THIS WEEK AT BENTLEY...

Over the Easter break, the PTFA also set a brilliant 2025 Challenge and we were blown away by the creativity and effort shown in the entries. A big thank you to all the children who took part. Special mentions go to Ivy for her incredible doodles, and George, who raised over £200—what an achievement! The overall winner was Ruby, who slid into a pool of jelly 25 times! A huge well done to her.

We thought it would be interesting to start spotlighting different subjects in our newsletters to give families a better understanding of how they are taught here at Bentley. This week, we’re starting with Maths with Mrs Blake.

Maths Learning at Bentley: A Personalised Approach for Every Child

At Bentley, we strive to ensure that every child's learning journey in maths is appropriately challenging and rewarding. To support this, we offer a range of tasks tailored to each child’s confidence level. With guidance, children can choose from different ‘chilli challenge’ tasks, allowing them to begin at the right level and progress at their own pace.

We use a variety of hands-on resources to help children understand new concepts and provide additional support for those who need it. Small group sessions with an adult are available for students who require extra help to meet the lesson objectives, ensuring that no child is left behind.

Through ongoing assessment, we identify any gaps in learning and offer targeted interventions to help children reach their personalised learning goals. For children who are confident in a topic, we present open-ended tasks that encourage them to think deeply, explain their reasoning, and explore efficient problem-solving methods. Maths puzzles, which combine logic with mathematical knowledge, are a particular favourite!

If you would like to learn more about how your child is being supported and challenged in maths, please feel free to speak with their teacher.

 

Wishing you all a wonderful long weekend—fingers crossed for some sunshine!

ATTENDANCE

Governors have set the attendance target for the school at 97%. Last week the overall attendance rate for the whole school was 88.17%. The class with the best attendance was Year 1 again. Well done year 1!

Attendance figures for each class for last week are below:

 

HOUSEPOINTS

This week’s housepoints totals:

240

184

193

196

 

SAFEGUARDING – EVERYBODY’S BUSINESS

As you know, our target for attendance this year is 97%.  Evidence shows that good attendance is a key factor in enabling children to reach their potential.  We are committed to working with parents to improve our attendance and achieve our target.

As a school we are working very hard to make sure children do not have gaps in their understanding particularly in reading, writing and maths. Parents are reminded that they should not book holidays in term time as this has a significant effect on a child's progress.

 

Attendance %	Days Absent
90	19 days off
91	17 days off
92	15 days off
93	13 days off
94	11 days off
95	9 days off
96	7 days off
97	5 days off
98	4 days off
99	2 days off
100	0 days off

 

SITE SECURITY

A reminder that when accessing the school during the day (from 9.05am) parents and visitors should please use the buzzer to gain access to the school. There have been a couple of occasions recently when taller parents have leaned over the gate and released the gate mechanism themselves. This presents a risk to all those on the school premises and goes against our safeguarding procedures. If you do not receive an answer immediately, please be patient and buzz again in a minute or two. If collecting your child from After-School club (or any other after-school activity) after the school office is closed (after 4.15) please buzz at the gate in the staff car park to contact the After-School Club staff directly.

After going through the gate please make sure it is properly closed behind you.

When parking near the school please remember to park safely and considerately. The disabled bay in the car park is reserved for those with a genuine need – please do not use this space this space otherwise.

Thank you for your co-operation in helping to keep everyone safe.

 WEATHER

We have been very much enjoying the beautiful weather this week. Please remember to send your child in with a water bottle every day, which is especially important in the warmer weather. Could we please ask parents to ensure that children have clothing suitable for the weather too – sunhats and a waterproof as the British weather is famously unpredictable! Suncream should be applied before school please, and if your child is attending After-School club or any other club to be held outside then a named bottle of suncream that your child can easily apply themselves should also be sent in. Thank you.

 

TT ROCKSTARS!

This week the Battle of the Bands competition returns! The competition will run until Thursday 8^th May.  Good luck everyone!

 

PARENT GOVERNOR

ROAD SAFETY

The Hampshire Road Safety Team are always shocked to hear how many children don’t always wear their seatbelt, even as young as Year 5 pupils, so we are aware that this is such an important message and could save the children’s and their families lives. Below is a Sway link that they have asked us to share with you. This highlights information about the use of booster seats as well as seatbelts and reminders of the seatbelt laws.

• Seatbelt safety 

ECO UPDATE

ECO UPDATE

Food, Glorious, Food

This week our fabulous Eco Council met up for one of our regular meetings.  The children discussed a range of issues but were particularly passionate about food waste.  If you read last week’s Eco Update, you will be aware that our food waste is now collected to make electricity. However, we still need to reduce the food that we are throwing away at lunchtimes which will in turn reduce our school’s costs. If your child has a school dinner, please talk about the choices that they make for lunch so that they are choosing a meal that they would like to eat.  Eco Council has observed that children are sometimes choosing a meal that they don’t like and then throwing it away. Food production has a huge environmental impact and is the second largest cause of carbon emissions here at Bentley (31.7 tonnes of carbon or 19% of our total). So, it is important that we minimise food waste as much as we can.  In addition, children who throw away their dinners are not eating enough to fuel their afternoon learning here at school.

Food is going to be an important ongoing conversation in school but your role as a parent is really crucial in educating your child the importance of eating healthily for our bodies and also for the planet.  For more information visit BBC Bitesize Parents and BBC Bitesize Food Glorious Food. Thank you for your support.

PTFA

What’s coming up in the next few weeks?

Keep raising your sponsorship for completing the colour run! Deadline to bring the cash raised is  Friday 16th. 

Friday 16th May:

Our first Frozen Friday of the year! Ice creams on sale after school. £1 each. 🍦 

Friday 23rd May:

PJ Day!

Children are invited into school in their pyjamas!! £1 per child taking part.