1
We hope that you enjoy the first edition of the Brightside Bulletin which is full
of news about our school. Members of the school council have been working
hard to contribute by interviewing teachers and pupils. Other children have
also helped.
There will be more editions of the Brightside Bulletin and we would like pupils
and parents to contribute.
Please send us

Information about your child’s achievements – have they gained any
awards or certificates?

Have you travelled abroad or visited an interesting place in England that
you could tell us about?

Can you tell us about your country of origin if you were not born in
England?

Have you any tips for a good day out for families?

Does your child like drawing? Send us an example of his/her art work.

Do you or your child have a favourite recipe?

Send us your opinions/views.
Please don’t feel shy – we want to celebrate our children’s achievements.
Donation from the Nisa shop on Jenkin Road
We recently received a donation of £250 from our local Nisa shop and this
money will be used to pay for the paper, ink and photocopying costs involved in
the production of the Brightside Bulletin. We are very grateful to Mandeep and
his team both for making this donation and for inviting the school council to
visit the store to collect the money. Nisa has supported us with donations in
the past and we are very grateful for their generousity.
2
School Dinners
This year has seen a change to school dinners. Last September the Government
introduced free school meals for all infant children. To help us cater for the
increased numbers of children eating a school dinner and to act upon feedback
from parents and children, we introduced the band system on a trial basis,
which due to its popularity is now a permanent feature.
How does this work?
At registration time children are able to choose which
school dinner they would like from the menu. Dinners
are then ordered to ensure each pupil receives the food
they asked for. Each menu option is colour coded and
children are given coloured wrist bands to wear before
they go into dinner so that our cook knows which meal
they have ordered. This makes the process of serving the children easier and
faster and avoids them having to queue up for long periods of time.
There is always a sandwich option, but choice was limited at first. We fed back
to Taylor Shaw, our school meal provider that some parents were requesting a
choice of sandwich filling and they agreed to offer a wider selection with a
choice of 2 fillings daily.
The new system seems to be working well and currently 90 % of children are
eating a free school meal. Although Taylor Shaw and Amanda, our cook, do their
best to cater for the tastes of our children, there are government constraints
on what they can offer, for example sugar and fat content has to be limited to
healthy levels, and all meals must be nutritionally balanced. This is reassuring
for parents.
As you can imagine, our children have a wide variety of tastes – whilst some
request one dish, others will refuse it, so it is hard to please everyone. You may
be interested to see the results of a survey carried out by last year’s school
council.
3
School meals survey amongst children
Don’t like
Favourites
Cheese pie
Fish fingers
Mashed potato
Cheese pie but not with onions
Burgers
Pizza
Cabbage
Burgers
Broccoli
Chicken
Cauliflower
Biscuits
Vegetable curry
Children said that they would also like
Salad dressing
Cheese strings
Kiwis
Apples
Water melon
Muffins
Baby Bel
Fruit string
Salad with pasta and tuna
Fried chicken
Ham sandwiches
Ice cream
Pomegranate
Fudge yoghurt
Jam sandwiches
Potatoes with cheese
Parents comments
“Good idea letting children express a choice as this is what has put my children
off dinners (uncertainty about whether they get what they like or will be left
with what they dislike and therefore will not eat).
A choice of jacket potato fillings every day would give children more options.
My daughter doesn’t like beans so would not choose jacket potato on those days
but would happily choose one with tuna or cheese.”
