Useful Information

Easter Events available to children who are eligible for Free School Meals

YMCA Winchester House are offering free spaces in their Day Camp Holiday Programme for children who are eligible for Free School Meals. Please contact St Mary's School Office for further details.

Children's Mental Health Week - 1st February - 7th February 2021

Place2Be launched the first ever Children’s Mental Health Week in 2015 to shine a spotlight on the importance of children and young people’s mental health. Now in its seventh year, they hope to encourage more people than ever to get involved and spread the word.

This year’s theme is ‘Express Yourself’ and is about helping children to find ways to share their feelings, thoughts, or ideas through creativity. This could be through art, music, writing and poetry, dance and drama, photography and film, and doing activities that make them feel good. This is not about being the best at something or putting on a performance for others. It is about helping children to find a way to show who they are, and how they see the world, that can help them feel good about themselves.

Ten:Ten have made a video which you can access by clicking the link below:

https://www.tentenresources.co.uk/children-mental-health-week/

The video:

· Helps children know that not only do they have special people around them who they can and should share their feelings with; they have a friend in Jesus, who is always listening and always loving.

· Has moments to pause for reflection, where the music keeps playing.

· Introduces the idea of looking after our mental health through creative expression.

· Acknowledges the difficult time that everyone is having at the moment, but are getting through with love, kindness and generosity.

· Explains that as we are made in the image of our creator God, expressing ourselves creatively is innate.

· Challenges pupils to plan their own creative outlets.

Click the link below to access additional resources from Place2Be:

https://www.childrensmentalhealthweek.org.uk/parents-and-carers/

Information about support with mental health for children and families from the NHS

https://www.iow.nhs.uk/our-services/mental-health-services/primary-care-mental-health-team.htm 

Remote Learning Parental Survey

Click the link below to access our Remote Learning survey for parents.

https://forms.gle/NAstWZre6tz33PUF9

Thank you for taking the time to fill in this survey - it will close on Wednesday 3rd February.

The Psychology of  Play

An interesting video to watch http://ow.ly/iWtY50zTOQg

Hants Police update 16th June 2020

O nline Safety Warning ⚠
We have been made aware of incidents of children being groomed through Snapchat and online platform Omegle – we are also aware of incidents of hacking on the game Roblox where players are invited to open a ‘gift’ which turns out to be a camera that takes a photograph.

If your child is using these apps/sites/games they should be vigilant – find out more about these platforms (and all others) from the NSPCC/O2 NetAware A-Z guide – helping you to keep your child safe at a time when they are online more than usual – perpetrators are fully aware children are online more and the increased opportunity this presents to exploit them!!! 

Parents can sign up to receive updates from NetAware: www.net-aware.org.uk/newsletter/

Parents Protect are a dedicated organisation providing support and advice to help parents/carers protect their children from sexual abuse and exploitation: www.parentsprotect.co.uk/  

The latest ThinkuKnow weekly packs for parents to use with their children focusses on live streaming for the likes of Tik-Tok, these are age specific:

4-5s     5-7s     8-10s     11-13s     14+

Parent Zone

Google and Parent Zone are pleased to share two NEW educational resources for Be Internet Legends to access NOW: 

• The Legendary Learner Wellbeing Kit: school communities are relying on tech right now – and many parents are worried about the effects of increased screen time. These new materials are designed to help families reflect on tech use, develop healthy digital habits and find a balance. Download the Legendary Learner Wellbeing Kit
   
• Be Internet Legends – Welcome to Interland: an exciting tour through the Be Internet Legends programme by our presenters Jennie and Dan. You can watch this video easily via YouTube Kids, at a time that suits you.
•  

 Lego-inspired Colouring Heroes

The clever people at Colouring Heroes have been designing colouring sheets since the start of lockdown, with the idea being to thank key workers and give children something creative to do. Their Lego-inspired emergency services characters have proved really popular, and now we’re pleased to share our Hampshire Police Officer Lego Characters. Visit the Safe4me page via the link below to download, print and colour in!

www.safe4me.co.uk/2020/06/11/colour-in-police-activities-for-children/ 

We would be delighted if you would share the works of art with us by tagging us on Facebook or Twitter @HantsPolice or email to: schoolyouthengagement@hampshire.pnn.police.uk

 Changes to Homework

Over the last few weeks, we have been reviewing our approach to homework.

We recognise that homework can be very stressful for all involved – parents, children and teachers! 

From the school’s point of view, homework has limited value. Some children complete their homework to a very high standard every week, whilst with others it can be difficult to get any homework completed at all.

Some parents give such very high levels of support that it is difficult to see what the child achieved independently whilst some are able to give very little support for various reasons. Research from the Education Endowment Foundation (EEF) suggests that the impact of primary school homework is limited.

We know that the following skills and knowledge are vital for every child to be able to access other parts of the curriculum and to make progress at school:

• Daily reading;
• Fluency with number facts (times tables and number bonds);
• Spelling practice (using joined handwriting as appropriate)

We ask that you continue to work with your child at home in supporting their development in these areas. Each child will have a daily reading record for you to complete. Age appropriate spellings will continue to be sent home to be learned and tested at school regularly.

Children will be given a Maths activities booklet appropriate to their age. Activities will include regular practice of times tables facts or number bonds, depending on the need of your child as well as other more practical and (we hope) fun things to do linked to an area of maths. Children will continue to be encouraged to make use of the Times Tables Rockstar site to improve recall of tables facts and this knowledge will be tested in class as well.

Similarly, each child will bring home a Reading Activities booklet with various activities designed to increase the enjoyment of and engagement in reading.

Activity squares in each booklet should be initialed by the adult at home who “supervised” the activity; in class, the activity square  will be stamped.

In addition, children will bring home a Home Learning Grid after half term that lists a variety of home learning activities, linked to a topic in class or another focus. The point of this is to encourage children to express themselves in a variety of ways, be it through a poster, a powerpoint presentation, a model or written piece of work – the choice is theirs! The grid will contain a variety of activities – it is not expected that children should complete them all but it does give them a choice of home learning activities to undertake. Opportunities will be given in class for children to share their home learning activities.

The exception to this new approach to homework is Y6 who, at this point in the year, will be revising for their national tests in May (SATs); however, after SATs are over, they too will have the flexibility to choose their home learning activities. Y2 children may also have additional practice work to prepare them for their national tests as well.

We very much hope that this different and more flexible approach to home learning will reduce the stress some children feel when faced with homework and encourage a more active participation in their learning at home.

As ever, if you have any questions, please do speak to your child’s teacher in the first instance.