Today we discussed the ideas that children classes had talked about during their Class Learning Forums.

Class Learning Forums happen on a weekly basis.  They are a time when children talk about class/whole school issues.  They use a 2:6:2 format.  2 minutes to introduce the issue, 6 minutes to decide on strategies and 2 minutes to choose and reflect on the expected impact of implementing the strategies.

Years 1-6 are going to trial 2 strategies:

1. Team Try-it: this will be one book that is shared by the table.  Anyone who wants to practise a spelling will try it 3 or 4 different ways to see which one looks right.  They are going to circle the one they try.

2. Spelling nudge: if someone is not sure which one, they will gently nudge the person next to them, who will have a look at the spellings and decide which one they think is right.  They may try this with another person and an adult if they need further support.

Our School Learning Team representatives will share the strategies with everyone in their class and trial them.  They will report back at the next meeting.

Next meeting: Tuesday 28 November 1pm

The School Learning Team have been nominated for this year.  Each class (from Years 1-6) nominate one girl and one boy to represent their class.  Children need to put themselves forward for this role, describe why they would be great for the role, then the class have a secret vote to decide who will do the role for the next year.

So far, the team have met 4 times this year, approximately once every other week.

Meeting 1: Miss Greenslade came to survey opinion of the School Learning Team about lunchtimes in the dinner hall, what they like about it and what they would like to change.  Miss Greenslade has also spoken to all our Meal Time Assistants with the same questions.

Meeting 2: The team fed back ideas from their classes.  These ideas were then collected by Miss Greenslade who put an action plan together to progress with people's ideas.

Meeting 3: we talked about spellings and asked all School Learning Teams to hold a Class Learning Froum on this topic about spelling strategies that helped them

Meeting 4: the team fed back their ideas.  These will now be collated and we will ghold an asselmbly about everyone's sugestions.

Today the School Learnig Team met to plan what they want to do next year.  These are the things they want to get involved in:

Making class profiles - they will be given to any new children who join the class and we will also put them all together for a whole school class profile book.

Red spot, green spot problems - training for School Learning Team on these and then leading assemblies to talk about these.

Collect a pool of art to represent our school.

Create a School learning Team newsletter.

Today we had to feed back the questions that our classes wanted to ask the candidates for tomorrow's Reception class interviews.  We cannot reveal them to the world incase we want to ask them in the future and a prospective candidate is reading this!

Year 6 did ask the questions, they selected 3 to ask and asked each of the 4 candidates then fed back to Mrs Whalley with their thoughts.

Today we had to feed back on www (what works well) in our writing.  Below is an overview of what we talked about:

We know how to write letters

We use our talk partners a lot

We always have time to improve our writing

We have pupil voice, meaning we guide what we are writing about

There is always a clear audience for the writing

We use rally robin

We use working walls to help us

We use video clips to inspire us

We use dictionaries and theasuaruses

We use a cursive style of handwriting

We use purple pens to edit

We choose how to present our work

We have targets to remind us about what we are trying to improve.

We use hot and cold tasks

We self assess our learning

We do quick writes

We talked about ebi (even better if) with our writing.  Below is an overview of what we talked about:

more spellings to learn

more choice of what to write about

have a smaller table each

lined pages

We had to ask our classes why people should come to Exminster Community Primary School.

Here is an overview of what was said:

Nothing is impossible

Teachers and staff are helpful

Friends help each other

Friendly, fun and fiar lessons

Inclusive

It is safe

Everyone is happy

Inspirational teachers

Good education

Diveristy

GOAL time

We raise money for others

We learn new things

Tie to play and learn

We have good fun

We have our Rainbow Values

The new School Learning Team have been meeting every 2 weeks since the beginning of term.

We have been talking about GOAL (Get On And Learn) time, what is working well and what we enjoy about it.  We have also been looking at what we want to do to develop it further.

We have been discussing writing in school and what we enjoy about it plus what would make it better.

We have been formulating questions to ask prospective candidates for a teaching job.

Our meetings follow a 2:6:2 formula.  This means we spend 2 minutes explaining the issue, 6 minutes with possible solutions and 2 minutes deciding which solutions to try.

Our pupil voice is fed back to staff through staff SHOUT OUTs and staff meetings.  We each have jobs to go back and discuss with our classes.

Our Year 5 and 6 School Learning Team are being trained as Learning mentors where we will be meeting younger children to talk about what they are proud of in their learning.

The School Learning Team were invited by the Parish Council to the planting of a Red Maple tree on Reddaway Drive today to celebrate the Queen's 90th birthday. Children helped to put down compost and plant the tree, donated by the RSPB, alongside the Parish Council and members of the Parish.
Lara commented, "Right in front of the tree, there is a sign that was made by Jeremy, remembering the Queen's birthday."
Jasmine said, "I will remember it is a big birthday for the Queen. It will have big, beautiful leaves."

