Geography: investigating issues in our locality
This week in KS1, the children have been collating the results of their fieldwork around Scholes village. We discussed and recorded which was our favourite place in Scholes and made a graph to show these results.
In all classes, the Peace Flame was our favourite spot. This was because the noise level was low, it was calm but also because there was no litter. We decided that litter was our least favourite thing about Scholes but luckily there was not much.
We also looked around the school grounds for litter. We noticed that the playgrounds with more bins had less litter and the playgrounds with less or no bins had the most litter.
What is the issue to this solution?
‘We could pick it all up!’
Living and learning : Speak out, stay safe
We talked about how to keep safe this week. Speaking to a trusted adult is very important. This NSPCC video, featuring Ant and Dec, talks about speaking out can help us stay safe. It also introduces Buddy, a mascot for this important message. (This is a YouTube link. Top tip for watching YouTube with your child: go to the settings cog along the play bar and turn off autoplay – this avoids an inappropriate clip coming up automatically, and helps to discourage your child from passively watching clip after clip.)
Supertato!
Supertato!
This week, in literacy we have been reading the book ‘Supertato’ by Sue Hendra & Paul Linnet. We have been retelling the story using actions and story maps.
Top tip for watching YouTube with your child: go to the settings cog (it’s along the play bar) and turn off auto play – this avoids an inappropriate clip coming up automatically, and helps to discourage your child from passively watching clip after clip.
Can your child retell the story Supertato to you at home? They could use the story maps below to help them – or even better, draw their own! Email us to let us how they did – your child will earn a challenge brick.
The children have also been busy doing lots of Supertato themed challenges. Here are some of the challenges they have been doing.
Challenge bricks – what is my child talking about?
Challenging activities are around the classroom for your child to complete to earn a brick. You might have seen them if you attended a stay and play recently – they are shown on blackboards in different areas of learning. The aim is to get a tower of bricks taller than SIX. Challenges include the learning we’re focusing on throughout the week.
Ask your child what challenges they’ve done this week.
At the end of the week, we talk about who has more and who has fewer bricks. If your child’s tower is more than SIX, your child will come home with a certificate.
Word of the week
Every week, we look at a new adventurous word. We call this our ‘word of the week’. This week our word of the week was ‘hero’ – linked to the story ‘Supertato’. We looked at the definition. ‘A person who is brave and good – often looked up to by others.’, drew pictures to represent hero’s and used the word hero in our everyday speech.
“I can see a hero – it’s Supertato” Georgie.
“My hero is Hulk” Jack.
“My hero is Rosie” Grace.
Maths
This week, the children have been developing their understanding of composition – the numbers within numbers.
We have been using the Hungarian number pattern (die pattern) as shown below.
These key representations help your child to underline the ‘5-ness’ of 5. The children now have a great understanding of pairs of numbers that make 5!
“3 and 2 more…5”
“3 and 3 equals 6”
Phonics
This week, the children have learnt the new digraph ‘er’ – a digraph is ‘two letters that make one sound’. They have also learnt the new trigraph ‘air’ – a trigraph is ‘three letters that make one sound’.
Before reading a word we always look for any digraphs (two letters that make one sound) or trigraphs (three letters that make one sound). Then, we say the sound it makes. Finally, we sound out the word and blend it together – using our phoneme fingers! This helps your child identify the digraphs before reading a word.
Poetry Picnic
Each week, we will be learning a new poem. We will recite this poem each day. By saying the poem out loud we can focus on the sounds and rhythm of each word or line. We talk to the children about how this can help us become better readers. This week’s poem is ‘A little house’.
We talk about how a poem sometimes has rhyming words and sometimes doesn’t. Can your child tell you the rhyming words in this week’s poem? We also talk about how a poem can have a fast rhythm or a slow rhythm. Can your child re-tell this weeks poem to you?
Reminders
Reception Coffee Morning – Tuesday 31st January, 2023
After dropping your child off, stay at school for an informal chat with Mrs Beesley, the Reception staff and get to know the other parents, too. We will be in the new area of school called ” The Hub” from 9- 10am. Come and join us.
Stay and Play (fiddly fingers) – Friday 03 February at 2.pm– 3.20pm.
This is an opportunity for you to come into school to find out about the Early Years Curriculum and watch your child learn in school.
There will be a sign-up sheet in the classroom/after school club on Monday 30th January.
PE – basketball skills
This half term in PE we are focussing on attacking skills.
Here’s what we’ve been learning:
Attack is offense in Basketball. On offense, there are many different tools available to your team. The goal of the attack is to break through the opponent’s defence and set up an uncontested shot. For this you will need strong fundamentals: dribbling, passing and shooting.
