Reception

As the final term of our first year in school

draws to a close we are reflecting on what a

busy year we have had!

Thanks you to all the parents who cam e to

watch our class assembly. The children were

very proud to show you what they can do and

share the work they have been doing this

term. It was lovely to see how much the children have grown in self confidence, all

participating enthusiastically and Im sure you will agree we have some real budding

stars in our midst!

Eco Week

The children enjoyed their involvement in the whole school eco week at the start of the term. Our focus was

Transport and we looked at different forms of transport and how we could power our transport more sustainably.

The children produced graphs to find out how they all got to school and then thought of better alternative means

of travel. They produced some super posters on the iPad using Pic Collage, to encourage us to travel in greener

ways. They especially enjoyed the visit from the Recycler Robot, who told us his 3Rs message of Reduce, Re-

use, Recycle. The children listened to how they could reduce their waste, recycle locally and put the 3Rs into

practice at home and at school and they loved Recyclers toe-tapping rap dance.

We also had a visit from the Water Board to talk to us about where

pour water comes from and saving water in school and in our

homes.

DT Day

During Eco Week we also had a DT day and made our own wheeled

vehicles using reclaimed and recycled materials. We found out about

wheels and axles and after we had made them we tested them on

different ramps and surfaces to see how far they travelled. Then the children got creative and decorated them us-

ing paint and stickers. I have never seen such

colourful vehicles!

Forest School

Forest school has been as busy as ever, we

have looked at insect habitats, made bug ho-

tels, planted and grown seeds for our butter-

fly garden and vegetables in the poly tunnel. We caught some caterpillars and helped Year 5 release their butter-

flies into the wild as theirs were more successful than ours! We have created our own art and sculpture using nat-

ural materials, looking at the work of Andy Goldsworthy and Richard Long,

using natural materials to produce our work.

Phonics

The children have really enjoyed taking Geoffrey the Giraffe home and find-

ing objects or doing things with Geoffrey for the focus sounds. We are

working on Phase 3 sounds and blends and we will

continue to consolidate these for the rest of the term.

Maths

In Maths we have been learning to count in 2s and 10s and to use a number line to count

forwards and backwards. We have done practical maths activities such as measuring and

weighing as well as looking at 3d shapes and naming them.

Im sure you will agree what a busy first year in school we have had!

Issue: 4

TWITTER

@ Boughton Heath

Boughton Heath Academy

Chronicle

Principal's Report 2015

Welcome to our Final Chronicle of this academic year!

Firstly, as the year draws to an end, I would like to thank our wonderful teachers. I believe the

vast majority of parents and children realise how truly gifted the teachers in the school are and how much of their own time they spend developing lessons and learning. This is just the tip of the

iceberg though! I know personally how all of our teachers stay at school until 6pm and arrive

before 8am. I know how much time they spend even after going home and at weekends, marking books and preparing. This is what makes our school great; the dedication of the staff to ensure

children get the best possible deal. I would like to personally thank all of them as it makes my job as Principal such an easy one when they are so driven and dedicated. Thank you all so much.

At the end of this term we will say goodbye to Mrs Sharp in Reception. She has stepped in after Mrs Hughes

moved on and brought a love for teaching and a passion for teaching in Reception. Again, I would like to

personally thank her for all that she has done for the children in our Reception class. The parent questionnaires have been coming in thick and fast. I appreciate all the responses from parents who have taken the time to

provide feedback to the school and point out that I always want feedback, no matter the nature of it. In relation to feedback those that emailed the consultation on a one way system were split 50:50 and therefore I will not be

pursuing this further.

