Summer smile competition

Have you captured a smile for our Summer competition yet? This summer, we’re looking for smiley faces to sum up our happy and healthy place to achieve and believe!

Over the Summer holiday, we want you to stay alert to happy and healthy faces all around you… and take a pic of any hidden smiley faces in your surroundings: a day out at the beach might include creating a smiley face, for example! Here’s our suggestion (look for the smiling face!)…

…but we’re sure you can do better!

Look out for things around you that show a hidden smiley face – a happy and healthy face – or encourage your child to create their own from things around them (pebbles, leaves, Lego…).

To help you get started, look out for some intended smiling faces like McCain Potato Smiles or commercial logos with a hidden smile but they’ll be too obvious to win the competition!

To enter, email your pics to stjamesoffice@spherefederation.org by Monday 08 September. Enter ‘Summer competition’ as the subject.

All entries will be displayed in a happy and healthy display in school, and there are prizes for our favourites.

Our last weekly school message of the year: Friday 18 July 2025

We’ve reached the end of the school year – we hope it’s been a happy and healthy one at St James’ CE Primary for you and your child. Our message this week is a long one:

1. Our first message is some early news about assessment outcomes
2. Our next message is about swimming – it’s especially important for parents of children moving into Year 3 next year
3. We’ve a uniform update – this is for everyone
4. A short, but very grateful, thank you to our wonderful PTA
5. Also for everyone are some links for holiday ideas
6. After this, we’ve an array of celebrations of our happy and healthy school!

Well done!

At the end of the school year, there are different statutory assessments for children in different year groups. With assessments still coming in or yet to be confirmed, it’s early days to look too closely at the results, but here’s a quick first look:

• The vast majority of our Year 1 children reached national expectations in the Phonics Screening Check – 86.2% compared to the national figure of 80.1%
• Our Year 4 children’s average score in the Multiplication Tables Check was 23.0 out of 25 – we don’t know the 2025 national average, but that’s comfortably above last year’s figure of 20.6
• In the Key Stage 2 tests (the SATs) in Reading, Maths and Grammar and Punctuation, the outcomes for Year 6 match the national figures

Well done to all the pupils for doing so well.

Swimming lessons

In September, your child will start swimming lessons as part of the PE National Curriculum. Lessons will take place at Wetherby Leisure Centre.

• boys: swim shorts under PE kit
• girls: bring their swimming costume to school, ready to get changed at school before walking down to the leisure centre

• towel
• goggles (if needed)
• underwear for afterwards

If your child needs arm bands, they’ll be provided at the centre.

Uniform update

Please remind yourself of our Uniform Policy so you and your child can be ready for September. We’ve made a couple of minor changes: nothing major, mainly making the guidance around additional items hopefully a bit clearly.

Thank you to our PTA…

What a wonderful year packed full of fun events courtesy of our PTA. Thank you to everyone who’s helped or taken part in PTA events this year. Read the 2024-25 annual report from PTA.

Happy and healthy in the holidays

Our weekly message: Friday 11 July 2025

This week has been our Being Healthy themed week, the second of our Living and Learning themed weeks in the year. A particular was our Sports Day – despite the heat, a fun day was had by all. Thanks for coming along and supporting this end of year highlight!

Home learning

Our first message this week is here for two reasons:

• to help parents of children going into Year 1 in September know about home learning
• to make sure other parents are aware of our expectations for home learning (this stems from feedback in our 2025 annual survey)

At St James’ CE Primary, we set out five home learning tasks for children to do:

• Reading – daily for at least 10-15 minutes
• Number fluency – use NumBots or TimesTables Rock Stars for about ten minutes each day
• Spellings – daily for 5-10 minutes
• Talk Time – weekly for about 15 minutes
• Living and Learning– weekly for about 15 minutes

Altogether, this varied diet of home learning totals about 35 minutes each day (that’s allowing for a day or two off). Read our Home Learning Policy. This includes a Homework Guide which you might want to print off and keep somewhere for easy reference.

Summer production

The Year 6 leavers’ production of ‘Let the Games Begin’ was a huge success. Well done to all of the children and staff involved in putting on a wonderful performance. Thank you, also, to all of you who managed to attend. We hope you enjoyed it.

