William Barcroft Junior School
'Success and happiness for all'
'Pupils are very happy to attend this nurturing and inclusive school'
'The school has high ambition for pupils' achievement'
'Pupils know they have a strong voice'
'The school's pastoral care is exemplary'
Ofsted report - June 2025
https://reports.ofsted.gov.uk/provider/21/143884
Message from the Principal:
Good afternoon everyone and welcome to this week’s newsletter.
First of all, can I say a huge thank you for your support at parents’ evening; this was our highest attendance in many years which is fabulous.
Thank you also for your fantastic contributions for Children in Need where we raised an amazing £424.19 ; what a wonderful effort from the whole community!
We’ve had a busy fortnight , with our DANCE values at the heart of our learning. We have been focusing on nurture with anti-bullying week activities, helping the community planning a litter pick next week and seeing plenty of delight and joy during swimming, science and violin lessons to name a few. We focused on ambition in our assembly together on Monday and how we never give up in pursuit of what we want to achieve . We have empowered the children to make improvements to play areas outside, with the pupil governors collating some exciting plans for new areas on our field in coming months. We have, as always, had a focus on safeguarding, with digital leaders out this week learning more about internet safety and the community police team delivering an assembly to older pupils about knife crime.
The weather has clearly changed now and we are firmly into the colder months. Please ensure that children are prepared for this with coats every day. Can we also remind everyone to put names in all items as it is so difficult to help with lost items if not labelled.
I also need to remind everyone of our rules regarding birthday cakes. There is nothing worse than us having to send a cake home and tell children/parents we cannot give it out, but there are strict laws that we have to adhere to. We have to give allergen information therefore items have to be individually packed and labelled. Whilst discussing food can I also remind about our healthy eating rules. We are increasingly seeing children bringing unhealthy snacks and lots of chocolate items for lunch. Playtime snacks must be healthy and not crisps, sweets etc. Thank you for your support with these matters.
Please enjoy reading the newsletter and seeing what your wonderful children have been achieving. Can I particularly draw your attention to the section on our science award (PSQM) that Mrs Shearer has led the work on. This is a fantastic achievement and reflects the high quality science curriculum we offer - well done to all staff! Have a lovely weekend everyone.
S Sargent
Principal
If your child is absent, please contact the school office via telephone rather than the enquires email so that we can log your child's absence before the registers close.
This week's lower school attendance winners are:
1st place - Bluebells
2nd place - Roses
3rd place - Daffodils
This week's upper school attendance winners are:
1st place - Snowdrops
2nd place - Lillies
3rd place - Magnolias
Autumn 2
Thursday 27th November - The Canoe River Cleaner assembly
Tuesday 9th December - Church visit
Thursday11th December - Y3 Learning showcase
Thursday 11th December - School production (production club) 2pm and 4pm
Friday 12th December - Y5 Learning showcase
Friday 12th December - Christmas panto day Year 3 and Year 6
Monday 15th December - Christmas party day
Tuesday 16th December - Y4 Learning showcase
Tuesday 16th December - Christmas jumper and Christmas dinner day
Wednesday 17th December - Y6 Learning showcase
Wednesday 17th December - Christmas panto day Year 4 and Year 5
Thursday 18th December - Talent Showcase
Friday 19th December - Community sing 12.45pm
Break up for Christmas for ALL pupils - Friday 19th December at 1.05pm
Children return on Monday 5th January 2026
Term dates
Please check the website for 2025 - 2026 term dates.
Year 4 Swimming
As part of the PE curriculum, our year 4 students will take part in swimming lessons at Havelock on the following dates:
Group 1 dates - Monday 24th November and Monday 1st/8th of December.
Group 2 dates - Thursday 27th November and Thursday 4th/11th December.
More information will be given closer to the time and a letter will be sent to all year 4 parents.
General Information
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.
Please note, electric scooters are not allowed on the school site due to health and safety regulations and not having the facilities to store them in school.
Please do not bring pets onto the school site due to health and safety regulations. This includes picking up from after school clubs.
PE Kits
PE kit MUST be brought to school on your child's PE days,
Year 5 and Year 6 - Monday and Wednesday
Year 4 - Tuesday
Year 3 - Tuesday and Thursday
PE kit should be worn for every PE lesson to ensure children are successful and safe during their session. Please ensure your child is wearing the school PE top with the WBJS logo, black or blue joggers/shorts and comfortable trainers.
WBJS Newsround
Take a look at all the fantastic learning that has been taking place this week!