If I may I would like to draw some early conclusions from the forty or so we have had back already. The vast majority are very positive and agree or strongly agree almost all of the questions asked. However, communication

from school to parents this year has not been acceptable overall. A small minority of parents have picked up on

this. I apologise as dates have been changed and simple messages are not being sent home effectively enough. Parents have a right to be upset by this when they are organising annual leave. We will improve this quickly. The

school will be writing a communication policy statement and consulting parents early in the Autumn term to ask how often and by what means communication should take place. Parental engagement is critical in

communication but we have not be effective enough in this area. It is something I will personally oversee next

year in the hopes of getting this right. This involves not only diary dates but links to pupil progress and attainment as well. This needs to be better also and we will make improvements next year.

We were a little disappointed to see some disagrees in relation to how school has communicated changes as a consequence of becoming an academy, as the governing body and I have worked hard to provide updates. At the last count since January there have been 8 updates (4 major letters, 2 notices in monthly newsletters and 2 in

Boughton Heath Chronicles), all of which have been emailed, sent home and put on our noticeboard and on Twitter. Please check that you keep your Parentmail account up to date and check book bags regularly. If parents

look to our Twitter page they will see numerous updates about how our school councils, playground leaders and teachers have been working together. We were surprised that a few reception parents disagree with question

number 18. This relates to the positive differences since we converted to academy. As a result of this transition

we have been able to spend 18,000 on a total Reception class renovation. I know many parents are not able to bring or collect their children and may not have seen the improvements and hope that many parents/carers will

be able to attend our Open Evening on Wednesday 15th July 3.30pm til 6pm to see the changes for themselves.

There are some noticeable disagreements with question 9 relating to homework so I have personally had a look at each classes homework books and in the juniors, their homework grids. These have been given out very

consistently. There are some pieces of work which have not been marked. This is due to the children not completing the homework and/or not giving it in. As the workload for teachers is already high, it is school policy

to look at late homework but not necessarily mark it. If there are any misconceptions or errors these will be discussed with the children verbally and in some cases in writing.

Although it is too early to provide parents with the final results (which will be done in September) I would like to

thank you all for your continued positive support and good will towards the school and the staff who work in it. We continue to strive for excellence at Boughton Heath and hope that, with your help and feedback, we will

continue to improve the outcomes and experiences we can offer all the children in our care.

May I also thank all of the parents who have given their best wishes to me and my wife. We had a lovely baby daughter, Sophie. I understand my absence from Sports Day and some class assemblies has been obvious but I

appreciate parents understanding while on paternity leave. I hope you all have a wonderful Summer and I look forward to putting our best foot forward in Autumn.

Many thanks, Steve Ellis, Principal

Year 6

Our Summer Term Topic has been based

around the discoveries of Darwin, evolution

and inheritance in the animal kingdom. With

the hatching of our chicks, great debate took

place as to why the four chicks were so

markedly different, yet came from the same

batch! We have look how to describe how

living things are classified into broad groups

according to common characteristics, based on

similarities and differences.

A large part of the first half of this term was dominated by our

preparations for the Key Stage Two SATs tests, in May. The

children were exemplary in their attitude towards the tests,

understanding that the tests were a culmination of their hard

work during the Juniors. Each child approached each test with

a level head, although I imagine that there were plenty of

nerves in reality, and we now look forward to receiving the

results and moving onto High school! The children should leave

Boughton Heath Academy with their heads held high, as they

truly have developed as learners and individuals.

Linking with our science topic of electricity, the ECO week and

renewable energy sources, we investigated the possibility of

powering a vehicle using only solar power. The children

planned, designed and constructed their vehicles. It was a

challenge to connect the motor to the drive shaft of the car.

Lots of trial and error, finally saw (some of) the vehicles move

under their own power. Additionally we looked and the wind as

another source if renewable energy. Again the children planned and constructed simple wind wheels, investigating

the number of turbine sails/blades, and which ones were the most efficient. The Year 6 residential is always a high

-light of the term and year. Yet again Robinwood provided the backdrop for the weekend. As with previous years,

the children were exemplary in their attitude, togetherness and behaviour. Each and every one of them tried their

hardest to conquer their fears, supported each other with encouragement and were commented upon by members

of Robinwood staff and staff from other schools in their manners, politeness and outstanding behaviour. Jumping,

swinging, constructing, paddling, climbing, problem-solving and target-hitting, and most importantly; having a

whale of a time! Well done Year 6!

