Newsletters

Dear Parents and Carers,

I hope the end of term finds you well and looking forward to a break, whether at home with family members or away. We have had a very positive term with lots of 'normal' events taking place and are back on track with our curriculum. However, once again, we are entering an uncertain period in schools as we learn more about the Omicron variant. I will endeavour to keep you up to date with any new information and will of course contact you during the holiday if there are any changes to next term.

We have had an unprecedented period of staff absence and staffing changes. I would like to express my thanks to all my colleagues for everything they are doing to respond to the challenges of COVID-19 whilst continuing to further improve the school. Their resilience in the face of the many challenges during the last 21 months, together with your continued commitment to support our children with their education and wellbeing through the disruption of the pandemic is inspiring.

Goodbye and good luck

Many of you will know that we said goodbye today to Mr Bradley after 14 long years of service. Children across the whole school said their thank yous and Brian was clearly very touched by the many cards and good wishes he received. During the assembly, I also presented Mr Bradley with the hugely generous gifts from the many parents who chose to make a donation. It is clear that Brian will be sorely missed, and we wish him a healthy, happy retirement.

Also leaving today is Miss Wilson (Jo) and Miss Hamilton (Emma). Both staff members have made a big impression in a short time, and we are sad to see them leave us so soon. Thank you both for the contribution you have made to Bramhope. We wish you well in the next exciting chapter of your careers!

Leeds Schools Cross Country League

Last Saturday the fourth race of the Leeds Schools Cross Country League took place at GSAL. The course was tough with two sharp inclines and a muddier than usual bend towards the finishing straight. The under 11 boys remain first overall with just one league race to go in March. Under 9 boys and girls both ran incredibly well with several children finishing in higher positions than ever before. Farah and Sophie have continued to show excellent commitment, running in every race so far in the Under 11 girls' races. Thank you to all the parents who helped with timings and warm-ups.

Mr McKeown

Year 6 Swimming

For four days this week, Year 6 have been attending swimming lessons at Holt Park as part of their Swimming and Water Safety curriculum. After being assessed, children were quickly put into groups and began working on water confidence. On Tuesday and Wednesday, after meeting the curriculum aims (to swim competently, confidently, and proficiently over a distance of at least 25 metres, and to use a range of strokes effectively) the focus switched to improving swim technique. The children loved their time in the pool, and many reported new personal bests, swimming more consecutive lengths than ever before. On the final day, we held a small gala where children swam in a relay representing their house teams- Wilberforce were the fastest. Following a very competitive round of qualifying heats, the individual 50m freestyle was a hotly contested race which was won by Jess. 

To finish the week, children were taught and performed three safe rescues which they can use in an emergency.

Mr McKeown

Visit to St Giles

We were delighted to be able to take Y3-Y6 to St Giles this year. Matt Broughton (the new vicar) led each of the Christmas services, both of which were interactive. Thank you so much for sending in toys for our appeal, they will be given to social services and passed on to children who would otherwise receive no presents. Thank you for your generosity! 

Merry Christmas from the PTA 

We just want to thank everyone for the support over the last 6 weeks while the new committee get to grips with everything PTA related. A particular thank you to the PTA links and additional volunteers who have massively helped build better communication links between the PTA and parents/guardians at the school.  

The Christmas events have been very successful, so thank you to the number of people offering to help, and those who have supported the events. Together we raised over £2000 which will allow us to buy at least 6 of the 7 iPads. We will have the final total in January. This will be so fantastic for each of the year groups!  

We are aware that Christmas is incredibly busy, and for some reason it has felt more busy than ever this year. Despite this, people have been very supportive and we are very grateful for this. Congratulations to those who won the raffle prizes, and I hope the Children enjoyed reading their Santa letters. Thanks so much to those who wrote letters for us, and helped with delivery.  

We are learning lots as we go along, so we are very happy to receive feedback! Please email pta@bramhopeprimaryschool.co.uk to get in touch. 

We look forward to events in 2022 that will bring a sense of community and joy after a difficult couple of years for everyone. We will be in touch in the new year with a calendar of events (which will hopefully include kids discos, parents nights, ice cream and bike rides), and we would love some volunteers to run small events, with plenty of support from the PTA.  

Thanks again for all your support. Please see below the feedback from the Wreath competition, including the winners! 

Rosanna, Fiona, Sarah and Caroline 

Your PTA committee 

Wreath Making – the results are in!!

Thank you to everyone who decorated a wreath and submitted their entry to the PTA – the standard was again very high this year, making Mrs Colbourn's job of judging very difficult, with a lot of wreaths in the running for the top 3 spots!  We hope that families enjoyed making them. Mrs Colbourn was really impressed with the standard and creativity: 

Winner - £20 Amazon voucher: Harriet Gardner Freeman (Reception) 

Runners up - £10 Amazon voucher: 2nd Bramhope Brownie Unit (Years 3, 4 and 5) and Rosie Royle (Reception) 

Congratulations to all the winners - the PTA Team will arrange for the prizes (which have been donated to the PTA) to be sent to the winners – and thank you again to everyone for taking part. 

All monies raised will go towards funding the school iPads, and the PTA Team would like to thank Lily's again for their continued help in making the event happen, and to Lisa Bates for organising this event (and for delivering half of the Santa letters too!).  

Winner – Harriet Gardner Freeman (Reception)

Runners Up

2^nd Bramhope Brownie Unit (Years 3, 4 and 5)

Rosie Royle (Reception)

Thank you

Enormous thanks to the PTA team; Rosanna, Fiona, Sarah and Caroline, who have worked tirelessly these last few weeks to organise all these fantastic Christmas events - we all really appreciate it!!

Bramhope Parents

Bramhope Buzz News

The Bramhope Buzz magazine group have had a busy and productive term. The 60th anniversary edition of the Bramhope Buzz has now been circulated. We hope you have received the link and enjoy this issue.

The team of young editors have really worked hard on this edition of the Buzz. There are now 13 on the team, and I am really proud of their enthusiasm and hard work. They have been a pleasure to work with. 

We are looking forward to planning activities for next term. We meet each week on Wednesdays 3.30-4.30pm. If you think your child would like to join the team please email me:

caroline.judd@bramhopeprimaryschool co.uk

Wishing you all a happy and peaceful festive season

Caroline Judd

Parent Workshops

We have been delighted to see so many parents/carers in school for this term’s two parent workshops. The feedback was really positive, and the speakers enjoyed the sessions too. We will be putting links and additional resources as suggested by our speakers onto the school website.

In October we had Lauren Green join us, a speech therapist from Away With Words. Her fantastic presentation was especially aimed at parents of under 6's The role of speech in child development: Making the Most of your conversations. Parents found the session really useful and enjoyed the opportunity for discussion with other parents.

In November Sue O’Leary-Hall visited with her stimulating session: How To Help With Homework. This was well attended by parents from all year groups. There were some interesting discussions, and we all left with a number of new strategies. Parents reported that the talk was really helpful and highly recommended.

SAVE THE DATE:

Our next workshop will be held on February 9th 7-9pm. The topic for discussion will be Parenting in a Digital World. This will be presented by Mrs Hahnel (our Computing lead) with the assistance of our digital leaders.

We hope to see you there

Mrs Judd & Mrs Yeomans

Pastoral Coordinators

Otley Children’s Centre

Otley Children’s Centre, wish everyone an enjoyable festive holiday.

Click on the links to view our January Timetable, a useful contact flyer and the family food flyer.

To those of you celebrating, I wish you a very merry Christmas and happy new year! We look forward to welcoming children back to school on Tuesday 4 January.