The video below is a fascinating insight into some China’s animals. It also introduces difference landscapes in China and the concept of endangered species.
After watching the videos with your child, discuss any similarities or differences. For example, compare Chinese New Year to preparations at Christmas.
Expressive Arts and Design
As part of our Chinese New Year topic, make a lantern. Template posted on the Memo Section of Tapestry.
Letters and Sounds
Today’s new sound – ‘ow’ (digraph two letters but one sound)
This video introduces the ‘ow’ sound – Geraldine’s back!
The following video supports blending and reading ‘ow’ sound words.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8UQ_Mls4qa0
Show your child how to write ‘ow’ using the correct letter formation.
Letter formation for ‘o’ and ‘w’ can be found in your child’s letters and sounds book.
Encourage your child to ‘have a go’ at writing the ‘ow’’ sound.
For challenge
Only if your child is ready. Say the following words. Ask your child to write the words.
For extra challenge
Write a sentence and draw a picture to accompany the sentence.
Maths
Comparing routes
This activity will help your child use positional and directional language to describe journeys. It will also provide an opportunity to rehearse the comparative language from yesterday.
Give your child a start and end point in your house or outside – somewhere familiar.
Ask your child to travel from the start point to the end point in two different ways.
Ask your child to explain their journeys using the correct positional language. Here’s a reminder:
up, down, forward, through, over, turn backwards,
under, turn around, turn towards
Example of the language you will be looking for:
Child: Let’s turn towards the window and walk forwards to the table. Go between the table and the cupboard. Pass under the pictures on the wall and walk next to the broom cupboard to the door.
You could also ask your child which route was the quickest/shorter journey.
Treasure hunt
This can be extended by playing a treasure hunt game. Ask your child to hide a special toy and give you verbal instructions where to find it.
Internet Safety Day
Detective Digiduck – internet safety for 3-7 year olds
Childnet.com provide engaging online safety stories for young children aged 3-7.
The Digiduck® collection has been created to help parents and teachers educate children aged 3 – 7 about online safety. The collection includes a ebooks, PDFs, a poster and an interactive app.
I hope you all had a wonderful weekend and ready for another week of home learning.
Please find below my plan for the week.
As part of the whole school Geography focus, we will be looking at China and celebrating Chinese New Year which falls on Friday, 12 February. To help you prepare for tomorrow, I’ve posted a template and instructions for the paper lantern on Tapestry today.
I also set out below materials you may wish to gather together over the week ready for Friday’s dragon costume. Of course, you’ll be able to improvise so don’t worry too much if you can’t find everything listed!
Religious Education– St. Adrian
Chaplaincy Team Assembly
Please find enclosed a link to our Chaplaincy Team Assembly. It’s all about St. Adrian, who is our class saint.
Your child may like to take part in the school competition set by the Chaplaincy Team. Draw a picture or make a poster to celebrate our class saint, St. Adrian. The deadline for the competition is Friday, 12 February. Post your entries on Tapestry and I will forward them to the Chaplaincy Team.
Letters and Sounds
Today’s new sound – ‘ur’ (digraph two letters but one sound)
This video introduces the ‘ur’ sound.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9354FVIi0nM
Show your child how to write ‘ur’ using the correct letter formation.
Letter formation for ‘u’ and ‘r’ can be found in your child’s letters and sounds book.
Encourage your child to ‘have a go’ at writing the ‘ur’ sound.
For challenge
Only if your child is ready. Write the following words:
For extra challenge
Write a sentence and draw a picture to accompany the sentence.
Maths/PE
Spatial thinking
The language of spatial thinking is linked to many aspects of mathematics. Position and directional learning is the most obvious but also patterning and geometry. It is also essential when considering the relationships between numbers; knowing which numbers come ‘before’, ‘after’, ‘next to’ or ‘in between’ is important, as well as knowing how near or far numbers are from each other or from a given point. If the language of these are not fully understood in the real world, it will be difficult to use them in the abstract world of numbers.