Year 5

This term we have been studying rivers and learning all the relevant terminology.

Year 5 spent a wonderful day at Felin Puleston in the grounds of Erddig House.

Everybody was equipped with wellies, waterproofs and a variety of equipment. The

rotated around a set of tasks to make the most of their day out and thankfully the

weather stayed dryalthough many of the children didnt! Mr Lucas from Year 6

helped the children to measure the speed of the river using corks, cones and

stopwatches and the children were able to choose their own locations to compare the

river speed at different positions. Using metre sticks and tape measures, width and

depth measurements were also taken to see whether the river changed where it

meandered. The children were also able to hunt for and identify river wildlife using

the technique of kick sampling. Finally, they designed their own art work inspired by

the work of Richard Long and Andy Goldsworthy.

During our materials investigations, the children learnt

that salt dissolved in water and that the temperature of

the water effect the speed of this process. The children

were then asked to remove the salt and decided that

evaporation would get the desired results. After placing

petri dishes in different locations around the school, the

children eagerly awaited the results. After four days the

salt had produced the most amazing square crystals that

intrigued the children. They wondered how the small

grains of salt, whose shape was unrecognisable, had

managed to turn into perfectly shaped cubes. The

children learnt about the formula for Sodium Chloride

and were given a list of clues, marshmallows and cocktail sticks to demonstrate their understanding of the newly

formed salt crystals.

This term Year 5 were

fortunate enough to

spend the day under

the guidance of Mr

Clayton, a visiting artist.

We linked our art work

to the sheep that were

kept by the Anglo

Saxons. The children

learnt how to reproduce

an image and then

decide which were the

highlights and the

lowlights of their image.

Using inks in various

strengths, pens and a

wax resist, the children had to look very closely at the image

to make an accurate reproduction. The children learnt to

apply the wax carefully and to add more between each ink

layer to bring the sheep to life. Later as a group, the children

learnt a technique of engraving. Large illustrations were

drawn and scratched into before charcoal was rubbed across

the piece. The charcoal gave depth to the artwork which was

then enhanced by inks and pen.

Reception

A note from the Governing body. Here we are at the end of summer term already and now 7 months into our Academy status and Im delighted to see Boughton Heath Academy making continued progress as part of Cheshires Academy Trust. (CAT) The governing body has completed the 3 governing meetings for this term, Curriculums and Admissions Tuesday 23rd June, Finance, Staffing and Premises Tuesday 30th June and our end of year full governing body on 7th July where many governors took the opportunity to spend time in school, observing classes, helping the children and generally mucking in! My thanks to all members of the governing body who give their time freely to support the school. Special thanks and goodbye to Morgan Jones who has decided to step down from his role as parent governor as his children leave the school. Morgan has been outstanding in his role. We will be advertising the vacant position in the new term and I would welcome applicants for the position from any parent/carer from the school. Its great to see the new initiate to develop public speaking coaching for pupils at Boughton Heath and our other CAT schools Kelsall and Mill View with the opportunity for those who wish to sit public speaking exams to do so. We believe public speaking is an important life skill that all pupils should have access to. We look forward to being able to organise our own debate teams within our school and inter-CAT debates in 2015-2016. On 9 July the Special Educational Needs Co-ordinators (SENCo) from each school will be meeting at Boughton Heath. The focus of the day will be to review our school policies and practices around SEND and to complete a CAT Special Educational Needs policy to ensure we are working to the highest possible standards across all three schools. As three outstanding schools working closely together we have agreed that moderating across our CAT schools will be a key priority. Our focus in the autumn term will be Maths and Literacy. Time will be provided for subject leaders to work together. Heads of School will be responsible for the following subject areas across CAT with the aims of continuous improvement and maintenance of high standards.

