January 2019

We will endeavour to keep school open, but in the event of a school closure, we will alert you via text, ClassDojo, Twitter, FaceBook and on the school website banner.

Closures will also be announced on Free Radio and BBC Radio WM.

12 classes have managed to beat our 96% target this week! Congratulations to 4NN who are our attendance champions this week with an amazing 98.67%. 1RW won the cup in Key Stage 1 with 98.00% and RBE won the award in Early Years this week with 96.67%.

Don’t forget that we are holding a competition this half term for all classes. Any class that manages 10 full days of 100% attendance will win a movie and popcorn afternoon.

We managed to beat our 96% target this week with 96.30%.

Please make every effort to make sure children are in school and ready to learn to help us beat our target. Every day lost is a lost learning opportunity! Thank you so much for your efforts this week. Let’s see which class will be the winners next week. Aim for 100%...

Our next stay and play session for under 4’s will be on Thursday 31 January from 1:30pm.

Come along and meet our Early Years team and have a play.

Good news

The Real Schools Guide 2019 was released last week. We are really proud to be rated 4 out of 5 stars overall, with 5 stars for ATTAINMENT FOR ALL and PROGRESS. It also gives us a clear target to reach 5 stars overall for 2020.

This Week

As always, it’s been a remarkably busy week. Here’s a brief summary of what’s been happening...

Monday - Our assembly started with Miss Hadfield introducing our MARTIN LUTHER KING themed week. Each and every class have looked at some aspect of Martin Luther King’s life throughout the week. This was followed by Miss Francois and Mrs Newbold holding a Poetry Slam. The poems performed were written by the children themselves and focused on being remarkable (linked to our new vision and values). The children had written and performed some REMARKABLE poems, which were inspired by our visit from Matt Abbott from the previous week. On Monday, the Year 6 children were visited by Professor McGinty, the wonderful time travelling detective. The Professor really brings history alive and he’s very funny. Find out more about his visit on page 2. Also on Monday, Reception classes (RBE and RGH) went on a bear hunt. This was a tremendous experience for all of the children. Thank you to Mr Haw and the Early Years team for creating such a memorable experience for the children. Experiences like this are so valuable. Read more about their bear hunt on page 2.

Tuesday - I was not in school on Tuesday as I was about 125 miles away (with Miss Francois) visiting some other AET academies in Hull. We spent the morning at The Green Way and the afternoon at Hall Road. Visits to other academies are great as it allows us to share ideas as we are always looking to create the best opportunities for our children. Next week I am spending one day in London, visiting two other AET academies. Whilst I was away, things didn’t stop at Lea Forest - far from it in fact! Tuesday saw the launch of the DAILY MILE. More information about our daily mile can be seen on page 2. Watch out as we want to get parents involved next!

Wednesday - I met with the PCAB (Parent and Community Advisory Board) and we had such a productive meeting. A MASSIVE thank you to the parents and members of the community that give up their time to make Lea Forest a better place for all of the children and the community. Look out for advertisements of future events which include: discos, non-uniform days, quiz nights, cake sales, talent shows…. The list goes on!

Thursday - I was over the moon to hear that 8 classes managed to achieve 100% attendance! This is just fantastic. Thank you to everyone for making a special effort. Thursday saw all children coming to school as their remarkable selves. There was also a burger bar themed lunch, which Mr Taylor fully took advantage of. Mr Haw spent the afternoon tree planting.

This week also saw the start of all of our clubs. We are now providing a range of clubs at lunchtimes and after school. Mrs Terry is looking for more recruits for her child and adult gardening club to help maintain our grounds. If you are interested in joining her gardening club which takes place on Thursday evenings, please get in contact with her.

Attendance

Our attendance this week was an amazing 96.30%

Next Week

We have our Governors visiting next Wednesday to look at all the remarkable improvements we are constantly making. It’s always a pleasure to walk around school with visitors and share the amazing things taking place.

We are also holding an NSPCC parent workshop on Friday 25 January from 9am until 10am in the Key Stage 1 hall. The hour-long workshop will help parents and carers understand their child’s online world, build confidence to have those important conversations that can help keep children safe online and help you know where to go for help and advice. We hope that you can join us – there’ll be a hot drink and biscuits!

Enjoy your weekend! See you all on Monday.

I hope that you all had a great Christmas break and managed to spend some quality time together at home. I think that we were all ready for a well-deserved break after such a busy and successful 8 week autumn term. It was lovely to end the term with our wonderful Christmas performances which celebrated the greatness of Lea Forest. I would like to wish each and every one of you a happy new year from all of the staff. We have huge aspirations for 2019…

We’ve really hit the ground running this week and Christmas is a distant memory. We are onto our new challenge of being REMARKABLE. On Tuesday, Mr Taylor and I led a whole school assembly to introduce the new vision and values to the children. We shared a few motivational videos and were blown away by the children’s responses and enthusiasm. In our assembly, we set the children a challenge to FIND THEIR REMARKABLE.

They started their journey by completing a 20 minute challenge in the remarkable escape room that we had created for them. This was a huge success and a wonderful first day back.

This whole week has been focused on BEING REMARKABLE and each class have produced some stunning and thoughtful work. We were lucky enough to be joined by Matt Abbott, who is the poet who wrote our remarkable lives poem. He worked with groups of children to help inspire them to write their own poems. We will be holding a poetry slam in Monday’s assembly next week where we will share these poems. We will also try to load some onto the website, Twitter, FaceBook and ClassDojo.

It really has been a manic, but pretty amazing first week back. Watch this space for some more REMARKABLE stuff!

We have lots happening next week including: Our poetry slam, a visit from Professor McGinty for Y6, Martin Luther King Day, the launch of the golden mile and a non uniform day so that children can celebrate being themselves #RemarkableMe.

I’d like to wish you all a restful and enjoyable weekend. Please ask your children about our new values and what they think REMARKABLE is. See you all on Monday!

On Thursday 17 January we will be holding a non uniform day where children can come to school as their REMARKABLE SELVES #RemarkableMe. We will be asking for 50p in return for children wearing their own clothes.

We are holding a competition this half term for all classes. Any class that manages 10 full days of 100% attendance will win a movie and popcorn afternoon. There are posters displayed in each classroom and are given a gold star for each day they have all children present in school.

This week’s results

Well done for a positive start to the term. Our target for attendance is 96%. There were 7 classes that managed to achieve 96% or better - that’s REMARKABLE.

Here’s our top 4 classes of the week:

4th = 1HM with 97.24% 3rd = 4NN with 98.33% 2nd = 4WH with 98.62% 1st = 5BP with 98.68%

Unfortunately, our overall attendance this week is slightly below 96% and stands at 95.62%. Please make every effort to make sure children are in school and ready to learn. Every day lost is a lost learning opportunity!

Our friends from West Midlands Police and the Parking Enforcement Team at Birmingham City Council will be patrolling the roads around our site to ensure that everyone is parking in a safe and legal manner.

Please remember these top tips to help keep our children safe and keep traffic moving.

1. Park safely away from the school gates and zig zag markings. Even if you late, don’t block our gate!

2. Do not block dropped kerbs and driveways.

3. Watch out for small children and slow down around our school site. Remember: 20 is plenty!