The other aspect of spatial thinking covered in this learning sequence links to understanding abstract representations of the real world. The ability to transform images from pictorial to an abstract image later supports solving worded maths problems. In this sequence, the children will go from passing through a space in reality to using maps of known spaces with symbols to represent known objects.
Here’s our first activity:
This activity can be done inside or outside. It naturally builds on itself because children will want to provide feedback on specific obstacles and courses can have endless combinations. The perfect obstacle course should be challenging, silly, and easily deconstructed or reconstructed.
Using any equipment available such as cones, cushions, tables, hoops, beanbags or small mats, ask your child to devise a route to be followed and then invite other members of the family to try their route.
The idea is for your child to use directional language to explain their route. For example, “Jump over the cushion. Then hop on to the mat. Now throw the beanbag in the hoop.”
The key words you want your child to use are:
up, down, forward, through, over, turn backwards,
under, turn around, turn towards
To end today’s blog, I’d like to celebrate our learning from the last week.
Children’s Mental Health Week
Maths
Phonics and reading
Looking forward to hearing all about this week’s learning through Tapestry.
Hopefully your child will be a little more familiar with this idea following our Gingerbread Man story telling. As mentioned previously, this activity will help your child see the story from another angle. Plenty of acting out the story and lots of modelling will help your child.
Hot seating
Again, this is something we’ve done before – “hot seating”. Pretend to be the giant and encourage your child to ask you some questions. Or you could change roles and your child could ask the giant some questions. Of course, you can play this game pretending to be Jack, the cow or Jack’s mother.
Maybe you could try the technique with another story – perhaps when reading one of your child’s favourite story books.
Letters and Sounds
Is it right?
This game will very much depend upon your child’s stage in their spelling skills. It works by writing different variations of a word and asking your child to identify the right word. Children love to tell us when we’ve got something wrong! You can play it using words based upon the use of phonics or to help your child learn tricky words.
Using phonics
Tell your child the word you are going to try and write. Write a couple of variations and ask your child to identify the correct word and tell you why the others are not. Perhaps use your child’s word strips for this game.
For example, you may say ‘I’m going to write the word chips’
You write: cip, chip, chips
Your child may identify the right word and tell you that you forgot the ‘ch’ sound and didn’t put a ‘s’ on the end of the other word.
Ask your child to write down the correct word.
Tricky words
Tricky words are the star shapes words in your child’s word bag. These words cannot be sounded out and the correct spelling is learnt. Here are some suggestions:
wos, woz, was
dur, the, thur
go, goa
migh, my
hur, her
Ask your child to write down the correct word. Discuss – ‘How do you know?’ ‘How do you remember?’
Maths
I hope you have been able to start growing your own beanstalks. Details on my blog dated 26 January.
How about creating a chart and begin to measure the beanstalks? Here is a simple example of a chart you could create. Use something like Lego bricks as a measuring stick eg. 2 bricks high.
British Values
Individual Liberty
Individual liberty is embedded within your child’s curriculum; Personal, Social and Emotional Development together with Understanding the World. For individual liberty we focus on children’s self-confidence and self-awareness and people and communities. This value, therefore, links nicely into our children’s mental health week.
You are helping your child develop a positive sense of themselves all the time. Every time we provide opportunities for children to bake a cake, mix their own colours or take part in a running race we are helping them to develop their self-knowledge, self-esteem and increase confidence in their own abilities.
Every time we share a favourite book with a child, go for a walk or build a small world for favourite toys together, we are giving children the time and space to explore the language of feelings and responsibility; reflect on their differences and understand that we are all free to have different opinions.
So keep on enjoying the time together playing, learning and having fun!
Today’s activity is to dress up for the day. Wear your favourite colour or choose a range of colours that express how you are feeling. Colour can be very personal and mean different things to different people, so this is a great way to express yourself.
Perhaps you could wear a favourite character from your dressing up clothes or your own special clothes. Maybe a favourite outfit. I’d love to see your outfits on Tapestry.