David Wearing, Principal Kelsall Primary School Science

Steve Ellis, Principal Boughton Heath Academy English

Susan Walters, Headteacher at Mill View Primary School Mathematics I recently spent some time in school and was so proud of all our children looking so happy and well behaved. We have a wonderful school and outstanding teachers and staff and Id like to thank you all for continuing to make Boughton Heath Academy an outstanding school and great community to be part of. Best wishes Joanne Lucy Chair Governors Boughton Heath Academy

Year One

Farm to Fork Reaseheath Farm and Tesco

Year 1 have enjoyed 2 trips during the Summer Term as part of their Farm to Fork topic. The children loved visiting

Reaseheath and learnt lots of facts about farm animals. They experienced how animals were reared on a farm in

preparation for being eaten. This trip was followed by a visit to Tesco where the children learnt about where the

food arrives, how it is stored and how it is prepared.

Plants Growing own vegetables

The children were excited to

grow their own vegetables as

part of their topic. They each

planted a bean and

experimented with what it

needed to grow. They were

excited to see that the one in

the dark had grown but was

white! The children also have

been caring for a plot in the poly tunnel. Hopefully we will have enough vegetables to produce a healthy meal! The

Natural Vegetable Man visited to teach us about growing plants in an organic way, and told us about some flowers

that were edible!

Music

The children have enjoyed

learning instruments in

music this term. They have

learnt a variety of songs on

the glockenspiel and

recorder. The songs have

allowed the children to

explore pulse, rhythm and

different styles of music.

Eco Week Healthy Living

Each class took part in an Eco Week this term. Year 1s topic was Healthy Living. The children learnt about the best

way to wash our hands, how to keep our bodies healthy and all about a balanced plate. We enjoyed visits from a

variety of people during aspiration week to inspire us to eat healthily. They also took part in Sports Day and showed

excellent sportsmanship. The children are all keen now to make good choices in their lives in order to stay healthy.

Year 4

During the summer term, we were lucky to have an art teacher from Kelsall School to help create mixed media art

work based on the Iron Man. Firstly, we learnt a technique called wax resist where the ink stains the paper but the

wax resists the ink. This technique involved drawing the front cover of the well known Iron Man book by Ted

Hughes. Next, we looked at the shading on the picture and which areas were light and dark. Once this had been

identified, we added wax from a white candle to those areas and then went over the whole picture with ink. In the

afternoon, we created massive A1 pictures of the Iron Man in different poses.

Again, we looked at the shad-

ing of the pictures and painted

the lightest colour first and

finished painting with the dark-

est colour. Finally, we finished

by adding foil to give the pic-

tures a metallic feel. We really

enjoyed our art day and we

produced some fantastic work

which is currently being dis-

played in our classroom.

As part of the ICT

curriculum, we had a

fantastic and tangible

learning experience,

coding robots which

linked well with our

Iron Man topic. Dur-

ing the morning, we

had an introductory

talk about robots. We

learnt about how ro-

bots work, how they

are used in everyday life and looked at the different robots we might

know in movies. Next, we designed and named our own robots and spoke

about what each of our robots did. Once we had familiarised ourselves

with robots, it was time to learn all about coding. We were set a challenge

of working out how many centimetres one full rotation of the robots

wheels were. We then used our mathematical skills to answer the ques-

tion - If one full rotation of a wheel is 1.92cm how many rotations does

the wheel need to take to go forward 25cm? Once we figured this out, we

learnt how to make the robots perform a square dance, learning how to code the robots to only turn one wheel. We

learnt lots of different coding skills, how to battle our robots and taught them how to talk. It was a brilliant day and

much fun had by all!

During the summer term, we had an eco-week. Year four learnt about litter and recycling.

