Parent Council - Minutes from Meeting 2

Parents' Council Meeting 2
October 10th

Attendance
M Drakes, L Nicholls, E Owsley, L Stevens, Mrs Clark, A Stevens, C Mason, L Chatterton, K Crawley

Reminder of purpose of Parents’ Council

(Mrs Hoffman) SEN Update

• SEN Review Cycle
• The cycle follows these stages each term:

· Start of term the register is reviewed

· IPPs are written and targets set

· Review meetings are held termly with parents

· Provisions and interventions are put in place as necessary

Mrs Hoffman explained how parents would be given any IPPs to review during the upcoming parents evening. Teachers and support staff would then work with children to achieve their targets.

There are four levels to the Special Needs Register

1. Statement – for those with specialist needs who require significant adjustment to be made to everyday teaching arrangements
2. School Action Plus – Those pupils where there is support from the school and from an outside agency
3. School Action – where children are receiving support within school that is different from or in addition to everyday teaching
4. Cause for concern – there is not necessarily a specific need, but staff are monitoring the pupil to ensure that progress is maintained

Speech & Language provision
Assessments have now been completed and the children will start work with Mrs Ilott and Miss Barr.
The majority of the children who need the S&L support will only require it for 6-8 weeks

Nurture Club
This has been set up to help targeted pupils have a calm, organized start to the day. They make their own breakfast and engage in activities with staff. Feedback from pupils, families and teachers has been that they now come into class in a positive frame of mind and ready to learn.

SEN coffee morning
Invitations to the SEN coffee morning will be sent out prior to half term once the parents evenings have been completed.
The intent is that this can be another forum where parents can received information from the professionals who work with your children, speak to the staff (Mrs Hoffman, Miss Barr and Mrs Ilott) and meet with other parents who may have similar experiences to share.

Workshops for parents
Mrs Hoffman informed parents that there would be a number of workshops during the year focusing on different aspects of provision. Some of these would be part of the EYFS Stay & Play days: Read Write Inc and early reading, nutrition, child development. Other workshops would be targeted to specific groups of parents to give you more information about your child and how you can help them at home.

(Mrs Nicholls) Pupil Responsibility
JRSO
The Junior Road Safety Officers have now started their job. They help to organize the Walk Once a Week badges and passports.
We have also promoted their role through the local paper
The children will help to run ‘Safer Roads’ campaigns in school and posters to advertise safe parking to parents

House Captains
These were elected by the children. They have started their job of collecting housepoints each week, presenting the House Cup is assembly and running inter House events. The first of these will be a football competition in November for KS2.

Play Leaders & Positive Play
We now have a number of positive play leaders on duty each lunch time. They help to set out the activities for the children: archery, tug o war, skipping, corn boards, jenga and other games.

We have a bid in with the National Lottery for funds to help develop a path around the edge of the field which can then be used by the children all year round and will add more elements to the play ground.

(Mr Drakes) Expansion Update
Pupil numbers are now as follows

• Reception – 55 pupils (5 places)
• KS1 – 115 pupils (5 places)
• KS2 – 182 pupils (2 oversubscribed)

Projected expansion from LA
The school is likely to become a 2 forms of entry school across every Key Stage from September 2014

Building implications
Two new classrooms are needed in KS2
Car park space will have to be created
The staff room will have to be made bigger
The second school hall will have to be bought back into use
New staff will have to be appointed for the additional classes

(Mr Drakes) Curriculum Developments
Times Table challenges

Children across KS1 & KS2 have started a new times table challenge called Times Table Rockstars. They have regular times tables practise every day from 8.55am – 9.05am.
Children have to understand their times tables in a variety of different ways
Examples of the tests will be published on the website with the minutes of this meeting
Idea is to have excellent speed of recall so that they can earn their Rock Stars certificates

Language & Literacy KS2
This is a new scheme for literacy. It is based on units that last for three weeks at a time. Week 1 is about reading a text and understanding it to quite a deep level. Week 2 focuses on writing related to the text. Week 3 looks at a non fiction task on a similar theme.
The grammar and philosophy for children are also part of the scheme
This has been introduced into KS2 from this term for two key reasons

1. Consistent quality of teaching style and sequence as it is similar to the Read Write Inc scheme that has been successful in KS1
2. Consistent quality of practice across KS2 – where literacy lessons where left far more to the teacher to plan and resource

Outdoor provision & resources
We have a bid in with the Lottery fund to raise £10,000 for a path around the edge of the field.
This will expand the playing surface by 450sq metres and add tunnels, sand pits, teaching areas, a stage and outdoor classrooms to the playground area
Staff have received training on how to use the outdoors effectively to increase engagement in lessons

Springboard support
This is support for early readers in Year 1. Last year the pupils on the program made above average progress
Drapers Academy fund the scheme and have agreed to extend that funding for another year – in fact they have allowed enough funds to expand from 9 pupils to 15.

