Year 4 showed their passion and understanding of what makes a good community today in their class assembly. It was a reflection on what we have been learning the past weeks, including our trips to Young Voices and the cathedral. The children took on board all the advice and encouragement from our practises – to say what they needed to say with meaning, with the precise choice of words down to them. I was particularly proud of the confidence they showed, owning the floor and looking out for each other with the “props” and microphone. It was a fantastic start to the week and created a warm glow of pride in year 4 to counterbalance the below freezing temperatures in the morning.
We also enjoyed marking the Lunar New Year, with children sharing their excitement at receiving their red envelopes and explaining traditions to us
The Magic Paintbrush is an inspirational read from Julia Donaldson. With her magic paintbrush, Shen can paint steaming pots full of fish and oysters to feed the hungry people in her village. When the evil emperor commands Shen to paint gold for him, she is determined to keep her promise to paint only for the poor. This week we painted only ‘for the poor’ and just like in the book everything became real. We also sorted Useful and Not Useful things and labelled them all by ourselves. We had some simple words like hat and box, and not so simple like shrimp and ring. Have a look at our writing books…. we did an amazing job:
As we are so confident blending sounds, reading the words and labelling everything Shen painted wasn’t tricky at all. Fantastic blending reception!
Little Wandle In Little Wandle this week we’ve learnt 4 new digraphs:
We were also busy learning new tricky words and reviewing previously thought. We had tricky words printed on mittens and the children had to dry them on the washing line:
In Maths this week, the children continued to engage with activities that draw attention to the purpose of counting – to find out ‘how many’ objects there are. We were naming the objects being counted to emphasise the numerosity of the set, e.g. Would you please collect 6 crayons and bring them to me?. We were also rehearsing the order of the first 5 numbers and understanding that the position each number holds in our number sequence does not change.
Dates:
30.01.23 – Inset day Friday reading mornings – 8:45am to 9:00 am.
Have an amazing weekend! Looking forward seeing you all on Monday. Mrs Solakova
Another busy week in year 3! From investigating the permeability in science to division in maths, to writing reports in English we’ve covered it all it seems in year 3.
We started off with dividing 2-digit numbers by 1-digit numbers without renaming using the part whole model. Then we used diens and the part whole model to help us divide a 2-digit number by 1-digit number with renaming.
In English we are looking at the text The Pied Piper of Hamelin by Michael Morpurgo. We are enjoying this story. In our writing we have focused on using conjunctions and paragraphing. We researched rat facts for our non- chronological report.
In science we had a visitor talk to us about food waste. We shocked by the statistics! We created posters and discussed ways we can reduce our food waste.
This week we looked at the story ‘Jack Frost’ and funnily enough he came to St Adrians! The children made their own Jack Frost pictures and I think they are fantastic!
We have decided to update our self portraits that are in the cloakroom – this time we are using paper plates and variety of collage materials, do you like them?
Photos from this week:
This half term for snack, once a week we will be having toast. The children did a really good job of spreading their butter onto their toast today.
Thank you to all the parents who joined us for reading morning this morning.
Please remember, water bottle should not be kept in book bags, we want to ensure children’s art work and library books stay safe and dry.
Year Six are back in to the swing of the new term, and what a busy term it promises to be.
It is good to see the children working every day to learn more and respond to the teaching and support we are able to give them in school.
In our Relationships and Health lessons this term, the children are looking forward to learning about themselves, their bodies and their health. We began by reminding ourselves that each one of us is creared and loved by God. Take a look at some of our self-portraits we drew as we thought about this.
In Art, we are learning about some of the significant artists of the Rennaisance. We have used images of Michelangelo’s David to inspire and develop our own sketching and drawing skills.
In RE, our theme for our first topic of this term is Sources. We are learning more about the Bible, but began by reflecting on how so many kinds of book enrich our lives.
Year 4 have had a great day out. As well as the learning, the walks to and from the cathedral were energising and beautiful, in the frost. We were pushed for time on the way home and everyone strode out, making it back to school more quickly than we’ve ever done before. Thanks, as always, to the fantastic parents who came and helped and without whom we couldn’t do these trips. The day included exploring the cathedral; finding out about St Alban, the first British Christian martyr; making and tasting typical Roman food; learning about Roman soldiers and their equipment; and finding out about the sorts of objects which are found in archeological digs. Oh – and a Roman soldier came to see us! He wasn’t very polite about us British, especially girls with long red hair for some reason. He seemed to me missing Rome, with it’s warm weather, elegant buildings and good food… fighting Celts painted blue isn’t as good as being at home, apparently…Here are some images from the day.
