Getting to know each other
We’ve enjoyed welcoming all of our new children to Nursery this week for their first sessions. It’s been lovely to see our older children helping to show them around and making new friends.
We listened to ‘Little Red Riding Hood’ and re-told the story in the book corner using props. Children tried to remember some of the repeated phrases in the story. “Grandma, what big eyes/ears/teeth you have!”
In group time, we learnt about the number one. We showed one on our fingers, did one hop, one clap and one jump. We found a number one on a domino and looked at a unicycle with only one wheel. Have a look for ‘one’ in your house. You might see one handle on the door or one mirror on the wall. Can you find a numeral one on a house door or number plate?
Winter
Winter
This week, we’ve been talking about typical signs of winter. We’ve been reading a range of winter themed fiction and non-fiction books. We have also been discussing animals that live in a cold climate. Climate is our word of the week!
Rainbow class have been writing about typical signs of winter.
Sunshine class have been writing about Arctic animals.
In Literacy, we’ve also been discussing the features of fiction and non-fiction books, sorting them into groups. Here are some thoughts that children shared during the activity.
Fiction books
“They’re fun to read and they can make you laugh”- Sonny
“Some books can be scary”- Mollie G
“They’re good for your brain because they make you feel good”- Maddison
Non-fiction books
“If you don’t know about something, you can read about it and find out”- Georgie
“I got a non-fiction book from the library because I wanted to find out about pyramids”- Keira
Maths: The staircase pattern
We’ve been counting to find ‘how many’.
With the help of our Numberblocks friends, we’ve revisited the ‘stable order’ principle of counting (Understanding that number names are said in order)
We’ve been learning about the ‘one more’ relationship between consecutive numbers. We discovered that when you represent numbers in order using cubes, it makes a ‘staircase’ pattern!
Phonics
This week, the children have learnt some new digraphs – a digraph consists of ‘two letters that make one sound’. Ask your child to tell you the sounds the digraphs below make.
oo oo ar or
You may have noticed that one of our digraphs is repeated. That’s because the ‘oo’ digraph makes two different sounds! It might take a bit of investigating in our reading to see which one fits the word. Please support your child with this when practising their ‘learn at home’ phonics sheet.
Before reading a word, we always look for any digraphs (two letters that make one sound). Then, we say the sound the digraph makes. Finally, we sound out the word and blend it together – using our phoneme (the sound a letter makes) fingers! This helps your child identify the digraphs (two letters that make one sound) before reading a word.
Penguin observations
Over the past two weeks, the children have loved observing the ‘penguin cam’ at Edinburgh Zoo. They’ve been watching closely, making notes about what they look like, how they move and what they have in their enclosures to keep them happy. We discussed how this is not their natural habitat and what their environment would be like in the Antarctic.
Living and Learning
This week’s Living and Learning statement is: I know that some drugs are harmful.
In Reception, we’ve focused on our PSED (Personal, Social, Emotional Development) statement “I know that I must only take medicines when an adult is with me”
The children shared some fantastic knowledge of why they must be with a trusted adult when using medicines.
“To make sure it’s not out of date”- Jack
“To look at the label to see how much you need”- Olivia
“If you get the wrong one, it could make you more poorly”- Skyla
“You might take too much”- Alfie
PE
On Wednesday, Rainbow class enjoyed their first fun-filled PE session led by Foot-Tech Academy
This half term, our PE skill focus is dynamic (moving) balance and static balance.
In Friday sessions, we’ll be using a variety of apparatus in the hall to develop these skills.
Inspiration on a rainy day
It’s been a very dreary, soggy week outside but, as ever, the children’s curiosity led to some fantastic exploration. After a conversation about rain, flooding and potentially needing a boat to get around (ha!) the talk soon turned to types of boat and learning about canal boats. The children watched some short clips of ‘Rosie and Jim’ and a group were inspired to build their own canal boat in the outside area. They showed great team work and story-telling. This spontaneous, child-led interest and construction carried on throughout the week.
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. This week’s poem is ‘I can build a snowman ’.
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 tell you if this week’s poem is fast or slow? We know that learning to recite poems, helps our reading in lots of ways.
Click here to watch Reception recite this week’s poem!
Celebration assembly
Reception have started attending Friday celebration assemblies with KS1. Each week, we’ll be awarding sports, living and learning and great learning certificates. If your child receives a certificate or award outside of school, they can also bring this in to share with everyone in the assembly.
Reminders
- Reading- Please remember to bring in library books on Thursdays and reading records on Fridays.
- Funky phonics Phase 3 stay and play- Monday 16 January/ Wednesday 18 January 9.00-9.30am Please only attend the session you have signed up for and please remember that we have space for only one parent/carer at this session. We’ve taken on board your feedback from previous stay and play events and have split the session over 2 days, to lower numbers and ensure a calmer learning environment for all.
We are looking forward to welcoming you all back into the classroom and showing you how much our phonics has developed!
We are Geographers!
