Keep up to date with all the news happening in the school at the moment. Articles are added during the week. Parents are encouraged to check regularly. Our weekly bulletin, emailed directly to parents, summarises content for the week.

• Supporting reading at home

  Thu 30 Apr 2020 Clare Haines

  We know reading regularly with your child can make a massive difference to their progress. But it isn’t always easy to fit it in day-to-day, especially at the moment.

  Here are some easy ways you can make reading a part of every day:

  1. Don’t worry about how long you read for. Every minute spent reading makes a bigger difference than you realise!
  2. Don’t worry about what your children are reading: recipes, cereal packets, catalogues… It’s all useful! Keep books and other reading materials close by.
  3. Reading to kids of all ages is helpful. If your child isn’t reading by themselves yet, read with them.
  4. Ask lots of questions: Who, what, where, when and why and ask them to summarise when you’ve finished.

  Find out how our teachers got into reading here:

  • What got me into reading

  Some of our teachers have been busy recording themselves reading a favourite book or poem. Look out for these on our year group noticeboards or the Nursery and Reception Instagram accounts over the coming weeks. 

  • Top tips for supporting reading at home

   

  

• The Fielding rap- Music Challenge 2 launched!

  Thu 30 Apr 2020 Maria Neil-Smith
  Music challenge 2 sees the launch of the new Fielding rap. To listen to Miss Neil-Smith's Hiphop track and get involved in this week's challenge click here. Entries by 12pm Thursday 7th May. 

• Pre-recorded instrumental tuition - your views please

  Thu 30 Apr 2020 Peter Dunmall

  339 of our pupils usually take individual or small group tuition to learn a musical instrument at school from Ealing Music Service.

   

  Ealing Music Service is proposing to offer pupils pre-recorded instrumental lessons at home while the school is closed. Would you use and pay for these pre-recorded lessons at home?

   

  Parents will not need to be present for children to take part and the video can be watched at any convenient time. Pupils can expect weekly content, including:

  • Teaching of pieces and new repertoire
  • Masterclass on technique and instrumental skills
  • Performances of pieces by the teacher for pupil analysis
  • General musicianship activities & games
  • Musical Activities– Using the Charanga website
  • ‘How to’ Videos - e.g. tuning your instrument, practise effectively
  • Listening activities, Music quizzes & games

  I feel that this offer is vastly different from learning an instrument in school with the support of a music teacher. I do not believe that parents will want this offer.

   

  Ealing Music Service will charge the school for the usual cost of instrumental lessons taken at school with a 25% discount. If we accept the offer, the school risks a charge of £30,000 for the summer term without being able to collect enough fees from parents to cover the cost.

   

  Your response will help me to decide whether to accept or decline this proposal. I need to hear your views:

  • https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/fieldingmusic

   

  A quick response, by Monday morning is needed. The survey takes less than 1 minute to complete.

• Learning phonics at home

  Wed 29 Apr 2020 Peter Dunmall

  Nursery, Reception and Year 1 pupils can continue learning to match letters to sounds at home while the school is closed.

  Phonics is the way we teach children to recognise the sounds in words. It helps your child to learn to read and is an essential part of your child’s education.

  In school we teach children to read through linking letters and sounds using a published programme called ‘Read Write Inc’ (RWI). Children begin their phonics journey in Nursery and as they progress through Reception and Year 1 they work through each stage of the programme, learning their sounds which are grouped in ‘Sets’.

  Find out more here:

  • Fielding, English

  During the summer term, there are a range of online resources you can use to support the teaching of phonics at home. 

   

  Daily lessons

  Your child can participate in daily lessons on the RWI YouTube site at home.  From Friday you will be able to find a link on your child’s Year Group Noticeboard to the phonics lesson schedule for the weeks ahead. You can also access the lessons by clicking on the link below,

  • RWI YouTube

   

  Our vulnerable pupils and children of key workers who are in school will have the chance to take part in a phonics session in school.

   

  Unsure which lesson to participate in?