Literacy
Changes to the Jack and the Beanstalk story
If your child hasn’t already done so, we can now start adding extra bits or altering the story of Jack and the Beanstalk. The simplest way to move into addition is by adding in more description eg. they were very poor and only owned one naughty cow!
You could build on this by:
adding in more dialogue eg. Jack said “Look Mum, I’ve got some magic beans”
adding in a new character eg. Jack saw a hen and some golden eggs
Perhaps the giant tries to explain to Jack that he is happy to share his gold coins with Jack.
Make an alteration that is significant and changes the direction of the story – alterations that have a knock on effect!
You could try altering:
the nature of one of the characters eg. the giant is kind and friendly
setting eg. the giant lives in a spaceship
the end of the story eg. Jack and his mother decided to ask the giant to live with them and built a bigger house
a key event within the story eg. Jack made a magic spell with the beans
As always, acting out the story together really helps embed story telling skills.
Letters and Sounds
Fe, fi, fo, fum (fee, figh, foa, fum)
This game plays on alliteration and will also help your child develop their ability to read nonsense words (letter sequences that follow regular phonetic rules and are pronounceable, but have no meaning). This is an important skill that will support your child’s use of phonics.
What to do:
Show your child how ‘fee, figh, foa, fum’ can be written based on the sounds they know eg. ‘ee’, ‘igh’ ‘oa’.
Introduce a different letter in front of each word eg. ‘s’ – see, sigh, soa, sum.
Play this game verbally first, taking turns to change the first letter at the front of the words. I normally find using a ‘b’ brings about much hilarity. You will see what I mean.
Challenge your child to choose a letter and write the giant’s phrase eg. if your child chooses a ‘t’ then ask your child to write ‘tee, tigh, toa, tum’.
Adding a vowel (a, e, i, o, u) as the first letter will not work so avoid these.
This game will also really help your child consolidate their knowledge of ‘ee’, ‘igh’ ‘oa’.
Jellybean graph
I hope you have been able to buy some jellybeans for this game. If not, you can use any small object eg. beads, Lego bricks. Before the jellybeans are gobbled up show your child how a graph could be made – see picture below.
Ask your child to make comparisons using the key mathematical words we are learning ‘more’, ‘fewer’ and ‘equal’. You will be looking for your child to say ‘I notice there are more orange beans and fewer yellow beans’. Model the language if your child hesitates.
For challenge
Ask questions such as ‘I can see four yellow beans and 5 orange beans? How many more orange beans are there?’. Again model the mathematical language and support your child as required..
Thank you for your feedback regarding the ebooks I shared on the Memo Section of Tapestry yesterday. If you have not accessed your child’s ebook yet, please note you will need to register to get onto the website, Oxford Owls. However, it’s free to subscribe and a fairly straight forward process!
Mental Health Week – Personal, Social and Emotional development
“Have You Filled a Bucket Today?” read by author Carol McCloud
This heartwarming book encourages positive behaviour as children see how rewarding it is to express daily kindness, appreciation, and love. The book is based upon an ‘invisible’ bucket to help children understand the effects of our actions and words on the well being of others and ourselves.
I thought it would be nice for the children to see a ‘real life’ author and hear Carol McCloud read her own book.
As a visual reminder, parents could use a small bucket/bowl and cotton buds, beads or a similar small object. Each time your child shows an act of kindness, pop a cotton bud into the bucket to recognise their thoughtfullness. You could also encourage your child to do the same for you!
Letters and Sounds/Literacy
Let’s go shopping!
This is an idea that I hope will inspire your child to write for fun. Set up a shop – this could be any shop that your child chooses eg. sweet shop, shoe shop, fruit shop, ice cream shop. Search around the house for resources that could represent the various items, a box for the till, upside down box covered with a cloth to display items, paper and pens.
Writing ideas your child could contribute: shop sign, open and closed signs, shopping list, labels for the items, price tags. Can you child write some rules around the shop? For example, wear a face mask, keep your distance – No Kids Allowed! (From our Jack and the Beanstalk story.)
