I hope everyone hasn’t frozen this week! Thankfully, some warmer weather is on the way. Thank you for your support in sending the warm clothes, they were certainly needed.
As ever, a busy week. As ever, some highlights! The Year 4 Brass Class had a wonderful day at Barnsley Civic with the Grimethorpe Band project. It was a pleasure to work with them and to see so many of our families at both the afternoon and evening events was again extremely uplifting. The Grimethorpe Adventure is a very inventive piece of composition and to work with such an illustrious organisation is terrific. Thank you to everyone who has been involved.
I met with Road Safety officials from Barnsley Council this week. We shall be raising the profile of road safety further at Birkwood and plan to work with our School Council to make Birkwood a safer place. I thank you for your care and consideration when arriving and leaving school and realise that 2024 is a very different time to 1957 (when Birkwood was opened) in terms of traffic so plead with everyone to be as safe and as considerate as possible. With over 400 children, drop off and pick up times can be tricky.
I must thank Mrs. Wilkie & Miss Sabin for their hard work in all things reading and writing at Birkwood. We met with a Local Authority Officer this week to discuss our plans in English and how we are striving to improve our curriculum offer further. We received some very pleasing feedback because of the hard work of our staff and of course the children. A very proud day for everyone at Birkwood!
The extension is flying up. The work looks great – our School Council really enjoyed the chance to have a nosey!
ParentPay & After School Clubs
For after school clubs I remind all families to use ParentPay to book children on to clubs. The clubs for next half term shall be available to book from Monday 29th January. This allows us to monitor numbers and aims to minimise admin time. I shall remind you again next week but thank you for your help in this regard.
Cough/ Cold/ Flu Season
If your child isn't feeling well and you're not sure whether to send them to school here is a link to the NHS 'Is my child too ill for school?' website, which is a useful tool to help you in decision making.
On 1st February we have our first bingo of the new year - Everyone welcome. Our annual Valentine Disco is also taking place on 6th February. This is open to childen in Years Reception to Year 6. Tickets are on sale from Monday 22nd January at a cost of £2.50 per child.
As always, I wish everyone an extremely safe and happy weekend. I hope you get chance to enjoy some special family time.
Our latest Safeguarding information has been included in the link above. This is a link to give advice on screen time.
- Headteachers Superstar EYFS/KS1 - IB Y1 Nightingale
- Headteachers Superstar KS2 - GN Y3 Earhart
- Class Times Table Rockstars - Y3/4 Holmes
- Music Maestro - Y4 Pankhurst
House Winners
- This weeks winners - Fire
- Current Half Term Leaders - Fire
- Overall Leaders - Earth + Fire
- School Attendance Target for the Year - 96.50%
- School attendance this year so far - 94.4%
- School attendance this week - 95.3%
- EYFS2 Anning - 95.6%
- EYFS2 Sharman - 95.3%
- Year 1 Einstein -96.8%
- Year 1 Nightingale -93.3%
- Year 2 Parks - 96.3%
- Year 2 Seacole - 95.2%
- Year 3 Earhart - 92.8%
- Year 3/4 Holmes - 95.7%
- Year 4 Pankhurst - 95.4%
- Year 5 Attenborough - 93.3%
- Year 5/6 Wollstonecraft - 97.5%
- Year 6 Kings - 98.4%
Well done to Class Kings who are this week's winners with 98.4%. Congratulations.
Our suite of X (formerly Twitter) Handles is here for you. Below is a link for 'all things Birkwood.'
PE & Sport
Please ensure children in KS2 - Years 3-6 come to school IN PE KIT on their allocated PE Days. Appropriate trainers must be worn. No crop tops – Sports t-shirts please and shorts. A tracksuit may be worn – please make a judgment on temperature. This will be until building work is complete as we have no access to discrete changing areas.
This Year's Dates
Next Year's Dates Below
Wednesday 4th September 2024 – Children return to school
Friday 25th October 2024 – School closes for Half Term
Monday 4th November 2024 – Children return to school
Friday 20th December 2024 – School Closes for Christmas Break
Monday 6th January 2025 - Children return to school
Friday 14th February 2025 - School Closes for Half Term
Monday 24th February 2025 - Children return to school
Friday 4th April 2025 – School Closes for Easter Break
Tuesday 22nd April 2025 - Children return to school
Monday 5th May 2025 – School Closed May Day Bank Holiday
Friday 23 May 2025 – School Closes for Half Term
Monday 2 June 2025 – INSET Day
Tuesday 3 June 2025 – Children return to school
Friday 18 July 2025 - School Closes for Summer
For current Year 6 children, their tests shall be Monday 13th May to Thursday 16th May 2024.
For current Year 5 children, their tests will be Monday 12th to Thursday 15th May 2025.
For current Year 4 children, their tests will be Monday 11th to Thursday 14th May 2026.