What’s been happening in Year 1 this week?
Every day, when the children arrive at school, there is always a task to complete. Today’s task was to create monsters. Using three coloured fingerprints, the class had to design creatures. As you can see from the photos below, we had some very interesting additions to our class!
For our writing lesson, the children listened to the sound of fire. They had to describe what they could hear.
I can hear the fire crackling.
I can hear a sizzling sound.
Next, we listened to the sounds during The Great Fire of London.
I can hear people shouting.
I can hear buildings falling down.
I can hear water splashing on the fire.
For their task, the class wrote sentences about The Great Fire of London. Here are a few examples.
To end the day, Mrs Burgess enjoyed a firework art lesson with the children.
Using pattern, glue and sequins the class created their own firework pictures.
A busy week so far!
The children have returned to school confidently and ready to learn! We have been really impressed with their learning attitude and behaviour.
In maths, we read a book called ‘The button box’ and the children had a great time looking through my mum’s button tin!
We discussed what the button might be from and what it was made of.
We then sorted them using different criteria.
We have read lots of books with a witch theme and the children have written recipes for potions and witch’s soup.
There was great excitement when we discovered a real spider in the classroom! The children then designed and built a ‘spider house.’
Continuous Provision in Year 1
Continuous provision forms an important part of effective practice in KS1 and well planned activities support, enrich and extend learning throughout the whole year. By giving the environment and our routines careful thought, not simply replicating Reception but refining it and moving it on, we can enable children to build on their EYFS experience.
Currently, the children are enjoying being historians. Therefore, we have linked the challenges in the areas to The Great Fire of London. Over the next few weeks we will share examples of the children accessing the learning in the areas. For now, here are some photos of our new challenges.
Maths
In class, the children have just been introduced to part-whole models. They have been placing objects into part-whole models in a variety of ways, using the terms “part” and “whole”
History, Reading and Oracy
Pudding Lane Bakery
Oracy is the ability to express yourself clearly and communicate with others effectively through spoken language. A key part of oracy is for children to think carefully about the language they’re using, and tailor it to their subject, purpose and audience. Oracy involves embracing different speaking skills, such as:
Discussion: exchanging ideas with others
Instruction: telling someone what to do, or explaining facts
Dialogue: having a conversation with someone, listening and showing an interest in what they say
Oracy isn’t, however, just about being a good talker – or talking lots. It also includes listening to others, and responding appropriately.
In order to stimulate conversations, we have added different resources in the shared areas. These are already developing the children’s curiosity and initiating oracy.
As part of history, the children are learning to sequence events. This activity involves ordering a timeline of the fire. The children are developing an awareness of time and chronology.
History! Questions and looking forward…
This week marks the start of our new History topic learning all about the Stone, Bronze and Iron age plus Ancient Egypt!
Ask your child to explain why we’re learning about these two periods of time together.
We discussed our new History vocabulary, questions for the topic and what we were excited about! Take a look…
Welcome back
We hope you had a great half term!
Here is some of the learning that will take place this half-term.
Phonics
We will continue to learn letters and sounds from Phase 2.
Set 3. g, o , c , k, ck
Set 4. ck, e, u, r
Set 5. h, b, f, ff, l, ll, ss
In addition, children will learn the ‘tricky words’ the, to, into, go, no.
We will be sending flashcards and words to practise at home.
English
This half term, we will be reading stories with an Autumn theme and encouraging children to retell them. They will be encouraged and supported to use their phonic knowledge to write labels for their drawings.
To celebrate World Nursery Rhyme week starting 16 November, we will learn five nursery rhymes.
You can find information about this and activities to try at home at
Maths
We will continue to learn numbers to 10 and introduce the idea that all numbers are made of smaller numbers(composition). Children will understand that as we count, each number is one more than the number before. As we count back, each number is one less than the previous number.
Don’t forget to email us with any questions.
moortowneyfs@spherefederation.org
Parent Partnership
We recognise that you are the children’s first and most enduring educators and would like to encourage you to share your unique knowledge of them.
Please take a look at this workshop presentation to see how you can share your child’s ‘wow’ moments and achievements with us.
moortowneyfs@spherefederation.org
Living and Learning: Mental health
Our recent Living and Learning focus has been all about mental health.
In Year 1, our learning has included:
- exploring and understanding different emotions
- identifying good and not so good feelings
- learning about ‘big’ feelings
This video introduced a variety of emotions. Emotions are feelings. They can change all the time. We all experience a whole range of emotions, from anger to happiness to fear.
We used clues to help us be emotion detectives. Looking at the character’s face as well as their body language helped us to decide which emotion the characters were showing.
