Welcome to Reception
All the children have now started their learning journey at Moortown with confidence and very few tears!
They have settled well and had fun exploring the areas of the classroom and making friends.
This week we will begin our ‘Relax and Read’ session on Wednesday morning and we have our first workshop on Thursday.
This workshop will explain how the children learn in Reception and how you can support their learning at home.
We hope you will attend the sessions at either 2pm or 6pm.
Counting
The children worked together to sort objects into groups. After the objects were sorted, they counted how many there were in each group. They were reminded to count the objects carefully so that they didn’t miscount.
PE
In Year 3, we’re learning how to throw and catch with increasing coordination.
After our warm up, Year 3 invented their own throwing and catching games. They were then asked to evaluate what the problems with their game were and how they were going to adapt it. Have a look at some pictures, below.
The class were challenged to work as a team and negotiate on their game rules. They were then asked to evaluate their games and make any changes needed.
Get your child to explain the rules and points system of their game to you.
Place Value
Year 5 have had a brilliant start to the year in all areas of school! They have thoroughly impressed with their appetite for learning and improving.
For Maths in particular, we have been looking at place value. The children have been using an array of methods to support their learning.
We have been using Denes, number lines, bar-models, counters and part-whole models to really show off how many different ways we can represent numbers!
In another area of the curriculum, we have enjoyed diving into our new class novel – Marianne Dreams. This has been the main focus for our Art topic, where we have incorporated artistic techniques such as cross-hatching, stippling and gradient into our artwork.
Ask your child what media has been used in the pieces of art above!
Mindfulness Matters
Following a very busy morning packed with learning, Year 2 settled down to enjoy some mindfulness.
What is mindfulness?
Mindfulness is simply… noticing what is happening right now.
Mindfulness is taking notice of how your body feels and what your mind is doing. When we notice what is happening around us, it can help us to calm down when feeling sad, angry or frustrated. Mindfulness helps us deal with tough emotions and can make us happy and feel good.
Today, the children focused on their breathing and what happens to our bodies when we ex and inhale. Following this exercise, the class were calm and focused all afternoon.
Marianne Dreams
What a fantastic start to the year we’ve had! Year 6 have really settled in to being role models in class and around school with their enthusiasm and behaviour both exemplary.
Our first topic is all about our class novel – Marianne Dreams. It’s a topic driven by Art and children will have the chance to produce an individual art project at the end of it.
As you can see from our topic display, we’ve been learning lots of new vocabulary such as shape, colour and pattern.
The first medium that we are exploring is pencil and we’ve been stippling, cross-hatching and creating gradients. Depending on which grade pencil you use, these are either dark or light, smudgy or precise. The Y6 artists have been using these techniques to create line, form and texture. Ask your child: “What’s the difference between a 6B and a 6H?”
We’ve also learnt about three well-known artists this week: Leonardo Da Vinci, Adonna Khare and Albrecht Durer. Other vocabulary we’ve learnt is realism vs surrealism. Challenge your child to tell you which category they think each artist fits into!
Next up – printmaking!
First News
In Key Stage 2, children get to read First News once a week. First News is a child oriented newspaper.
After reading, we share any interesting articles or fun facts that we’ve discovered with each other as a speaking and listening exercise.
Encourage your child to share what they read during today’s session, at home.
We’re ready and responding in Year 2
This week, Year 2 have continued to demonstrate great listening and learning skills as we settle in to new routines and lessons. Being ready and responding to feedback are the two 8Rs for learning we are focusing on this week. Our 8Rs for learning promote good learning behaviour.
We’ve started to follow daily routines including putting reading books in the reading group baskets. Books will be changed on a Monday and a Thursday but it is important for children to have their books at school every day in case they are reading with an adult. Please do briefly record in their reading record books when your child reads at home.
This week, we met our own material monster, named ‘M and M’, as we begin our new science learning all about materials.
‘This is a peg. It is made from wood and metal.’
‘This is a __________. It is made from _______.’
‘This is a __________. It is made from _________.’
What is the bell made from?
What materials have been used to make the door?
This learning supported our english work of rehearsing sentences. We encourage the children to speak/answer questions in full sentences and then to check their sentence makes sense.
Meanwhile in maths, our focus has been numbers to 100.
In this learning, we’ve used our base 10 resources to create numbers and record using digits and words.
A great start to the week, Year 2!
Drama to aid writing
As part of our writing learning, we channeled our inner thespians today. We’re working on writing a diary about our exploration of the 13 Storey Treehouse and we acted out that exploration in today’s lesson.
We all chose our favourite pose and created a class freeze-frame of a whole host of emotions.
Platinum award
At the end of each year, schools are invited to apply for their School Games Mark. The School Games Mark rewards schools for their commitment to and development of competition, school sport and physical education.
We’re very proud to announce that our application has been verified and we have been awarded Platinum award.
Platinum award is open to schools who have achieved Gold award for the previous four years.
We have achieved this award due to encouraging a large number of children to participate in sporting activity; providing a variety of different sports; partaking in competitions; involving children in leadership activities and having many local links with external clubs and establishments.
Thank you to staff who have accompanied children to these events or run after-school clubs this year. Thank you also to Mrs Russell who provides excellent administration of our clubs and sporting events and competitions. Thank you as well to all parents/carers who have helped with transport and supported at our events this year.
Finally, well done to all pupils who have tried out a new physical activity either at an after-school club or as part of a competition or participation event and to those children who have represented our school so well this year.