Byfleet Primary Newsletter

• We hope everyone enjoyed our whole school Nativity shows - a huge well done to the children and staff who put on a brilliant show. Despite the high-number of staff absences, we managed to keep things going so a big well done to the BPS for pulling together to ensure the show could go on! We're also very proud of the children who stepped in to new roles in the show to fill in for their absent peers. Big thanks to Mrs Collins, our music lead, for leading on this.

• Thank you for supporting our Year 2 cake sale and mini Xmas fair last week. A big thanks to Friends of Byfleet for hosting this.

• Our KS2 children are looking forward to seeing some Christmas Carols to our elderly neighbours from King's Lodge Nursing Home on Monday 12th December.

• We hope the Reception Rainbows families enjoyed the Christmas sing-along performance this afternoon! Our Reception children and staff did a brilliant job and really put us in the festive mood!

• We sent out communication about Scarlet Fever and Strep A this week. If you missed it, here it is.

• Our scaffolding from the roof repairs has come down and it's great to see the school back to normal. Year 5 and 6 can now enter their classrooms via their back doors, instead of walking through the playground.

• This week our half-termly governors meeting took place. Mrs Collins, Mr Tredger and Mrs Sharkey-Yun shared information about Pupil Premium, Sports Mark & Sports Premium and our new maths Calculation Policy. The governors found it useful to hear from our staff and find out more about the projects they are working on. Next week, we look forward to inviting the governors back into Byfleet to listen to our subject leaders presenting their subject development reports, showcasing the ambitious plans they have to help us develop our teaching & learning.

• Next week we bid farewell to Mrs Frampton. We wish her well in her next venture.

• This is the last newsletter for the Autumn term. Thank you for your continued support and for helping us making the past term a wonderful success. We wish you a merry Christmas over the holidays and enjoy spending time with loved ones. We return to school on Tuesday 3rd January 2023.

In September we introduced our new House Point system, which has been a big hit with our children.

Children earn house points across the week for 'being brilliant' - excellent behaviour, beautiful manners and super effort.

Each week, our House Captains count up our house points and weekly winners are announced in our weekly Celebration Assembly.

The overall winning team will win a day of mufti on the last day of each term.

A big well done to our Autumn House Winners - Kestrels with 2440 points.

First - Kestrels - 2440 points Second - Hawks - 1951 points

Third - Eagles - 1887 points Forth - Falcons - 1770 points

Next week Friday (last day of term), KESTREL house children may wear their own mufti to school to celebrate!

Big thanks to all our parents for your generous donations to St Peter's Children's Ward. We have had an overwhelming response and St Peter's will be so grateful. The staff members that have been involved will be organising the items to be delivered to the hospital next week.

Well done to the following children for being recognised for doing something brilliant this fortnight......

Last Friday, Year 6 had some unexpected visitors who stole our chairs and destroyed half our classrooms! Fortunately, the children were given the chance to win their chairs back and save their planet. First we wrote some fantastic letters to the aliens persuading them to return our precious chairs, then we used oil pastels and chalk to draw our own outstanding alien artwork and in the afternoon we created our own maths board games based on Mr Jenning's trip from Horsell Common towards Leatherhead. Year 6 were absolutely fantastic and we loved all the imaginative and very creative costumes!

This week our link Educational Psychologist came into school to complete sessions to support teachers from YR-Y6. The Educational Psychologist facilitated a 'Solution Circle' with staff, allowing them to dicsuss issues presenting in their class that are barriers to learning. This reflective practice challenged staff to think about learning and consider new ways to address issues. Staff worked together as a team, guided by the Educational Psychologist to problem solve and consider solutions together - working in this way really helped add insights and ideas that one person may not have been able to come up with on their own. It was a really helpful way to address needs within the class, and a great way for the Educational Psychologist to give support in a way that will have a whole school impact.

Our whole-school attendance target is 96%. So far we are at 95.88% so almost there!

We are delighted that only two classes were below our 96% target for November.

We will continue monitoring Year Reception Rainbows and Year 4 Green.

In September, there were 17 'lates' resulting in a total of 53 minutes of learning being lost.

In October, there were 19 'lates' resulting in 24 minutes of learning being lost.

In November, there were 39 'lates' resulting in a total of 1 hour and 14 minutes of learning being lost.

We have a slow start from 8.35 - 8.45 to help your children arrive on time. Please help us reduce the number of lates next term...

We are holding 'Careers Week' at Byfleet from Monday 23rd January to Friday the 27th of January 2023. Our aim is to provide a focus on careers to help support pupils to develop awareness and excitement about possible future pathways.

It would be fantastic to have some parent volunteers who would be happy to come in and talk to classes about their careers and field of work. It would be great to have people from a range of pathways, and also please let us know if you can put us in touch with anyone who may be happy to help. We would love to address any gender stereotypes in career paths too - so if you know any male midwives, female lorry-drivers etc. please get in touch!

