Bowmansgreen celebrated World Book Day in style this year, with pupils and staff dressing up as book characters or in their pyjamas, to mark this annual event in the school calendar. Masked readers tried to hide their true identities from pupils, as they talked about and read from some of their favourite books. Thank you to Miss Ottley for organising this event and to parents and carers for helping your children to look fantastic!

All pupils are currently studying a whole school unit of English based on the book ‘Tuesday’ by David Weisner. Throughout the unit, each year group will have completed one or more writing tasks. Families who have been learning remotely, please could the pieces of writing be emailed to your child’s class email address or brought into school on Monday so that they can be used to help plan your child’s next steps in writing, which will be shared at the Meet the Teacher meetings.

March 8th is International Women’s Day.  Despite all pupils returning to school on the same day, we did not want to miss out on celebrating this important date. All pupils will hear stories and learn about some amazing girls and women and hopefully be inspired by their adventures and achievements.

Please be reminded to book your appointment for Meet the Teacher, on Tuesday 16^th or Thursday 18^th March, 2021.

Breakfast club provision – information and update for March 8th

Three more sleeps until all pupils return to school – exciting!

Enjoy your weekend.

We are looking forward to welcoming all pupils back to school, next week.

Details about our plans to re-open school on Monday, can be read here.

Our next Meet the Teacher evenings will take place on March 16th and March 18th. Appointments will again take place via video call and the booking system is now open. Some of the January meetings were affected by a power outage suffered by the the company hosting the calls – we do not anticipate the same issues re-occurring. With all pupils returning to school from March 8th, we feel that it is important to meet with all of our families quickly, to focus on how best to support your child after such a lengthy, unsettled period.

We expect and will be prepared for many pupils to find the transition back to school quite a challenge – whether they have been learning remotely since the beginning of January or they have been in school throughout, as part of a very small class. It will be a different experience for each child, affecting them in different ways. If September is anything to go by, our pupils will amaze us with how positively they will manage and embrace this transition. We will not, however, underestimate the impact that this second Lockdown and another partial school closure will have had upon our pupils and we will work hard to identify and meet their needs, acknowledging that this next period of recovery will be long lasting.

Next week, we will provide details about our recovery curriculum and how we plan to support pupils holistically, as they all return to school, addressing their social, emotional and learning needs as a result of this pandemic.

Next Thursday, March 4th, is World Book Day. Miss Ottley has been busy organising some exciting activities to support this event, detailed in her letter, sent out earlier this week.  We look forward to celebrating this day with you, in your pyjamas or fancy dress!

Enjoy Mr Bronstein’s music assembly with a focus and activities for World Book Day.

There have been three applications for our two parent governor vacancies. We are currently setting up an online voting system for the election, which will take place next week.

This half-term’s home learning grids are now available.

British Science Week starts next week (March 5th – 14th) with the theme of ‘Innovating for the future.’  Pupils learning at school and remotely can get involved in some exciting and inspiring activities and experiments.

Enjoy your weekend.

As anticipated, the Prime Minister has just announced that all schools in England will fully re-open from March 8th. We expect updated guidance from the Department for Education (DfE) to follow shortly so that we can effectively plan to welcome all pupils back – again! – according to government guidance and recommendations. We will keep families informed about the expectations and measures that we will take, to fully re-open Bowmansgreen, promptly and safely.

Although the Prime Minister has now announced a ‘roadmap’ to lift national restrictions, please be reminded that a national Lockdown currently remains in place. Government guidance and the law sets out specific expectations for leaving home and meeting others. Children are often very keen to share their news with school staff and an increasing number of pupils are reporting that they have visited and stayed over at their friends’ houses in recent days and weeks. This is very awkward and uncomfortable for staff as well as contravening Lockdown measures. With only a few weeks to go until national restrictions begin to be lifted, I would like to urge all members of our school community to continue to do their bit to help keep each other as safe and protected as possible, especially as all pupils are set to return.

