Head’s desk

We have enjoyed an action packed start to the spring term 2016 with a range of new

as well as tried and tested activities for your children to enjoy and learn from.

The Allotment Project

Our Allotment project Workday is scheduled for Thursday March 10th (reserve date

Thursday 24th March) when we intend to turn the space in front of our willow tunnel

on the top field into a five raised bed allotment area with surrounding protective

hedge.

We will also put in footings for a shed which will ultimately act as a store and a

structure for attaching water butts and thereby a water source. Thank you to those

parents who have already volunteered to help on the day; for further offers of help

please see Mrs Powell in the office.

Friday 12th February 2016

Youth Connexions Workshops

On 27th January, the Hertfordshire Youth Connextions team came to Layston for

the day to run workshops for our Y3 and Y4 pupils on aspirational employment choices

for the future. We were delighted to be joined by some pupils from Hormead School

too.

‘It was very good because it can teach any age about their future and what they want

to do’. Ellie Y4

‘It was very interesting learning about how careers all link together. The activities

were fun because you got to design and work as a team.’ Matthew Y4

‘Did you know you can earn £50,000 as a dentist!’ Oliver Y4.

Lab Tots

For our youngest children Lab Tots came and visited on 28th January and gave the

children an experience of dressing up and acting like real scientists.

Young leaders MfL programme

On the 25th January year 8 students from Edwinstree delivered an afternoon of

French teaching to our Year 4 children. As part of our in going transition programme,

the Edwinstree students, many old Laystonians themselves, were set the challenge of

teaching a set of French vocabulary in an interesting and engaging way. The project

was deemed a success and both parties are keen to repeat in the summer term.

Sports

One of this term’s roving reporters Alfie in Year 4 contributed to this report about

our Gold Sainsbury’s School Award

“Layston C of E First School has been awarded Gold by Sainsbury's School Games in

recognition of the important role which sport plays at our school. This is a fantastic

achievement ensuring that all children in school can play some role in sport, whether they

are contributing by competing, refereeing, organising or providing artwork, report writing

and entertainment towards the various competitions we run within school.

Layston has produced sports teams who have competed in a range of competitions within the Sainsbury's School Partnership calendar of events. These teams have successfully competed against other schools in our area and region.

This success is due to our commitment to ensuring as many children as possible have access to clubs, sport and healthy living - the gold award we received in January 2015 provides further recognition that Layston is committed to sport and healthy living.

We look forward to another year of events and will be depending on our Sports Ambassador and School Sports Crew to officiate and organise the events”.

School teams have represented Layston at the swimming gala of January 28th, where

we came a commendable second with only one point only separating the top two teams

and at the Speed Stacking Festival of 9th February in which the Layston team did

brilliantly to finish in first place. Well done, in particular, to Dempsy and Poppy who

achieved the fastest ‘3-3-3’ and ‘3-6-3’ times respectively.

At the time of writing we await a whole school street dance workshop for 11th

February lead by the ‘Now Street Dance’ Company.

Music

Twenty children from the school Choir in years 3 and 4 will be joining the mass

Hertfordshire Schools Choir for a celebration of music at the Royal Albert hall on

Sunday March 13th 2016. Parents and staff will be there to support and enjoy and we

will give a full report in the next newsletter.

In the meantime all our children from Y1-4 had a chance to perform to their parents

on Monday 1st February at two informal concerts. The programme included playground

chants from Y1, the Oompa Loompa song from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory Y2,

‘Make Me Feel the Love’ (Dylan /Adele) by Y3 and the composition of Soundscapes

from Space plus three part harmony singing from Y4. In addition Grace, Ted, Kitlyn,

Connie and Ben performed piano solos. We are keen to support performance at

Layston and hope to bring you more concerts on a regular basis.

Taster morning 2nd February

Our parent taster morning was very well supported by our families and we received

glowing feedback.

