William Barcroft Junior School

'Success and happiness for every child'

We are very proud of our school, the children, staff and environment and of course the great support we receive from our parents.

For more information, please visit our full website by clicking here.

In a recent parent questionnaire, parents said the following:

99% of parents say their child is happy at William Barcroft Junior School

98% parents say the school have high expectations

99% of parents said their child does well at school

100% of parents say their child felt safe in our school.

Message from the Principal:

Good afternoon everyone and welcome to this week’s newsletter. I have quite a few messages about

upcoming events that I need to share with you, as we are getting very close to the crazy busy season!

Next Friday (8th December) is our Christmas jumper, Christmas dinner and party day. Children can

obviously wear their Xmas jumpers but can also wear any non-uniform/party clothes of their choice

for the day. If your child would like a Christmas dinner, please tick this on ParentPay, even if your

child already has dinners or is entitled to free school meals. These orders need to be done by

Tuesday 5th December, please.

The following week will be our end of term Learning Showcases. You are invited into school at 9:15

(please come to the school hall door) and the children will share their assembly to showcase what

they have learnt this term. After this, we will serve tea and coffee whilst giving children the opportunity

to share their books with you. We are estimating a finish time of approximately 10:15. The days will be

as follows:

Year 3 - Monday 11th December - 9:15am

Year 4 - Tuesday 12th December - 9:15am

Year 5 - Wednesday 13th December - 9:15am

Year 6 - Thursday 14th December - 9:15am

This will appear on ParentPay today for you to let us know if you will be attending. There will of course

be no charge for this but we do need to know the numbers at each event. Unfortunately, we are

unable to cater for more than 2 family members per child. We also politely ask that babies and

toddlers are not brought so that the children’s presentations are not interrupted

The children in Production Club will be sharing their end of term show on Tuesday 12th December.

Again, if you would like a ticket for this, they will be available on ParentPay for £2. There will be a 2pm

show and a 4pm show to accommodate as many parents as possible.

As you know, we also have our annual pantomime trips booked in for Friday 15th December (Years 3

and 5) and Monday 18th December (Years 4 and 6). These are now live on ParentPay with a

subsidized cost of £10. We have extended the deadline for this but please ensure that your child’s

place is booked by 7th December.

Our final trip out of school is the church visit on the afternoon of Tuesday 19th December. There is

nothing you need to do for this other than giving permission on ParentPay and ensuring the children

are well wrapped up for the walk around the corner to Old Clee Church.

We have a number of other in-school events such as our attendance treat, our Carols by Candlelight

and our Talent Showcase, so it is going to be a busy last few weeks! Next week is also our testing

week across the school, so attendance and punctuality are particularly important. Please give us a

call if you have any queries with any of the above events, and remember pupil premium vouchers can

be used to pay for the pantomime if your child is eligible. Can I also remind everyone that we do finish

at 2pm on the very last day of term - Wednesday 20th December.

Enjoy reading the newsletter and seeing what the children have been up to and have a lovely

weekend everyone.

S Sargent

Principal

Take a look at the weekly round-up of our fantastic learning...

YEAR 3

Year 3 are enjoying ‘The Nothing To See Here Hotel’ - a fantasy story - as part of our English learning. We have created our own non-chronological reports describing a magical creature from the hotel. We have been practicing our sewing skills in Design and Technology theme week, making bookmarks for each other in the year group. We can't wait to exchange them as Christmas presents! In Maths, we are learning our 3,4 and 8 times tables. We are using TTRS to help us improve our quick recall time. Please encourage your children to play at home too as TTRS certificates are awarded weekly.

In PE we have been enjoying team games and learning and understanding empathy for others by adapting ball games whilst sat down.

In Science, we are learning about forces. We carried out an experiment testing friction on different surfaces. We pushed vehicles on foam, wood, textiles and sandpaper. Ask your child which surfaces had the least and most friction.

As part of our PSHCE learning, we attended a first aid workshop. We looked at first aid kits & discussed what they are used for and what we could do to help in an emergency.

YEAR 4

Year 4 have really been enjoying their book for this term ‘The Land of Roar’ by Jenny Mclachlan. In the book, we meet twins Arthur and Rose, who end up discovering that their childhood imaginary world ‘Roar’ is real. They have to rescue Grandad from the evil villain ‘Crowky’. We can’t wait to see how their plans turn out! We are going to be writing a Dragon’s tale over the next couple of weeks, set in Roar.

In Maths, we have been brilliant with learning our 6, 7 and 9 times tables! Please keep encouraging your child to go on TT Rockstars at home as this will really help to cement their new knowledge.

We have been working hard on our art week. We looked at Ancient Egyptian death masks, and also Tracey Emin’s ‘Death Mask’. We drew two different masks, an Ancient Egyptian inspired one and a modern style one. We then used the sketching skills and portraiture skills that we have worked on over the past half term to draw the face of our hero on the masks.

YEAR 5

Over the last two weeks we have been fully engrossed in our book ‘The Haunting of Aveline Jones’. It has gripped and captivated us. We have loved writing a diary entry as though we are Aveline; even more so we have enjoyed writing our own scary stories based on Aveline Jones.

