This week in Reception
This week is World Nursery Rhyme Week.
A nursery rhyme is a simple traditional poem or song for children. They date back to the late 1700s when the earliest versions were lullabies that mothers would sing to their babies.
Learning and singing nursery rhymes is beneficial for:
- boosting vocabulary and language development
- helping children develop literacy skills
- providing a fun way to support early numeracy skills
- helping children develop social, physical and emotional skills
We will be learning five nursery rhymes.
Sleeping bunnies, Incy Wincy Spider, Wind the bobbin up, Down in the jungle and Head, shoulders, knees and toes.
You can find links to all these rhymes at www.worldnurseryrhymeweek.com/
Phonics
The children are really enjoying their phonics lessons and beginning to use the letters and sounds they have learnt to blend and segment words independently. This week we will belearning the phonemes b, f, ff, l,ll. The tricky words are I, no and go.
Maths
Thank you to everyone who attended our maths presentation. I hope you found it useful. If you have any questions, please ask.
This week, the children will continue to engage with activities that draw attention to the purpose of counting – to find out ‘how many’ objects there are. They will develop their understanding of the concept of cardinality (that the last number in the count tells us ‘how many’ things there are altogether).
Children In Need
Friday is a non-uniform day to raise money for Children In Need.
Don’t forget to let us know of any ‘wow’ moments at home. Is your child beginning to notice and read words? Do they try to read signs when out and about?
Please let us know of any achievements.
moortownreception@spherefederation.org
Yorkshire Sculpture Park
Last week, Year 5 visited Yorkshire Sculpture Park on our first school trip of the year.
The children explored the park, commenting on, and comparing a variety of sculptures over the course of the day.
Take a look at some pictures from the day:
Exploring pattern
In a recent art session, we looked at artwork by one of our featured artists: Martha McDonald Napaltjarri.
We closely observed the pattern within each piece of art and discussed what we could see.
We then explored our own patterns inspired by Napaltjarri and here’s some of our work.
Book club
This weeks book club featured an activity called word storm!
We had to draw a picture of a character or setting from the book we’re reading and then surround it with powerful words and phrases.
Take a look…
Art Gallery Trip
Today, we enjoyed a wonderful visit to Leeds Art Gallery. The visit links well with our Art topic this half term. All the children behaved impeccably and represented our school really well. We hope you have enjoyed talking about our trip at home.
At the gallery, we used shapes as inspiration to create our very own abstract art. Using view finders we found our favourite part and described what we could see. What shapes can you see? What does it remind you of?
We also looked at some of the wonderful pieces of art in the gallery. We used our bodies to make shapes that represent the art.
We enjoyed looking at different pieces of abstract art and discussing the colours, shapes and lines in each piece.
We also looked at some figurative art. We then drew round our bodies (in poses like those in the art) to add even more lines and shapes to our whole class abstract art piece.
Writing: planning a description
In our writing lesson this morning, we’ve been planning a setting description that we will write in the next few days. The stimulus for our writing is a short animation called Eye of the Storm.
Children have been tasked with planning descriptive phrases and figurative language that they will use in their pieces. You’ll see in the photos that children are using thesauruses to help them choose vocabulary that will bring their descriptions to life.
Here are a few examples of the descriptive ideas we came up with in the lesson:
“The black, ominous clouds were choking the airship as lightning flooded the sky.” Sasha.
“He stood there as lonely as the bruised fruit in the bottom of his fruit bowl.” Leah
“Wire protruded out of his throne-like chair. Ready, he sat calmly like a breeze dancing in June.” Saahir
“The peculiar man stood lonely and in grief as he watched the oppressive sun rise above the clouds.” Khadija
“Like man against Mother Nature, the stuttering airship fought for its life against the ever growing tempest in the sky.” Sam
Let there be light!
Hello!
Year 4 had a great first week of the second autumn term after having (what sounds like!) a lovely half term break.
We began our new topic unit that will lead us up until Christmas and it is art! The children have been really looking forward to this as they love being creative. The two artists that we’re going to be focusing on are Martha McDonald Napaltjarri and Wassily Kandinsky. They both have their differences in terms of their heritage and style but we’ll be exploring all areas through reading and writing but most importantly art.
I was blown away during our first hands on art lesson! We had a go at observational drawing, which on first glance, did look quite tricky. However, the children focused on drawing exactly what they could see in front of them (an orange or pear) including how the light hit the object and how they could add texture.
Here are just a couple of the fantastic outcomes
Help at home by practising this skill. You can draw absolutely anything -even a potato!
Drop in session
Reading: retrieval of facts about Henry Moore and Barbara Hepworth
In our reading lesson this morning, children have read a text about the artists Henry Moore and Barbara Hepworth. They worked in pairs to retrieve facts about each artist.
Did you know that both Henry Moore and Barbara Hepworth were born in West Yorkshire?
Did you know that both artists won a scholarship in 1921 to study at The Royal College of Art?
Did you know that Barbara Hepworth was often mistaken for Henry Moore’s pupil rather than his peer?
Did you know that Barbara Hepworth sadly died in a fire in 1975?
Did you know that Henry Moore, his wife Irina and his daughter Mary set up the Henry Moore Foundation in 1977?
Did you know that many of Henry Moore’s pieces were sculpted with the figures in a reclining position, taking inspiration from the landscape he had grown up in?
Odd socks day
Next week is Anti-Bullying Week.
This year’s theme is ‘One Kind Word’ and we will be taking part in Odd Socks Day on Monday 15 November.
Odd socks day is to raise awareness of our differences, individuality and personal choice. Come to school wearing your odd socks to celebrate what makes us all unique.
This year, the Junior Leadership Team have requested a voluntary donation of £1 on the day to raise money for our school charity, Dog’s Trust.
Thank you for your support.