It was so lovely to see everyone after the holidays and hear all the amazing stories and experiences the children have had during the festive season. I would also like to take the opportunity and thank you all for the lovely gifts. We are beyond thankful!
In RE last week we talked about Epiphany and the children created an amazing Epiphany display. Have a look yourself:
This week we began a new topic and in the next 4 weeks we will be talking about Local Church – Community/Celebrating. The children will be learning that the Christians belong to the local church community – the parish, which celebrates in a variety of ways. That they celebrate tradition and story and find their meaning in Jesus. So, as part of the new topic we held a special celebration, back to school party, and what is a party without a cake… or in our case without a cupcake. The children were busy mixing all the ingredients and baking delicious cupcakes:
Next week we will write our very own invitations!
Little Wandle In Little Wandle this week we began learning phase 3 sounds. Please check your child’s pink folder for all phase 3 sounds sheet and a homework.
This week we introduced 3 new digraphs and a trigraph.
As always I highly recommend that you practice the new digraphs/ trigraph every day, as this would really build fluency and will boost your child’s confidence. No new tricky sounds have been taught this week, because we are currently reviewing the ones already learned in Autumn term.
Maths This week, the children used their perceptual subitising skills (seeing the quantity without counting) in increasingly complex arrangements, moving from dots in a line and arrangements of 2, to a focus on standard dice arrangements. Towards the end of the week we played lots of fun dice games like snakes and ladders and the children were encouraged to subitised the dice dots instead of counting. If you happen to play a dice game over the weekend, please take some time and post it on Tapestry so we can celebrate in class.
Our new role play is up and running and the children are having so much fun selling and buying healthy fruit and veg. As you all know we love learning while playing, so our Market helps us talk about healthy and unhealthy choices, lot’s of counting, measuring and social skills are involved in our Play. Here are some pictures of our busy, busy day 🙂
And finally please check your child’s book bag for Spring term homework grid. You are welcome to do all the activities or choose at least 3 of them. Then you can either post them on Tapestry, email a photo to the office or bring a copy to school. Please let me know if you have any difficulties accessing Tapestry.
Have a fantastic weekend. Looking forward seeing you all on a Monday! Mrs Solakova
We have been continuing with our Winter topic this week and we looked at the book ‘One Snowy Night’ by Nick Butterworth. We learnt who Percy is and what he does in the park he looks after. The children enjoyed this book and liked the bit at the end where the animals hide in different areas of Percy’s hut to keep warm!
In RE this half term we are thinking about celebrations. On Wednesday we decided to have a back to school party and talked about the things that would happen if you went to a party.
We would love to see pictures of any celebrations the children have been too – parties, weddings, festival etc! We would love the children to share them with their friends and put them up on our RE display
Key Dates
Monday 30th January – INSET Day
Monday 13th – Friday 17th February – Half term
Thursday 23rd February – Nursery Parent Consultations
Please remember children need spare school uniform at school – please include socks!
We have had a lot of leaking water bottles, to protect our lovely books and children’s artwork please could water bottles not be kept in book bags.
Happy New Year and welcome back Nursery children! The children were excited to return to their classroom to see their friends yesterday and we had a surprise – Santa has kindly given us some new toys which the children enjoyed exploring.
Key Dates/Information
Monday and Wednesday are our PE days – Children do not need PE Kit as they will do PE in their school uniform. Please keep practising taking off and putting on both socks and shoes.
We will still have our Library slot on a Friday morning so please ensure library books come into school each Friday.
Reading morning every Friday 8:45-9.00 – maybe a grandparent would like to come one week?
Monday 30th January – INSET day
Monday 13th – Friday 17th February – Half term.
Thursday 23rd February – Nursery Parent Consultations
Friday 31st March – Last day of term
Winter
This half term our topic is ‘Winter’. We will be reading stories linked to Winter and be thinking about the clothes we need to wear and why. We will look at the North Pole and the South Pole and talk about the animals that live there. Our new role play for this half term is ‘The North Pole’ where the children can spend time in the igloo, read stories, play with small world polar animals and enjoy the campfire.
Thank you for all the Kris Kringle gifts that came into Nursery on the last week of term – they looked lovely under the tree. The children were really excited to receive their present from a friend in their class.
It really has been a great term, the children have settled in really well and I am so proud of how far they have come. They have gotten to grips with the routines within Nursery brilliantly and I am really looking forward to Spring term.
In the past week and a bit of term the children coped brilliant with the unexpected visitors we had, they performed their Christmas Nativity, had a visit from Santa and enjoyed a fantastic Grandparents Tea morning in which they sang so beautifully – they definitely deserve a well earned rest.
I want to wish all the Nursery children and their families a very Merry Christmas.
