October 2018

I can’t believe it’s the end of the first half term...and what a half term it has been! We hit the ground running in September and haven’t stopped since. I am so very proud of all the successes we’ve already celebrated and look forward to so many more. There’s been a real ’team’ spirit, with everyone working together, including: staff, pupils, parents and the wider community #TEAMLF

We started off this week with our special Harvest Festival Assembly which I had the pleasure of leading. I couldn’t wait to share our wonderful harvest collection with the children. A BIG BIG thank you to all of the parents and staff that sent in items. The display, created by Miss Shread, Mrs Lewis and Mrs Hudson was truly stunning! We managed to make deliveries with a selection of children (pictured above) to the food bank, a residential care home and local elderly residents. All donations were highly appreciated. It’s great to know that we’ve done something to help people in more need than ourselves.

On Tuesday Miss Magee and Miss Ryan were both out of school for their graduation ceremony. I’m sure you will join me in wishing them congratulations. This was a great opportunity for me to teach for the day and I had the pleasure of teaching 1HM. Since starting as Head Teacher in September, I have tried to get into classes and teach at least one class each week. I will continue to do this next half term. Being in the classroom is a real passion of mine and it’s great to see how respectful and hardworking our children are.

Thursday was a really busy day too! I was in Hull visiting another AET school in the morning with Mr White and Miss Oliver. We have been working relentlessly to improve the curriculum for our children. We want our curriculum to be the best, providing the children of Lea Forest with engaging and meaningful learning experiences which they will remember. In the afternoon, we were in Doncaster to record a Podcast with the Cornerstones team who are very interested in the exciting way we teach. Thankfully, I made it back in time to Lea Forest to watch the boys win their two football matches. It’s been a fabulous start to the season for the boys. After half term, there’s lots more matches for the boys and it also sees the start of the girls’ football season. Thank you to Miss Lewis and Mr Carlton for providing so many opportunities. Mrs Gonzales and the Early Years team also held a ’light and dark’ event on Thursday evening, where we saw many parents coming into school and sharing learning experiences with their children - this was amazing and we will be looking at planning more similar events in the future.

Happy half term - Enjoy and take care! School opens again on Monday 5 November 2018.

Mr Clarke

Parents of children in Yr6 have until Wednesday 31 October 2018 to complete their secondary school applications. Please ensure you have completed the online application form for your child by the deadline to ensure that they have a place in a local secondary school for September 2019.

Mr Croxon will be supporting our Nursery parents with the online application process from 6 November, with workshops in the Learning Hub running on a weekly basis until the Christmas Holidays. Please see the posters and messages on class dojo for workshop times and dates.

It’s been another tremendously busy week at Lea Forest. I would like to start by saying how lovely it was to see so many parents for our parent consultation meetings. I think it was our best attendance of parents to date. It was great to chat to so many of you and to hear so many positive comments. The parent survey was completed by 241 of you and the overall results are amazing. I thank you so much for your valued contributions and comments. From this, we will be looking at homework in more detail as this was the only area that parents felt needed looking at. 94% of parents completing the survey felt that children receive a suitable level of homework - this means 6% want to see an improvement. Leave this with us and we will make the necessary improvements.

We also held our reading workshop with Year 3 children and parents. Our Year 3 team were so pleased with the amount of parents getting involved and were also pleased with the evaluations. We continue to carry out reading workshops throughout this term, with Year 5 next week and Year 6 after half term. After listening to feedback to parents, we will be looking at holding maths workshops in the spring term.

I had visitors from Cornerstones Curriculum also this week who wanted to come and look at our wonderful curriculum work. Melanie and Simon, both CEOs of Cornerstones, had got in touch with me after seeing all of the wonderful work being shared on Twitter. They were blown away by the high quality homework, displays, lessons and topic books. They can’t wait to work with us further to make the curriculum as enriched and exciting as possible. Watch this space!

