Just a quick reminder that the children can bring party clothes, in a carrier bag, into school tomorrow. They can put on their dancing shoes after lunch and get ready to strut some moves!

As the end of the term approaches, you’d think it was time to wind down. Well, not in Year 1!

The children have continued on with their learning and we have turned some Christmas crafts into great learning opportunities.

Maths with gingerbread men?

This was an opportunity to create some repeating patterns, some symmetry, counting and even some addition and subtraction.

Careful cutting

Whilst making their Christmas cards, the children were encouraged to cut things out for themselves.

Using a pair of scissors can be tricky. However, all the effort was worth it when snowflakes appeared like magic!

Threading salt dough

Another craft activity we have completed is making decorations with salt dough. This involved careful painting of both sides which was a challenge. The children worked out that asking a friend to hold the decoration whilst they painted the back was a good solution. Everyone threaded some ribbon through the hole and some attempted to tie a knot in the ribbon.

The four seasons

These calendars were created with a theme of the four seasons. The children thought carefully about each season throughout the year. Then, using the image of a tree they added detail according to the relevant time of year. Lots of colour and some very detailed painting.

It’s been an absolute pleasure to have been working with the Year 1 children. Over the last few months, I have seen talented artists, creative writers, resilient mathematicians, enthusiastic readers and much more. A change of adult can be quite unsettling for some children. I have to say, the whole class have coped well with this and the changes have not affected their high standard of learning. In fact, I have been amazed by the quality of the work produced by the children.

‘I respect my communities and other communities,’ has been the focus of our Living and Learning sessions this week.  In class, the children discussed what the community means to them. They were given the start of a sentence and were then asked to complete it, making sure they included reasons for their ideas.

My community is important to me because …….

I know that different religions are celebrated in my community because……

I think that our community is………

We would like to see more ………………

I show respect to my community and others by …………

Moortown community is ………………….

Some of the children walked down to the Chapel Allerton community to visit a new children’s bookshop.

Set in the heart of Chapel Allerton, The Little Bookshop is Leeds’ only independent children’s bookshop. Opening its doors in October 2017, The Little Bookshop is a place to explore literature and illustration with your child. With regular story times, author events and a cafe serving up fresh and wholesome food we hope you’ll have an experience in the shop that embodies the joy of reading for your family. 

As well as visiting another local community, the children were able to enjoy what the bookshop had to offer and enrich their love for reading. The children enjoyed selecting some books that were linked to our next big topic – Life.

It was great to see those children then sharing the books they had returned with, with the rest of the class.

If you are ever stuck for something to do, then why not pay a visit to  ‘The Little Bookshop.’

Coffee and cake available too! 

In Year 1, we have been thinking about how each and every one of us is special. We all like different foods,  celebrate different religions, live in different places, have different hobbies and yet, in lots of ways, we are all the same.

The children have thought about identities.

Who are you?

We had such a lovely time creating paintings of ourselves. Take a look at our gallery below.

Along with this, we have also thought about the communities that we live in and learnt about similarities and differences within them.

What is respect?

“What is respect” is a big concept to grasp.

Respect is how you feel about someone or something.

Having respect for someone means you think good things about who a person is or how he/she acts. You can have respect for others, and you can have respect for yourself.

Respect is how you treat someone or something.

Showing respect to someone means you act in a way that shows you care about their feelings and well-being.

Showing respect for others include things like not calling people mean names, treating people with courtesy and showing good manners.

Learning how to show respect is so very important. We have thought about respecting ourselves and others. The children also discussed that we should show respect to our community, animals, people and belongings.

Whilst I have been working in Year 1, I have seen the children showing respect to each other. They are proud of their classroom and the school as a whole.

Well done!

 

Following our whole school themed week this week, Who do you think you are?, children were asked to  consider the following statement by showing what they have learnt.

I know what community is.

As a guide, children could think about these aspects.

• What is community?
• Where is their community? Children could consider their school community to local community to wider community.  Moortown Community Group has lots of information about our local community.
• Who is in their community?  Children could consider visits/visitors during our themed week.
• Why is community important? Children could consider the terms ‘identity’ and ‘diversity’ discussed during our themed week.

How can we be a good citizen in our community?

We were absolutely delighted with the high standards of homework this week. The children had thought of the most ingenious ways to create their homework.  As we moved around in the classroom, celebrating everyone’s efforts, sounds such as, “WOW! Look at this! How did they think of that? This is such a great idea,”  could be heard.

A great deal of respect is always shown by the children in Year 4 especially during homework celebrations.

One particular piece of work that stood out to both adults and children alike was a song with a difference. Kirsten had used the famous Christmas song, ‘The Twelve Days of Christmas’, and changed it to ‘The Twelve Days of Moortown Community‘.

It was superb! So much so, we just had to all sing it!

The Twelve Days of Moortown Community

By Kirsten 

On the first day of Christmas in my community, we sang Christmas carols by the tree.

On the second day of Christmas in my community,

Two helpful brownies,

And we sang Christmas carols by the tree.

On the third day of Christmas in my community,

Three fire fighters,

Two helpful brownies, and we sang Christmas carols by the tree.

On the fourth day of Christmas in my community,

Four policemen saving,

Three fire fighters,

Two helpful brownies, and we sang Christmas carols by the tree.

