Living and Learning: Health and Prevention
Year 6 have been learning about germs and how to prevent spreading them.
We started off the lesson by taking part in a quiz. Did you know that the kitchen is normally the most germiest room in the house? And, there are 100,000 microbes in a sneeze?
The children then discussed cross contamination and how quickly germs can spread. We talked about the need to wash our hands to help prevent this spread. We could use soap or hand sanitiser.
Help at home: Discuss other ways we can stop germs from spreading.
Computing: Scratch programming
This half term we are improving our computing skills. The first few lessons have focussed on logical reasoning, including solving sudoku and number sequences. This week, we worked on using the Scratch program to create a Chatbot quiz. In our quiz we programmed the sprite to ask our name, respond with a greeting and then ask us a question. We were able to use the ‘if, then and else’ block to ensure that the right answer had a positive response and all other answers gave a different response.
We really enjoyed getting stuck in with the coding and we worked very well together with our partners.
Help at home by logging on to Scratch and letting your children experiment with coding at home.
Class Assembly – Internet safety and personal information.
Well done Year 1! After another great week, our wonderful Year 1s have performed their class assembly. Our class assembly was on being safe on the internet. The children showcased their learning from Safer Internet Day on stage for this class assembly. After weeks of practise they all came together to give us a great performance. Well done Year 1!
What is internet safety?
Internet safety consists of many different things. To name a few; thinking before clicking and posting, to treat strangers with respect, to be cautious online with others and to never share personal information online. Personal information consists of our full name, our date of birth, our home / school address and our photos online.
Once again Year 1 well done on another great week and I hope you have a great rest over the weekend. (You all deserve it!)
Poetry Basket: Pat-a-cake
This week our poem is well-known nursery rhyme, Pat-a-cake.
Two of the words we’ve been focussing on are to prick and plenty.
Spring 2: Week 3
This week, we continued exploring our transport theme by reading The Hundred Decker Bus by Mike Smith. After enjoying the story, we let our imaginations run wild and designed our very own Moortown bus!
Our ideas were fantastic: one deck had a dessert and a brownie bakery, another featured a deep swimming pool, and we even created a calm deck in case you wanted some quiet time.
Click here to see our amazing bus! We look forward to showing you our bus when you attend the next Learning Journey drop-ins.
Maths
This week, we explored ordinality – learning the positions of numbers up to 8. We used key language like “more than,” “less than,” and “equal to” to describe relationships between numbers, focusing on each number’s place in the counting sequence.
Help at Home: Play a game of ‘More or Fewer?’
- Make a set of number cards from 1 to 8.
- Gather a collection of small objects (e.g., buttons, toy cars, coins) and arrange them so your child can see them clearly.
- Turn over a number card.
- Ask your child: “Do you have more or fewer [objects] than this number?”
This simple game helps children practise comparing quantities and using the language of more than, fewer than, and equal to in a fun, hands-on way!
Home learning challenge
Recycled materials needed!
If you have any clean recycled materials at home, please consider sending them in for the children to use in our creative area.
Items that would be great include: cardboard boxes, cereal boxes, kitchen roll tubes, yoghurt pots, egg boxes, and other small packaging materials.
Please ensure all items are clean and safe for children to use.
Reminder
- Learning Journey Drop In’s
Tuesday 24th & Thursday 26th March – 3.15pm – 3.45pm
Skipping Festival 2026!
Today, Year 4 took part in the 2026 Skipping Festival and we won! This means we’re through to the finals in June and we can’t wait.
They did a brilliant job and worked so well as a team – all their practising definitely paid off! It was amazing to watch them all showcase their incredible skipping skills. They also showed great support for each other and the other teams. I was so impressed by their determination, teamwork and respect.
In between the skills, the children had the chance to skip, dance and sing along to the music which they loved. They even got the chance to learn some new skipping skills like the butterfly.
Both the individual skills and the group skips were fantastic. Your children won lots of awards – including five gold medals! We’re all so happy to win and be through to the finals in June.
Well done Year 4 for trying your best and representing Moortown so well – we’re so proud of you! Let’s do it all again in June!
Living and Learning: personal hygiene
Year 3 have been learning about how we can keep our bodies healthy. For example, we have learnt about what germs are and how to prevent spreading them.
We started off the lesson by talking about the different types of germs there are; bacteria, viruses and fungi. These can be all around us and some are helpful and some are harmful e.g. some yoghurts have ‘live cultures’ in that are good for our digestive system.
The children then discussed how quickly and easily germs can spread. We highlighted that places where germs are common.
We talked about the need to wash our hands to help prevent this spread. We could use soap or hand sanitiser and to make sure we’ve washed them thoroughly enough, you should sing happy birthday twice while you do it!
Help at home: Discuss other ways we can stop germs from spreading.
Writing – The Dragon Slayer
Across this half term, Year 3 will be writing a narrative about The Dragon Slayer. We’ve watched a short clip of an animated film that we will base our narrative on.
The purpose of a narrative is to interest and entertain.
We’ll catch the reader’s attention by describing the main character and their background. Then we’ll write about the journey he goes on to find his next dragon.
So far, we’ve learnt about what verbs we could use to help catch the reader’s attention. For example:
Tarragon, the dragon slayer, grabbed his sword.
Tarragon, the dragon slayer, clasped his sword.
Tarragon, the dragon slayer, gripped his sword.
Tarragon, the dragon slayer, held his sword.
We’re moving onto to adverbs next!
Help at home by thinking of synonyms (words of similar meaning) for ‘walked’.
Topic: we’re computer programmers!
This half-term in Topic, we’re computer programmers!
So far, we’ve had a few unplugged lessons where we have discussed what an algorithm is, how to use repetition to be efficient programmers and what logical reasoning is.
This week, we began looking at how a computer can ask questions to sort items. We created a branching database to sort a group of dinosaurs based on their various attributes. However, we had to be careful to only use closed (yes/no) questions.
An attribute is a quality or characteristic that can be used to describe someone to something (e.g size, colour, material).
Next week, we’ll begin building these branching databases on the iPads.
Help at home: choose a selection of kitchen utensils. Can your child sort them using yes/no questions. Is it made of metal? Is it sharp? Can you use it to stir?
Maths: Equal groups
Today in our Maths learning, we explored the idea of equal and unequal groups.
We had lots of fun finding different ways to group 10, 15, and 20 cubes into equal groups.
Help at home: Build with small objects. Use cubes, Lego or coins to make different equal groups (for example: 20 in groups of 2, 4, or 5).