Summer Fair

Thank you to everyone who attended the Summer Fair and all those involved in organising the event. The total raised on the day was £2,107.54! This is a fantastic amount and it will be a huge contribution to the playground trim trail that the PTA are saving up for.

Governance

For those of you interested to read more about our Governing Board, the Sphere Federation Annual Governance Statement for 2024-25 has been published.

We do still have a vacancy on the Governing Board. Please mention this to any friends or relatives! Anyone interested should contact the chair of governors, Mrs Rachel Cooper: rachelcooper@spherefederation.org

That’s a date!

At Sphere Federation, we like to be organised because we know many of you do, too. That’s why you’ll find most of the key dates in our calendar for 2025-26. Because we’ve got these planned in so far in advance, there’s a small chance one or two might need to be changed (we’ve not had to do this very often this year!). Well over 50 events are listed, including:

• Christmas events
• Church visits
• Early Years events such as Stay and Learn sessions
• Happy and healthy school community sessions (formerly known as our Coffee mornings, but renamed because some are in the afternoon now, too!)
• all our Living and Learning statements (with improved prompts for continuing the  learning at home)
• Living and Learning themed weeks (Me and My Money and Staying Safe)
• Living and Learning themed days (Anti-bullying day and Safer Internet Day)
• National assessments
• Productions across the year
• Watch us while we work sessions (so you can see some teaching and learning in core skills like Reading, Writing and Maths)
• Topic review sessions (come and and see the learning in Art and Computing)
• Some online presentations (Y6 SATs and residential; Y1, Y2 phonics and early reading; online safety)
• Parent-teacher meetings (in October and February)
• Photographer (for individual and class photos)
• lots of events to celebrate Reading
• Sports Day

Safeguarding over the Summer break

During the Summer holiday, you might have a concern about a child that you feel needs acting on. In term time, we would encourage you to share the concern with us at school but this isn’t possible when school is closed.

Here are some options for you if you have any concerns:

• During office hours: You can call Children’s Social Work Services on 0113 222 4403 (Monday to Friday 9am to 5pm, except Wednesdays when they’re open from 10am). You can also discuss your concerns with someone who works with children and families, such as your health visitor or your GP
• Out of office hours: If you think a child is in immediate danger call the police on 999
• Our Federation Safeguarding Lead will also be picking up emails. You can contact her using our safeguarding email address: stayingsafe@spherefederation.org

Talking of summer, don’t forget…

Our Summer competition

The aim is simple: capture or create a smiley face to sum up our happy and healthy place to achieve and believe! We want you to stay alert to happy and healthy faces all around you… and take a pic of any hidden smiley faces in your surroundings: a day out at the beach might include creating a smiley face in the sand, for example! We’re sure you and your child can do than our suggestion (look for the smiling face!)…

Look out for things around you that show a hidden smiley face – a happy and healthy face – or encourage your child to create their own from things around them (pebbles, leaves, Lego…).

To enter, email your pics to stjamesoffice@spherefederation.org by Monday 08 September. Enter ‘Summer competition’ as the subject. All entries will be displayed in a happy and healthy display in school, and there are prizes for our favourites.

Next week’s our last week of the 2024-25 school year. The last day of term is Friday 18 July. If your child’s in Year 6, we’re looking forward to seeing you for our Leavers’ Service at St James Church on Thursday at 2.00pm.

Our weekly message: Friday 04 July 2025

You should have received your child’s annual report this week. Please contact your child’s teacher if you’d like to discuss the report – your questions, comments and concerns are important.

We start this week’s message with a repeat of an email from yesterday…

This week’s message has a few repeats of previous messages so you’re prepared…

Themed week: Being Healthy

Next week is the second of two themed weeks in the year. Here are a few reminders.

• Children should wear PE kit throughout the week, but please make sure it follows our Uniform Policy:

• Travel actively to school – scooter, walking, riding their bike safely! For the chance to win a book token, send your photos by Thursday 10 July to stjamesoffice@spherefederation.org
• Thursday 10 July is our Sports Day: Early Years at 9.15am and Key Stage 1 and 2 at 1.30pm.
• Pupils have an online health questionnaire at home for their homework.

