bias of historical sources and records; deciding what can be used and trusted to help us understand the past.  In Geography, we will looking at invasions and migrations that took place during this period of history.

‘Letters’ - During this experience we will be using a text called ‘Letters to a Young Muslim’ by Omar Saif Ghobash to enrich our RE unit of work on what it is like to be a Muslim in Britain today.  We will use our learning about immigration and asylum from previous experiences within this and will develop our understanding of ordnance survey maps and grid references.

‘Darwin Detectives’ - This experience will begin at the end of Term 4 and will then continue after the Easter holidays.  We will be looking at the findings of Charles Darwin within our science learning and will be completing some historical travel writing. We will write more on this in our next newsletter!

You will be able to see more information on each of our experiences on the website, including an overview, long and medium term plans, and a knowledge organiser which we will be using regularly in school, and expecting you to use at home. Ways in which you can use these include, reading it through together to find out what learning will take place, discussing the key vocabulary (possibly looking up the definitions at home, practicing the spellings and using the language together) and engaging with your children about what they are learning in school.  These will be used throughout the experience in school, as well as at the end of the unit to help us assess the children’s achievements.

Class Texts

We will read ‘Odd and the Frost Giants’ by Neil Gaiman throughout Term 3 and at the start of Term 4.  We will then move on to ‘Letters from the Lighthouse’ by Emma Carroll.  All of our daily reading lessons will be taught using these books and we will use them for our Read Aloud sessions.  Through our class texts we aim to develop our understanding of prosody when reading aloud, and the children’s ability to comprehend what they are reading whilst making valid inferences.  There will also be a focus on new vocabulary and what it means.

Homework

There is an expectation that children read daily at home, for at least 20 minutes.  The children should bring home a book at their appropriate reading level, using our Accelerated Reader scheme, as well as another book of their choice. Reading records should be completed each evening and brought to school every day to be looked at with an adult.  The children should be ready to explain to an adult in school what they have read, including any interesting vocabulary they have discovered along the way.  Just a gentle reminder that parents should still be reading to their children at this age as well – many children will enjoy the quality time together sharing a book, and it is hugely beneficial for their own reading skills and enthusiasm for reading.

Additional homework will be stapled into the reading records at the start of each new experience.  There will be a task for each week, and there will be discussions about these in school.  The tasks are open-ended, allowing children to take the learning as far as they wish, and there are many opportunities for children to learn alongside their parents at home, so parents please enable this to happen!

Uniform

A reminder that children should be in school uniform, as per the website and the last newsletter.  This includes no nail varnish or make-up in school, and only one small stud in each ear.  Hair must be tied back every day, and remain tied up whilst in school.

PE

This term, we have PE on a Monday and a Wednesday. Please ensure that your child comes into school wearing their PE kit on these days. If a child is unable to join in with the P.E lessons due to injury they should still come in their full P.E. kit as they will contribute to the learning and assessment of skills covered. Earrings must be taken out or protected with tape during P.E. lessons. Teachers are not allowed to take earrings out for children so please ensure it is done before they arrive to school that morning.

PE kit:

Trainers

House colour T-shirt

White PE shorts

Green track suit bottoms or black skins underneath the white shorts maybe worn for outdoor games in cold weather. Skins must not be worn without white shorts over the top.

All items of uniform should be clearly labelled with your child’s name.

Outdoor Learning

We hope to have lots of opportunities for outdoors learning so please make sure your children have suitable footwear and waterproof jackets in school every day. We have a welly rack in each classroom so please send in a pair of named wellies that can stay in school. Walks and outdoor activities will take place in all weathers.

End of the Day

As you know safeguarding your children is paramount at BGPS and it is essential for all that this continues at the end of the school day.  We ask for your support to help ensure that we are sending your children off the school site in the manner that you expect us to.  

• If children are not leaving school with a parent or carer that we have on record, then you must advise us of this as otherwise we have to ensure that a phone call is made to confirm that you are happy for this to happen. 
• If you have a child in Year 6 who you are happy to walk home from school on their own, please inform us in writing so we are aware of this.  This is only for Year 6 children at this stage of the academic year. Please note that BGPS expects children to continue our high expectations of behaviour whilst journeying to and from school.

If your child has a phone, due to walking home alone, these must be turned off and handed in to the class teacher first thing. They will be kept in the office during the school day and returned to them at the end of the day. If a child is found to have a phone on their possession during the day, they will no longer be allowed to bring one into school.

Finally, if you have anything that you would like to raise with us then please do so, we are always happy to discuss any issues with you in order for them to be resolved as quickly as possible.

 

Best wishes,

Mrs Martin, Mrs Lewis, Mrs Quantick, Mrs Rees-Porter and Miss Wilson