‘It was a great experience…..’ ‘It helped me see the layout and for my child to tell

me what went where…’ ‘It helps parents see their child so settled and happy… ’ It

amazes me how far the children have come….’ ’All working together, technology,

patience , relaxed and fun…!’ ‘I loved it …definitely things have changed since I was

at school…’

It is clear you really value the opportunity to share in your child’s school experience

and see first-hand the range of learning that takes place.

Some parents felt that they did not receive adequate advance notice of activities

that they can attend. To help signpost parents to significant events we will in future

highlight parent friendly events in the school calendar (which is emailed out at the

very beginning of each term and is kept updated on the website). In addition the

newsletter carries advance dates and the week before Mrs Mann coordinates the

parents diary dates again emailed out. We also try and text the day before to remind

parents and write up key event reminders on the playground whiteboard. If you feel

you are not receiving regular texts and emails from the school please check your

details with the office.

Pupil parent teacher ( PPT) conferencing

After the success of our trial PPT conferencing in years 1, 3 and 4 last spring, we will

be rolling out PPT’s to all year groups. The PPT’s will run throughout the day in 15min

slots and will involve you, your child and their teacher talking about the learning that

has taken place, their achievements to date, areas for development and how you can

support learning at home. We will provide you with a sheet to jot down this

information for your own reference as an aide memoir to the meeting. The PPT’s will

give you the opportunity to see“2buildaprofile” and ‘Pupil Passports’ in action as well

as look at work in books.

Feedback from the trial suggested that some parents would like to have the option

of speaking to the teacher without their child being present for part of the time,

therefore this year parents can opt for the last 5 min (of the 15min conference) to

be with the teacher alone and you will be able to opt for this on the reply slips

circulated soon after half term. To remind you the dates are:

YR- Wed 23rd March

Y1- Tues 29th March

Y2- Thurs 24th March

Y3- Thurs 31st March

Y4- Monday 21st March

A Goodbye

Finally it is with very mixed emotions we will be saying goodbye to Angie Blanchard

just before Easter. Angie has been an active and unique part of our school community

for some years, working as a learning support assistant, organising and championing

our walking bus and latterly as a forest school practitioner. Angie and family are

moving to Bournemouth where her husband has been relocated and we wish them bon

voyage as they set off on the next part of their life’s journey together. We will be

having a collection for Angie, please any contributions to the school office by the end

of February.

Fortunately we have two additional members of staff who will take over Angie’s role,

Mrs Jo Marsden in Forest school and Mrs Sonia Parker will be rejoining us as a

Learning Support Assistant.

Dates for the Diary Parent Events

3rd March – World Book Day – Reading Breakfast from 8.30am- Parent event

10th March – Allotment day (build the allotment) Parent event (if helping out)

13th March – Royal Albert Hall, (Hertfordshire School Choir) tickets available through the box office)

Parent event if child participating)

17th March – Y2 trip to Bucks County Museum

PPT’s – parent event

YR- Wed 23rd March, Y1- Tues 29th, March, Y2- Thurs 24th March,

Y3- Thurs 31st, March, Y4- Monday 21st March

22nd March 9.30 am - Easter service . Parents welcome

24th March – Reserve Day Allotment day Parent event (if helping out)

NB- Fri 25th – Mon 28th inclusive long Easter weekend holiday

30th March – RE day

1st April – break up at 2pm

Wishing you all a safe, happy and fun Spring term break and see you back at school on Mon 18th April.

Playground art by Kyson and Elise Y2

Reception

We used outdoor area time to think

about Mary and Joseph’s flight into

Egypt. They would have needed to have

carried Jesus safely on the journey. Ms

Lomax helped us build a carrier and we

tested it out. We

also made hides

for the family to

on use on their

journey.

We had great fun building bridges to

cross a river, just like The Billy Goats

Gruff.

We have really improved our skills to talk

to others and explain our thinking, we

are also able to act on others ideas and

suggestions.