Maths: multiplication
This week in Year 2 we have been exploring multiplication. We are able to recognise equal groups, count how many objects are in each group and how many groups there are. We then use this knowledge to find the total.
We started by writing our equations out using repeated addition. We then wrote the equation as a multiplication.
(E.g. – 2 + 2 + 2 + 2 is the same as 2 x 4)
Help at home by arranging equal groups in the home for your child. You could use socks, coins or any other object that can be counted in 2s, 5s or 10s!
Top tip for watching YouTube with your child: go to the settings cog (it’s along the play bar) and turn off autoplay – this
avoids an inappropriate clip coming up automatically, and helps to discourage your child from passively watching clip
after clip.
Science – materials
In this weeks science, we have been completing comparative tests. We have been discussing diiferent materials and their properties. We then made predictions to decide if they would be absorbent or not.
We poured the same amount of water on each piece of material to test our predictions.
One of the materials (wrapping paper) we tested on both sides due to one side being shiny and the other dull.
Help at home by identifying different materials and discussing their properties.
Reception Coffee Morning – 31.01.23
Reception Coffee Morning – Tuesday 31st January, 2023
After dropping your child off, stay at school for an informal chat with Mrs Beesley, the Reception staff and get to know the other parents, too. We will be in the new area of school called ” The Hub” from 9- 10am. Come and join us.
3,4B: we are geographers!
This half-term, we’ve been geographers. Specifically, we’ve been learning about volcanoes. We’ve studied plate tectonics and learnt how volcanoes are formed. We’ve investigated where they are and thought about whether volcanoes are a good or bad thing – the answer isn’t as obvious as it seems.
In particular, we’ve studied two volcanic eruptions in detail: Eyjafjallajökull in 2010 (which you might remember) and Mt Vesuvius in 79AD (which you probably don’t remember – although I’m regularly told how old parents are).
We learnt about the negative aspects of volcanic eruptions: the disruption to travel, the destroying of infrastructure and the loss of life. And, we learnt about the positive aspects of volcanoes: geothermal energy, rich soil for farming and tourism.
Help at home by…
- asking your child about their learning
- researching volcanoes at home
- looking for articles or books about volcanoes
- using Google Earth to look at some volcanoes
A little challenge, can your child…
- tell you some information about the eruption of Eyjafjallajökull in 2010
- tell you some information about the eruption of Vesuvius in 79AD
- explain some of the positive and negative aspects of volcanoes
- tell you where some volcanoes are
A little extra challenge..
- Can your child tell you more about the word volcano and what it means (a clue: it’s Latin!)
3,4 A Class News
It’s been another busy week at Scholes!
In Writing, we wrote up our recounts about a volcanic eruption and the children used some fantastic vocabulary, including some lovely fronted adverbials.
In Maths, we’ve been working on multiplication. Year 4 have been using column multiplication to multiply 3 digit numbers and Year 3 have been partitioning to multiply 2 digit ones, moving onto using the formal method in Week 4.
In Reading, we’ve continued to work on a variety of different skills, including retrieval, inference and choice. It was also great to see some fantastic reading record activities in Book Club on Wednesday.
In Topic, we’ve been learning about how volcanoes are formed and the impact they can have, both positive and negative.
That’s not to mention some really thoughtful contributions in Living and Learning (please see the previous class news post for more detail, the picture below shows everyone working away on their posters), some great ball skills in P.E and some super work on classifying rocks in Science!
Well done 3,4 A on another successful week. I also wanted to say a big well done to all the children who learnt and recited the poem sent home earlier in the term – Catch a Little Rhyme. There were so many who gave it a go!
Please help at home by reading regularly with your child, helping them to practise their spellings and ensuring they continue to practise their times tables on Times Tables Rockstars (in particular, x8 for Year 3 and x9 for Year 4). Thank you for all that you do, your support makes a big difference.
Living and Learning – Being Safe
Our theme in Living and Learning for Weeks 3 and 4 of term is being safe.
In Week 3, we thought about what makes a happy and healthy home. Our objective was to recognise features of a healthy family life and to know when and how to ask for help. We wrote some of these ideas down to create posters.
The children made some great contributions about what things make for a happy home, including having the things you need, feeling comfortable and having someone to care for you.
Help at home by talking more about these themes with your child, encouraging them to share their feelings and emotions and discussing safety at home.
In Week 4, we’ll be talking about the NSPCC and their Speak Out. Stay Safe. programme.