Living and Learning: d:side visit drug education
Dave from d:side visited us, as part of our drug education aspect of Living and Learning, to talk about keep ourselves healthy and what goes in our body.
Here’s what was covered in the session.
- How we are different to our friends / classmates
- What keeps our bodies clean and healthy
- Identifying internal parts of the body and their position and function
- Identifying ways in which we can value ourselves and value others
Finally, there was chance to share some compliments and recognise how we can value others.
Spring term after-school clubs
Our spring term after-school clubs will be starting next week and while many of the clubs are full, we do have some spaces available for the following clubs.
Living and Learning: What is a drug?
After discussing alcohol, caffeine, nicotine and medicines in our Living and Learning lesson on Monday, Dave from d:side came in today to teach us more about alcohol.
We learnt about what is an is not alcohol; what alcohol does to people’s bodies; when it is legal and illegal to drink alcohol; and reasons might or might not drink alcohol.
Talk about this with us as home as we had lots of questions.
To finish off the lesson, some of us tried completing some simple tasks with ‘beer goggles’ on. This helped us to understand how alcohol can affect us physically and, although it was pretty funny in the classroom, we discuss when these affects would become dangerous.
Tennis Taster!
Living and Learning: I know what a drug is.
Year six were delighted to welcome Dave from d:side to talk with us today.
We spoke about what drugs are, who uses them and why.
We talked about how they can help your body, but only if they’ve been prescribed to you by your doctor or given to you by an adult to suit your illness and age.
We also talked about how they can harm your body and how to keep safe.
As always, Y6 asked thoughtful questions, shared maturely and listened politely; they should be very proud of themselves.
Vocabulary Games
There are several simple but fun games we’ve been playing to keep on top of our computing vocabulary. 
Game one: describe the term to the person without saying what it is. For example: “It’s when you break down a task into small steps!” would be a great description of decomposition.
Game two: everyone in the group has a word on their head. They take turns to ask yes or no question in order to determine their term. For example: “Am I something that exists digitally?” could be used to determine if you have the word content on your noggin.
Game three: one person stands in front of the group and they have a word on their head. The rest of the group has to describe what the term is without saying predetermined words. For “digital footprint”, our banned words were “mark” and “internet”.
Tricky! Give it a go at home.
Living and Learning
Today, Year 3 had a visit from Dave from d:side. We learnt all about the dangers of smoking and how we can stay happy and healthy.
We learnt about the laws around smoking and passive smoking.
We learnt about why cigarette boxes changed in 2016 from bright, colourful packaging to boxes with health warnings and pictures of the side affects on.
Olivia explained, “It’s to try and put people off from smoking because they can get really poorly.”
We then learnt about what is inside a cigarette.
Cigarettes contain tobacco, a plant that grows in hot countries. Hiding inside tobacco, is a drug called nicotine that can affect your body.
Noah explained, “Nicotine is addictive which means some people want it a lot and need another one.”
Ewan added, “There’s also tar. It’s black and gloopy.”
Oliver said, “It’s bad for people with asthma and it makes it harder for me to breathe.”
Over 4,000 chemicals go into making a cigarette. Including the same chemicals that make batteries, toilet cleaner, rat poison and nail varnish remover. Year 3 were revolted!
All of Year Three were involved in the session and many asked some very interesting questions. Well done Year Three!
Maths: Arrays
In maths, we are learning about multiplication and today, we focussed on arrays.
An array in maths is an arrangement of objects, numbers or pictures in columns or rows.
This morning, we noticed an array in real life when the milk was delivered.
We looked at the rows and columns to work out the corresponding multiplication number sentences. This helps us to recognise that multiplication can be done in any order.
5 lots of 3 = 3 lots of 5
5×3 = 3×5
Then, we used practical resources to make our own arrays and to work out the matching number sentences.
Can you spot any more arrays around us?
Have a look at our multiplication video in the calculations section of the website to see the sequence of learning.
What is an adverb?
As part of our current english learning about instruction texts, today our focus was what are adverbs?
Adverbs are words that add more information to the verb.
In instruction texts, adverbs can be useful to give more information about how someone should do something.
Carefully, fill the cup with water.
Stir it gently.
This morning, the class worked in pairs to act out different adverbs. Their partner had to guess which adverb it might be.
We noticed, throughout the day, just how many adverbs are used in classroom instructions.
Calmly, line up.
Quickly, collect your resources.
Science: Seasons
This half term, our biology topic in science is seasonal changes.
In line with the KS1 science expectations, our main learning objectives are:
- I can observe changes across the four seasons.
- I can observe and describe weather associated with the seasons and how day length varies.
The vocabulary we will be learning and using in this topic include:
- winter
- spring
- summer
- autumn
- seasons
- day length
- temperature
- change
So far we have been learning the seasons and the corresponding months of the year that match each season. Some of the things we have noted that change across the seasons include:
- weather
- temperature
- trees
- plants
- animals
- clothes we might wear
This video (One year in forty seconds) helps to show the changes across the seasons.
On our class calendar, we note the weather and season on a daily basis. We also record the temperature using our thermometer giving children the chance to develop an important maths skill of reading scales.
We will be moving onto learning more about weather across the seasons and how the length of the day (and night) changes across the year.