Parent governor elections
Thank you to all of you who voted in Sphere Federation governing body elections for a new parent governor.
The governing body of Sphere Federation is made up of two staff members (including the Head of Federation), governors appointed by Leeds City Council and the Diocese of Leeds, and representatives from the local community, all of whom share the important job of overseeing the running of the school. Mr Matthew Hick has been elected as the new parent governor joining the team. As a reminder, here’s Mr Hick’s ‘blurb’ from the nomination form:
As a former pupil of a Sphere Federation school, and someone with a lifelong connection to the neighbourhood, whose two children now attend the school, it would be a privilege to become a governor for the Federation and give something back to the community. I have extensive leadership experience and am the Chair and founder of an organisation that promotes volunteering work, former Chair and Trustee of an organisation that promotes voluntary, community and social enterprise and Co-founder of a local Covid-19 support Group. Alongside this I am Head of Volunteering with a large national charitable organisation where I lead on strategy, policy, and systems. In 2019, I was nominated to become a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, for my work in the voluntary sector, which I gladly accepted. Away from work and volunteering, I enjoy spending time with family, sport – and, in particular, running – and film. After 12 years of working in the third sector, I believe passionately in the power of people to come together to build a better future. I believe this applies equally to social action groups as it does to boards of governors and trustees. I would relish the opportunity to apply my passion and skills to helping Sphere Federation achieve its ambitions.
We had five candidates in total and all five presented a strong set of skills for the role. Thank you to all five for expressing their interest and we hope the other four might do so again when another vacancy arises.
Our weekly message (20 November 2020)
We’re reaching the end of the tenth week of the school year…
We’ve been really pleased with our pupils and their positive attitudes on their return to school. We’ve assessed their learning and we’re also pleased: whilst there are some gaps and some ‘slowing down’, we’re confident we can catch up over the year, especially with your continuing support.
Talking of support, thank you to the very many of you who joined the first of six Zoom workshops to help you support your child at home – Wednesday’s was about Science and ‘topic subjects’ like history and geography. (Those who arrived early got to hear why I’m looking so battered just now, too!) Next week, we’ve two English-related workshops: one on reading (Monday, 6pm) and one on phonics (Wednesday, 6pm). Contact school for details on how to join the Zoom.
Last week, we talked about how fortunate we’ve been in not having to ‘burst a bubble’. We spoke too soon: in one of our Sphere schools, we did have to send a class home to self-isolate. (Interesting to note the date last week…) As we said, in such circumstances, check out our Home Learning page. (In fact, check it out now so you can familiarise yourself, just in case.)
Covid-19 continues to throw up new challenges each day and the range of symptoms that people report seems to grow each day, too. However, the government is sticking to three main symptoms:
- a high temperature
- a new, continuous cough
- a loss or change to your sense of smell or taste
There have been instances where symptoms have been vague and a Covid test has not been done until a few days after people have felt unwell. In these cases, we’re taking the 14 days isolation period from the positive test date or from the onset of classic Covid-19 symptoms, listed above. (This might seem to contradict what Test and Trace advise you, but it’s in consultation with Public Health England and the Department for Education.)
Similarly, we’ve had a few situations where children who have been self-isolating have come back to school too soon. The reason for this is that parents appear to have had messages from Test and Trace saying that children can come back. As a school, we need to follow government guidance which states that self-isolation is for 14 days. When you let us know that your child has to self-isolate, we note when they can return to school and we’ll tell you. If your child comes back before that date, they’ll be sent home. The only exception to this is if the person showing symptoms gets a negative test.
We’re working really hard to keep everyone safe and hope you understand our position on this.
Have you done a Covid test on yourself? It’s not the nicest thing to have to do, and it seems people fall into two camps: those who hate more the throat swab, and those who hate more the nose swab! Some of you will already have administered the test for your child. If not, this guide might help.
And that’s enough Covid talk for one message!
This week, we’ve been grateful to some parents who alerted us to concerns that their children may not be drinking enough water. We’ve reminded staff in the classroom and at lunchtime that they should be encouraging and checking children are drinking to stay hydrated – so important for health and for learning. Please help with this: make sure your child brings in a bottle full of fresh water each day.
