Head teacher blog 3rd May 2019

It has been a truly remarkable week at Farfield with the nation’s (and world’s) media focused on us for a few days. I was surprised by the attention but it seems a mix of food, children and animals makes a heady news-worthy mix.

I think the biggest and most welcome news this week was also about Leeds, food and children (and, presumably, activity). It seems that Leeds is ‘turning the curve‘ as regards obesity in its youngest children: the first city to do so. This has been put down to city-wide leadership and prioritisation, and the long term commitment to children’s centres and projects such as HENRY: Health and Nutrition for the Really Young.  Figures for older children and young people have yet to show the same improvements – perhaps this will follow – but this week’s published research is nevertheless very heartening news for our children and city’s future.

Here at school, it has been a busy football week – particularly for the girls who have recently had league matches and a tournament (losing a narrow final), and the first session for the Wildcats girls’ football club after school. 24 children attended this new club and more have shown interest. Our U9 team also qualified for and attended the city football finals this week but were knocked out in the quarter finals.

On Tuesday the RSPB came in and worked with three classes in Y3/4, following work with Y1 earlier in the year. The workshop was called ‘Giving Nature a Home’ and included time spent in the grounds identifying habitats for different animals. I am told that the lady delivering the workshop expressed great admiration for our site and for our children which is good to hear.

On Thursday we had a visitor come into school to do assemblies and begin work around air pollution. This work is part of the council’s new Clean Air Charging Zone, due to come into force in January next year.  This was timely, as a parent had contacted me earlier in the week commenting on how ridiculous and polluting it is for so many cars to be sat idling outside the school. This follows experts working with Year 5 around energy conservation last week. I think that as a school we could do so much more on the sustainability agenda and I will be looking to pull together staff, governors, interested parents and the children to make some more fundamental changes to our school’s practice: looking at waste, energy consumption (and generation), purchasing policies, land use, water and transport. Last night, governors approved work on a feasibility study to come up with a proposal to compost all food waste on site (including cooked food and meat).  We know we are in a climate emergency and wildlife is massively in decline.  Surely we all have a moral duty to do much better?

Have a great bank holiday weekend.

One Comment

• Kate says:

  04/05/2019 at 6:59 am

  I have just read the report in the Times summarising what you refer to in your blog post above. I am in awe of the inspiring way in which you are bringing alive the curriculum. AND you have a girls football team!! I need to move to Leeds… keep doing what you’re doing.

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