Children In Need

The school council would like to thank everyone for the support they showed on Friday for ‘Children In Need’.

The children looked bright and colourful and certainly brightened up the day.

With donations from non-uniform and the cake stall after school we raised a total of £394.24.

Thankyou once again for your continued support

School Council and Mrs Roberts

We are back!!!!

This is the first blog of the new School Council at Exminster!!

We met for the first time this week to discuss 'What a school council member does'

We arrived very keen to participate, all proudly wearing our school council badges.

We discussed what happens at the meetings and how we will feed the information back to our classes 'circle time'.

We began the meeting by introducing ourselves and saying something about us. We then began to plan what our future meetings would look like.

Mrs Roberts then took photos of us all to display on our classroom doors and on the school council board in the hall.

Our first task was to choose a charity for the year! We all gave our ideas and voted for the top 8 to take back to our classes to vote for the top 2!! We are going to bring those top 2 to our next meeting and vote for the top 1 as a council. We are really excited about planning events to raise money in the future.

Watch this space for future updates!!

School Council

We have had a really busy term on the School Council.

During February and March we were asked to be part of the interview process for our new year 1 teacher Mr McGlynn and for our new headteacher Mrs Whalley.

We were very excited to have the opportunity to ask them a variety of questions from;

Why did you want to be a teacher? to, How would you deal with an injury involving blood?

We are looking forward to the summer term very much as we have planned a non-uniform day to raise money for our charity 'The Little Valley Animal Shelter'. We will be asking the children to come to school dressed as an animal, bring a toy animal to school and finishing with an animal themed cake stall.

We are very proud to be School Council members as it is a very responsible job to have in school. Our weekly meetings involve us all getting together to share our classes views on issues within the school. In return Mrs Roberts tries her best to solve the issuses, if not she always knows someone who can!!!!! 

We look forward to writing more blogs in the future when we have more fun things to share!!!

School Council and Mrs Roberts

                                                 School Council 2013-14

Towards the end of September all the children in the school had the opportunity to nominate themselves to become a school council representative for their class. This is always a difficult decision for the children, not only nominating themselves but also voting for the right people for the job! Each class nominates a boy and a girl to be 'their voice' for that year. We meet every 2 weeks on a Thursday lunchtime in Mrs Roberts room. If we are lucky we get some 'beetle juice' or a treat!! Our job is to communicate ideas back to the meetings that come from our circle time/SEAL sessions. This may include issues that need to be resolved, or good things that have been successful.

At the beginning of December we had a vote to choose our 'Charity for the Year' it was a tough decision as we started with 10 charities but could only select one. The winning charity was 'The Little Valley Animal Shelter' in Exeter. Little Valley is owned and run by the South, East and West Devon Branch of the RSPCA and is located on the outskirts of Exeter. The Shelter, founded in 1991, supports the work of local RSPCA inspectors by caring for and rehoming over 1000 of the neediest animals from our local area every year. We are hoping to arrange a visit to the shelter for the children once the current refurbishments have been completed. The children currently have lots of ideas of how to raise money for them, including a non-uniform day with a pet theme! a mini Easter fayre to include handmade Easter themed items, toys, books, cakes and a café.

The children are very proud to be council members within the school and you will see them wearing their badges on their jumpers with pride.

More recently the children have organised a Christmas jumper day where they raised just over £200 for the Philippines Typhoon Appeal, and together with the book sale organise by the Year 6 children, just over £300.

Well done school council keep up the good work!!!

Exminster Primary School Council is made up of 24 pupils, 2 from each class throughout the school. We meet on a fortnightly basis with Mrs Roberts and Mr Foale in Mrs Roberts' room. Our meetings start with us trying Mr Foale's famous 'beetle juice', don't worry its only squash with jelly really!!!
We are very proud to be school council members and you can spot us around the school wearing our badges with pride.
We are the 'voice' for our class. We share our classes views and outcomes from our special 'circle time' at our regular meetings and are always there to listen to our classes opinions.
We take these opinions to council meetings where we as a council talk about solutions to problems and ways to move forward.
Our charities for the year 2012/13 are the Dogs Trust and our Zambia link school. We are supporting these charities in different ways. The dogs trust we are organising a 'PJ day in March and the money will go direct to helping them to continue their special work. Kirsty the education officer from the dogs trust came into school recently at took a whole school assembly to let us know how vital their work is.
For our link school in Zambia we are organising a 'toy sale' in January to raise money to by a reading scheme for the children as currently they have a very limited book supply.