What is a noun?
This week, the children have started learning all about nouns. There are two types of nouns.
Common nouns
These are the names of things (places or objects).
Proper nouns
These are the names of a particular person, place or thing. They always begin with a capital letter.
Today, Year One enjoyed doing a noun hunt around the classroom.
Here is a link for one of the activities we used in class. Have a go with your child at home. Or maybe, go on a noun hunt around the house.
What are nouns? – BBC Bitesize
Below are a few sentences. Can your child identify the noun?
There are pretty flowers in the garden.
I like to read a book.
The wood is dark and scary.
The farmer takes his animals to market.
The pig eats lots of food.
Curious Historians
As part of the current history topic – The Great Fire of London – the children have been using historical sources to ask and answer questions about the past.
Questions are tools of curiosity
In Year One, the children are given plenty of opportunities to ask questions and these have stimulated some great conversations.
To help develop and nurture the children’s curiosity about the past, we have a dolls house in the classroom. The class can spend time looking inside the house and studying the various items. As well as raising questions, we have been using this resource as an opportunity for writing. Using some of the vocabulary taught in history lessons, the children have been writing about the objects in the house.
Keep asking questions, Year One!
This week in Reception
As we head towards this very different Christmas, we are thinking of ideas to make this time as festive as possible.
Literacy
We are reading the traditional story, ‘The Gingerbread Man’. The children will be retelling the story and taking part in lots of gingerbread themed activities-our roleplay area has become a gingerbread bakery!
Phonics
This week we are recapping Phase 2 and focussing on ‘tricky words’.
The tricky words learnt so far are the, to, I, no, go, into.
We will be encouraging the children to use these words in their independent writing.
Watch this useful parents and carers guide to tricky words here.
(This is a YouTube link. Top tip for watching YouTube with your child: go to the settings cog along the play bar and turn off autoplay – this avoids an inappropriate clip coming up automatically, and helps to discourage your child from passively watching clip after clip.)
Maths
We will investigate the number 5 through number rhymes and stories including 5 currant buns and 5 little ducks.
The children will be introduced to the link between counting forwards and the one more pattern and counting back and the one less pattern.
School menu change and Christmas meal
Athletics
For the rest of the half term, we are focusing athletics.
This week, we have been practicing jumping and sprinting.
What amazing athletes we have in Year 2!
Animals and their young
This half term, we have been learning about animals including humans.
In our last lesson, we learnt that animals, including humans,
have offspring which grow into adults.
The children worked in groups to match the adult to their offspring.
Living and Learning: Strong emotions
In our last L&L, we were learning about emotions.
First, we named lots of emotions we might feel.
Then, we focused on exploring and describing what makes us feel unhappy.
The Children then were given the opportunity to explain when they might feel unhappy, and also to practice asking, and listening to, others about what makes them unhappy.
After that, we discussed things we can do when we are feeling unhappy.
Finally, we discussed things that make us happy.
Maths is everywhere!
The children have been using maths in all the areas of provision to learn about shape, measures and money in our new role-play bakery.
History: interpretations of the past
In our history learning today, we used our knowledge about the Athenian and Spartan city states to decide which one was the best!
We split into two teams to debate and within our teams split into little sub-groups responsible for debating one aspect of life in the city states.
The class did a great job at debating. They took turns well, made pertinent points, responded to opposing points and summarised. They also used openers to introduce their points and were respectful debaters throughout!
So, who was the best city state? Well, the debate was close. Athens won the categories on government and economy but Sparta won education and role of women. Tomorrow, we’ll make final points and I’ll make a decision on the winner!
Living and Learning: strong emotions
In our Living and Learning lesson today, we were talking about strong emotions and some strategies to cope with them. We decided that talking about how we were feeling was a really good way of solving a problem or feeling better about something that may be troubling us.
We then watched a BBC education video about someone who joins a new school and is desperate to make friends and fit in and ultimately makes a bad choice in order to fit in with a group of people. We discussed the emotions that the person could have been feeling and how that influenced his choices. We also discussed what they could have done differently and how they eventually solved the problems.