Learning in Year 1 this week

Week beginning Monday, 16th March 2020

Below is a summary of the learning taking place in Year 1 this week.

English: This week, brings us to the end of our sequence based around the text Katie Morag and the Two Grandmothers. The children have planned their own ending which is supporting them to write their own ending for the book, before having the published ending revealed to them. They shall then peer-edit their work to check for correct punctuation, spelling and look at re-writing a sentence to improve it.

Math’s: We are currently discovering Addition and Subtraction Word Problems. The children are encouraged to recognise what the word problem is asking them, to solve the problem and to use resources to support their working out.

Science: This week on our current topic on Plants, we shall be looking at the parts of a plant. They shall be dissecting a tulip to label the individual parts correctly. An on-going activity within the classroom, is also to record observations about their sunflower which has been growing for 3 weeks now. We also check in on our wide range of vegetables that we have growing around the room.

D&T: The children shall be carrying on creating their Islands that they have designed using junk modelling. We have looked slightly into ratio and discussed which features should be bigger/smaller than others.

Geography: Based around our current topic on The UK, this week we shall be developing our understanding of where The UK is in relation to other countries. We are going to travel up in a hot air balloon (power of the imagination) flying over the school, landmarks and human/physical features to create journey lines, using where we travel on a map.

Computing: Continuing developing the children into TV Chefs, we shall be developing our recording skills using an ipad to film giving instructions for a recipe.

RE: This week, we have looked at the beginning of Lent and discussed if any children have a Lenten promise. The children then wrote a Lenten promise which was added to our Tree ‘Remember Jesus and help me to change and grow‘. We shall also be furthering our understanding that Lent is an opportunity to change.

Phonics: Majority of children in their Phonics groups have been learning and continuing to progress their understanding of the slit digraphs.

Learning in Year 2 this week

English

Mrs Hayes’s English group: We are finishing our teaching sequence on Wolves. The children are writing their own non-fiction booklet on Wolves. Our spelling learning focus includes reinforcing the Year 1 and Year 2 common exception words as well as single and plural spelling patterns i.e. scarf/scarves; puppy/puppies; bridge/bridges etc.

Maths

Mrs Hayes’s Maths Group: We are finishing off our topic on Fractions and beginning our learning on Money. We will be working with coins to solve word problems up to £1. We thought about all the different ways that we can pay for a £1 Sport Relief badge.

Mr King’s Maths Group have been doing it the other way around! Having finished off our topic on money we are now starting to look at fractions. So far we have looked at recognising equal parts, then finding one half, one quarter and three quarters of shapes. We plan to go on and look at finding thirds of a shape, looking at how two quarters and one half are equivalent, and then learning to find halves, quarters and thirds of amounts (e.g. half of 8 is 4, one quarter of 8 is 2).

Science

We are continuing with our learning on Plants. We carefully drew and labelled a strawberry plant and predicted what will happen as the plant grows through the next month. Next, we will be exploring the marigold plants that were sown by the children six weeks ago. The children each have their own seedling (3-4cm tall at the moment) and they will track it’s growth across the next month on a bar chart. Building on from learning that took place last autumn, the children will also set up an investigation to explore what happens to plants grown without water or plants grown without light.

Computing

We are introducing our We are Programmers unit, currently focusing on directions i.e. Go forward two steps, make a quarter turn to the right, go forward three steps etc.

Design and Technology

We have been setting up our sewing kits, ready to begin learning how to do a running stitch. As we will not be having parent helpers in school for the foreseeable future, children will bring these kits home to complete them there. If you child is not in school to receive a kit, feel free to practise running stitch on material or binca. The aim of the sewing activity is that the children will learn how to thread a needle independently, tie a knot in the end of the wool and then complete a running stitch.

History

We have been exploring a hundred year old family photo to see what we can find out. We have been thinking about the questions ‘What do you know/think/want to find out in relation to this photo.

Religious Education

We have just started our new topic: Opportunities. We are thinking about how Mothering Sunday gives us an opportunity to think about why our mother is so special to us. We have written messages relating to this theme and are practising our Mother’s Day song. During the week, we will be thinking about our journey through Lent and renewing our wish to help others.

How to access our Google Classroom

To access Google classroom, children will need to sign in using their school Google account.

Visit google.com and click ‘Sign in’ in the top-right of the webpage.

If you, or someone using the same device, already has a Google account, you will need to add your child’s school account and switch between them before accessing the Classroom.

How to add Google accounts

Open the Chrome web browser.
On the top right, select your profile image or initial.
On the menu, choose Add account.
Follow the instructions to add your child’s Google account.
Children’s school Google usernames all end with the domain, @stadrians.herts.sch.uk
Your child should know the first part of their username and the password.
For security, I cannot add that information here. It might be worth phoning a friend if in doubt!