Myself and Miss Ward have focused on maths this week and spent time looking at the children’s learning in their maths books. We are over the moon to see such strong maths books, with so much time and effort taken by children and teachers. We are very proud of our maths model in school and really do believe that the children are getting a great deal. You can find out more about how we teach maths and how our maths model works in the spring term when we hold further parent workshops. In the meantime, if you would like any support with homework, please speak to your child’s class teacher.

Every week I write about attendance as this is our big push this year. I am delighted to report that our attendance is on track. Lots of classes day by day are achieving 100% which is absolutely amazing. Thank you to those parents who are making a special effort with getting your children to school every day. The best class with the highest overall attendance are awarded weekly. They receive golden time with our sports coaches. It is becoming more and more competitive in school and I love a bit of competition. Help your child’s class win by ensuring they are in school every day. This week’s winners are revealed on page 2.

Looking ahead to next week, it is anti-bullying week and we have lots planned. The week will start with odd socks day. Children can wear odd socks and contribute 50p. We have a number of lessons, workshops and even a production planned to support this special week. Please ask your children about what they’ve learnt and discussed.

Wishing you all a great weekend,

Mr Clarke

Written by Millie 6CF and Charlie 6NO

Today we talked to Clare from the NSPCC and she talked to us about the different types of abuse and neglect that children can experience. Such as cyber bullying, physical abuse, mental and emotional abuse. We learnt that abuse is not ok in any form and that children should not have to experience it as it not their fault.

Sometimes children will feel isolated, anxious, upset, angry or hurt as result of neglect or any type of abuse.

Clare taught us the NSPCC “Speak Out Stay Safe” slogan and we had a chance to meet Buddy the NSPCC mascot. We also learnt an important dance and phone number. If ever you are feeling disheartened or just need someone to speak to you can call 0800 11 11 it’s completely free to call and open 24 hours a day.

We also learnt that we can talk to trusted adults (People over 18) Teachers, Parents or carers, police officers and NSPCC volunteers.

The autumn term has started and October is the perfect opportunity for parents, children and staff to leave the car at home and give walking to school a try.

International Walk to School Month (www.livingstreets.org.uk) happens every October, with schools across the world joining forces to get walking (or scooting, cycling, running, jumping, hopping…).

Walking improves physical and mental health and means children arrive at school more alert and ready to learn. Plus, by cutting down on car journeys, you’ll play your part in improving air quality.

Air pollution currently causes up to 900 early deaths a year in Birmingham and children are especially vulnerable. Road vehicles contribute around 80% of the total nitrogen dioxide pollution in our air and cars ‘idling’, standing still with engines running, is a big factor.

What another fantastic week it has been. Yet again, we started the week by opening the doors to our parents, providing another reading workshop. Mrs Newbold and Miss Hadfield really enjoyed working with the children and their parents through a range of resilient reader activities. We have been delighted with the amount of parents taking part in the workshops this year. I was also pleased to hear some positive feedback personally from a few of our parents. Monday also saw the first of our PCAB (Parent and Community Advisory Board) meetings. There is more information about this on the reverse , but I would like to take this opportunity to say a BIG thank you to our PCAB members for their hard work and commitment in making the school better for our children.

I have spent some mornings carrying out learning walks and this week I was looking at the standard of teaching and learning in writing with Mrs Newbold and Miss Francois who are our subject leaders for writing. I am amazed by the learning environments and how hard the teachers and children work. The children’s books are looking great already with so many learning opportunities. I’ve also been back in class teaching this week! I enjoyed my mornings with 3RR and 1WH and look forward to getting to teach some other classes next week.

As you are all aware, we are having a big push on attendance this year. I am pleased to say that we are improving our attendance week upon week, with many classes having 100% on a daily basis. Thank you to everyone for making a special effort to be in school every single day. Our attendance winners are revealed on page 2.

Finally, yesterday was census day. Census is a capture of the number of children in each school. This information is collected by the local authority. I am thrilled to share that we are at our capacity for the first time ever. This shows how popular our school has become - Lea Forest is the school to be at and we continue to do our best to provide the best possible education for all of our children and for our community. I look forwards to welcoming you all at our parents evenings next Tuesday and Wednesday.

Mr Clarke