Congratulations to Amelia, Hollie, Maddison and Issa, the winners of our recent House competition in support of Children’s Mental Health Week. Their super, winning entries are all so different and perfectly demonstrate what makes the pupils of Bowmansgreen so incredible. What a creative, diverse and talented school community we are! Well done to everyone who took part in the competition and thank you to our Year 6 House Captains for helping to decide on the final winners. The winning entries will be published on our Health and Wellbeing page, tomorrow.

Something very curious happened at Bowmansgreen during half-term….
You might have noticed that this half-term has started with a frog-themed ‘incident,’ that has really excited and inspired pupils. All year groups are focusing on the book ‘Tuesday’ by David Wiesner, as the stimulus for their new unit of English. If you have not yet had a chance to enjoy this picture book, please do take a look as it will help to explain the ‘crime scene’ that faced your child today – as well as the lily pads!

To accompany the unit of work on ‘Tuesday,’ Mrs Street has prepared two lessons that focus on the music and instruments used in the animated video of the book.
Introduction to ‘Tuesday’ by David Wiesner
Tuesday – Music narration 

It was great to see everyone wearing blue on Wednesday, to help us feel connected as a school community and in support of Children’s Mental Health Week. Pupils have been taking part in a range of activities to discuss and support their own mental health and wellbeing. Children learning at home and school are telling us that they miss being together but that often, they have developed some good coping and self-care strategies and have found ways to keep in touch with friends. The morning meetings and focus groups are also helping to keep pupils learning remotely, connected to school and their peers.

We will continue to provide pupils with information and activities to help them take good care of themselves physically, mentally and emotionally. Take a look at our Health and Wellbeing page for more advice and strategies for families, including the Five Ways to Wellbeing which is our focus for ‘Feeling Good Week,’ next week.

Pupils are taking part in a House Competition this week, to create a piece of art work to reflect the fortnight’s focus on mental health and wellbeing. They will have discussed the focus with their teachers – either ‘Express Yourself’ of ‘Five Ways to Wellbeing.’ Work will be shared with their teachers – pupils learning remotely can email work (scanned, pdf or photo) via the class email address or handed into the school office, if preferred. Entries to be submitted by Wednesday.

We have two parent governor vacancies at Bowmansgreen. If you are interested in becoming a school governor, find out how to put yourself forward for a nomination.

Our approach to remote learning acknowledges that the quality of the learning that pupils engage in – whether at home or school – is key. A short activity of sharing a story, discovering something new, or giving quality one-to-one time so that your child feels listened to, is much more effective and beneficial than sticking rigidly to a number of hours learning when the environment is busy, noisy and full of distractions and interruptions, which is what many households are like when most family members are at home together!

Primary aged children require adult support with their learning, as they develop their knowledge, skills and independence across the curriculum. At school, they rely on adult modelling, explanation and scaffolding in most areas of learning. That is why most primary classrooms have additional adults working in them. We appreciate that this is an additional pressure for families when supporting your children to learn at home – your young children are not likely to be able to learn for long on their own. This is perfectly normal and why teachers are trained to plan and deliver activities that develop skills, knowledge, understanding and independence – they are experts at teaching your children. Again, there is no expectation that families can replicate this model at home.

We want families to feel supported to help their children learn and not feel pressurised to deliver ‘schooling’ – which, from your feedback is working well for some families but proving very difficult and stressful for others. We ask that you do your best to spend quality time supporting your child but appreciate that it is not always easy, within the context of busy family households already under the strain of Lockdown.

With most children currently learning at home, there is more opportunity for them to spend time online. Read the latest parent online safety newsletter, from Herts for Learning which includes a Tik Tok checklist (and reminder that the official app rating is 13yrs) and information about a new digital safety and wellbeing kit for families.

There is tension in the air! A change of leadership on the Times Tables Rock Stars leaderboard has thrown pupils (and staff!) at Bowmansgreen into a frenzy. Log-in to find out who has toppled Mr Gowler from his lofty throne. Let’s just say that the girls of 6A are getting comfy in that throne. How long they stay there, is up to you…..