In our history topic we have learnt about the Elizabethan period and the Monarch- Elizabeth the 1st. We have investigated what we can learn about her through portraiture and how she ruled. We enjoyed learning about her rival-Mary Queen of Scotts and also about the Spanish Armada.

In maths we have deepened our understanding of numbers: factors, multiples, squares, cubes and prime numbers. In addition, we have developed our understanding of equivalent fractions.

We have loved our art week, where we further developed our sketching techniques, through portraiture; we have created our own piece in the style of either Tim Burton or Hans Holbein- you can see some examples of our work in the photos.

YEAR 6

Year 6 have been working incredibly hard in English - we've been creating a non-chronological report covering 'The World of Witchcraft' based on our gripping book, 'The Bewitching of Aveline Jones'. The children have focused on how to improve their writing through vocabulary and ensured they've used a range of sentence types while creating an effective layout and structure. The children have really enjoyed this piece. In Whole Class Reading, we have thoroughly enjoyed reading 'The Horror at Fang Rock' and 'The Curse of Tutankhamun'. The vocabulary in these two extracts have been thrilling, helping us draw further deductions and inferences from the text.

In Maths, we've been mastering our knowledge of equivalent fractions, decimals and percentages and how to find the equivalents with speed and accuracy. We've begun our journey of finding percentages of amounts and are still workings towards mastering this skill.

We've been enjoying our Art week, discovering a range of artists and their portrayal of war through sketching. The children have enjoyed discussing their inferences when looking for metaphors or representations within the art, particularly Pablo Picasso's 'Guernica'.

In Science, we were deepening our understanding of solubility and whether solids will dissolve or not. We made predictions with items like sugar, soil and sand then put these theories to the test. The children were able to explain clearly why a solid did not dissolve.

Meet our pupil governors!

Our pupil governors have lots of different responsibilities in school.

They help organize key events in school, support Mrs Baggott with setting up and preparations and discuss key matters as our pupil representatives!

Attendance

This year in school, we aim to improve attendance and punctuality as a key priority.

Here are the attendance figures per year group:

Week beginning 20/11/2023

Year 3 - 93.82%

Year 4 - 91.93%

Year 5 - 95.68%

Year 6 - 92.28%

Week beginning 27/11/2023

Year 3 - 94.46%

Year 4 - 92.18%

Year 5 - 92.33%

Year 6 - 94.09%

Here are the attendance figures per class:

Welcome to the William Barcroft Library!

Home Reading

Here are the percentages for home reads per class over the last two weeks. Our school expectation is 3 weekly reads per week and this is taken on a Thursday. Please ensure your child has their reading record every day to be checked.

Reading rewards

Reading superstars

Well done to our first reading superstars in school! These children were chosen due to a great effort with home reading, outstanding engagement in whole class reading sessions, impressive stats in their star reader assessments and completing their accelerated reader quizzes. The children keep this trophy on their desk for the week and show how fantastic they are!

Reading trophy

A huge well done this week to our reading trophy winners! The classes with the highest percentage of reads in each class win the reading trophy for the week.

3S for lower school with 91% and 6S for upper school with 96%!

Stars of the Week

This week's stars have been working extra hard in school and have impressed their teachers and other adults in school.

Well done everyone!

Scroll through the images on the left to see who has received the well deserved golden stars this week.

#wbjspraiseculture

@WBJJuniorSchool

@HarbourLearning

Maths

Over the last two week we have been monitoring engagement on Rockstar’s and here are the stats for each class, remember to keep logging in at home:

4LB

5HS

What are we currently reading in English?

Year 3 are currently reading The Nothing To See Here Hotel in their English lessons.

Year 4 are currently reading The Land of Roar in their English lessons.

Year 5 are currently reading The Haunting of Aveline Jones in their English lessons.

Year 6 are currently reading The Bewitching of Aveline Jones - the sequel to Year 5's The Haunting!

Drop everything and read!

Here are our current class readers. These are books that have been chosen by the children. Please ask your child what is happening in their current class read!

3A – The Wreck of Zanzibar - Michael Morpurgo

3C- Charlie and the Chocolate Factory – Roald Dahl

3S - The Christmasaurus - Tom Fletcher

4B - Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl

4LB - The Witches - Roald Dahl

4V - The Giraffe, The Pelly and Me - Roald Dahl

5D - Matilda by Roald Dahl

5HS - Zombie Cows from Outer Space - Luke Temple

5S - The Executioner's Daughter - Jane Hardstaff

6B- The Whitby Witches - Robin Jarvis

6F- Gangsta Granny - David Walliams

6S - Crater Lake - Jennifer Killick

Science

Have a go at this exciting science experiment using only raisins and lemonade.

Fill a glass with lemonade or fizzy water. Add raisins.

What do you think will happen?

What happened did happen?

Why do you think this is happening?

Can you research the science behind this?

This video explains:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZY4oO5AcCKE

Attendance and Punctuality

Does 5 minutes late really matter?