Finally…
Here’s the latest edition of Families magazine. There are lots of creative Christmas-themed ideas to do at home – we like the Christmas decorations on page 5 and the Christmas cooking on page 8!
Healthy eating assemblies
The whole federation joined together to take part in an assembly about healthy eating last week. It was very exciting to see the other classes in the other schools! We had these booked in for Health Week last summer, which had to be cancelled.
The Leeds Health and Wellbeing Team delivered the assembly where we learnt all sorts of interesting things about keeping healthy and finished off with an interactive quiz.
Children in Need
Thank you for helping to raise money for Children in Need by coming to school in non-uniform today. Some of our older children had a go at the challenge where they had to ‘act their age’, completing an activity the number of times that represents how old they are.
In total, we raised £84.50 which will go towards a great cause!
Our weekly message (13 November 2020)
It’s so good to keep receiving positive feedback about how we’re doing in these challenging times, including our weekly messages. Many thanks for this. This message kicks off with a gentle reminder. Lower down, there are details about some ways to support your child’s learning at home (whether they’re self-isolating or just in general). We’ve also important advice about your child keeping warm in school and some news about Christmas.
Continuing to take care
This is the end of the ninth week in school and we’re so fortunate that we’ve not burst a bubble – yet. Within your household group and beyond, it can sometimes feel a bit too much of an effort to maintain all the precautions…
- hands (wash and sanitise them lots during the day)
- face (wear a mask around people outside of your household)
- space (maintain 2 metres distance around others)
…however, please do keep helping us keep our schools open for all. In general, respect the national lockdown restrictions, and in school, wear a mask and keep your distance from others at the start and end of the school day.
Supporting your child at home 1 – online activities
Since September, there’s a fairly steady number of children having to stay at home due to Covid. Whether your child is self-isolating or if you’re keen to provide a bit of extra support at home, please do remember we publish an overview of learning for your child to get on with at home on our Home learning page. Contact us if this online approach doesn’t work for you – we can provide paper-based learning if you’re child is self-isolating at home. It’s definitely also worth checking out our Help your child and Calculations and times tables pages which both contain a range of ideas, links and activities – even just a bit of regular practice of times tables and handwriting can make loads of difference!
Talking of times tables, Times Tables Rock Stars is an app and website that we use in school to quicken the recall of tables facts. It’s something that you can use at home, too – your child has their own username and password. (If you don’t have these, or you have any questions, email your child’s class teacher.) Each game is short so you don’t need lots of time. ‘Garage’ is where you’ll find tables set by us whilst ‘Soundcheck’ includes all facts up to 12 x 12.
We’ve just signed up to Numbots, too. Perhaps more suited to younger children or children who need a bit of extra support with the basics, this is a great app and website for practising addition and subtraction facts. Your child can use it at home – they login using the same details they use for Times Tables Rock Stars. There are 15 different games, each with a different focus. Topics covered include doubles and number bonds to 10, 20 and 100.
PhonicsPlay is a great website that teachers in Reception to Year 2 (and sometimes Year 3) use in their daily phonics lessons. In each game, you can select the phase of phonics and, more specifically, which letters (graphemes) and sounds (phonemes) to focus on. The games are a fun way to practise reading sounds, real words, ‘alien words’ and sentences. Login details are Sphere (user name) and Spher3 (password). Check out the Resources page.
Supporting your child at home 2 – Zoom workshops for you
Normally in the Autumn term, we provide a range of workshops to help you support your child’s learning at home. This year, we’re happy to offer something similar via Zoom…
The sessions – each lasting just 30 minutes – are:
- Wednesday 18 November: Curriculum
- Monday 23 November: Reading (mainly for Key Stage 2)
- Wednesday 25 November: Phonics (mainly for Reception / Key Stage 1)
- Wednesday 02 December: Maths
- **Re-scheduled date** Monday 07 December: EYFS (mainly for Reception)
- Wednesday 09 December: Times Tables
All six sessions start at 6pm. If you’re interested in attending, please send us a message on the School Gateway app or email us at stjamesoffice@spherefederation.org. We’ll email the joining details out to all those who express an interest.