To help us continue with themed weeks such as this, we’re asking for a small contribution: £2 per pupil (Gateway) will help us to pay for visitors for themed weeks. Thank you to everyone who has contributed so far.

Production

Don’t forget our Key Stage 2 Summer production next week, too. There are two performances:

• Tuesday at 1.45pm
• Wednesday at 6.00pm

2025-26 classes

As we come to the end of the school year, we’d like to update you on the teachers for the next school year.

We’re saying goodbye to Mrs Palmer who’ll be moving to Moortown Primary (one of our federation schools). We wish her all the best at Moortown. We’re also saying goodbye to Mrs Cowgill who has been covering maternity leave in the Nursery class. Mrs Cowgill has done a fantastic job and we’ll miss her lots.

We welcome Miss Gilliland who is joining us from Scholes (Elmet) Primary. Some children will remember Miss Gilliland when she did her teaching placement at St James’ last year.

Yesterday, your child met with their new teacher and spent some time getting to know them. I’m sure they’ll want to tell you all about it when they get home.

Here are the classes for September:

• Nursery and Reception: Miss Kendrew
• Year 1: Mr Nash
• Year 2: Miss Gledhill (M, Tu, F) and Mrs Bye (W, Th) (In January, Mrs Ward will return from maternity leave and will teach in Year 2 with Mrs Bye)
• Year 3: Miss Gilliland
• Year 4: Mrs Poole
• Year 5: Mr Freeman
• Year 6: Mr Kilner

Rock steady

On Monday, we had an exciting visit from Rocksteady Music School. The key focus of the visit was to engage pupils in music, to learn about various instruments and how to play them. We kicked off with a whole school assembly where children learnt all about what it takes to be in a band (sing along to some of the latest hits!). After this, there were separate workshops where a pupil band was put together in just 30 minutes!

That’s all for this week. Before we end, here’s an idea if there’s a summer birthday in your household…

Herd Farm is a council-run activity centre offering a range of outdoor activities and pursuits for both adults and children. They’ve recently launched a Birthday Adventure Offer which they’re trialling during the summer holidays. Interested? Check out this video clip.

Our weekly message: Friday 27 June 2025

Thank you to everyone who donated a bottle for the Summer Fayre last week. We’re looking forward to welcoming our school community to the event tomorrow at 11.30am. There’s still time to buy wristbands and raffle tickets or you can just turn up on the day and join in the fun.

Our Living and Learning statement this week…

…has been I can say one good thing about myself.

Self-esteem is how you feel about yourself. These feelings can change as things in your life change, such as going to a new school or becoming a brother or sister. Does your child recognise their strengths? Do they know subjects at school they’re strongest at? Outside school, do they know what skills are they especially good at? Just as importantly, what are their strengths in their character?

At home this weekend, have a chat about strengths. Think about questions such as:

• What are they?
• How did they become strengths – practise or a natural talent or luck?
• How can we maintain them?

Attendance matters

This year, the government introduced new measures to tackle unnecessary term-time absence.

• Since August 2024, the fine for school absences across the country has been £80 if paid within 21 days, or £160 if paid within 28 days.
• If a parent receives a second fine for the same child within any three-year period, this will be charged at the higher rate of £160.
• If there’s a third time, other action like a parenting order or prosecution will be considered. If you’re prosecuted and attend court because your child hasn’t been attending school, you could get a fine of up to £2,500. 

Leeds has issued 7,410 penalty notices so far this year and will continue to issue notices across Summer. This figure includes second fines for some parents following two separate periods of absence in the year. It doesn’t include situations where there is a third instance because this results in legal action.

At St James’ CE Primary, attendance for the majority of pupils is good and our whole-school average is much improved. Thank you for avoiding unnecessary term-time absence.

Our Summer competition

It’s time to get your thinking caps on for the return of our Summer competition. This year, it’s the return of smiley faces to sum up our happy and healthy place to achieve and believe!