Remember, encourage your child to ‘have a go’ at writing. Promote independent writing and confidence in writing skills. Encourage your child to ‘sound out’ words and use their sound mat to find the sounds they can hear. Celebrate emergent writing, your child may just begin by only writing some of the sounds they can hear.
Maths ideas: writing numerals for the price tags, counting the correct amount of items requested by the customer, deciding upon open/closed times. Perhaps you could add some real money (1p, 2p or 5p coins) or decide upon something to represent the money eg. beads.
Maths
Roll a dice and balance game
You can use the ‘beanstalk in the clouds’ suggested yesterday for this game. Or just use a cardboard tube standing upright and balance a paper plate on top.
What to do:
Gather together a collection of small objects eg. small bricks, miniature toys, pieces of pasta.
Roll a dice – how many dots can you see?
Balance this amount of objects on the plate.
The challenge is to balance the objects without the plate falling off the tube.
Keep going until the plate falls.
How many objects did you manage to balance?
Recognising a small number of (a group of items) at a glance without counting is a key mathematical skill. Playing games with dice really helps develop this skill. If you have any board games, these are an excellent resource to support the development of maths.
You could extend your child by using two dice and encourage addition.
Celebrating our learning
Thank you to those parents who responded to my email regarding home photos. I’ve decided to delay this week’s learning celebration until I have gathered together the responses. Watch this space!
Before we begin today’s home learning, I would like to direct you to the Memo Section of Tapestry. I have set an ebook home reading task aimed at your child’s reading level. Please read with your child at home and post a record of your child’s home reading on Tapestry.
Children’s Mental Health Week
I’d like to draw your attention to the following links:
Today’s activity is to dance to a song that makes you happy!
Communication and Language/Literacy
Jack and the Beanstalk
Try some substitutions to the Jack and the Beanstalk story. As mentioned before, the easiest substitutions to make are places, characters or names. A simple substitution for Jack and the Beanstalk might start like this:
Once upon a time there was a very busy boy/girl called (your child’s name) ………
Then continue the story but use your child’s name throughout instead of Jack.
Once your child gets the idea, here are some other suggestions:
• Change the name of The Giant • Change the beanstalk eg. ladder, stairs • Change the castle eg. spaceship
Perhaps your child could draw a new story map for their new story.
Letters and Sounds
Flipping Phonics!
You will need:
Word bag New high frequency words/sounds to add to your child’s word bag are posted on the Memo section of Tapestry. Frying pan Fish slice or spatula
What to do:
Place a selection of words in the pan facing upwards.
Your child chooses a word by reading it.
Your child flips the word with the fish slice/spatula and says the word.
To challenge your child:
Place words face down one at a time (choose just a small selection).
Ask your child to write the word.
Your child flips the word to check their spelling.
Maths
Bank the difference game
This game will help your child use counting to compare and find a numerical difference.
Watch the following video – how to play bank the difference:
Expressive Arts and Design
Make a beanstalk in the clouds
You will need:
Kitchen roll or toilet roll
Paper (ideally green)
Scissors
Paper plate
Cotton Wool
PVA glue
What to do:
Draw simple leaf shapes on the paper
Ask your child to cut out the leaf shapes
If you have paint, paint the tube green
Stick the leaf shapes onto the green tube
Stick cotton wool onto the paper plate (to represent clouds)
Your child may also wish to draw a simple castle to add to the plate
Balance the plate onto the tube
This activity will help develop your child’s scissor skills. We focus on scissor skills frequently in Reception in preparation for Year 1 activities.
Balancing the plate requires some problem solving skills. Your child will discover that the plate needs to be balanced in a certain way to stay on top of the tube. Do not stick the paper plate on at this stage because tomorrow we will use our beanstalk in the clouds for a maths activity that involves balancing.
I look forward to hearing all about your children’s learning on Tapestry.