This term our theme is all about planet Earth and our local area. We have been learning about the 4 countries that make up the UK and the capital cities of each country.
We also recapped what human and physical features are! Human features are man-made, whereas physical features are naturally occurring.
Help at home – Ask your child to give you an example of a human and physical features around your local area.
Next week in Geography KS1 will be going on an exciting tour around our local area – Scholes! The children are very excited. We will be stopping at places very close to school and observing the areas. We will decide to what extent we like each location and will be monitoring how clean Scholes is, by counting (and collecting) any litter we spot!
Topic: What are the causes of climate change?
The children are busily enjoying the geography topic and have this week been learning about the causes of climate change.
The children read articles and watched a video about how increased food waste, deforestation and the burning of fossil fuels are contributing to the increasing temperature of the Earth. Methane and carbon dioxide are the main contributing gases that are destroying the ozone layer. The year 6’s were given the opportunity to show off their creative sides and create a booklet that shows their knowledge of this topic.
Here are some lovely examples of what they produced.
Help at home: Ask your child about the causes if climate change. Do they know the vocabulary for this term? Can they give you any definitions?
Science: materials
This term’s Science topic is materials. This week we have been looking at the different materials that objects can be made from. We have noticed that some objects are made from more than one material. We sorted items from our classroom using hoops to make a Venn Diagram.
Maths: adding two 2-digit numbers
This week in Year 2 we are focussing our learning on adding two 2-digit numbers together. To start with, we are learning to add two 2-digit numbers together that are not across ten. After this, the focus will be on adding across a ten.
Step 1 – write out the equation.
Step 2 – draw base ten to illustrate how many tens and how many ones are present in each number. (Lines to represent 10s, circles or squares to represent 1s).
Step 3 – add the tens together.
Step 4 – add the ones together.
Step 5 – add the above together.
By breaking the addition down into small, manageable steps we are able to answer these difficult questions with ease.
Help at home: by practicing these skills at home with your children. Use blank sheets of paper and ask children to talk through and show you their working out.
Adding two 2-digit numbers (not across a 10) –
Adding two 2-digit numbers (across a ten)
Class News 5/6A
Happy New Year to all pupils, parents and families! I hope you have all had a restful and happy festive period. It has been great to be able to welcome the children back into class. It may have been a short week but we have packed a lot in. Let’s see what they’ve been getting up to.
Our main Topic focus will be geography this half term, in particular ‘Environment and Natural Disasters’. We have been looking at the difference between weather and climate, and exploring the causes of climate change. The Year 6 pupils have filmed their very own version of ‘Newsround’ to report on what is leading to increased global warming across the world.
In Science, Earth and Space are our focus for the next seven weeks. Together we have been looking at the orbit of the moon around the Earth, and the different phases it goes through. Help at home: For their homework, the pupils have been asked to take a photo of the moon each night for the next 28 days. Please remind your child to do this at home, and from a position where they can clearly see it. By the end of this, we will be able to make a “flick book” of the moon’s orbit around Earth.
Help at home: Our times table focus for this week is the 3 times table, and spellings are based on homophones. Daily practice of times table and spellings can make a significant impact on your child’s performance at school. It could be at the breakfast table, on the journey to school, or when chilling on the sofa.
Finally, let’s see who our certificate winners were for this week.
Great Learning – Travis. Resilient, respectful and resourceful, he has shown a fantastic attitude towards learning all week.
Living and Learning – Amelia. Mature, composed and considerate of others, she always makes mature and well thought-out points in our class discussions.
Sport – Louis M. Great basketball skills this week. Controlled dribbling, and accurate shooting. Great job!
Have a great weekend!
Mr. Robson
Living and Learning: I know what a drug is.
Over the next couple of weeks in our Living and Learning sessions, we will be focusing on “Being Safe”. Our discussions this week have centred around what a drug is, and how they might handle the pressure of being asked to use these by friends or peers. As a class we discussed the various strategies young people have at their disposal; passive, aggressive and assertive, and looked at a number of scenarios to see how they might react if they found themselves being put under pressure to take drugs.
Help at home: ask your child if they know where to get help if they’re worried about drugs or being safe. They could talk to a trusted adult. Do they know who their trusted adults are? They could also contact Childline on 0800 1111 or even contact the police using 111.
English – Here We Are by Oliver Jeffers
We are using our class novel, Here We Are (Notes for Living on Planet Earth) by Oliver Jeffers to inspire our reading and writing learning this half term. We have enjoyed reading and discussing the book, picking out the main themes and messages.
We will link the book to our geography learning about our local area and art too. We will be reading about our school and Scholes, then writing about our school and village too.
Help at home
- read the book again and talking about the key messages
- talk about our local area – particularly what you like and dislike about it
- help your child learn their address
- read other books by Oliver Jeffers
There is a link to listen to it here. (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.)
1,2B PE – large apparatus
There was much excitement in PE yesterday when we got the large apparatus out in PE. We climbed, stretched, rolled and balanced, refining our gross motor skills.