Over the Summer weeks, we want you to stay alert to happy and healthy faces all around you… and take a pic of any hidden smiley faces in your surroundings: a day out at the beach might include creating a smiley face, for example! Here’s our suggestion (look for the smiling face!)…

…but we’re sure you can do better!

Look out for things around you that show a hidden smiley face – a happy and healthy face – or encourage your child to create their own from things around them (pebbles, leaves, Lego…).

To help you get started, look out for some intended smiling faces like McCain Potato Smiles or commercial logos with a hidden smile but they’ll be too obvious to win the competition!

To enter, email your pics to stjamesoffice@spherefederation.org by Monday 08 September. Enter ‘Summer competition’ as the subject.

All entries will be displayed in a happy and healthy display in school, and there are prizes for our favourites.

Have a happy and healthy weekend.

As we approach the end of the year, the next few weeks are busy ones – please keep an eye on our calendar. Next week…

• the annual report for your child will be emailed – the day for this depends on your child’s year group
• on Thursday, your child will meet their 2025-26 teacher
• also on Thursday, for parents of pupils in Year 2, there’s a Ready to Read celebration assembly

Have a happy and healthy weekend.

Our weekly message: Friday 20 June 2025

Have you completed our annual survey yet?

If you have – thank you. We’ll spend time over the next few weeks considering what you’ve said (and making sure we pass on any compliments).

If you haven’t, there’s still time! We’ll close the survey at 6pm today. Complete the St James’ CE Primary survey here.

Vacancy

We’ve a vacancy for a Senior Administrator at Moortown Primary. Hours are negotiable but around 23.75 hrs per week, term time plus two days (11.45am – 4.30pm, Monday to Friday). Read more about the post.

Sound of steel

This week, children in Years 3 and 4 have been learning how to play steel pan drums. The sound of the steel drums chiming around school all day long sounded great.

• ‘I learned that if you bang them really hard they might go out of tune.’ (Elara, Y4)
• ‘Me and my partner showed other people how to take it in turns to play the song together.’ (Alba, Year 4)
• ‘It was amazing doing it for the first time.  It felt like I was in an actual band!’ (Vinnie, Year 4)

Happy and healthy

Recently, children in Year 5 attended a rounders competition at Wetherby High School. They played against other schools showing courage and perseverance.

Our weekly message: Friday 13 June 2025

Every half-term, we have a new topic in Key Stage 1 and 2. (Check out the Class News pages for what’s happening in our Nursery and Reception classes.)

What is this half-term’s topic?

Design and Technology is the driving subject for this half-term and it’s a great topic to finish the year! The focus for all classes this year is construction (next year, it’s textiles). Children will be busy designing and making products using different materials.

A key aspect of the Design and Technology curriculum is the understanding that products don’t just get made. Instead, they go through a design process that includes three key elements:

• evaluate
• design
• make

Think of this process as a cycle. For example, Sphere Motors want to create a new family car. Before the car is made, they need to evaluate existing products and talk to customers so that they’re clear about what the new car needs to have. They will then design the car and evaluate those designs. They may make a prototype of the car to help them evaluate the designs. Next, they’ll decide on a final design that will go into production and get made. This finished product will be evaluated and the whole process starts again.

Each phase has age-related specific knowledge, skills and vocabulary that they’ll learn, use and apply across the topic. See page 14 and 15 of the Topic Curriculum Guide.

Years 1 and 2

Children will be introduced to the design process (design, make, evaluate). They’ll then look at some badly designed products and identify why they are badly designed. Following this, they will set up and perform tests to see what types of shape make strong and stable structures. They’ll then work as groups to create structures out of paper which may be strong enough for a child to stand on. After this, they’ll use the knowledge and skills gained to design and make a chair for Baby Bear from Goldilocks. They’ll design, make, test and evaluate the chair.

Years 3 and 4

Children will be reminded of the design process before learning about design criteria. They’ll look at different products and identify what the design criteria were for each product. They’ll also learn about a pioneering British female designer called Caroline Haslett. Following this, they’ll be given their design brief and design criteria for their project: create a prototype go-kart using TechCard. They’ll investigate existing products before designing, making and evaluating their go-karts. An extra challenge will be to integrate an electric circuit to make their go-kart move.