  Nursery

  In Nursery the children have started to look at the set 1 sounds in school.  You could join in the set 1 lessons to recap the sounds they have already looked at and explore some of the new set 1 sounds.

   

  Reception/Year 1

  In Reception and Year 1 the children have been working through sets 1-3. In school we send home books that support the sounds that the children are working on.  Below we have matched the coloured books with each set, this indicates the live lesson that your child could join. In school we regularly recap the sounds in the previous set so you may wish to revisit some of the earlier lessons especially if your child is finding the lesson a little tricky. 

  • Set 1 – Nursery Sound Blending, Ditty, Red books – Live lessons at 9.30am
  • Set 2 – Green, purple books – Live lessons at 10.00am
  • Set 3 – Pink, Orange, Yellow, Blue and Grey books– Live lessons at 10.30am

   

  Story Time

  While children are learning to it is also important for them to hear lots of stories being read to them.

  After watching each lesson, we encourage you to read aloud to your child and, if your child has reading books from school, listen to your child read.

  To provide your child with the further opportunities to hear stories being read, story time takes place every Monday, Wednesday and Friday on the RWI YouTube site.

  You can also find links to further phonics activities and games to support your child’s development in reading on the year group notice boards.

   

  There is no expectation or pressure on parents to complete a daily phonics lesson at home. When pupils return to school, we will prioritise learning phonics. If you have any questions please send an email to admin@fielding.ealing.sch.uk.

• Lockdown Gardening

  Mon 27 Apr 2020 Ellie Lock

  It's brilliant to hear that so many of you are growing sunflowers, but it doesn't have to stop there. We may not be in the school garden, but we can still meet up in cyberspace. 

  There are plenty of things you can grow even if you don't have a packet of seeds, or a garden... or any soil. Below is a list of ideas for a spot of Lockdown Gardening - all you need for some of them is a bit of old veg and a glass of water. Plants and seeds want to grow - all they need is a little encouragement.

  You can send photos of your Lockdown Gardens to elock4.307@lgflmail.org, and I'll post them on the website. We might even get the chickens to judge your skills - and you know how much Victoria loves to judge.

  (If you want to know what the dreadful old sausage has been up to, you'll find the ghastly "Diary Of A Wise And Beautiful Chicken" here).

   

  Lockdown Gardening ideas:

  If you have soil: 

  Don't throw away sprouty old potatoes or sweet potatoes - pop them in the earth and grow a whole new plant. The same goes for garlic and ginger.

  Seeds last a long time - if you have a jar of dried peas or beans, plant a few and see if you can bring them back to life. Or try it with a few tomato, cucumber or sweet pepper seeds left over from a salad.

   

  If you don't have any soil:

  The scientific word for growing plants without soil is "hydroponics."

  Mustard and cress seeds will grow on a damp sheet of kitchen paper.

  You can sprout dried peas and beans in an old plastic bottle - lie it on its side, make some air holes and a slot to post in your seeds, and grow them on damp kitchen paper. It's like a mini greenhouse.

  If you're lucky enough to have an avocado stone, balance it on top of a jar or glass with its bottom hanging in the water... and watch it grow roots.

  If your old lettuce has roots, stick its bottom in a glass or water and it should grow fresh leaves from the centre.

  Don't throw away the bottom of a spring onion, garlic clove, leek or celery stalk - pop them in a glass of water and they should sprout new leaves.

  Cut herbs like basil, coriander and rosemary should sprout new roots if you put them in a glass of water. You'll need a pot of compost if you want to keep growing them though.

  Cut off carrot tops or pineapple tops, put them in a saucer of water and watch them grow - don't eat them, these ones are just for show.

  You may have ingenious ideas of your own - we'd love to see them.

  Happy Lockdown Gardening!

   

  

• Fielding Music Challenge of the week

  Mon 27 Apr 2020 Maria Neil-Smith
  It would be great to see you get involved in the Fielding Music Challenge of the week. Click here to see a video of Miss Neil-Smith introducing this week's challenge. Details of how to get involved and share your entries are below the video. The weekly challenge will also be accessible via a link on Year group noticeboards every week. Deadline for entries for challenge 1 is Friday 12pm. It is open to all pupils from Nursery to year 6. Have fun!