Once you have, set up your child’s Google account. You may need to switch between accounts for them to access the Google Classroom.

How to switch between Google accounts

In the top right, click your profile photo or email address.
Click the account you want to use.
A new window will open for this account.

Year 2 liturgy

On Wednesday, the children celebrated a liturgy with Father Francis. The focus of the liturgy was thanksgiving and the children enjoyed planning prayers, readings and hymns that they would use within the liturgy. It was a joyous occasion and the children prayed thoughtfully and sang with gusto!

How to access our Google Classroom

In the event of school closure, I am hoping to provide activities via the Google classroom. It might be worth checking that your child is able to access this in case we are instructed by the Government to close in the coming weeks. Further details can be found below.

To access Google classroom, children will need to sign in using their school Google account.

Visit google.com and click ‘Sign in’ in the top-right of the webpage.

If you, or someone using the same device, already has a Google account, you will need to add your child’s school account and switch between them before accessing the Classroom.

How to add Google accounts

Open the Chrome web browser.
On the top right, select your profile image or initial.
On the menu, choose Add account.
Follow the instructions to add your child’s Google account.
Children’s school Google usernames all end with the domain, @stadrians.herts.sch.uk
Your child should know the first part of their username and the password.
For security, I cannot add that information here. Further details can be found in your child’s reading log.

Once you have, set up your child’s Google account. You may need to switch between accounts for them to access the Google Classroom.

How to switch between Google accounts

In the top right, click your profile photo or email address.
Click the account you want to use.
A new window will open for this account.

Accessing the Google Classroom

Visit classroom.google.com

Protected: Y6 home learning

How to access our Google Classroom

To access Google classroom, children will need to sign in using their school Google account.

Visit google.com and click ‘Sign in’ in the top-right of the webpage.

If you, or someone using the same device, already has a Google account, you will need to add your child’s school account and switch between them before accessing the Classroom.

How to add Google accounts

Open the Chrome web browser.
On the top right, select your profile image or initial.
On the menu, choose Add account.
Follow the instructions to add your child’s Google account.
Children’s school Google usernames all end with the domain, @stadrians.herts.sch.uk
Your child should know the first part of their username and the password.
For security, I cannot add that information here. It might be worth phoning a friend if in doubt!

Once you have, set up your child’s Google account. You may need to switch between accounts for them to access the Google Classroom.

How to switch between Google accounts

In the top right, click your profile photo or email address.
Click the account you want to use.
A new window will open for this account.

Accessing the Google Classroom

Visit classroom.google.com or follow the link in the side bar.

Celebrating World Book Day

On Thursday, Reception and Year 1 came together to share books. Both classrooms were transformed into reading dens for the children, in pairs, to take it in turns to read a book aloud.

Hopefully we can make this a more frequent event as the children loved it!! It was definitely reading for pleasure!

Eco Team 2023-2024

The children in their classes used democracy and voted to choose who would represent them in the Eco Team and we are all very proud to have been chosen as our class Eco representatives. We are passionate about making a difference to our school and homes by making sure that we do all we can to spread good ideas about how to look after our beautiful planet.

Our first mission was to plant some trees to help the wildlife around the school grounds. We chose a great site for the trees, where they wouldn’t get mown down by the lawn mower and ordered a selection of trees that would be great for birds, butterflies and bees. When the saplings arrived, we got all the resources ready (compost, trowels, gloves, wheelbarrows etc!) and taught each class how to plant the trees Over the next few years, we will care for them to ensure that they grow as big and strong as the trees already in our school grounds. Here is one class in action!

Here we are, ready to plant.
These silver birch trees were planted ten years ago.
Into the ground goes the new sapling.
We made sure that there was lots of new soil around the tree.
The ball on the end of the cane is to stop the lawnmowers from accidentally mowing our new trees!

Here are our plans for 2024:

Plant new trees and care for them
Use both sides of your piece of paper: Set up a poster campaign to remind children not to waste paper as it means that more trees have to be chopped down
Look after the wildlife in our school grounds by putting up bird feeders, butterfly ponds and renewing our bug hotels.
Keep the playground tidy by doing litter picks around the school grounds and encouraging everyone to use the bins.
Reduce the use of plastic around the school by encouraging children to use re-usable plastic pots for their daily snack instead of a new plastic bag every day.
Keep our air cleaner and use less petrol by walking to school more. We will be telling our friends about the Walk to School week in May and then try to persuade them to walk to school at least once a week, even if is just by parking a little bit further away from school and then walking from there!
Even more ideas to follow …

Our ‘Clothing and Shoes’ recyclying bin

Last May, working with ‘Recycled Clothing Banks’, we recieved a new addition to the playground: our clothing recycling bin and it have been wildly successful.
We are passionate about promoting recycling at St Adrians and we encourage you to keep donating clothes, towels, sheets, blankets, curtains or even shoes!