On the fifth day of Christmas in my community,

Five brilliant teachers!

Four policemen saving,

Three fire fighters,

Two helpful brownies, and we sang Christmas carols by the tree.

On the sixth day of Christmas in my community,

Six neighbours giving,

Five brilliant teachers!

Four policemen saving,

Three fire fighters,

Two helpful brownies, and we sang Christmas carols by the tree.

On the seventh day of Christmas in my community,

Seven lights switched on,

Six neighbours giving,

Five brilliant teachers!

Four policemen saving,

Three fire fighters,

Two helpful brownies, and we sang Christmas carols by the tree.

On the eighth day of Christmas in my community,

Eight St. Gemma’s collectors,

Seven lights switched on,

Six neighbours giving,

Five brilliant teachers!

Four policemen saving,

Three fire fighters,

Two helpful brownies, and we sang Christmas carols by the tree.

On the ninth day of Christmas in my community,

Nine local Councillors,

Eight St. Gemma’s collectors,

Seven lights switched on,

Six neighbours giving,

Five brilliant teachers!

Four policemen saving,

Three fire fighters,

Two helpful brownies, and we sang Christmas carols by the tree.

On the tenth day of Christmas in my community,

Ten librarians lending,

Nine local Councillors,

Eight St. Gemma’s collectors,

Seven lights switched on,

Six neighbours giving,

Five brilliant teachers!

Four policemen saving,

Three fire fighters,

Two helpful brownies, and we sang Christmas carols by the tree.

On the eleventh day of Christmas in my community,

Eleven mince pie servers,

Ten librarians lending,

Nine local Councillors,

Eight St. Gemma’s collectors,

Seven lights switched on,

Six neighbours giving,

Five brilliant teachers!

Four policemen saving,

Three fire fighters,

Two helpful brownies, and we sang Christmas carols by the tree.

On the twelfth day of Christmas in my community,

Twelve families rejoicing,

Eleven mince pie servers,

Ten librarians lending,

Nine local Councillors,

Eight St. Gemma’s collectors,

Seven lights switched on,

Six neighbours giving,

Five brilliant teachers!

Four policemen saving,

Three fire fighters,

Two helpful brownies, and we sang Christmas carols by the tree.

An amazing selection of such super homework – I’m sure you’ll agree.

Comments from the children included:

“So much to choose from.”

“Enas, has celebrated her religion.”

“I love the drawing of the school. It’s a great idea!”

“WOW! Our whole class put together as little people in a box.”

“Such detail in Oliver’s work.”

“Celebrating all the local places of worship is really thinking about the community.”

“We were blown away by this week’s homework! Keep up these high standards and be proud of yourselves. WELL DONE!” commented Mrs Freeman, Mrs Charlesworth and Mrs Pearson.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Today, Year 4 went back to the kitchen. On the menu were cheesy scones.

Listening carefully to given instructions is always important – especially when using sharp knives and hot ovens.

All the children used skills they have been taught before. These included:

• accurate weighing and measuring
• grating
• mixing
• kneading
• rolling and cutting
• and, of course, washing up

  

 

In Year One,we have focused our English lessons around a story – The Lighthouse Keeper’s Lunch.

Every day, Mr Grinling the lighthouse keeper cleans and polishes his light to make sure it shines brightly at night. At lunchtime he tucks into a delicious and well-deserved lunch, prepared by his wife. But Mr Grinling isn’t the only one who enjoys the tasty food. Will Mrs Grinling think of a way to stop the greedy seagulls from stealing the lighthouse keeper’s lunch?

We’ve looked closely at three different ways of telling this story. These variations of the same tale sparked some great discussion.

The children then worked on the items they would put into Mr Grinling’s basket. Before doing any writing, we orally rehearsed what we were going to write.  This is an age related expectation for the end of Year One: I can say what I’m going to write and then compose a sentence orally before writing it.

The children were encouraged to  say a sentence, count the words, say it again and finally write it.

We had some great sentences during our lesson with the correct use of capital letters and full stops. Some children experimented by using the word ‘and‘ to join their ideas and make their sentence longer.

• “I will put in some apples.”
• “I will put in some chocolate cake.”
• “I will put in some salad and some grapes.”

Another age related expectation for Year One is to: use a capital letter for ‘I’.

Ask your child about this story and see if they can retell it. Following that, encourage your child to orally rehearse a sentence  about the characters in the book and then have a go at writing it.

It’s been a very busy week in Year 4.

With a big focus on our identity, we began the week discussing and thinking about  all the different things that make us who we are.

As well as identity, we thought about the community we live in and how that is a big part of our lives.

On Wednesday, Year 4 spent the morning visiting St Gemma’s Hospice in Moortown.

Today, we were joined by some visitors from the National Institute for the Blind.

Following our own identities activities yesterday, we now thought about how people are not all the same.

People are different in many ways and today we thought about what it must be like to be blind or partially sighted.

I was so impressed with the questions the children asked.

“How does your white stick help you?”

“Do you bump into things a lot and hurt yourself?”

“How do you manage when going on the bus?”

All the children showed empathy and were very thoughtful when listening to the our visitors.

We had the chance to look through various types of glasses and goggles.

These either blurred or blocked our vision and gave us a good idea of what it must be like to be visually impaired.