Newsletter – 2nd October 2026

Reception – Castlegate: 96.44%

Year 1/2 – Fishergate: 98.4%

Year 1/2 – Micklegate: 97.59%

Year 1/2 – Stonegate: 97.71%

Year 3 – Coppergate: 97.86%

Year 3 – Whip ma whop ma gate: 97.29%

Year 4 – Petergate: 93.94%

Year 4 – Walmgate: 98.38%

Year 5 – Colliergate: 96.62%

Year 5 – Skeldergate: 94.29%

Year 6 – Fossgate: 96.01%

Year 6 – Goodramgate: 97.37%

We’ve been really busy in Reception, getting to know each other and learning about our feelings. For National Poetry Day, we’ve been learning a poem all about feelings. We’ve also loved reading and reenacting the story of the Three Little Pigs. We’ve been developing our observational skills as artists and drawn pictures of flowers and of ourselves!

In Maths, the Year 1s have been learning about greater than and less than. We had a go at using straws to replicate the symbols. They did a super job of using the new symbol and vocabulary. 

In Science we have been investigating our senses. The children discovered that their sense of touch is much better when they touch with their skin, rather than through gloves and that their sense of sight supports their sense of touch!

We loved our art lesson this week! We experimented with different sketching pencils to create tone within a range of shapes.

PE in the sunshine was the best! We loved improving our throwing and catching skills with a partner.

Recognition Awards

Stonegate

Matilda – For settling into year 1 beautifully. Matilda always makes sure she is being super kind to all of the friends in our class. She can work with anyone and works especially well in a team. She makes sure she is always showing bronze behaviour. 

Ash – For always showing silver behaviour. Ash is a super listener and this is shown in his work that he produces. Ash always gives his writing 100% effort and even uses some of the year 2 vocabulary. Ash is kind and is always ready. He has made a super start to year 1. 

Micklegate

Kiyansh – For making a superb start in Year 2. Kiyansh has shown himself to be a really hard working and 100% engaged pupil who listens really carefully, answers lots of questions and asks great questions as well.

Tom – For being such a friendly and spirited member of our class. Tom has shown such confidence to put his hand up to ask and answer questions and gets stuck into every task and activity with great enthusiasm.

The children have settled fantastically into Year 3 and have been wowing us with their writing skills and creativity. We have finished our first writing unit based on The First Drawing, writing a wonderful short narrative. We have all been immensely impressed with their vocabulary choices and the effort they put in.

Our new writing unit, based on the book The Mysteries of Harris Burdick, has got the children very excited as they look at the many unusual and wonderful images, wondering what the stories behind them could be.

All of the children have really shown their artistic talents in this unit’s art project. They loved painting with natural materials by mixing spices and plant material with water to make prehistoric-style paint. The classroom smelt wonderful with cinnamon, turmeric and paprika after the activity! The children then progressed to making their cave walls textured using lentils and salt before creating their own cave paintings.

Recognition Awards

Coppergate

Tilly – For settling in so well, completing all her jobs and learning to use a keyboard for typing.  Well done!

Arthur – For his incredible effort in art.  He thought carefully about the shapes, scale and detail.  Great work!

Whip-Ma-Whop-Ma Gate

Kaia – Sets a great example in behaviour and presentation. She is always ready to learn and super helpful around the class! 

Ziggy – He has the whole package and embodies all of Scarcroft’s values| He has an infectious passion for learning!

York Food Festival

The children had a wonderful time visiting the York Food Festival, where they learnt all about how chocolate is made. They enjoyed making their very own chocolate lolly and finding out more about the process from cocoa bean to chocolate. The children also had the opportunity to make either pasta or bread. It was a fun and exciting day with lots of food!

Art

The children have been inspired by the colourful and vibrant artwork of Brazilian artist Beatriz Milhauzes. They explored her use of bold colours, patterns, textures and tones. The children created their own wonderful collages by layering different papers and material.

National Poetry Day – Blackout Poetry

For National Poetry Day we tried Blackout Poetry. We took a page from a book (shocking I know!) and circled a word that caught our eye. Then we chose other words linked to this and circled those too. We then coloured in and blacked out the rest of the poem so that only those words were left. These created our own Blackout Poems. Here are some of the results.

Recognition Awards

Petergate

Anna – Anna has had such a great start to Year 4 and I’ve been so impressed with her creative ideas, participation in class and beautiful handwriting! She is always answering questions and adding insightful ideas to class discussions. Well done Anna!

Walmgate

Isaac – has been quietly impressing me since the start of term. He has been remembering lots of information he needs in his writing and has been trying really hard to improve his reading. Keep it up Isaac!

Problem solving in PE. We had great fun.

We’ve been experimenting with mixtures to see what dissolves and what doesn’t. Fantastic, active science! 

Recognition Awards

Colliergate

Dylan – for giving a hundred percent effort and having a brilliant attitude to every lesson so far!

Mia – for her outstanding determination and amazing effort with all of her learning.

Skeldergate

India – A delight to have in class. India has made a fabulous start to Y5. She always tries her best in every lesson.

PE – Rowntrees Park Tennis Festival

The Y6 girls had a great time and represented the school fantastically at their Rowntrees Park Tennis Festival last Friday. There were loads of smiles, great attitudes and surprisingly strong opinions about biscuits!

Writing

The classes are getting really stuck into their writing for Year 6 and thoroughly enjoying reading Resist. We are now gearing up to writing our first longer piece of writing – a biography!

History

We finished our topic on WW2 by learning about how jobs roles were changed for women while the men were abroad fighting, including trying to decide if this was a lasting change. We also heard stories from members of the Windrush Generation who had moved to the UK after WW2.

Everyone was fantastic during our trip to Eden Camp 2. We loved showing our groups round the huts and had loads of engaged, interesting conversations and questions. It was lovely to hear nice reports of the classes from our parent volunteers. Thank you all for coming too!

Recognition Awards

Fossgate

James B – for his excellent standard of presentation across all of his books since the start of Year 6.

Poppy – despite only starting at our school in September, she is a really valued member of our class already. She is super friendly, kind and works really hard. We’re so happy you joined us, Poppy!

Goodramgate

Alfie – for an absolute shift in focus and effort once he’d awoken from the holidays – really throwing himself into each lesson.

Lara – Mrs de Simone must have read my mind! Lara also only started with us in September and is already a fantastic member of the Scarcroft community. She is kind and helpful in class, works really hard and has instantly made new friends.