“It will benefit the children to have a hot meal if they want, or to have
something cold.”
“I think that it’s great that all children can now have school meals for free.”
4
“My child will continue with packed lunch so you can see what they have eaten
that day and how much. So you know they have eaten something.”
“Please include wholemeal/partial wholemeal flour in the recipes, lentils and
other beans (kidney beans) in the vegetarian option, other carbohydrate option
apart from potatoes. Traditional English recipes like yorkshire pudding, Cornish
pasty, tarts etc can be included.”
Parents suggested the following sandwich fillings
Cheese spread, egg mayo, tuna mayo, coronation chicken, corned beef, tuna
coleslaw, prawn coleslaw, cream cheese and fruit, nut butter (peanut?), sliced
cooked meats, chicken and sweetcorn, potted meat, tuna and cucumber, ham,
chicken tikka with less spices
Sundry suggestions
Wraps
pasta bar
Bread sticks + dip
potato salad
Raisins
fruit bar
Carrot sticks
cous cous
Cucumber sticks
fruit flap jack
Sausage roll
cheese and onion roll
Frubes yoghurt
mixed veg and cheese Cornish pasty
All this information was passed on to Taylor Shaw. If you have any comments to
make we would be pleased to hear them. You can write on the comments slips
and post them into the comments box outside the school office.
5
Macey, Leah, Junaid and Ayah had some questions
to ask cook
Who decides what food you cook?
My boss, a man called Phil, sends me the menu. He decides what
food we offer.
Who makes the dinners? Who helps?
I (Amanda) am the cook, but Louise and Annie help. Louise is in charge of
sandwiches.
What is your favourite dinner?
Cheese flan
Which dinner do the children like best?
Fish and chips and pizza.
How many meals do you cook every day?
160 meals and 160 puddings. Some sandwiches – today 25 cheese
and 18 ham. Some of the teachers also buy a school dinner . The
teachers have the yellow plates because they are slightly bigger
than the children’s blue plates.
How long does it take you to cook all the dinners?
About 3 1|2 hours
Are you here all night and if not what time do you start work?
I go home at night and I start work at about 8pm. I make the puddings first. I
leave work about 2pm.
How big is the kitchen?
The children were invited to look in the kitchen. It was bigger than they
expected.
How do you keep the kitchen clean?
6
We wash everything every day - the big bowls, the mixer, the oven, all the pots
and pans and beakers, the work surfaces and the floor. We have to be
particularly careful about the floor because when we chop vegetables some
pieces sometimes slide onto the floor and into the corners so we have to make
sure that we pick them all up.
Do you like cooking?
Yes
Why are there three sinks in the kitchen?
One is for hand washing only. Amanda washes her hands as soon as she arrives,
using the smallest sink, and so do Louise and Annie. The other bigger sinks are
for washing the pots etc.
Why do you wear special clothes?
To protect us from hot food splashes and the chemicals that we use to keep the
kitchen clean.
Brightside School Council
Before Christmas children in the year 1 and year 2 classes were asked if they
would like to be considered for this role. If they expressed an interest, their
names were written on a board in the classroom. Each child in the class was
asked to vote for one boy and one girl from the list on the board. They could
not vote for themselves. They were asked to consider who they thought would
make a reliable member of the school council. Each child was given a slip of
paper on which to record their vote so that it could be done privately. Class
teachers were also able to nominate one child.
Once the votes were counted, the result was announced to the classes and a
check was made to ensure that those children who received the most votes
were still willing to participate.
The first council meeting was held just before Christmas and the council
continues to meet at regular intervals.
7
Brightside School Green Team
What jobs do the green team do?