Keeping warm
Even though it’s getting colder, it’s important that we keep all areas of school as ventilated as possible. Ideally, the windows and doors should be open all of the time but we obviously don’t want staff or children shivering! We’ve asked teachers to judge the temperature and make a decision on whether it’s realistic to keep windows open during lessons. There’ll be times when it’s just too cold so we’ll open windows and doors when children aren’t in the rooms to blast some fresh air in.
Over the coming months, it’d be great if you could make sure your child has an extra layer on under their uniform or an extra jumper or fleece (unbranded and in the school colour where possible). Don’t forget suitable coats, too.
Christmas is coming…
…really?! Whilst we all wait eagerly for news of what Christmas might look like for ourselves and our families, we can say with some certainty that Christmas at school will be quite different.
Unfortunately, many of the things we do involve gathering large groups of children (and adults) together. Sadly, we won’t be performing any nativity plays for you to come and see. Instead, we’ll aim to share Christmas with you virtually with a few festive fun times. Details of these will be shared nearer the time.
Christmas parties will be held in individual classes with each child asked to bring their own party ‘pack-up’ to enjoy. Again, we’ll share details nearer the time.
Christmas will still be fun – just a little different!
Relationships and Sex Education Policy
Thank you to those of you who recently responded to our recent consultation about our revised Relationships and Sex Education (RSE) Policy. We’ve taken a good deal of the feedback on board, especially around the notion of consent.
As part of our Living and Learning subject, coming up soon will be some teaching and learning specifically around RSE. Please see the letter and final policy. If you’ve any questions, comments or concerns, please speak with Mr Roundtree or Miss Beatson.
Parent / carer workshops
Normally in the Autumn term, we provide a range of workshops to help you support your child’s learning at home. This year, we’re happy to offer something similar via Zoom…
We’ve arranged six short Zoom sessions led by Sphere Federation leaders on a range of subject areas. Each session will last for just 30 minutes, but will provide a few top tips and guidance as to how to support your child at home. The invitation is open to all parents and carers across Sphere Federation, although we’ve indicated below if the session might be more appropriate for particular age ranges.
The sessions are as follows:
- Wednesday 18 November: Curriculum
- Monday 23 November: Reading (mainly for Key Stage 2)
- Wednesday 25 November: Phonics (mainly for Foundation 2 / Key Stage 1)
- **re-scheduled date (apologies)** Monday 07 December: EYFS (mainly for Foundation 2)
- Wednesday 02 December: Maths
- Wednesday 09 December: Times Tables
All six sessions start at 6pm. They should last around 20-25 minutes, plus there will be a questions and answer session at the end of around 5-10 minutes.
If you are interested in attending any of these Zoom workshops, please could you either send us a message on the School Gateway app or email us at stjamesoffice@spherefederation.org. We will then email the Zoom joining details out to all those who have expressed an interest, prior to the session.
We look forward to welcoming you to our virtual workshops!
Our weekly message (06 November 2020)
Welcome back to school, and (sadly) to Lockdown 2…
Guidance for schools about the new national restrictions was released just the day before the lockdown kicked in, so we’re still working through any changes – we don’t anticipate too many, thankfully. You may have read headlines about teachers claiming that schools should close. The arguments stem from one particular union, and others disagree. As we said earlier this week, we fully support the decision to keep schools open – children need to be in school to learn and socialise. We can assure you that Sphere Federation schools have been working as hard as we can to keep our schools safe places to learn.
Your child’s a historian this half-term!
With the start of a new half-term comes the start of a new topic. Across Key Stage 1 and Key Stage 2, children are becoming historians this half-term:
- children in Years 1 and 2 will learn about the Great Fire of London
- children in Years 3 and 4 will become experts on Ancient Greece
- children in Years 5 and 6 will compare the Stone Age and Iron Age in Britain with what was going on in Ancient Egypt at around the same time
Read this one page list of History learning for the half-term ahead – it contains the core learning in terms of both knowledge and skills. (Be aware, though, that because of the closure of schools in Lockdown 1, teachers are being more flexible in their approach to the expectations set out in this document, making sure that missed learning and gaps are being addressed in Reading, Writing and Maths.)