• Fielding's Always Active - Challenge 5 and Game of the Week

  Mon 27 Apr 2020 Dan Thomas

  First of all well done and thank you to everyone who has been taking on the Challenges of the Week and having a go at the Games of the Week too. The main aim of these challenges and games is to help us stay active while having some fun and judging by the videos and photos you have been sending in, lots of you are doing just that! Remember you don't have to be filmed or photographed in order to do the challenges and once you have sent in your attempt, don't stop doing them - keep trying them and try to beat your scores or the other people in your household.

   

  This week our challenge of the week is the T-shirt Shuttle which I have already become addicted to. My first attempts haven't been great so lots of you should be able to beat me! Our Game of the Week is 2-Player Tag and actually includes 3 different versions of 2/3 player tag games - shoulder tag, t-shirt tag and bear tag. They are all lots of fun and will definitely get your heart rate going up. Have a go at them and let me know how you get on.

   

  Get on to the Fielding's Always Active page to have a look at past challenge and games as you can do any of them at any time. If you want to try one of the older challenges and send in your attempts, do it!

   

  Finally, well done to this weeks Fielding Sporting Stars who have been sharing other ways that they have been staying active this week - we could have a future Netball star, a Tour de France winner and an even better version of Joe Wicks - the Extreme Twins! Have a look and keep telling us what you have been up to.

• Staying safe using WhatsApp whilst staying connected

  Fri 24 Apr 2020 Miss L Stabler

  During these tricky times, lots of us are relying on messaging and video calls to keep connected to friends and family. Whilst this is important, we still need to stay aware of using technology safely. We know from previous conversations with our older pupils that lots have access to I messaging and WhatsApp on different devices. Some children have told us they know they can overuse these to send silly messages to each other which can result in pupils waking to more than a hundred messages.  While we would like them to feel connected with friends, we would just like to remind children about the importance of not overwhelming people and check they fully know how to use WhatsApp safely. The NSPPC NetAware website has lots of information for parents about a range of Apps that pupils use, including the risks they might contain and age restrictions and guidance. There is a page explaining the potential risks of WhatsApp and tips on using safely. There is also guidance for other popular apps: Zoom, Houseparty and Instagram.

• Teachers write to pupils at home

  Fri 24 Apr 2020 Peter Dunmall

  Every pupil will receive an email message from their class teacher today and then once a week while the school remains closed. The email will be addressed to children and sent to a parents' email address.

   

  Teachers are keen to keep in touch with their classes. Their message will include links to learning on-line, helping parents set expectations and improve motivation while pupils are learning at home.

   

  Nationally, research shows that around 1 in 5 pupils are accessing learning at home. Exit links from our website news articles and uptake on some of our learning platforms, suggests that less than 1 in 5 of our own pupils might be learning at home.  We are keen to find out more about learning at home. We will do this at the end of next week.

   

  We continue to use the Oak National Academy resources because their video lessons, quizzes and worksheets are better than we can produce while we are closed. Sometimes we will add extra links from BBC Bitesize and other websites to support the Oak National Academy material.

   

  For children in Year 1-6, we suggest that they complete:

  • an English lesson, every day, from Oak National Academy
  • a maths lesson, every day, from Oak National Academy
  • our own links to 'foundation' subjects , including science, art, history, geography, every week

   

  Children of key workers and those who are vulnerable and are in school for childcare will be given the chance to complete the same learning during the day.

   

  Children in Reception and Nursery should continue to use the links provided on Year Group Noticeboards.

• Guidance for parents from the NHS school nursing team

  Thu 23 Apr 2020 Clare Haines

  Please see the attached guidance from the school nursing team for what to do if your child is unwell.

  • Guidance for parents on how to get help for your child's health during Coronavirus lockdown