Beecroft Primary School

We are delighted to announce that we, Beecroft Primary, have achieved the School Games GOLD Mark Award for the 2021/22 academic year.

The School Games Mark is a Government-led award scheme launched in 2012, facilitated by the Youth Sport Trust to reward and recognise school’s engagement (provision and uptake) in the School Games against a national benchmark and to celebrate keeping young people active, and we are delighted to have been recognised for our success.

Our physical activity and school sport achievements this year include:

– Becoming a Girls Football School, now with over 40 KS2 girls having taken part in competitive matches

– Half termly inter school football competition for our U10 and U11 football teams

– Half termly playground challenges to increase physical activity

– Free extra-curricular clubs after-school and dinner time for all KS2 pupils

– Young leaders trained in both KS1 and KS2 leading playground games.

– Half termly Wellbeing Days with a wider range of physical activity

– Year 6 Catch -up swimming programme – Fridays

– Brownlee Triathlon participation

– Year 3 – Fun Run 

– Year 1/2 – Multi – Sports Festival

We are extremely proud of our pupils for their dedication to all aspects of physical activity and school sport, including those young volunteers, leaders and officials who made our events possible.  We are committed to using the School Games to try and engage those young people who haven’t previously been active or represented our school and to try and ensure that all our students have a positive experience and want to try out new activities beyond school too in our community.  We believe in the power of physical activity and school sport as a school and give opportunities to those young people that need it most either as a participant, leader, official or volunteer.

As part of our application, we were asked to fulfil criteria in the areas linked to the five School Games outcomes and we are pleased that the hard work of everyone at our school has been rewarded this year.

A special thank you to all of our young leaders who have shown great commitment and all of our pupils and parents who have taken part or supported events.

It has been another busy half-term of sport at Beecroft.

Skip Into Summer

In the playground children have really embraced the skipping challenge. It has been amazing to see the skills that children have developed over the 6 weeks; some never having skipped before. In Key Stage 1 children are skipping with speed and control, while in KS2 children have developed paired skipping, group skipping with traditional rhymes and cross over skipping. We now have many boys and girls skipping like professional boxers!  Our young leaders have also continued to progress, organising different challenges for their peers each break and dinner time.

Year 6 Swimming Boosters

The Year 6 swimming, Covid catch up course on Fridays has been a big hit. From the first week to now we have seen progress in terms of water confidence and stroke proficiency from all children. There are still another 6 weeks to go but already 3 children who couldn’t swim before can now swim at least one length!

Girls’ Football

The girls took part in their monthly league meeting at Carr Manor and the progress this time was clear to be seen. Of the 5 matches played they won 3 and drew 2 scoring 8 goals along the way. They look forward to the upcoming cup competition on the 22^{nd of} June.

Boys’ Football

In the inter-school competition, our U9s team played their first match in a friendly vs Scared Heart. It was an excellent game with all children showing great effort and determination. Unfortunately, although their performance deserved at least a point they conceded two late goals to lose the game 3-1.

In inter-school competition, the U10s played against U11s team in a fantastic game of football which had everything – even sunshine! The final score was 2-1 to the U11s.

Brownlee Triathlon

20 pupils from Y6 represented the school in the Brownlee Triathlon at John Charles Centre for Sport. This was an exciting opportunity to take part in the grueling event which included swimming 25m, running 2km and cycling 2km.  All children who took part, completed the event, and were awarded a Brownlee medal. It will be a great memory for all, and we hope the event will inspire the children in the future!

Dear Parents/Carers,
Thank you for all your support and a ‘big’ thankyou to those parents who supported us towards our Healthy Schools Award (we passed and the full report is on the website) 

“The school is a very strong advocate for the Healthy Schools Award. It is evident that the school invests much in health and wellbeing and that the Healthy Schools programme has a very high profile. All staff are highly motivated to raise aspirations and improve the health and wellbeing of all pupils. …..All pupils I met were happy, confident, articulate, engaged polite and friendly and demonstrated an excellent knowledge of health and wellbeing….The school works well with parents and families and strong relationships have been established with families and the community as a whole. Parents all commented on the excellent communication from school and accessibility to staff, when needed.
The commitment, passion hands-on approach and vision of the head teacher and the Healthy Schools Coordinator/PSHE lead and mind mate are very apparent.”

Attendance:
The government is ‘stepping up’ expectation with attendance – the majority of our Beecroft parents ensure that their child attends every day the school is open and are absent only when there is a statutory reason (illness) However the government’s new list says all parents are expected to:

1. Book any medical appointments around the school day when possible. (Not during lessons.)
2. Only request leave of absence in exceptional circumstances and do so in advance and this would not be every year. (Not holidays in term time)
3. Notify the school as soon as possible if their child has to be unexpectedly absent (e.g. sickness )

Number 1 and 2 can be improved upon by some of our parents as leave that becomes up to a month out of school is unacceptable.

Where a child is persistently absent (below 90%) the parent is asked by the government to work with school to improve this. (Individual letters are being sent out this week for appointments and these must be attended.)

The majority of our parents are always supportive but there remains a number of parents who do not support us enough. Attendance at school is the law.