We used these sentence starters to share when we might feel certain feelings to help us understand the reason for these emotions. As well as sharing this orally, we wrote some sentences too.
I feel excited when it is my birthday.
I feel happy when I go to the park.
I feel angry when someone doesn’t share with me.
We recognised that sometimes we might have a not so good feeling or a big feeling and we might need to talk about these emotions with someone we can trust – a friend or an adult at home or at school.
Self care techniques can also help us to look after our own mental health.
We were very proud of the children’s self care/wellbeing bingo homework and we hope they continue to make use of these techniques.
Staying hydrated…
Reading a good book…
Finally, further information about mental health can be found on the Public Health England (PHE) ‘Every Mind Matters’ website providing NHS-endorsed tips and advice to help children and young people’s mental wellbeing and equip parents and carers with knowledge to support them.
Year 1’s first half term
All the Year 1 staff are very proud of the all children in their first half term. They have adapted well to the new procedures and they have amazed us with how well they are taking responsibility with their learning and routines.
Also, it was great to catch up with so many parents at the online parent-teacher consultations last week.
From these conversations, here are a few reminders to share.
- If the children have read their reading book, they can change it by putting it in the book return box, at the cloakroom door, on Tuesdays and Thursdays.
- Library is on Mondays and the children can take out a new book if they have returned their current book. It is helpful to keep their library book in their named folder if possible.
- It is great to see how well the children are engaging with Lexia at home. Some of the children are already reaching the end of the Year 1 learning (Level 5) and we would like these children not to progress any further at home as this will move onto Year 2 learning.
For next half term, here’s some information about the children’s learning.
- PE will continue to be on Tuesdays and Thursdays. We will aim to be outside where possible so please ensure your child wears their outdoor kit.
- As you will have seen, we’re excited to start our history topic all about the Great Fire of London.
- We have enjoyed our science learning about habitats and the environment and animals including humans is our next area of learning. There are some very knowledgeable scientists in the class! The BBC website is a great source of information that you could look at home.
- Our Living and Learning focus will continue to be on the theme of relationships. The children have made some great contributions in this learning.
- In maths, our focus will be on addition and subtraction. We’ve also been enjoying the BBC Super Movers videos in class as brain breaks.
- In phonics, we will soon have completed our revision of the Phase 3 sounds. Here are some phonics games you could try at home.
- Spellings will continue to be checked on a Friday and the children do see their spelling results after they have been marked. As this remains at school, please ask your child how they have got on.
- In writing, we continue to focus on what is a sentence. The four reminders we use in class are:
- Capital letter at the start
- Full stop at the end
- Finger spaces
- Does it make sense? Reread your sentence.
- We will continue to read a variety of fiction including poetry and non-fiction texts in class including our weekly fluency text. We read this daily to develop the children’s reading skills including using their phonics knowledge to help them read new words, understanding different vocabulary, taking account of punctuation and even starting to use some expression.
Thank you for all your support over this first half term and please do get in touch if you need any support with your child’s learning.
Own it – helping your child stay safe
Has your child got a mobile phone? There are lots of benefits to having a phone, but drawbacks, too. We strongly encourage you to make sure your child has the BBC Own It app installed. It can help to guide your child if they’re exposed to things that upset them, and it can even question the user if it seems like they’re about to send unkind or hurtful messages.
We have had a few issues in the past, and recently, around the use of WhatsApp and other social media platforms. As well as installing the Own It app, we also recommend that you are regularly checking your child’s phone.
If you have any concerns, please ask for support.
Book Wars Round Two
This week’s book club saw the highly anticipated return of Book Wars.
Daisy suggested a fantastic idea for our second battle: if you were suddenly sucked into your book, how badly or how well would your life now be going?
See if you can guess the book that the Y6 is speaking about!
“I’d be a criminal who’s dug their way into trouble. I’d have probably been stealing sweets!” – Leo
“I would be either a dog, wizard or item like a bone, scroll or camera. You’d probably never find me.” – Ethan
“I’d have a daemon and probably get taken by the Gobblers!” – Jemima
“I’d now be killing people but you’ve got to pay me the price!” – Hifza
“I’d be the heir to the throne of a kingdom but kidnapped twice! I’d be secretly looked after by witches and wizards.” – Emma
“Mine would be good and bad at the same time. I’m robbing a bank so I’m getting some good cash but I also might get arrested!” – Albie
“I was a normal schoolboy but now I’m a secret agent who faces many deadly organisations.” – Moh
Who do you think has got it best or worst in their new world?