I hope you all had a fabulous weekend. This week we will be celebrating Children’s Mental Health Week, playing letters and sounds games and begin a new RE topic – Eucharist: Relating. We will also spend one more week exploring The Jack and the Beanstalk story.
Please find below my plan for the week. You will need to collect an empty kitchen roll, paper plate, cotton wood and pva glue for making our castle on Tuesday. On Thursday will be using jelly beans for our maths game.
Children’s Mental Health Week – 1- 7th February 2021
At St Adrian’s, we are committed to promoting positive mental health and emotional wellbeing to all students, their families and members of staff and governors. We are proud to support Children’s Mental Health Week and the theme this year is ‘express yourself’.
Expressing yourself is about finding ways to share feelings, thoughts, or ideas, through creativity. This could be through art, music, writing and poetry, dance and drama, photography and film, and doing activities that make you feel good.
Every child in each class are being asked to complete an assignment linked to Children’s Mental Health week and post a photograph to celebrate their home learning from the week. You will notice from my plan that I will set an activity each day. Please choose at least one activity to post on Tapestry during the week.
Today’s activity is linked to PE. Take a picture of your child doing something outside or inside. For example, a nature walk or taking part in exercise. Below are some suggestions for indoor movement:
This is a game we play during PE – it’s a good ‘warm up’ game. Your child should be familiar with the game.
What to do:
Ask your child to move around (walk, run, hop, jump etc) until you shout ‘stop’
Ask your child to do a funny position with their body to match a bean name.
Ask your child to move around again until you shout ‘stop’ again.
Ask your child to do a funny move to match a different bean name.
Continue ……
This game works best outside. Each time you ask your child to move around, change the instruction eg. walk, jump, hop
Here are the different bean positions:
1. Runner Beans: Run on the spot 2. Broad Beans: Do a big, broad star shape 3. Baked Beans: Lie on the floor, curled up in a ball 4. Kidney Beans: Make a curvy C-shape with your body 5. Butter Beans: Pretend the floor is slippery 6. Jumping Beans: Jump up and down 7. String Beans: Stretch up tall like a pencil 8. Beans on Toast: Lay on the floor with arms and legs stretched out wide
Letters and Sounds
Wanted Poster
Ask your child to write a ‘Wanted Poster’ for either Jack or The Giant. If you have printing facilities, I have added a template that you may wish to use. Otherwise, just ask your child to draw the poster.
Talk to your child about what they could write. Here are some suggestions which support phonics:
The Giant
He is big.
He is tall.
He has long legs.
He took the hen.
Jack
He is small.
He can run.
He can chop.
Remind your child of tricky word ‘all’ when writing ‘tall’ and ‘small’.
Encourage your child to use capital letters and full stops.
Encourage your child to use their sound mat to support their writing.
Maths
I spy game – making comparisons
Play a ‘I spy’ game where you ask your child to spot objects and make comparisons.
Look for real objects around the house eg. “I spy with my little eye 6 cushions and 4 chairs”. Ask your child how many more cushions?
Gather together a collection of toys “I spy with my little eye 2 dolls and 4 animals” How many more animals?
To support your child, you could line the objects up next to each other to show the comparison.
Take turns playing the game with your child.
For Challenge
Perhaps your child could add the object together. How many altogether?
Use larger numbers to extend your child.
Maybe pretend to see some objects from Jack and the Beanstalk story “I spy 2 golden eggs and 8 magic beans”. Perhaps use bricks or pieces of pasta to represent the eggs and beans.
Religious Education
Eucharist: relating
This week we are beginning a new RE Topic – Eucharist: relating. Please see our Foundation Stage RE blog for details. Here is the link:
Today we will explore how and why people gather together.
Talk to your child about activities that are better done together eg. playing a game. Why is it more fun together?
Talk to your child about things we can do alone. How does it feel to be alone?
Of course, being on your own can be something we prefer. For example, praying is a very special time we may do alone. However, the idea of this discussion is to help your child understand the collaborative nature of this topic. Draw your child’s attention to times when the parish family gather together in church eg. wedding, baptism, Christmas and Easter celebrations.