And now, a message from Miss Beatson…
We’ve had a really positive start to the half term; the children have come back eager to learn and happy to be with their friends. These are such challenging times for all of us but our children have shown great resilience and we’re all very proud of how well they continue to cope with the changes to school life. This half term, our Christian value is perseverance and I don’t think I can think of a more suitable value to focus on in these current times.
I’m really pleased to say that we’ve reviewed our school lunch grab bags and we’re now able to provide a hot meal option each day. I know this is something many of you have been asking about and our catering staff have been eager to provide, particularly now the weather is getting colder. Check out the menu on our website page or on the notice board in the playground if you’re considering a school meal for your child.
Our bagel bar is proving very popular and the children are enjoying meeting with their friends over breakfast before their day of learning begins. If you’d like your child to attend, then bring them to school between 8.30am and 8.45am.
I’d just like to finish by thanking you for your kind, supportive comments and messages that I know the staff in school really appreciate at this time. I’d also like to thank you for your support as you continue to wear face coverings and keep your distance in the school grounds to ensure we keep everyone as safe as we possibly can.
New national lockdown
The Department for Education have been sending schools daily emails since the start of the coronavirus crisis. This is an extract from today’s email. We fully support the decision to keep schools open – children need to be in school to learn and socialise. We can assure you that Sphere Federation schools have been working as hard as we can to keep our schools safe places to learn…
On Saturday 31 October, the Prime Minister announced new national restrictions that will come into force on Thursday 5 November for 4 weeks until Wednesday 2 December.
We will continue to prioritise the wellbeing and long-term futures of our children and young people and will not be closing early years settings, schools, colleges or universities. It remains very important for children and young people to attend, to support their wellbeing and education and help working parents and guardians. Senior clinicians still advise that school is the best place for children to be, and so they should continue to go to school.
Until Thursday 5 November, the relevant Local COVID Alert Level measures will continue to apply in the area where you live. From Thursday, the national restrictions replace the local restrictions in your area.
Relationships and Sex Education – consultation
Thank you to those of you who submitted your thoughts about our recent online consultation.
From September 2020, Relationships Education and Health Education are now statutory and form part of the National Curriculum. As a result of the changes, we’ve updated our Relationships and Sex Education (RSE) policy. We were keen to hear your views as parents / carers alongside the views of teachers and governors.
We asked three main questions, below. We can’t promise to take on board every view in our final policy, but we will definitely consider each one.
Are there any changes or additions that you think should be made to the Relationships and Sex Education (RSE) policy?
Two themes came across strongly in the responses to this question: mental wellbeing (comments included ‘I would love to see emphasis on the child’s relationship with themself eg how they should learn to be kind to themselves as well as kind to others’ ) and consent (‘Talking to even young children about their rights over their body and their right to say they don’t like something, obviously in an age appropriate way – you can say you don’t like being tickled etc ‘).
We already do a lot to promote positive mental health, and we’ll continue to explore ways we can build on this – it’s obviously important. We’ve also started to introduce the notion of consent – asking if a pupil gives consent to have their photo taken, even. We’ll definitely ensure consent in the context of relationships and sex will be stressed.
What do you believe is the most important subject area of RSE that should be taught for different year groups and why?
Consent strongly featured in this section, too. This might be specifically mentioned (‘For very young children I think the focus should be on privates being private and the pants rule. For older children the focus should be around age of consent and how important it to adhere to that and what is meant by consent’) or in more general terms (‘Mutual respect across the board’).
Various other things were mentioned here, including accessing safe health information online, LGBTQ and diversity, and online grooming.
Is there an area of RSE that you think should not be taught for different year groups and why?
The vast majority of respondents replied ‘no’ to this question: ‘No. I think it is very important that these things are taught in school’. Two respondents who had concerns left their contact details so we’ll be able to speak with them and hopefully reassure them. Every year before children in Year 5 and 6 have lessons around physical changes and reproduction, parents will be invited to a session to discuss the content and the delivery, so each year there will be a similar chance to reassure people.
If you’ve any questions, comments or concerns about Relationships and Sex Education, please do contact us. In the meantime, thanks again to those who responded to our consultation.