Dear
Parents/Carers,
Last
Friday’s staff training day gave us the opportunity to reflect on the year – in
particular looking closely at the standards pupils right across school have
secured in this academic year. In readiness for Ofsted and just because we are
intent on continually strengthening what we do, we had a great time looking at
the historic 3 year picture, comparing standards in 2011 (our last Ofsted) and our
latest pupil outcomes. It is brilliant to notice the great strides taken during
the past 2 years. Key headlines include:
ü Continuing
improvement in Reception outcomes, with pupils entering KS1 with our highest
average ever (just below age appropriate expectations) in reading, writing and
maths
ü 93%
of Y1 pupils reaching the benchmark in the phonics screening test (compared
with 71% last year)
ü Higher
percentage of pupils securing age appropriate expectations – and fewer pupils
below - in KS1 in reading, writing and
maths
ü Higher
percentage of pupils exceeding age appropriate expectations in KS1 reading,
writing and maths
ü Higher
proportion of pupils securing good or outstanding progress throughout KS1 and
LKS2 (Y34), and therefore a higher proportion of pupils meeting targets set for
them at the beginning of the year.
To
add to our joy, the DfE released the long awaited Y6 SATS results on Tuesday.
The results confirmed our expected outcomes (phew!) and demonstrate a stable
position following the improvements made in recent years, with:
ü 81%
of pupils securing L4 outcomes in reading and maths, with all pupils securing
L3 or better (a first!), and 84% of pupils securing L4 outcomes in writing (up
from 78% in 2011)
ü 39%
of pupils securing L5 outcomes in reading (in line with 2011), and 42% securing
Level 5 outcomes in maths (up from 16% in 2011). In addition, one of our pupils
successfully secured our first ever L6 outcome for us in maths – what a genius,
and what a landmark for Cookridge.
ü Pupil
progress in writing is consistently good across school, with higher proportions
of pupils securing good progress (in line with national expectations) than ever
before.
ü 75%
of pupils secured the L4 pass mark in the SPAG (Spelling, Punctuation and
Grammar) test, launched this year.
In
September, we will provide a full report to parents to clearly explain
standards in our school, and what areas now stand out as priority areas for
improvement. In the meantime, let me take this opportunity to thank every
member of staff, every child and every parent for their hard work in securing
our improvements to date. Our work is not done – we have much to be excited
about in terms of our planned improvements for the year ahead – but there is
time to take a breath and celebrate where we are. Well done and thank you!
Reports
This
evening please look for your child’s report as it was sent home today! During
the past week, I have enjoyed reading every one of the 320 reports
painstakingly crafted by our teachers – and they are a lovely read which tell
me one thing: we really have got fantastic kids! We enclose a slip for your
brief feedback on the reports and the year – please take a few moments to fill
it in: we welcome your comments.
BOOKS PLEASE!
We
are going to be organising our class and school reading book stock over the
summer holidays so it is fresh and ready for the children to choose from in
September. We would appreciate you having a good look at home for any books
that your child has borrowed from their class trays or from the school library.
Books from class have a plain coloured sticker on them and school library books
have a sticker with the genre of the book typed on eg historical, animal
fiction etc. Please could all books be returned to school by Monday 22nd July at the latest. Thank
you.
Bugsy Malone
After
Monday's dramatic turn of events, with a bout of sickness that saw Miss Fowler
stepping in to play Fat Sam and the evening show being cancelled, we are happy
to announce that the evening performance of Bugsy Malone will be on Monday 15th
July 7-8pm. Children are to arrive through the main school
door between 6:15 - 6:30pm to allow time to get ready. Parents are invited to
go through the school gates and into the hall. We would love to see as many people
there as possible! We are very sorry for this unavoidable chain of events which
led to such short notice reorganisation and thank parents for their
understanding.
Get involved – Come to
Zumba!!!
Miss
Glendinning and Miss Carroll are keen to set up a weekly Zumba aerobic session
for all parents starting from September. The sessions would involve lively
music, groovy moves to get you feeling fit and of course well-earned
refreshments! To whet your appetite and gauge the level of interest we would
like to invite you to a taster session on Monday 22nd of July from 2-3pm,
please enter the grounds from the school gate straight into the hall. All you
need to come with is comfortable clothing, trainers and most importantly bags
of enthusiasm. We look forward to seeing you there!
STOP PRESS - CBBC IN LEEDS!
Yes,
you read it correctly - CBBC stars are coming to Leeds for a 3 day extravaganza
in July! The CBBC Live in Leeds event - which is aimed at children aged 6-12
years old and their families and will take place in Millenium Square on 25, 26
and 27 July - will be free to attend and is a collaboration between BBC North
and Leeds City Council. Stars from some of CBBC’s most popular shows will be
appearing at the event, and programmes including Blue Peter, Newsround and Wild
will be going live from the location over the three days. The CBBC presentation
team, including Chris Johnson and Hacker the Dog will also be broadcasting live
from Leeds during the event. There will be a wide range of activities to get
stuck into and it sounds like a fabulous event to get involved in!
Sports News
On
Tuesday in the basking heat 24 Year 4 children attended a cricket day at a
local sports club. All the children took part in a morning full of bowling,
batting and fielding coaching before competing against other schools in the
afternoon. Team A deserve a special mention as they won both their games
comfortably with Joshua Whitaker, Srosh Akbari and Alex Collie among the stand
out performers. Well done to you all!
After
winning their group earlier in the year, the Y56 football team compete in the
quarter finals next week. We got knocked out of the cup at this stage last
year, can we go one better this time around? Good luck boys!
Attendance
A
high volume of holiday absence is once again affecting our attendance figure
this week, sadly.
|
National Minimum ‘Good’ Expectation
|
Target
2012-13
|
Attendance this week
|
Year to date
|
||||||||
|
95%
|
96%
|
93.1%
|
95.2%
|
||||||||
|
Class attendance figures for this week are:-
|
|||||||||||
|
Rec
|
Class 1
|
Class 2
|
Class 3
|
Class 4
|
Class 5
|
Class 6
|
Class 7
|
Class 8
|
Class 9
|
||
|
A 94.0%
B 96.4%
|
94.0%
|
98.7%
|
92.6%
|
93.9%
|
88.9%
|
93.3%
|
86.6%
|
90.6%
|
93.8%
|
||
Coffee Morning
Don’t
forget - Wednesday 17th July @ 9am it’s time for a coffee! Parents who are
interested in an afternoon playgroup should most definitely come along –
particularly with little people who might like some new toys!
Have
a wonderful weekend,
Sam
Bailey