With the help of Recycler, The Rapping Robot, we learnt all about what we can reuse,

reduce and recycle so we can be more eco-

friendly. During our workshop, we learnt all

about the different types of waste we may have

at home and which different recycle bins they go

in. We did this in the form of a relay race and

were split into teams called Reduce, Reuse and

Recycle. We had lots of different types of waste

and we had to work as a team to place them in

the right bin thinking about whether we could

reuse or recycle the different items.

Year 3

Ness gardens

Our topic this term has been How Does Your Garden Grow. At the start of the term we went to Ness

Gardens where we looked at the different plants. The children enjoyed pond dipping and learnt all about

the different needs for different types of plants and how they were brought to Cheshire. To follow on

from this, we have studied the different parts of plants, seed dispersal, what plants need to grow and how

water is transported through the stem. The children were able to plant their own broad beans and

enjoyed working out the right amount of water, soil and sunlight their plant needed to survive. We used

the polytunnel to plant a variety of vegetables, we quickly learnt that they needed more water and now

are nearly ready to harvest! The children and I are looking forward to baking using the fresh ingredients

at the end of term.

Bio-diversity

During Eco-week, Year 3 looked at the topic of bio-diversity and studied the life

cycle of butterflies. The children loved watching the fascinating journey from egg to

caterpillar and chrysalis to butterfly. We are looking forward to setting our

butterflies free

later this week.

During Eco-

week we took

a trip to Caldy

Valley where

the children

looked at the habitats of different insects. Each

child collected different insects and we looked at differences and similarities between them.

Sports Achievements in Year 3

Throughout the year we have enjoyed a variety of different sports from brilliant coaches. The children

have showed great skills in gymnastic, tennis, tag-rugby, cricket and athletics and built skills in team work

and good sportsmanship. The children are now using these skills at lunchtime and break time when

organising their own games. I was really proud of the childrens

efforts and team support during sports

day. Year 3 were also proud of Evie Davis

who came second in her sprint at Stanney

Oaks and Ebony Slater and Laura Yeo

who came second in a recent tennis

competition. Well done to all of year 3 for

their achievements in sport this year!

Year 2

For Geography

this term we have

been looking at a

contrasting non-

European locality,

The Daintree

Rainforest in Aus-

tralia. We have

learnt about life in

a Rainforest and

enjoyed reading the story, Where the Forest meets the

Sea. We found out that Aboriginal people were the first people to live in the

Daintree Rainforest and there is a small population still living there today. We

were very interested about how Aboriginal people lived in the Rainforest so we

had a Tangible Real Experience Day where we learnt Aboriginal dance, cooked

on a campfire and created Aboriginal artwork. This experience really helped us

understand how Aboriginal life is so different to ours.

Our Science topic this term has been plants. We have been

looking at how plants grow

from seeds and what can af-

fect their growth. The ques-

tion we came up with was

Can the size of the pot a seed

is planted in affect the

growth? Using our post-it

note science we knew that we

could only change one thing

in our investigation and this

was the size of the pot the

seed would be planted in.

Therefore we had to use the

same seed for all of the pots. We chose sunflower seeds. We

proved that the size of the pot definitely did affect the sunflowers growth. Year Twos focus during

Eco-Week was Our School Grounds. As we had so many sunflowers growing we decided to put

them in our school grounds to make the environment more pleasing to look at but also to attract

the insects that love to feed on them. We have arranged the sunflowers in a circle using the idea

from the book we have read Sunflower house. We are hoping we may see some flowers before we break up for

the Summer!

On Tuesday 23rd June Year Two set off on their first residential to Ironbridge. We

were all very excited and were pleased that the weather forecast was good. Blists Hill

was a brilliant experience which made us feel like we really were in Victorian times

Finding out about the Victorian dentist and taking part in a Victorian lesson made us feel

lucky that we didnt really live a hundred years ago!

On the second day we went into

the town of Ironbridge. We

wrote a wonderful River Severn

acrostic poem sitting on the

banks of the River. Finally we

walked across and sketched the

Ironbridge. Year Two all felt