In school, we celebrate our reading success and the children with a significant reading milestone. We identify those children with 'Reading Certificates' for our rewards:
Bronze award - 150 reads
Silver award - 200 reads
Gold award - 250 reads
Diamond award - 300+ reads
These children are celebrated in the 'Star of the Week' assembly with a personalised certificate and given a corresponding badge to wear with pride!
Get ready for a day of festive fun and charitable giving as the school celebrates Christmas Jumper Day for Save the Children on Tuesday, December 16th! Students and teachers are invited to swap their usual uniform for their festive Christmas jumper. By making a small donation each member of the school community helps raise vital funds. This money goes towards Save the Children's work, providing life-saving medicine, food, education, and protection for children facing tough circumstances in the UK and globally. It’s a brilliant way for the school to embrace the holiday spirit while learning about the importance of empathy and supporting a great international cause.
Please see the link below to make your donations:
https://superkind.org/campaign/william-barcroft-christmas-jumper-day
Thank you.
To honor those who have served and sacrificed, the school proudly participated in the annual Poppy Appeal. Students and staff had the opportunity to purchase poppies, wristbands, and other related merchandise, with all proceeds going directly to the Royal British Legion. The children completed a 2 minute silence to show their respect to those that have fallen for our country.
Children were encouraged to wear odd socks on Monday 10th November to help raise awareness for Anti-bullying week. The Anti-bullying Ambassadors also held their first assembly alongside Miss Steane to share awareness on what bullying is and how we can support our school community.
On Friday 14th November, children came to school in their yellow or spotty clothes and challenged themselves to have mad hair! Students bought Children In Needs cookies for 50p at break time and raised a fantastic amount for the charity. Thank you to our parents and carers for supporting us to fundraise for this special chartiy.
We are proud to announce that we are one of 310 schools that have been awarded the Primary Science Quality Mark (PSQM) this month, a nationally recognised accreditation that celebrates a commitment to developing excellence in science leadership, curriculum design, teaching and learning.
Led by the University of Hertfordshire, for over a decade the Primary Science Quality Mark (PSQM) has been setting children on a path to a life filled with exciting possibilities and opportunities, by giving them access to a strong foundation in quality primary science education. Over 5,800 Quality Marks have now been awarded, impacting on the learning of over 1,000,000 children.
Helen Sizer, PSQM Director said: ‘By achieving The Primary Science Quality Mark, a school has shown commitment to raising the profile and quality of science education through the development of effective science leadership, visionary curriculum design and excellent teaching practice which is positively impacting on children’s learning across the school. Such success is only possible through the collective effort of the whole school community, and all those involved should be incredibly proud of this achievement and the positive difference this is making to children’s learning and understanding of the world around them.’
On Thursday 20th November, our students took part in a workshop at Centre4 to promote internet safety. The engaging activities were designed to promote open discussions about important topics such as bullying, online safety and digital resilience. The children had the opportunity to explore the dangers of being online and the ways they can protect themselves and others.
We hope that the workshop has helped equip some of our younger generation with tools that will serve them well in the digital world.
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/
Every year hundreds of thousands of people here in the UK fall victim to fraud when buying something online. With Xmas and Xmas sales rapidly approaching, fraud and scams will be significantly on the increase.
GetSafeOnline has a plethora of information to help with this such as:
Discord, the app, is still very popular particularly with gamers and like many apps it has safety features, including features for parents/guardians. The Discord Family Center is quote a tool built to help parents and guardians stay informed and involved in your teen's Discord experience while respecting their privacy and autonomy unquote. The safety features have recently been updated and now include:
Ability to view the activity feed.
Get weekly email summaries,
Manage safety and privacy settings.
To find out more about these features and more, and how to set up Family Center you can view the Discord Family Center HERE. There is also a parent hub which has lots of information and resources for parents such as user controls, moderation, reporting and more. You can find the parent hub HERE.
Change the life of a local child, be a foster carer. Enquire today Fostering in North East Lincolnshire | NELC
As a foster friendly school, we want to raise awareness of the need for local foster carers to come forward in the area. If you think you can make a positive difference to a child’s life, enquire today. Fostering in North East Lincolnshire | NELC https://youtu.be/sNXx6dycp3Y
For all SEND enquiries please contact Mrs Asher our school SENDCO.
Sleep is essential for life and development. In our modern society, sleep can be limited or disrupted. This can have serious consequences at all ages and stages.
Children with SEND are more likely than their peers to have issues with sleep.
Please follow this link from NEL SEND local offer for more support:
Please check out the following links to our X (Twitter) accounts and see what each class have been up to this week in real-time!