Scribe your child’s ideas.
Make a chart of ‘All that we do together’ as a family at home.
Make a chart of ‘All that we do together’ as a parish family in church.
We played this ‘asking questions’ game when we were learning The Gingerbread Man story. We’ve already explored the Jack and the Beanstalk story with lots of reflective questions. I’ve compiled some more specific questions relating to our Jack and the Beanstalk story which will deepen your child’s learning.
What did Jack’s mother ask him to do at the market?
Where did Jack meet the lady who gave him the beans?
What did Jack give to the lady he met?
When Jack got home with the beans what did his mother do?
When Jack got up in the morning what did he see?
How did Jack get into the castle?
What did Jack do with the gold coins?
How did Jack get away from The Giant?
What happened to The Giant?
What did Jack and his mother do after The Giant fell on their house?
Literacy
Retell the story of Jack and the Beanstalk
Have a go at using your story map and begin encouraging your child to retell the story independently.
Here’s a reminder of how you can develop your child’s story telling skills. Begin by telling the story together. Point to the story map as you retell the story. Once your child seems confident, you can start to withdraw from saying the words. Maybe you can just mouth the words or just keep prompting with the actions. If your child falters in their telling, you can always leap in and keep the story going. Tell your child ‘When I stop, you carry on’. The aim is to move from you being the dominant teller to becoming a listener. Your child moves from being the listener to becoming the teller.
I have sent a transcript of the story through Tapestry under Memos.
Find an audience for the story
As mentioned previously, try encouraging your child to tell the story to someone else. Maybe your child could tell their story to a collection of toys, telephone or Zoom a family member, record the story on your phone (with supervision) or set up a theatre performance.
Letters and Sounds
Today’s new sound – ‘or’ (digraph two letters but one sound)
This video introduces the ‘or’ sound.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JXB3b8Sk6OU
The following video supports blending and reading ‘or’ sound words.
Below is the action for the ‘or’ sound.
Show your child how to write ‘or’ using the correct letter formation.
Letter formation for ‘o’ and ‘r’ can be found in your child’s letters and sounds book.
Encourage your child to ‘have a go’ at writing the ‘or’ sound.
For challenge
Only if your child is ready. Write the following words:
For extra challenge
Write a funny sentence and draw a picture to accompany the sentence.
Maths
Build a tall beanstalk
This is a fairly simple game. Use whatever construction toy you have at home. Play together ‘Who can build the tallest beanstalk?’
Make comparisons between your beanstalk and your child’s.
Whose beanstalk is the tallest?
Whose beanstalk is the shortest?
How many more bricks is the tallest beanstalk?
If you add bricks to the shortest tower, how many more bricks would you need to make the beanstalks equal?
If you took bricks away from the tallest tower, how many bricks would you need to take away to make them equal?
You could also talk about doubling or add the bricks in each beanstalk together.
British Values
Democracy within the early years is all about teaching children that their opinions are important and that each child’s thoughts and feelings should be listened to and valued. Democracy is also about teaching children that sometimes we are given the power to choose and make decisions as individuals and as a group. Turn taking and sharing all come under democracy, much of democracy is promoted through personal, social and emotional development within your child’s curriculum.
Although this appears to be a fairly difficult concept for children to understand, it is very easy to promote and much of this is done during daily practice at home. Here are some ideas:
Polling station – the family vote for their favourite film to watch, story to hear or snack choice.
Turn taking – play games that involve taking turns, listening to others.
Emotions – help your child identify their emotions and talk about reasons for these emotions. Many emotions will be displayed by children in times when group decisions are being made. Identifying emotions is an important step in children being able to manage their emotions.
Thank you for reading my blog and please don’t hesitate to comment or make suggestions about the blogs through Tapestry.
I hope you are all keeping safe and healthy at home and enjoying learning with your family.
Here is today’s home learning.
