Living and Learning: I know we’re all the same and we’re all different
In Key Stage One, we have read the book ‘Elmer’ by David McKee and considered things from another’s point of view. How might Elmer feel about being different from the other elephants? Why did Elmer want to look like the other elephants? How do the other elephants view Elmer?
Through this book, each class has been able to discuss how the elephants are the same and different. We have applied this to ourselves too.
Class novel – Naughty Bus
We are enjoying repeatedly reading our class novel, Naughty Bus by Jan and Jerry Oke, and using it to inspire our reading and writing lessons too. The real photos and way the words are printed in the book has ignited lots of interesting discussions.
The word swim looks like it’s sinking.
Saving me looks like it’s being hooked by the powerful winch.
Help at home by taking discussing how authors use text or pictures in books to affect the reader.
Science vocabulary
Our new Science mini-topic is here below. We also designed some posters about what we can do to look after our Earth.
Help at home by talking about how we can care for our planet.
Science – caring for our planet
For the first two weeks of this half term, KS1 are learning about how to care for our planet. We know it is everybody’s responsibility to look after planet Earth. We have a responsibility to look after our local area and we can do that by caring for other people, animals and plants.
During our first session, the children had a look at the ‘wildflower garden’ by our KS1 playground. It was there that we discovered bird feeders, hedgehog and bug houses and recently planted plants and trees by our Year 6 children. We know all of these things help to look after our planets.
‘Trees produce oxygen that we need to breathe.’ (S.C 2c)
‘Hedgehogs can find shelter in the houses.’ (HP 2C)
This week we compared two areas to one another. We decided to look at Scholes village and London. We talked about differences such as population, traffic and transport ect and the effects this may have on these environments. We talked about how we could improve each area to help the wildlife. Here are some examples of the posters we made in class!
Living and learning : Strong emotions
In our Living and Learning sessions we have been talking about our feelings, and in particular, strong emotions. We all have felt angry, sad and happy at some point. We identified different emotions and when we might have felt them. We talked about how emotions can feel overwhelming but will pass over time.
Design Technology – Food
1,2B had our turn in The Hub this week completing our fruit salad recipe.
We peeled, chopped, sliced and segmented our hearts out! The best part is the tasting though, of course.
Help at home by involving your child in food preparation and cooking. It helps with sequencing, fine motor control, maths, science and so much more!
1,2B Class Reward
As part of our reward system at school, we work as a class to achieve a short term target. We have been trying to come in after lunch and work on our spellings quietly. It’s taken a bit longer than some other targets, but we achieved our 10 smiley faces this week. We all get a vote on what we’d like our reward to be. It was a landslide for the new adventure playground!
Help at home by helping your child choose a target they can work towards, with a reward at the end!
Arty Ideas
During weekly art sessions, we focus on different art skills, often in our ‘Arty Ideas’ books. This week, we were looking at regular and irregular patterns. We discussed what makes a pattern regular or irregular and then had a go at creating some of our own. It was great to see how each pattern is unique, just like the children!
Help at home by looking for patterns around your house or environment (eg wallpaper, flooring, walls, fences).
Poem of the week: On The Ning Nang Nong!
Every week we have a different poem of the week. We read this every day in school. This week we are reading On The Ning Nang Nong by Spike Milligan.
Day 1 – Miss Young reads the poem to the class and models fluency.
Day 2 – Miss Young reads with the class and we focus on our prosody.
Day 3 – The class read it without Miss Young.
Day 4 – Children read the poem on their own and in a pair.
Day 5 – We all have a practise of saying the poem with our best fluency and prosody, without looking at the words. The poem is then sent home as part of children’s homework.
See below a video of 2C reading their poem of the week. This is day 3!
KS1 visit from our lovely lollipop lady, Sue
Today, the whole of KS1 had a very special visitor. Our beloved lollipop lady, Sue. She came along to inform our history learning and shared her memories of shopping as a youngster.
The children all listened carefully as Sue told us how there were not as many shops as there are now and how there weren’t any supermarkets. You needed to go to lots of different types of shops for your groceries such as a butchers, a bakery or a green grocers. Sue’s father was a green grocer and he started out his business by selling tomatoes from a box which he carried around on his head!
Sweets and pop were a once weekly treat and snacks weren’t really readily available. It was mainly just three meals a day. There was no choice of meals either – everyone in the family ate the same thing and you rarely got to choose what it was. This was the same at school. There was only one choice of school dinner or you could go home for lunch. Meals were seasonal. You had to wait until fruits and vegetables were in season to eat them. You couldn’t get them in the shops all year round like you can today.
The children loved that Sue passed through the gates today to join them in class and the session was very interesting and informative. Thank you Sue!
Help at home – Talk to your child about what shopping was like when you were a child. You could also ask older family members, friends or neighbours to share their experiences with your child just like Sue did. Questions that may help your discussions might be:
- What kind of shops did you buy your food from?
- How did you pay? Were you able to pay with your phone or watch?
- What kinds of foods were available? Was there as much choice as there is today?
- What was your favourite meal? Is it the same now?
- Did you get your shopping delivered?
- Do you have any photographs that you could share together?