Family Assembly: Wednesday 25^th May – all welcome (Please bring any surplus/old uniform to swap – stall after assembly)

Consultation Evening Video Call: Wednesday 25 May – 2.15-5.15 (Not Y6) If you were happy on the last meeting and had enough time you may want to wait until the July meeting.

Year 5 go to Nell Bank 16th-19^th May. We wish them a ‘happy holiday’ and good weather.

Best wishes,

J. Turner

Headteacher
Beecroft Primary School

Dear Parents/Carers,

Below is a timetable of your child’s PE sessions this summer term so that you know which 2 days (Years1-6) your child requires their PE kit.

• If your child is in Year 3 they have one session of PE and one session of swimming.
• If your child is in Year 6 they also have one session of PE and one session of swimming, which we have introduced this year as part of our Covid Catch-up using the Sports Premium Funding.

Please remember school PE kit consists of:

• Plain white t-shirt
• Plain black or navy shorts
• Sensible trainers
• Your child can wear either their school jumper or a plain black hoodie on colder days

In addition to this, please ensure if your child has asthma that your class teacher has an up-to-date inhaler. As the weather gets warmer, children may also bring a sunhat while they will need their water bottles and sun cream (please apply this at home).

Please send PE kit in a named pump bag.

The majority of classes will be taught by our specialist PE teacher Mrs Farthing-Kaye.

Yours sincerely,

Mr Campbell

Deputy Head

Dear Parents,
What a fantastic way to end the half-term! All children were impeccably behaved and despite the weather, they all enjoyed taking part in a range of activities including:

· Magic with Mr Schofield

· Forestry (fire-lighting) with Elite FOREST SCHOOLS

· Cooking (healthy smoothie making) with Miss Pinder

· KS1 Mixed Football/ KS2 Girls’ Football with Mr Campbell

· Orienteering with Mr Smith

· Internet Safety with Miss Halliday

· Dance with Mrs Glasby

· Happy Wellbeing bags with Miss Walker

· Music inspired artwork with Mrs Pickard

· Board games and Lego with Mrs Waggitt

We look forward to our next Wellbeing Day in May.

Well done everyone who took part in the Lego Comic Relief competition. 

There were some amazing habitats produced ranging from Lego rainforests to shoe box salt lakes and even water-coloured wetlands.  Everyone who took part received 20 colour points for their efforts. 

To take part in Comic Relief this year, we will be having a wear red and/or your red nose day on Friday 18^th March. All children may bring in a voluntary contribution of up to £1 to support the cause. Money raised will go towards helping people in the UK who the COVID-19 pandemic has made life harder for; whilst this year, Red Nose Day donations will also be used to support people fleeing the war in Ukraine, as the terrible conflict intensifies. In school children will learn about the causes being helped and take part in a fun red nose class quiz.  As another part of our fundraising, we will be taking part in Comic Relief’s Lego Challenge.  

The challenge is to design or make a habitat fortheir favourite of this year’s themed red nose creatures. You can find the creatures and information about their habitats at:  

https://www.comicrelief.com/rednoseday/schools/lego#get-lego-factsheets-anchor

Entries can be built out of Lego, made out of card and other materials or simply drawn/painted on paper. If your child brings their habitat entry in on Friday 18^th March, they will be judged by school council with the top 3 entries being photographed and sent through to Comic Relief for the main competition. 

Good luck with your designing! 

Whole School:
The whole school continued with their termly sports challenges at break and dinner times, with the aim of getting children more active and engaged in sport. This half term the challenge was the Road To Beijing, where challenges had a Winter Olympics theme. This included hockey and curling style games, which were run and led by our young leaders. All children in KS1 and 2 enjoyed taking part. The young leaders have been learning to plan and coach other children after school with Miss Pinder. They will continue to develop their skills this half term and introduce more playground games, with new equipment they have purchased.

Dear Parents/Carers,
I would like to start by thanking you for all your support – with particular thanks for the work you do in reading with your children, listening to reading and reading to your child. Reading is the single most important skill and interest to be learned in primary school.

I hope that your family is well and that the pandemic situation is becoming easier as time passes. Just a reminder – that I am asked to pass on – please get your vaccine. As we are meeting more with parents in school the vaccines contribute to peace of mind. You can be re-assured that our staff have had all three! There has been much less disruption because of this and protection for your children.

 Dates moving forward

Wednesday 16^th February 8.50am: Playground Family Assembly (short) – and afterwards play and stay in Years Reception,  1 and 2. Years 3 to Year 6 look round at work in the hall and classroom until 9.45am. You will be warmly welcomed. Bring your own cup for tea or coffee

Friday 18^th February: Wellbeing Day

Thursday 3^rd March: World Book Day – dress as a book character and bring your favourite book to the class.

Week 28^th February: Phone calls about your child’s progress

Attendance: Thank you again to a majority of families. Our attendance overall is 97.3% from September to present. Please can I strongly recommend that extended leave and holidays are not taken in term time. Where this has happened pupils’ attendance has fallen below 90% and has become persistent absence. Pupils fall behind and together with Covid it has created difficulties in getting children to catch up.

The half-term holiday starts on 18 February and the return to school on Monday 28^th February 

With best wishes,
J. Turner