Communication and Language
Word webs
Let’s do another word web to continue to build upon your child’s vocabulary. I think there are many words we can explore in the story of Jack and the Beanstalk. For example,
The following video supports blending and reading ‘ar’ sound words.
Below is the action for the long ‘ar’ – pretend you’re at the dentist, open mouth wide and say ‘ar’.
Show your child how to write ‘ar’ using the correct letter formation.
Letter formation for ‘a’ and ‘r’ can be found in your child’s letters and sounds book.
Encourage your child to ‘have a go’ at writing the ‘ar’ sound.
For challenge
Only if your child is ready. Write the following words:
For extra challenge
Write a sentence and draw a picture to accompany the sentence.
Literacy
Story Map – Jack and the Beanstalk
Watch my Jack and the Beanstalk video first. See yesterday and Monday’s blog.
Once your child has listened to the story of Jack and the Beanstalk, draw a story map together.
Below is my Jack and the Beanstalk story map.
Display the story map in a prominent position where it can be seen. It can then be used as a visual reminder for your child when retelling the story.
Maths
One small step for Jack, one giant step outside!
What to do:
You may wish to prepare this activity for tomorrow to surprise your child.
Make a giant footprint ideally outside in some mud or sand. If you do not have a garden just cut out a large footprint from a piece of paper and leave it by the door – or the old Santa trick in flour or talcum powder. Try to make the footprint as large as it can possibly be.
Write a letter from the giant:
Pretend to find the letter from The Giant and read it to your child.
Ask your child to look for the evidence.
Once the footprint is discovered, talk about it eg. ‘How long is the footprint?’ ‘How wide is the footprint?’ ‘How big do you think The Giant actually is?’ ‘Show me how long a toe might be!’
Ask your child to wonder how tall The Giant might be if this is his footprint. Encourage your child to visualise The Giant’s height by comparing it to buildings near your home.
A good opportunity for you to model mathematical words such as wide, long, height.
Encourage your child to measure the footprint. At this stage, children begin measuring using non-standards units such as forks, bricks, sticks etc.
Your child could use their measuring object to measure other items around the house. For example, ‘The Giant’s footprint is 6 forks long, the table is 10 forks long’. ‘I wonder which is the longest?’ ‘How do you know?’
Make a story chair/story area
Create a specially decorated chair or story area with your child. This then becomes a special place for your child to tell all sorts of stories. All you need to do is choose a chair and drape different fabrics over it or your child may wish to make some decorations for the chair. Maybe add dressing up clothes, fairy lights, some writing materials etc. Of course, you could also use the castle (den) suggested in my blog yesterday.
I look forward to hearing all about your child’s home learning on Tapestry.
Today our home learning will also celebrate the fantastic learning you have been doing at home. I have been overwhelmed by your enthusiasm and energy. Not only have you embraced my home learning, but posted additional learning activities some of which I’d like to share for extra inspiration.
Communication and Language
Making predictions
You will recall this activity posted previously. However, I thought I’d repeat it because it is so important in terms of your child’s reading skills.
Read a story together. This could be a story book or maybe your child’s reading book.
Read a few pages to introduce the characters.
At key places, stop and before you turn the page ask ‘What do you think might happen next?’
When you read the next page ask ‘Was your prediction right?’
If your child needs a little support, ask more direct questions eg. Goldilocks and The Three Bears – ‘Whose house do you think she will find?’ or offer alternatives for your child to choose from.
Literacy
Jack and the Beanstalk – joining in
We explored this activity during our Gingerbread Man story telling activities. Hopefully, your child will be growing in confidence and, with daily repetition, can begin to join in with the story. Watch the story of Jack and the Beanstalk again.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=00BbNDgeBtg&t=52s
Talk about the story and ask questions to make sure your child fully understands the story. Here are some example questions:
What do you like best about the story?
Was there anything you didn’t like about the story?
Did you notice any patterns (repetition) in the story eg. ‘Jack opened his eyes wide in amazement’?
Was there anything in the story that you’re not sure about?
