Dear Parents,

We hope that your children have settled in and are happy at Woodlea.  Now that they have been in school for a few weeks, we feel it is important for parents, that you too are aware of the routines that your child follows in school.

Morning Routines

The school doors open at 8.45am and the children come into school.

If they need to change their reading books and their record book is signed by an adult, they change this book themselves.

They then go into their class and complete morning work from the board. This means that at 8.55am, the children are in place and ready for their first lesson.

Homework

As you are aware, there has been a questionnaire sent out for parents to give opinions on. These will then be looked at and in consultation with staff, an agreed homework will be decided. For this half term, homework will be in the form of reading, learning spellings and times tables. There is a Project Style homework, set additionally to this. For this half term, it is based on your child’s class endangered animal. This encourages children and parents to work together at home and can take the form of collage, ICT, painting, sculpture … The choice is yours!

Reading

We are asking that the children read at home a minimum of four times a week and this is signed off in their reading record book by an adult. The children can read from any text at home – reading ingredients in food products, signage by the road / in a supermarket, the programme listings on television, a sports programme from a match, a magazine – the list is endless. Children are encouraged to change their own books, once completed. We have found this to be positive as it gives the children ownership of their reading.

Basic Skills

We ask that you practise number bonds and times tables with your children to help support them in their daily maths lesson. All the children in the school are having a daily basic skills session, additionally to their maths session. These skills are important for all children of all abilities and contribute to the speed and accuracy of the children’s maths work.

Effort Club

This takes from 12.15 – 12.35 the children then go for their lunch.  As a school we are encouraging children to have pride in their work and our expectations are related to their ability – not age. Effort club is for children who fall short of what is expected of them – it could be as simple as not underlining the date and learning objective or not completing a set amount in class.

Birthday Children

Children who are celebrating a birthday can come into school in their own clothes and ask a friend to join them. They are instantly recognisable by anyone in school and often wished a ‘Happy Birthday’. Every month there is a ‘Birthday Lunch’ where Mrs Leggett invites all children, whose birthday it is in that month to have a hot dinner. The children who are on the decorated birthday table receive a party hat, additional cake or biscuit as well as having the rest of the school singing to them.

Positive Behaviour

At Woodlea Junior School, we actively promote positive behaviour and seek out children doing the right thing. If your child is consistent with their good behaviour, they will receive Golden Time, on a Friday afternoon. This is an activity in school chosen by your child and can range from science experiments, to loom bands to gardening. In addition to this, parents will receive a text message to directly inform you that your child is displaying positive behaviour.

Friday Family Assembly

We would like to invite all parents and family members to our Friday Family Assembly. During this assembly, we will be celebrating work, behaviour and achievements made during that week.  The assembly starts at 9.05am.

Nut Free School

Woodlea is a ‘Nut Free School’. All snacks, lunches and other food brought into school must not contain nuts.

Healthy snacks

As a Healthy School, we expect snacks which are brought in to be healthy; fruit, cereal bars and veg sticks are all acceptable.

We realise that this is a lot to take in, however we are so proud of the children and hope that their positive start to year 3 continues.

Should you wish any further information, Mrs Younis and Mrs Smith will be happy to discuss or clarify any of the above areas with you.

Thank you for your continued support.