Turn off the lights when there is nobody in a room

Close down the computers at the end of the day

Collect paper from the paper bins for recycling

Take left over food waste to the compost heap

Do gardening jobs

Litter pick

Speak about projects in assembly
“I want to make Brightside School and the area around it safe. I don’t
like graffiti and rubbish.”
Vivian
Two members of the School Council, Junaid and Rayanna, asked Miss
Moxam, who organises the Green Team, some questions.
How long has there been a green team at Brightside School?
For 3 years. We have new children on the team every year.
Is it fun to be in the Green Team?
I think so – there are lots of interesting things to do.
How did you find out which children wanted to be in the Green Team?
We talked about it in assembly and told the children about the jobs that needed
doing. Anybody who wanted to be on the Green Team filled in a job application
form. Then names were put on the board and children voted for the people who
they thought would be good Green Team members.
Recycling and raising money for charity
We raised £22 for Bluebell Wood Children’s Hospice by
recycling our empty ink cartridges. This is the first time that
we have done this and we hope to raise more money for
Bluebell Wood in the future by saving all the ink cartridges
that we use in school.
8
Teacher Feature
Mr Webber
Rowan and Kamran interviewed Mr Webber.
How did you learn how to play the piano?
I started to have piano lessons when I was 7 years old. My piano teacher was
called Mrs McLean. I studied with her for 7 years and then changed to a
different teacher – Mr Hill in Bishop’s Stortford where I lived.
What other instruments do you play?
Trombone, accordion, guitar, and I also play the clarinet a little bit, and the
same with the trumpet.
Which instrument is the hardest to play?
The piano because you have to use all your fingers and both hands are doing
different things.
Do you work in any other schools?
Sometimes I go to other schools to teach the trumpet. Last year I went to
Sharrow, Lowfield, Heritage Park and Norfolk Park Community School.
What is your favourite instrument?
I like singing best and your voice is an instrument. I like playing my trombone in
a band called the Free Radicals and I also like playing the piano because it is
relaxing.
9
Class 7 news
What news is there from class 7? Ayah and Blessing interviewed Miss Frost to
find out.
Have you been looking after some fish in the library?
Yes, we had a tank with some trout in it.
Where did the fish come from?
A lady called Helen, who is a River Steward and who helps to
look after the River Don and the creatures that live in it, asked
if our school would like to look after some trout eggs. We said
“yes please” so that we could watch them hatch and grow into
baby fish. She brought a large fish tank to school, filled it with
water and we watched as she gently put the eggs into the water.
She told us how to look after the eggs and the little fish once
the eggs had hatched.
Did you have to feed them?
Yes. As soon as the fish started to swim up to the top of the tank we had to
give them a small amount of food, once in the morning and once in the afternoon.
Children in class 7 took turns to feed them in the morning, and children in class
10 did the same in the afternoon.
What happened to the fish?
Just before the Easter holiday we waved goodbye to them and put them in the
River Don. There was a news item about it in our local newspapers.
Extract from Sheffield Star
"Youngsters reared the fish from eggs to fingerlings, feeding them daily and
monitoring the water conditions of their aquariums, before helping to release
them. The children have learnt first hand about raising the trout and
Sheffield’s waterways as part of the project funded by the Equitable
Charitable Trust and delivered by the River Stewardship Company. They
discovered all about the life cycle of fish and what wildlife is found in the area.
Hellen Hornby, community team manager at the RSC, said: “This project has
been really successful in getting children involved and excited about the
10
environment. “They have taken ownership of nurturing the
fish in their classrooms and have learnt how important it is
that we protect the wildlife in our towns and cities.”
What else has your class been learning about this term?
We have been learning about the Great Fire of London. To find out what really
happened, we built some model houses out of cardboard and set fire to them in
the playground to see how they burned.
Was that dangerous?
No because we had to do a risk assessment to make sure that we could do it
safely. First we learned about fire safety. All the children know about how
dangerous fire can be and what they need to do to keep safe. Then we made
sure that our small fire could not spread and all the children and adults had to
stand a safe distance away.
Have you been on any trips?
Yes we went to the fire museum and learnt about the fire engines that were
used in the past. We also saw new ones.
Have you been on any more trips?
Yes we went to the Botanical Gardens to look at the flowers and plants. This is
because our topic for this term is “How does your garden grow?” We have been
looking at the lovely flowers in the school garden this week.
11
Sadaf’s Model
Sadaf in class 7 made a model with her mummy, of the Great Fire of London. It
is made from wood like the houses in London at the time of the Great Fire.
Sadaf’s visit to India
Sadaf went to India at Christmas to attend her uncle’s
wedding. She flew from Manchester Airport, stopped in
Dubai and then flew to Hyderabad.
This was a very long journey! Sadaf was able to watch TV
on the plane and some of the time she went to sleep.
Whilst she was there she visited a school. She was
surprised to see that the teachers wrote on black boards with different
coloured chalk and all the children sat at benches. There were a lot of children
in each class.
Sadaf also rode on a camel. It cost 20 rupees and there were bells on the
camel’s feet. It was very difficult for her to climb onto the camel’s back
because it was so tall.
Sadaf enjoyed playing on a swing which was inside their house, and which had a
very soft seat!
She also enjoyed the wedding when everyone wore beautiful clothes.
On New Year’s Eve there was a firework display.
Sadaf also visited a kite festival called Sankranti. Hindus celebrate this
festival by flying colourful paper kites.
12
Comic Relief Fun Run
Thank you to all those parents who helped or took part in the fun run with their
children and also to those of you who purchased items from the Comic Relief
stall that we set up in the school entrance.
We sold merchandise worth £355 and raised £163 from the collection buckets
and refreshments.
13
14
Attendance News
Every week we hold a class competition to see which class has the best
attendance for that week. The winning class receives a yellow star to display on
the classroom door.
At the end of each term we count up how many stars each class has received,
and the children in the class with the most stars each receive a prize.
Last term class 10 won!
We have joined forces with Sheffield International
Venues. Gain 100% attendance this academic year and
you could receive a FREE swim or skate voucher.
Valid at any Swim Sheffield Venue or Ice Sheffield
Thank you for reading our magazine!
15