Years 5 and 6

Children will begin the topic by learning about some different pioneering female engineers. They’ll then look at different bridges and list the design criteria for these bridges. After that, they’ll be introduced to their project for the half-term: create a vehicle for Eggy (the egg). The vehicle will need to meet specific design criteria agreed by the children. One of these design criteria will be about safety. Pupils will investigate different safety features in cars and this will lead to them creating designs for their own cars which have some safety features to protect Eggy. They’ll then make them using different tools. Finally, they’ll put the vehicles through some rigorous tests to evaluate them.

How can you help?

Talk to your child about what they’re learning in class. The Class News page of the school website is a good place to go to find out more about what the children are doing.

The school library and local libraries will have some books about Design and Technology which your child will be able to borrow and develop both their reading skills and design knowledge.

Finally, check out BBC Bitesize KS1 and BBC Bitesize KS2 plus all programmes on CBBC and CBeebies with a Design and Technology focus:

• Bitz and Bob
• Grace’s Amazing Machines
• Junk Rescue
• Maddie’s Do You Know?
• The Dengineers

Our weekly message: Friday 06 June 2025

We hope you had a happy and healthy half-term break.

Do you have a friend or family member looking for a Nursery? Along with Reception, our Nursery was judged by Ofsted (January, 2025) to be outstanding. If you know of someone looking for a place, let them know about us. We have places in Nursery available.

Themed week: Being healthy

Our next themed week is the week beginning Monday 07 July. This is the second of two themed weeks each year.

Learning will be based around how to be healthy physically and emotionally.  A variety of events and visitors are planned to help us deliver this key aspect of Living and Learning.

Drug education

D:side will be delivering drug education sessions to all classes the week before our themed week. Information for parents and carers about these sessions will be available from d:side on Wednesday 02 July from 3.00pm-3:30pm. Weather permitting, you’ll find Dave in the main playground.

Sports Day

As part of the week, you’re invited to watch your child take part in our annual Sports Day on Thursday 10 July:

• Nursery and Reception: 9.15am – 11am
• Key Stage 1 and 2: 1.30pm – 3pm

Healthy way to travel to school

This themed week is a good opportunity to think about a healthy way to travel to school. We encourage children to use an active and sustainable method of transport, maybe parking further away from school, scooting, biking or walking to school. We’d love to see their active travel photos (send photos to stjamesoffice@spherefederation.org by Thursday 10 July). There will be a prize draw at the end of the week for children to win a voucher.

Can you help?

If your job involves an aspect of health and you can support our Being Healthy themed week by coming into school, please contact the office to pass on your details.

A few other things…

Due to the rising costs of visitors to school, we’re inviting you to make a small contribution: £2 per pupil will help us to pay for visitors and ensure themed weeks like this one can continue in the future. If you choose to contribute, you can do this on School Gateway. Thank you for your support with this.

Due to the nature of the activities planned, children are allowed to wear PE kit all week. Please respect our Uniform Policy for what to wear on PE days.

Staying safe in the sun

Now that summer’s here, it’s important to remember to stay safe in the sun. Please remember to apply sunscreen to keep your child safe.

Gold!

We’re happy to announce that we’ve achieved the School Games Gold Mark Award for the 2024-25 school year.

The School Games Mark is a Government-led award scheme launched in 2012, facilitated by the Youth Sport Trust, to reward schools for their commitment to the development of competition across their school and into the community, and we’re delighted to have been recognised once again for our success.

Every day matters

Our whole-school attendance figure is 95.2%. This means we’re above the national figure for primary schools: 94.9%.

Well done to children in Year 1, Year 3 and Year 5 – each of those classes have attendance above the school average…

• Reception: 94.6%
• Year 1: 96.1%
• Year 2: 94.6%
• Year 3: 96.9%
• Year 4: 93.8%
• Year 5: 96.4%
• Year 6: 91.8%

Thank you for making sure your child attends school as much as possible.

Finally… Have you had a chance to complete our short annual survey? It’ll take just five minutes or so. You’ve still plenty of time – the closing date is Friday 20 June.

This half-term's Christian value is...

…courage.

