On Friday 29th September Year 6 ran the annual giant coffee morning/afternoon in order to raise money for Macmillan, a charity which does amazing work supporting people with cancer and their families throughout their treatment and beyond. The children spent time in the build up to the coffee morning researching the fantastic work that the charity does and used their new knowledge to make fact sheets and posters to put around our coffee day. The children worked tirelessly, not only providing first class service to their customers but also providing some great entertainment.  They have raised a fantastic £850.43 which will be donated to the charity in order to support their research and their work around the country.  A huge thank you to everyone who bought a cup of tea or coffee and a cake for supporting Year 6 on the day!

Year 2 enjoyed a visit from the local author and poet, Christina Gabbitas, for National Poetry day with Year 1 and Reception.  The children enjoyed listening to rhyming songs and stories as part of a read along assembly.  They loved meeting all the creative characters from the rhyming story, ‘Felicity Fly Meets the Dragon Fruit and Friends’.   Each KS2 class took part in a half an hour poetry workshop where they created an eight line rhyming poem all about the seasons.  They also had the opportunity to listen to some of Christina's poems and ask questions about what it's like to be a poet.  All in all it was a lovely day.  Thanks to Christina for spending it at Springbank.   

The internet is potentially a wonderful resource but as we all know there are also risks associated with using the internet/social media and we have a well-developed curriculum aimed at teaching the children how to keep themselves safe online. On Friday 15th September all our KS2 and KS1 children school took part in an Online Safety Day which looked at a broad range of topics linked to how we stay safe on the internet. Topics included how to ensure we keep our passwords safe, how to interact with other internet users and why it is important to always speak to an adult if we are worried about anything we see or hear online. This year we also had a competition where the children were all asked to develop an idea for a 60 second film about Online Safety. The winning pupils will work with Mr Bradshaw later this year and have the opportunity to see their idea turned into a proper film!

Some of the departed members of Year 6 have been included in a promotional video discussing their involvement in the 2017 Leeds Book Awards. The children were filmed at the event earlier this year when they were challenged to read six books in six weeks and vote for their favourite author. It was a fantastic event and one that we are thoroughly excited about entering into again this year. Please follow the link below to see what our children had to say about their experience.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xYwji5Hs3ps&safe=true