New Football Kit
Thank you to Suttle Transport Services for sponsoring our new football kit. The children were very excited to try it on for the first time yesterday. We look forward to competing in our new kit next term. 
School Charity
After much discussion, the school council have decided that we will support the charity Unicef this year. The children were keen to support a charity which helps children around the world.
Christmas Fair
Our Christmas Fair is this afternoon. Please come along and get into the festive spirit. We have lots of stalls to visit and the school choir will be singing at 3.30pm.
‘Pick a square’ could win you this delicious Christmas cake.
Subscribe to First News and raise money for school
Sphere Federation has teamed up with First News to offer a fantastic opportunity which will help us raise money for our school.
The children love reading First News in school and now you have the chance to get a great offer and have First News delivered to your house every Friday for your kids to enjoy at home.
To make things even better for every subscription parents take out using our unique voucher codes X17SFED we will get money back to put towards our school.
To subscribe, please click here.
Important information regarding measles
You may have heard in the news that there have been a number of confirmed cases of measles in Leeds. As you will be aware, measles is extremely infectious and can be a serious illness in some cases. The attached information contains advice on preventing the spread of measles, what the symptoms of measles are and how parents can protect their families by ensuring that their children have had two doses of the MMR vaccine.
If you are not sure whether your child is up to date with their vaccinations or your child is not up to date, please make an arrangement with your GP practice as soon as possible.
It is never too late to immunise: measles can have serious complications regardless of age.
Children in Need
Thank you to everybody who donated money by dressing up or buying some cakes from our cake sale today. We raised a fantastic £191.03 for Children in Need.
Town Hall visit
Today, the School Council visited the Town Hall, to look at proposed plans for playing areas in Wetherby. They were asked for their views and opinions to help developers design the best possible parks they can.
Here is some feedback our school council gave the planning team:
- “I like the swings in the spider web park because they look like they go really high.”
- “I like some of the ideas for the slides because there were different sizes so all ages could use them.”
- “I thought in one of the parks they could have a big slide as well as a little slide.”
Anti-bullying Week
Next week is national Anti-Bullying Week and our Living and Learning statement is I know how to STOP bullying.
The theme this year is All Different, All Equal with the following key aim:
The idea is to help children and young people celebrate what makes them, and others, unique and help them understand why it’s important that every child feels included in school, able to be themselves, without fear of bullying.
Our school definition has recently been reviewed by the new School Council.
‘Bullying is when you hurt someone, physically or emotionally, several times on purpose.’
As part of their learning this week, children will discuss these aspects of bullying:
- Our definition of bullying (above)
- Types of bullying – cyber-bullying and prejudice-based bullying related to gender, sexual orientation, race, religion and belief, special educational need and disability
- What to do if children experience or witness bullying. The key message is to tell someone (start telling other people)STOP can stand for two key messages: the definition (Several Times On Purpose) and the solution (Start Telling Other People).For further support, bullying resources can be found at…
- https://www.anti-bullyingalliance.org.uk/tools-information/advice-parents
- https://www.kidscape.org.uk/resources/
- http://www.bullying.co.uk/advice-for-parents/
- https://www.internetmatters.org/hub/news-blogs/get-involved-in-anti-bullying-week-2017-all-different-all-equal/
- https://www.nspcc.org.uk/preventing-abuse/child-abuse-and-neglect/bullying-and-cyberbullying/keeping-children-safe/
- https://www.childline.org.uk/info-advice/bullying-abuse-safety/types-bullying/
- https://youngminds.org.uk/find-help/feelings-and-symptoms/bullying/
Remembrance Sunday Parade
Thank you to our pupils who represented St James’ at the Wetherby Remembrance Sunday Parade today. There was a huge turnout from the local community and it was fantastic to be part of it.
Yesterday, you 'watched us while we work'...
…thanks very much to you if you came along yesterday to the first of our ‘Watch us while we work’ sessions. This was a visit to school to get a flavour of what Reading, Writing and Maths teaching and learning is like in school, and hopefully to help you understand more about your child’s progress and how you can support at home.
Thanks for the feedback, too. Following the visits to classes, you had the opportunity to speak with Miss Hague about what you saw and to raise any questions and comments.
Here’s some of the feedback:
“Excellent to see how the children respond in each class. Year 5,6 was fantastic – hands-on learning, helping each other and talking through problems. Year 3,4 – nice idea using dice to help so calculations. Will use this at home. Year 1,2 – nice to see the children working in groups. Liked the counters to help them.”
“All of it was very good to watch.”
“It was good to see the pride in children as parents watched, and good to see older children taking responsibility for showing children round.”
“The children seemed to be really enjoying the work but also they were challenged. It went really well. Very reassuring.”
“It was good to see what was going on in the classroom and how the children are taught so we can implement this at home.”
That’s great – thanks very much. Teachers will appreciate the comments.