What would you have done if you were …. Jack’s mum, Jack, the Giant?
How would you have felt if you were …. Jack’s mum, Jack, the Giant?
If you could change one thing in the story, what would it be?
If you have a different version of Jack and the Beanstalk, talk about the differences – which ending does your child prefer?
Letters and Sounds
Today’s new sound – short ‘oo’ (digraph two letters but one sound)
There are two types of ‘oo’. A long ‘oo’ (boot) and a short ‘oo’ (look). We are going to learn the short ‘oo’ today.
This video introduces the short ‘oo’ sound.
Below is the action for the long and short ‘oo’:
Show your child how to write ‘oo’ using the correct letter formation.
Letter formation for ‘o’ can be found in your child’s letters and sounds book.
Encourage your child to ‘have a go’ at writing the ‘oo’ sound.
For challenge
Only if your child is ready. Write the following words:
For extra challenge
Write a funny sentence and draw a picture to accompany the sentence.
The following video brings together both the long ‘oo’ and short ‘oo’.
Maths
Golden eggs game
Our version of the story doesn’t include golden eggs or a harp. This is for simplicity at this initial stage of becoming familiar with the story. Next week, I will be encouraging your child to adapt the story. Perhaps you could explain to your child about different versions of a traditional tale.
This game will help your child explore addition and subtraction.
You will need some ‘golden eggs’ – don’t worry about looking for a beanstalk to climb! These could be boiled eggs, crumpled up pieces of paper, potatoes, beads, pieces of pasta, Lego bricks – children are very good at suspending belief and letting their imagination running wild.
What to do:
Place 10 eggs in a container (basket).
Tell your child that the goose has laid these eggs for the giant.
Tell your child that Jack takes two eggs and count the eggs as they are taken out.
Ask your child ‘How many eggs are in the giant’s basket now?’
Encourage your child to explain why they think there are 8 eggs left.
Model your own mathematical thinking if your child needs support to explain. Use your fingers to show your child.
Check your child’s answer.
Continue the activity by placing eggs into the basket or removing some.
Perhaps pretend to be Jack creeping up to take the eggs. Maybe your child could cover their eyes, count how many eggs are left and work out how many eggs Jack took.
You may wish to ask your child to challenge you or make suggestions about the number of eggs that the goose lays or Jack steals.
Vary the amount of eggs depending on your child’s understanding.
To help your child visualise the numbers in a context that may be more familiar to them, use an egg carton to hold the eggs instead of a basket.
For support
Begin with 5 eggs in the basket.
Expressive Arts
Make a castle for the giant or Jack’s house
Acting out stories really helps children become familiar with story sequences. It also enables children to put themselves into particular characters’ shoes and imagine how things would look from that point of view. Through drama and role-play children can imagine characters’ body language, behaviour and tones of voice in ways that they can draw on later when they write.
Encourage your child to create a castle in a similar way they may make a den. Maybe you could also make Jack’s house. Act out the story together.
If you have a bunk bed or a cabin bed, you’ve got a ready-made den structure just waiting to be transformed.
Seats can become walls. Get a few dining room chairs or two sofas? Simply arrange them back-to-back with space in between for your castle/house. Then all you need is a big sheet or blanket to drape over the top as a ceiling and you’ve got the beginnings of a castle/house.
Tables act as all-in-one walls and ceilings, meaning you won’t need as many sheets and blankets to finish off the main structure. You can also join up lots of different tables to make quick den extensions – just add blanket walls and you’re done!
Of course, once a den is made I’m sure your child will have lots of other play ideas. Reading a book in a cosy den is a lovely activity. In school we sometimes leave some books in a den which really encourages the children to read.
Celebrating our learning
Writing for fun – home cinema and party time.
Subtraction game. Set out two teams with a flag at each end. Each player rolls a dice. The highest number wins each turn. Subtract the lower number from the higher number. The resulting figure is how many soldiers get knocked down.
Reading time.
Understanding addition using objects.
Being creative. A windmill for a mouse and Stick Man.