Lastly we really enjoyed showing our

parents our learning. We had a fun

morning and look forward to welcoming

parents again very soon.

Year 1

In Year 1 this half term, we have been exploring fairy tales in lots of interesting and

diverse ways. During our forest school sessions, we made beds and chairs for the

three bears out of the different natural materials we could find. We had to build

different sizes for the different bears and think about how we could make them

sturdy for even Mrs Marsden to lie on!

We had a fantastic day with the puppet making on Tuesday – thank you to all the

parents who helped out! They will be in our role play area for us to use when we re-

enact our favourite stories.

We also learned about the properties of different materials, and designed and made

the Three Pigs’ houses. We experimented to see what could be used for their house;

we needed our building materials to be waterproof to keep out the rain, strong to

withstand the Big Bad Wolf, and hard to stay standing up.

Year 2

This half term has already been very exciting! Year 2 are

really enjoying our topic of Roald Dahl. So far, we have read

the story of “The Twits” and have nearly finished “Charlie

and the Chocolate Factory.” It was great to see so many

Year 2 parents at our taster session last week. I hope you

enjoyed your time in our classroom.

We loved making our Mr Twit mirrors. “I put fish tails in

mine because Roald Dahl says that Mr Twit never washes

and has a disgusting beard.” (Sebbie I) These Mr Twit

mirrors have helped to shape our thoughts on what type of

person we want to become. “We know we use our manners to

be polite and help our friends to be kind.” (Izzy) “We

wouldn’t like to be like Mr Twit!” (Jack)

We have also designed and made our own Willy Wonka Chocolate Bars and created our

own Wonka invention machines in maths! “We had to melt chocolate, add sweets and

let the chocolate set.” (Millie) “We had to design our own logo and make 3d nets to

put the chocolate in.” (Toni)

“We had to use 2d shapes to design a machine that would create amazing chocolate

sweets.” (Seb C) We then described our inventions using shape names and positional

language. “Miss Bowman got us to colour co-ordinate the shapes to show that we know

the names and their properties.” (Toni)

In Forest school we have been focusing on trust.

“We took our partners on a journey around the

wildwood blindfolded! James H had to trust that

I would look after him and explain where to step.”

(Grace) We have also focused on story telling

making story catchers out of natural materials.

We also really enjoyed performing to you in our KS1 music concert. Thank you very

much for coming! “I love music. My favourite part of music is playing the recorder! I

practise at home all the time.” (Tyler)

In Science this year we have looked at plants and their lifecycles as well as where

food comes from. We are very pleased (and relieved) to tell you that are bulbs have

grown!

“First we put a bulb on top of pebbles in a clear cup because we wanted to see how

the roots grow.” (Oliver M)

“Then we waited and waited for the roots to grow!” (Maddie)

“Finally they came through and the shoot started to grow from the top too.” (Elise)

“Now they look beautiful and smell really nice! They are all different colours.” (Kate)

Year 3

With our Romans topic coming

to an end, we created our own

mosaics. The children produced

some very interesting patterns.

We even created our own shields using

tissue paper and an awful lot of glue!

Thank you very much to all the parents

that came in to help. After half term, I

will take the troops outside to practise

marching in formation like well-trained

Roman soldiers!

Recently, we’ve been learning about

space and we have focused on a

rather important historical event: the

first moon landing. We have

attempted to retell the story of the

landing by creating our very own Lego

animation movies on the iPads. To do

this, we have been learning all about

stop motion which requires lots of tiny

movements, patience and plenty of

photos! Thank you to the parents that

popped in to see the animations in

progress during the taster session.

One Friday afternoon, several

children became teachers as they

each delivered a fractions lesson

to the class. I was very

impressed with the amount of

effort that had clearly been

made to prepare for these

lessons.

Year 4

So far in 2016 we have been exceptionally busy. After a much deserved holiday we

came back fresh and ready for a term of hard work.