At St James’ CE Primary School, we learn about Christian values that help us to become well-rounded citizens in society. Each half-term, we have a new Christian value that will be embedded into our collective worship and our reflection areas.

‘Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go.’ Joshua 1:9

One of the Hebrew words translated as ‘courage’ means ‘to show oneself strong’.

The Bible abounds with stories of courage. Moses was courageous when he confronted the Pharaoh of Egypt and commanded him to let God’s people go (Exodus 5). Joshua was courageous when he conquered Canaan (Joshua 1). Young David was courageous when he faced and fell the giant Goliath (1 Samuel 17).

The Bible says we can be courageous by having faith and confidence in the fact that God is with us and for us. This value promotes the act of speaking out against an issue of injustice, often on behalf of those whose voice is not heard.

A Junior Leader in school thinks this value is important because, ‘It’s all about being brave and you have to be brave to get through something hard in life’.

Help at home!

Talk together about a time when you have been courageous or you have seen someone being courageous.

Have a think about times that are coming up when you can show courage.

Our weekly message: Friday 23 May 2025

Happy half-term! We can’t believe we’ve reached the end of Summer 1 term so quickly.

Targeted training

We’ve the third of five training days in school today. On training days like this, the teachers across Sphere Federation gather together and benefit from training that’s age-specific. This means that teachers in each phase (Early Years, Years 1/2, Years 3/4 and Years 5/6) receive training that helps to support their teaching in specific age groups. Today, teachers have been planning, practising and preparing for three different subjects: PE, DT (Design and Technology) and Maths.

The training our teachers receive was recognised by Ofsted in all three of the school’s inspections:

• ‘Professional development for all staff is exemplary. Leaders have planned high-quality training.’ (Moortown Primary, March 2024)
• ‘The professional development available for all staff is of high quality, and they appreciate the collaborative support shared among the schools in the federation.’ (Scholes (Elmet) Primary, May 2024)
• ‘The school ensures that staff receive regular, high-quality training and development. This contributes to staff having excellent subject knowledge across a range of subjects.’ (St James’ CE Primary, January 2025)

The last two training days are on Monday 21 and Tuesday 22 July, meaning the Summer 2 term ends on Friday 18 July.

Uniform update

Every year around this time, we review our Uniform Policy. You’ve told us in previous annual surveys you like to have the policy well in advance so you can start to prepare for the new school year. Read the 2025-26 Uniform Policy. There are a couple of minor changes:

• additional guidance around footwear – choose shoes that are safe to run around for healthy, active playtimes (eg avoid Crocs)
• additional guidance around hair accessories – hair bands, bows and other accessories should be minimal: as small as possible and not too bright

Talking of uniform…

Top tip

Are you thinking of having your child’s ears pierced? Please do this at the start of the summer holidays to allow for healing time. Advisors recommend no earrings are worn for PE. We expect children to remove earrings before the lesson and put them back in after the lesson. This will be carried out by the child. If they’re unable to remove or put their earrings back in by themselves, they must not wear them on the day they have PE.

Brownlee Triathlon

This week, children in Key Stage 2 took part in the Brownlee Foundation Triathlon event. All of the children represented St James’ CE Primary well. They completed the whole course with huge smiles on their faces! The children had to swim, cycle and run their way to the finish line, working together and spurring each other on. We even got to meet Jonny Brownlee, who very kindly took a photo with our school! Thanks to all parents and adults who helped organise the event.

Awe and wonder

At St James’ CE Primary, we welcome visitors to our happy and healthy community. Last week, we were delighted to have one of our grandparents lead our collective worship. Mr Hayward-Giles spoke to the children about his recent adventures to Borneo, an island in the Pacific Ocean. He talked about reconnecting with somebody he hasn’t seen in 60 years and the wonderful welcome he received from their family. The children loved hearing about Mr Hayward-Giles helping out at the Sun Bear Conservation Centre and about the wonderful rainforest. The children were in awe and wonder looking at the photographs and listening to the stories. Thank you to Mr Hayward-Giles for telling us all about his adventure.

Finally this week…

Have you completed our annual survey yet? It’ll only take a few minutes.

Have a happy and healthy half-term holiday.