5 minutes late every day = 3 days lost over a year

10 minutes late every day = 6.5 days lost over a year

15 minutes late every day = 10 days lost over a year

20 minutes late every day = 13 days lost over a year

Registration at William Barcroft Junior School is 8.45am, and we will be allowing children in from 8.35am for some warm up activities. Please do not leave your children on the playground unattended before 08:35am. Doors close at 08:45am. Our finish time is 3.15pm for all pupils.

Reminder to all parents/carers that penalties and fines may be issued for any unauthorised holidays taken during term time or persistent absences.

We have many incentives for your children regarding attendance at our school-ask your child about our 100% attendance trolley!

Please contact the school office if you have any questions. Thank you.

#wbjspraiseculture #wbjsattendance #wbjsperfectpunctuality

General Information

We have a new information rack in our school office with helpful information and advice for our parents.
At William Barcroft Junior School we pride ourselves on having high expectations about the school uniform. Recently we have noticed that a number of children have not been wearing appropriate school shoes. If your child arrives at school without the correct footwear they will be provided with a pair of plimsolls to wear for the day. Thank you in advance for your support
Uniform Direct are our uniform provider for our school and provide a wide range of William Barcroft Junior School uniform available to purchase from the Grimsby store, at 54 Victoria Street (opposite Marks and Spencer Food Hall).
Please do not ride bikes and scooters on the school grounds, this is for children and adults. This is for the safety of our children, thank you.

PE kit MUST be brought to school on your child's PE days,

Year 3 will have PE Monday and Wednesday

Year 4 will have PE Tuesday and Thursday

Year 5 will have PE Monday and Wednesday

Year 6 will have PE Tuesday and Thursday

Can you take photographs in school?

Please ensure if you do take a photograph of your child on school site, that this is ONLY when you are told to do so by a member of staff and that the picture is of only your child. For example: After our Star of the Week assemblies.

Tuesday 5th December - SEND coffee morning.

Friday 8th December - Christmas dinner day, Christmas jumper day and Christmas party day.

Monday 11th December - Y3 Learning showcase.

Tuesday 12th December - Y4 Learning showcase, production performance for parents.

Wednesday 13th December - Y5 Learning showcase, talent showcase.

Thursday 14th December - Y6 Learning showcase.

Friday 15th December - Attendance treat AM, Panto PM.

Monday 18th December - Panto PM

Wednesday 20th December - Break up for Christmas.

Christmas dinner

Our Traditional Christmas Dinner will be held on Friday 8th December. Please confirm on Parent Pay if your child would like Christmas Dinner. Due to the number of children having Christmas Dinner, we can not offer any other alternative food options on this day. If your child would not like to have Christmas Dinner, please provide a packed lunch. This is to confirm you are booking your child a Christmas Dinner - Payment will be deducted via your Parent pay account in the usual way for school meals. The payment of £2.20 will be deducted from your Parent Pay account on the day unless your child is entitled to a free school meal.

Menu week commencing 04/12/23

Menu week commencing 11/12/23

Please see attached an informative wall poster that serves as a reminder of the key steps to ensure children's safety in the digital world. This poster is displayed around school to reinforce online safety practices but also encourages open conversations among parents, caregivers, and staff.

Follow this link to visit the safeguarding section of our website, and for a copy of our Safeguarding and Child Protection policy. https://wba.harbourlearningtrust.com/our-academy/safeguarding/

SEND Support Coffee Morning

Mrs Asher is hosting a coffee morning in the hall on Tuesday 5th December to discuss any support for SEND children. Our Designated Safeguarding Lead will also be available to discuss any support with regards to attendance or safeguarding.

For Parents - Fortnite Guidance

Epic Games (which includes Fortnite, Fall Guys and Rocket League) provide some really useful features for parents to manage their child's gaming experience. This includes 'cabined accounts' which are accounts where the child is under 13 and certain restrictions are applied by default, e.g. talking to other players. You can find further details and instructions from Internet Matters.

https://www.internetmatters.org/parental-controls/gaming-consoles/epic-games-store-parental-controls-guide/

For Parents - WhatsApp Guide

Even though WhatsApp has an age restriction of 16+, during our recent student survey the most popular messaging app from Y4/5 upwards. Over the last year or so WhatsApp have introduced new features so we have included an updated guide on this week’s newsletter so that parents can ensure the most appropriate settings are applied for their child.

https://www.internetmatters.org/resources/whatsapp-safety-a-how-to-guide-for-parents/

For Parents - Updated Supervision Features for FB Messenger and Instagram
In June 2023 Meta rolled out some new parental features for FB Messenger and Instagram. As of 30th August these updates are now available globally.
Specific updates for Messenger:

· View how much time the child spends on the app.

· Updates on their contact list.

· Notification if the child reports someone.

· View who can message their child.

· View who can see their child's stories.

Specific updates for Instagram:

· Before being able to message someone who doesn't follow them, people must now send a text only invite to connect (in other words, no more unwanted explicit photos from people you don't follow). No further interaction can take place unless the recipient accepts the invite.

Please click here to see more support and information.

https://about.fb.com/news/2023/06/parental-supervision-and-teen-time-management-on-metas-apps/