Shaw-cum-Donnington C.E. Primary

West Berkshire School Improvement Team

Summer Maths Challenge–Years 1-6 (ages 6-11)

At the heart of mathematics is the ability to “talk maths”. It clarifies mathematical thought and gives children a platform to clarify if they know or do not know something. This strengthens their self-assessment.  It is vital to give our children opportunities to talk about their maths in order for them to articulate their thinking and reasoning. Misconceptions come to light when reasoning is spoken aloud.

Maths Talk’ Counts is a West Berkshire Summer Holiday Challenge aimed at getting all children in West Berkshire talking about mathematics.

In our ‘Maths Talk’ Counts Summer Challenge, the activities are grouped by year group curriculum objectives: Year 1 –Year 6. Depending on your child’s ability and confidence, select the activities best suited for your child.

There are 31 activities for the 31 days during the month of August. You may choose to work in chronological date order or not.  Shade in each date as your child completes.

Once completed, email a scanned copy or a photo of calendar to kavash.bamfield1@westberks.gov.uk by Friday, 11 September 2020.

Winners·

All entries will be put into a draw where a winner from every year group will be randomly chosen.·

Each winner will receive a £20 Amazon voucher.·

When emailing your calendar to kavash.bamfield1@westberks.gov.uk, please put your child’s initials, school name and year group in the subject line.

Mrs Sayer
Maths Subject Leader

Following the success of our summer writing project last year, I would love for Shaw-cum-Donnington children to capture their Summer 2020. The summer holidays are a wonderful opportunity for our children to continue their creative writing skills at home. Children can create a piece of writing that reflects some of the fun that they have experienced over the summer. Your creative writing can be presented in a variety of different formats:
Diary
Poem
Story
Fact file
Timeline

Please think about the presentation of your work. You may wish to include: photographs, souvenirs, personal art work and postcards (the list is endless!) which can really enhance the quality of your work.

I will be displaying summer homework in our Library area in September. A winner, from each year group, will be presented with a prize for their achievements in writing.

Wishing you all a very happy, safe and restful summertime!

Mrs Rushton
English Subject Leader

Download the EYFS Summer Challenge for fun and exciting activities for you and your child to do over the summer holidays.  You are welcome to share some of them with your teachers when you return to school in September. 

Under these exceptional circumstances, The Reading Agency which runs the annual Summer Reading Challenge for children has moved the challenge online. West Berkshire Libraries are keen to support this. As you know, there is evidence to indicate that children who continue to read during the summer holidays are better able to avoid the 'reading dip' which might otherwise occur. During this difficult time when many children are at home due to the coronavirus pandemic, We know you will agree that keeping children reading has become more important than ever and we hope that you will want to encourage your child/ren to take part in this.

The theme for this year’s challenge is ‘Silly Squad’: a celebration of funny books, happiness and laughter. Children can sign up to take part at https://summerreadingchallenge.org.uk. When they do so, they will need to include an email address for a parent or carer. Their parent/carer will then be contacted by The Reading Agency and will need to sign up on their own account and give permission for their child to take part in order to complete the registration process. Please note that as part of their sign up, children need to create their own, unique UserName and to select West Berkshire as their place of residence. However, no personal names are used on the public website.

For the digital challenge, children can set their own reading targets regarding the number of books they hope to read before September. This can be as few or as many as families think practical, although we recommend 6 books as usual. The books don't need to be library books - they can be books from home, from school or anywhere else, including e-books and audiobooks.

As they progress through the digital challenge and rate and review their books, children will unlock a range of games, quizzes and exciting video content. A downloadable certificate will be available to anyone who completes their challenge.  Please bring this into school in the autumn to share with your teachers.  There is also a School Zone on the Summer Reading Challenge website, where you can find downloadable activities and other resources to help inspire children to read for pleasure.

Newbury, Hungerford and Thatcham Libraries are now open for book collections by appointment only. Library members can now reserve specific books online, or order up to five books of any sort (such as Children’s Picture Books or Children’s Storybooks) which staff will pick for them. They will then contact you to let them know when you can visit to collect your books. Hopefully this service will soon be extended to all West Berkshire libraries, including the mobile library. For those who cannot order online, they are happy to take telephone requests. (Please ring your local library for this.)

Also, from Saturday 1 August, families who are collecting books from the library will also be able to pick up a record sheet for the Summer Reading Challenge. By using this, children who do not have online access and cannot take part in the digital Summer Reading Challenge will still be able to join in by reading six books, which they record on these sheets. As with the digital Challenge, there will be a certificate for anyone who completes their Challenge before the end of September.

Throughout the summer, West Berkshire Libraries will continue with their own programme of online events and activities for children as well, which include digital Storytimes on Fridays and weekly book-related craft activities. For more details about all of these and to keep up with other library news, please follow WBerksLibraries on [facebook.com/wberkslibraries] Facebook, [instagram.com/wberkslibraries] Instagram or [twitter.com/wberkslibraries] Twitter.