Dear Parents,
Welcome to the Summer term of 2022! I am sure you will agree that time has shot by, but rest assured there are more great things to come. We are looking forward to the upcoming summer fair, a walk along Hadrian’s wall, sports day, our residential visit, a Jubilee afternoon tea, sports competitions and events at William Howard school, and to finish with; a summer musical and leavers celebrations!! Phew, what a lot to do!!
In the previous term the children have enjoyed a theatre visit in January, and have played the African drums with Zozo, along with a climbing competition and finishing off with some of the Easter traditions we have welcomed back after Covid. I was proud of the way all children contributed at the Easter service.
The familiar daily routines of class 3 have helped to keep everybody as healthy and safe as possible.
All routines and arrangements will be as follows:
- Literacy homework will be given out on a Monday and needs to be completed and handed in by Wednesday morning; Maths given out on Wednesday and completed/handed in Friday (it may switch around, depending on work completed in the class)
- PE will be Tuesday and Wednesday, but children need their kit in school all the time, as we will have more different activities as the weather gets nicer;
- Spellings will be given out on a Monday for a test on a Friday – it is much easier for the children if they do a little bit every night rather than cram on a Thursday night;
- Times tables will be tested on a Friday. This skill is also vitally important;
- Rowan’s after-school football is continuing on a Tuesday.
The curriculum: This term’s topic is called Ruthless Romans. We enjoyed a visit to Housesteads fort to kick the topic off, and will attempt to squeeze in other small visits, as we are surrounded by lots of ‘Roman’ sites, and it would be a shame not to utilise this. We will enjoy learning about clothing and armour, gods, food and drink,
- RE: Learning from the Carlisle Diocese scheme of work: world poverty
- Science: Evolution and inheritance;
- PE: football, tennis and cricket plus sports day and lots of other outdoor activities;
- Geography and History: life and times of the Ruthless Romans, mapping with a study of Rome;
- Music: Music express- exploring musical processes;
- Art and DT: Food testing, cooking, mosaic work and a study of architecture;
- Literacy: writing a tourist information booklet about Rome, to include retelling, recount, instructional writing, comprehension skills;
- Maths: place value, numbers, addition and subtraction strategies, multiplication and division, problem solving, measures;
- PSHE: Health and wellbeing, growing and changing
- French: General use of the French language avec Mdme Sweetman
Assessments: We conducted our usual end-of-term assessments before the holidays, and will have fed back any issues or concerns we have at this stage.
SAT’s: As year 6 will be aware they will be taking their SAT’s tests the week commencing 9th May, Monday to Thursday. Please could you help them by ensuring an early night before and get up with plenty of time for a good breakfast. We will keep the tests as low key and informal as possible.
PE Kit: The children need a pair of PE trainers (in a separate plastic bag) that will be expected to get dirty and muddy after use on the field, so please don’t send in expensive shoes. The footwear for Rowan’s will be used on the field and therefore cannot be used for PE on the rubberised surface on the top playground.
Residential: Our residential booked for Dukeshouse Wood on June 20th for 4 nights grows closer, and as such we will start to provide information about kit lists and things to take
Reading: I would like the children to read every night (including weekends). However, I appreciate this can be difficult, so a minimum of twice a week recorded in the reading records would be essential to support their learning. The ‘Spellbinding’ programme of books we bought proved successful, and we finally voted collectively on the book they judged to be the best. This proved to be ‘The boy who made everyone laugh’, by Helen Rutter.
Equipment: All stationary children require for their daily tasks is provided by school. We are a large class with storage space at a premium, so please can children only bring into school items they are required to, including reading books and records daily, spelling records and purple spelling activity books, and Friday test books for spelling and timestable tests on Fridays. Please check book bags as letters often remain in there for several weeks!
Spares, wellies and bottles: Thank you to all parents for providing children with the above items, we have now 100% of children fully equipped. Just a quick note that some wellies are getting a little small, and spares damaged, even though we are approaching Summer we still require these in school thanks to the uncertainty of Cumbrian weather! Water bottles are still required to travel home after school, and return refreshed the next morning.
Finally, my email address is This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. If there is anything you wish to let me know about please stay in touch. I check my emails daily.
Yours Sincerely,
Mark Harrison