We have been privileged to have Miss Miller and Mr Ewing joining us from Cambridge

University and will miss them when they leave us at the half term holiday.

This term our topic has taken us south to the wonderful continent of Africa. In

particular, we have been investigating Egypt. We have improved our artistic skills by

designing and drawing Egyptian Death Masks. We have also improved our writing

skills by writing a set of instructions for burying an Egyptian pharaoh. During

computing lessons we have designed PowerPoints about Egyptian Gods and Goddesses.

Our designing skills were further improved when we made shadufs, ancient Egyptian

water carriers. We tested them out and are pleased to say the classroom was not

flooded.

Our English work took on an African theme as well. We read Mufaro’s Beautiful

Daughters, focussing on character and setting. Using the knowledge we had gained,

we wrote a sequel to the story.

We have been keeping extra fit in Year 4, more so than usual. An extra Bootcamp

session has helped us realise the importance of keeping fit and making sure we look

after our bodies.

Our science has had a biological theme. In particular we have looked at food chains,

how animals are classified and the digestive system. We won’t go into all the details

in case you’re reading this while having dinner!

We are looking forward to a much need holiday and then coming back refreshed to

learn more about Africa!

FOLS

We are very excited and active this year with lots of new members of FOLS joining. We

are currently still raising funds for our new adventure playground frame which we hope

will be in place sometime this year. We would really like and hope to see this in place by

end of summer for the children to enjoy.

We have our totaliser near the school office door for everyone to see how much money

we have so far raised for our new play equipment.

Our very first Bingo on Saturday 29th January was a huge success and raised a fantastic

total of £500. Thank you to all that came and supported this event. Lots of lovely

feedback, children young and older really enjoying the bingo with their family and

friends.

Our tea/coffee morning before the taster session on 2nd February was another

enjoyable morning. Seeing the parents get together before spending time with their

children, learning about what they are currently doing in class.

Year 2 cake bake on Wednesday 3rd February was well supported, and we made £122

profit which is amazing thank you!! Lots of yummy cakes made and brought with the class

making some very special Wonka chocolate bars to sell which were very yummy. Each class

are given money from their cake bake for the teachers to spend in class.

COMING EVENTS

Easter cake decorating class for parents on Tuesday 15th March, 7pm onwards. The

Christmas cupcake decorating one was very popular and everyone really enjoyed the

evening with lots of fun. Limited space available - details to follow soon.

Family Quiz on Saturday 27th Feb 3-5pm £5 a ticket hotdog included

Wednesday 23rd March Easter Egg Tombola after school

Easter Treasure Hunt in school in the morning on the last day at school before

Easter, Thursday 24th March with the children and teachers involved.

NEXT TERM EVENTS

School disco on Friday 20th May

Thank you for all your support we really do appreciate everyone's help, attendance in our

events & feedback.

You can contact us via the school office or by email:

FOLS@layston.herts.sch.uk

Also please take the time to visit and join www.thegivingmachine.co.uk

This helps raise money for our school when you do your online shop (lots of retailers

listed) through The Giving Machine.

Many thanks,

FOLS

Governors

Spotlight on Safeguarding:

Safeguarding is a key focus of the work of the Governing Body. Safeguarding is defined

as protecting children from maltreatment, preventing impairment of health and/or

development, ensuring that children grow up in the provision of safe and effective care

and taking action to enable all children to have the best life chances. Claire Shearn is our

nominated Safeguarding Governor and Mrs Bloomfield Layston’s Designated Senior

Person.

A number of the Layston Policies are designed to safeguard our children and staff and

are regularly reviewed and updated. We have a specific Child Protection Policy together

with Anti-Bullying, Safer Use of Images, Health and Safety, E-Safety and Policies.

Policies are accessible on the school website at

http://www.layston.herts.sch.uk/statutory-information/school-policies/

Governors and Staff attend regular Safeguarding related training.