To volunteer please complete the google form via the link below, and we will contact you in the new year:

VOLUNTEER for Careers Week here

Christmas Holiday Club:

Surrey County Council’s ‘Club4’ is a free holiday activity programme, aimed at children in Reception to School Year 11 who are eligible for benefit-related free school meals or known to a key worker (eg because they have an EHCP or if they have a social worker). Please see the flyer below and contact them if you think you are eligible due to receiving free school meals. If your child has a social worker or an EHCP and you would like them to attend, please contact Mrs Sharkey-Yun (Inclusion Lead) who can support with a referral.

Additional details and to book: https://www.surreycc.gov.uk/schools-and-learning/schools/support-for-parents-and-carers/club4

For more information about the Year 4 Multiplication Check, please see the DfE guidance here.

Don't forget to encourage your child to do 20 minutes of Doodle tables every day to help them prepare.

There are also many Apps that can be downloaded specifically designed to help prepare your child for this Mutliplication Check.

All things phonics!

Well done to the children in Reception and Year 1 for working really hard in their phonics lessons this term. We have recently completed the Autumn 2 assessments and they show great progress!

What happens prior to my child bringing their reading book home?

The reading practice sessions take place at least three times a week. Each reading practice session has a clear focus, so that the demands of the session do not overload the children’s working memory.

The reading practice sessions have been designed to focus on three key reading skills:

• decoding - reading the words

• prosody – reading with meaning, stress and intonation

• comprehension – understanding the text

Collin Ebooks

Please remember to login to the Collins Ebook website so your child can access their reading book online.

Only 45% of children in Reception and Year 1 have logged on this half term. We're hoping this number will increase in the Spring term.

We have an exciting opportunity for 17.5 hours per week (Monday-Friday) in our Breakfast and After School Club provision.

• Breakfast Club is 07:30 - 08:35 (1hr, 5min)

• After School Club is 15:05 - 17:30 (2hrs, 25min)

If you are interested, you needn't have to do both Breakfast Club and ASC - these positions may be slip.

Please click here for further details and the Job Description, Person Specification and Application Form.

It is very important to us as a school that we maintain a good relationship with the residents of Kings Head Lane and Kings Lodge Care Home.

When parking on the lane please do not park across residents driveways. If using the car park adjacent to school please park only in the marked bays, parking in the care home car park is not permitted and may result in clamping. Please do not stop or park in front of the school gates or in the coned areas - access for emergency vehicles must be available at all times.

On an environmental note, if you arrive to collect your child and wait in the car park we ask that you do not sit with your car engine running.

Daily Reading

We are proud to announce that our first BRONZE reading award was given to Penelope in Year 4! Well done for reading x5 per week!

Each child can earn Reading Awards for reading daily.

Bronze = 50 reads Silver = 100 reads Gold = 150 reads Platinum = 180 reads

We attend school for 190 days a year. We aim for children to read x5 per week to allow them to reach the 180 Platinum mark. This could include the weekend if they can't fit in 5 reads during the busy week.

We will only count one reading 'entry' per day in your child's reading to count towards their award but please feel free to record all the reads completed per day if you wish.

Our policy outlines that children read everyday so please help them achieve this by making time to record their reading in their diaries each night. Children from Year 3 upwards are independent enough to record this themselves so please continue to encourage them to do so!

For Autumn 2 so far, here are our reading award results on track for their Bronze Reading Award:

Reception: 24% on track Year 1: 59% on track Year 2: 27% on track

Year 3: 24% on track Year 4: 41% on track Year 5: 29% on track

Year 6B: 30% on track Year 6V: 59% on track

The Winter Calendar will soon be arriving in Doodle, a seasonal challenge where your child can earn festive rewards by Doodling 'little and often'!

Between the 1st and 24th of December, encourage your child to complete at least one exercise a day in DoodleMaths to open a calendar door.

They'll find seasonal accessories hiding behind each one – and if they open all of the doors on one or both calendars, they'll receive an exclusive virtual badge!

To find out more, please visit doodlelearning.com/post/winter-calendar. Or if you have any questions, visit help.doodlelearning.com and click on the green icon to chat to Doodle's Customer Support team.

Happy Doodling!

Well done to these children for scoring the highest Doodle Stars in their class for the past two weeks!

Year 2 Orange Liam H 138 Sienna 231

Year 3 Yellow Ottilie 338 Ottilie 486

Year 4 Green Sophia Ross 123 Sophia 151

Year 5 Indigo Ella 350 Ella 256

Year 6 Violet Jack 1515 William 223

Year 6 Blue Jamie 147 Matilda 147

Our top spot winner is Jack W in Year 6V with 1551 stars!

The course explores self-confidence, vocal, literacy and team skills. We encourage our young participants to explore their creativity through text, story and play.

Classes are run every day of the week for anyone aged 5-11 (year reception - year six) at our rehearsal spaces in Rose Theatre, Kingston.

The cost of the term is £120, and we also offer a sibling discount and have bursary options available upon request.

https://rosetheatre.org/rose-participate/rose-youth-theatre

Ultimate Coaching bookings for Spring Term 2023:

Girls football: https://ultimate-coaching.class4kids.co.uk/term/230

Football Monday:

https://ultimate-coaching.class4kids.co.uk/term/223

Football Weds:

https://ultimate-coaching.class4kids.co.uk/term/228

Gymnastics:

https://ultimate-coaching.class4kids.co.uk/term/226