Reading for pleasure
We are continuing to promote reading for pleasure in a number of ways this term

• Reading Teams Competition
• Year group author challenge
• Normal reading rewards
• Broadford Big Read
• Spinebreakers

They will be giving reading tips, featured in a library display, given special badges to wear and taken on trips to help choose new books
Children are chosen based on the numbers of books they have read and borrowed from the library
Producing a fortnightly newsletter about what they have been reading

(Miss Morris) TLR3 Project
Aim of project

• To foster a spirit of career aspiration in Broadford pupils
• To make children aware of different careers and professional jobs
• Children to understand how maths and literacy skills are used in the workplace
• To know how to apply for a job
• To know about the qualifications needed for different posts and the path of study required

Pupil Survey
This has been carried out in Year 5&6 to identify interests. Other jobs will also be added to the pupil driven list

Impact in classroom
Teachers to ensure that pupils know why they are learning a particular skill
Video resource to link learning to the workplace

Impact out of classroom
Assemblies with speakers from different professions who will talk about their job and how they got it
Visits to workplaces to see what is involved
Small group sessions for children with similar career interests

Contribution from parents
Do you work in a career which could be of interest to the children?
Are you a professional who can explain to the children how you got your job?
Please contact the school and speak to Miss Morris

(Miss Taylor) SMSC
Links with other schools
Dersingham Primary (Newham)

· Visit booked for November 7th to meet the children and tour their site

· They will then come and visit our school

· Opportunity to link classes together as well

Anti Bullying Policy & Procedures
Children follow a simple A B C anti bullying policy and have a simple contract which they have all signed up to.

A more detailed blog post about the Anti Bullying Procedures will be added after this post

Anti Bullying Week 
This is in November and Miss Taylor will be promoting Anti Bullying week with the children. There will be assemblies and wrist bands given out to the pupils

Update on items from last meeting

o Communication – Phase Group mailboxes set up to help pass messages. These will be put onto the newsletter as a permanent feature in case parents forget them

o Reading – Springboard program expanded from 9 to 15 pupils. 2x Reading volunteer meetings held and growing list of volunteers. There will be another reading volunteer meeting after half term. Mrs Nicholls will be publishing the details shortly

o Weekly overview given out to staff and now shared with parents

Monday	Give out spelling books, mental maths homework KS1 give out / change reading books KS1 and Years 3&4 phase / planning meeting 3.30
Tuesday	KS2 meeting 12.15 fortnightly
Wednesday	KS1 give out / change reading books Years 5&6 phase / planning meeting 7.30 EYFS phase / planning meeting 12.15 Staff Meeting 3.45 – 4.45
Thursday	Certificates to be completed and handed in ready for assembly: E for Excellence, Trackers , Reading awards, Star/rainbow writer, I got stuck , Presentation, Project superstars
Friday	Staff Briefing 8.15 KS1 give out / change reading books Give out newsletters Collect in spelling books and check any homework tasks Spelling and mental maths test administered (If not Friday then move to Thursday)

Letter to parents going out by half term on how to pay for trips. This will go out at the same time as the letter to Year 6 parents about Stubbers

ParentView Survey

Parents are urged to complete the online survey, if they haven’t already.

http://parentview.ofsted.gov.uk/login?destination=give-your-views

So far 117 parents have registered their views on the school for this academic year

It is an important way of us getting feedback on how you feel about our performance

Suggestions for further improvement

Suggestion	Action Agreed	Person Responsible
Coning off the car park slipways in the morning as parents are still using them to turn and park	Cones to be placed outside each morning and the gates closed	Mr Martin
Some children have felt that have to be packed lunch if they are attending a club at lunchtime. Some children have been told off for being late.	All staff to be informed that children just have to go to lunch first if they have a club. They can be packed lunch or school dinner	Mr Drakes
There is heavy congestion at home time by the gate. This leads to confrontations with parents trying to come in/out	Double gates to be opened – with clear warning that the surface is uneven.	Mr Martin
Elections for the school council were held very early in the term. Some children may not have put themselves forward as they were not yet confident with their new classmates	In future elections for class council will be delayed until nearer the half term. This will give children the chance to settle.	Miss Taylor
Email addresses for the new shared mailboxes need to be on the newsletter. Not all parents have access to the blog/Facebook at work and need to know the address	The addresses for the mailbox will be added to the weekly newsletter	Mr Drakes
A number of new staff have joined the school. Not all parents know who they are and would like more information about them	New staff have their photo, name and Year Group published on the blog	Mr Drakes

 Date of next meeting

Parent & Governor Meeting Monday 11th November

Parent Council Meeting 3 Thursday 6th February @ 9am