September 2019

Parents of our current Year 6 children can apply online using the links below:

Birmingham Residents:

https://eadmissions.birmingham.gov.uk/prefs.php

Solihull Residents:

https://eservices.solihull.gov.uk/Enrol/

We are running weekly sessions on Monday at 9am in the library with Mr Croxon for any parents that need assistance completing their form.

From Wednesday 2 October we will be opening our library to parents from 9am - 9:30am.

-Come along and meet Mrs Clarke our school librarian

-Get tips on choosing, sharing books and reading stories aloud with your child

-Explore the range of picture books and story-telling resources we have in the library

-Experience the joys of listening to a story

Please ensure that you keep the school office informed of any medical conditions that your child may be diagnosed with.

In order for us to administer any medication we require parents to complete a Medicine Administration Form which is available to collect from the main office.

All medication should be labelled with your child’s name, dosage and class.

We have been inform by Birmingham City Council that a new lollipop person has been appointed and the crossing patrol will be reinstated shortly on the junction of Crossfield Rd.

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This week has been ANTI-BULLYING WEEK at Lea Forest and there’s been a lot of activities taking place around this theme. Thank you to Miss Hadfield who has led this throughout the school and raised awareness. This years phrase was CHANGE STARTS WITH US. We started the week with an assembly led by Mr Taylor. He set the children a challenge of giving someone a compliment. I missed the assembly and then wondered for the rest of the day why I was receiving so many compliments from the children - more than usual anyway! We have also worked as a school to create a clear definition of bullying so that everyone is clear (including parents).

I’d like to say thank you to all of the Reception parents that attended our family picnic on Wednesday afternoon. It was lovely to see so many of you. The Reception team enjoyed having some time to get to know the families of our wonderful children at the beginning of their learning journeys. We had lots of positive feedback and can’t wait for our next events being held for Early Years. We hope that you can all join us on Wednesday 9th October for our bedtime story session - get your PJ’s ready! We also have a ‘crafternoon’ planned on Thursday 17th October. Parental engagement is so important and we really value your contributions.

Finally, thank you to Mrs Morsely for organising such a wonderful European Day of Languages on Wednesday. The whole school celebrated many different languages and had a taster lesson, including British Sign Language, French and Spanish. We were also joined by pupils from Tudor Grange Academy, Kingshurst.

A large number of our Year 5 and Year 6 children have permission to walk home alone. It has been reported that a lot of these children are not heading straight home and are hanging around the streets or at the local shops. If your child is a Year 5 or Year 6 walker, please ensure you speak to them about the importance of going straight home at the end of the school day.

Attendance will be a key focus again this year and our target is to ensure that we meet 96% for the whole school.

We want to thank all of our parents and carers for their continued support in helping to raise attendance and make sure that every child achieves their full potential.

HOLIDAYS WILL NOT BE AUTHORISED AND WILL BE RECORDED AS AN UNAUTHORISED ABSENSE.

Should you have concerns regarding your child’s attendance, please make an appointment to see Mr Wills or Ms Wale to discuss this.

Next week will see the start of our clubs and extra-curricular activities. We have a wide range , including:

- Reading Club (Mondays - Key Stage 2 with Miss Jones)

- Reading at Greater Depth Club (Mondays - Year 2 with Miss Evans)

- Origami Club (Tuesdays - Years 5/6 with Mrs Wood)

- Debating Club (Tuesdays - Years 5/6 with Miss Francois)

- Forest School (Wednesdays - Key Stage 2 with Mr Haw)

- Art Club (Wednesdays - Years 3-6 with Mrs Newbold)

- Votes for Schools Club (Wednesdays - Key Stage 2 with Miss Hadfield)

- Times Tables Rockstars Club (Thursdays - Year 4 with Miss Ward)

- Robotics / Scratch Club (Thursdays - Year 6 with Mr White)

- Photography Club (Thursdays - Key Stage 2 with Mr Croxon)

- Gardening Club (Thursdays - Years R-6 with Mrs Terry)

- Maths at Greater Depth Club (Fridays - Year 2 with Miss Jackson)

This week, Lea Forest have launched an exciting new programme called 'Vote For Schools'. Miss Allcroft led this week’s assembly with our first question 'Is gaming good for you?’

This sparked wonderful discussions between the pupils which culminated in pupils voting 'yes' or 'no'.

We look forward to finding out the results next week. Our work links to our children’s rights, Article 13:

Every child must be free to say what they think and to seek and receive all kinds of information, as long as it is within the law.

On Wednesday we welcomed Rock Star Royalty to Lea Forest as drummer Jeff Rich led a drumming workshop for Key Stage 2. Our children even had the opportunity to find their remarkable and play the drums alongside Jeff in a fantastic whole school drumming performance. Key Stage 1 were lucky enough to join the final performance.

Team Lea Forest were back in action this week with our first sporting tournament of the year at Ninestiles Academy.

Our team of Year 5 and Year 6 took part in a Tag Rugby competition against teams from Guardian Angels, Lyndon Green, Oaklands and Hillstone.

Miss Lewis was proud of how brilliantly they played throughout the tournament, showing great teamwork; winning 3 of their 4 games.

This week we’d like to introduce you to our REMARKABLE Pastoral Team who consist of (left to right): Mrs Law (SENCO), Mr Wills (Senior Learning Mentor), Mrs Tarrant (Learning mentor) and Mr Comrie (Learning Mentor).

I have been really pleased with the improvements in attendance this week - our best yet this year!

Attendance

A grand total of 11 classes beat our 96% target this week.

Here’s our BEST 4 classes this week:

1st - 4ST with 99.05% 3rd - 6NW with 97.79%

2nd - 4RW with 98.26% 4th - 5BS with 97.73%

Attendance this week: 96.81% Our attendance or the year to date: 95.2%

What another fantastic week it has been! We started the week by opening the doors for our chill and chat event, which allowed parents and carers to come along and share their views. Vicky Shread, our PCAB Chair started the meeting and then Mrs Gonzales and I joined. I asked everyone to be honest and to share ‘what we do well’ and ‘what we could do to make things better’. Thankfully, there was a long list of things we are doing well, with just a few suggestions and ideas on what to do next. These ‘chill and chat’ events are crucial for our continued success. Thank you to everyone that came along. We will have another ‘chill and chat’ event soon - look out for the next date.

I have spent some mornings carrying out learning walks and this week I was looking at the standard of teaching and learning in maths with Miss Ward who leads maths. I am amazed by the learning environments and how hard my staff and children work. The children’s books are looking great already with so many learning opportunities and progress shown.

We will be holding our annual ANTI-BULLYING WEEK next week, so please ask your children what they’ve been learning about. I’d also like to explore your opinions and create a definition for what ’bullying’ is. This word is often used, but not everyone has the same understanding.

West Midlands Police and Parking Patrols from Birmingham City Council will be patrolling around the school next week. We are very grateful to the vast majority of our parents that park legally and safely away from the gates and zig zag markings but we are also concerned that our staff have reported 20 vehicles to the police this week for dangerous parking. Please think carefully about where you choose to park and don’t place our children’s lives at risk to save a few seconds.

Our Rags2Riches clothing recycling scheme will be returning to Lea Forest on 1 October 2019

We will be sending out collection bags and letters on Monday 23 September for our families to donate any old unwanted clothes or shoes and help us to raise vital funds for the school.

We are working towards our first National Online Safety Centre Award this year and will be running a series of online activities and events for our parents later this year.

If you have an e-safety query or would like some advice please contact Mr Croxon or Mr Clarke via ClassDojo