Stay and play session
Today, we had our creative stay and play session. Thank you to everyone who came – we hope you had fun!
The expressive arts and design early learning goals are:
Exploring and using media and materials
– Children sing songs, make music and dance and experiment with ways of changing them.
– They safely use and explore a variety of materials, tools and techniques, experimenting with colour, design, texture, form and function.
Being imaginative
– Children use what they have learnt about media and materials in original ways, thinking about uses and purposes.
– They represent their own ideas, thoughts and feelings through design and technology, art, music, dance, role play and stories.
Not just this morning, but everyday, the children in Reception continue to surprise us with their wonderful imagination and different ways of expressing their ideas!
Here are some photos from our fantastic session this morning…
Why not get creative at home? Make use of any recycling to build a junk model or use an old sponge to do a sponge painting. The possibilities are endless!
Great spelling practice
In Year 6, we’ve been working on our ability to spell words when we haven’t had the week to learn them. We had a go at fifteen words each day (with Miss Rushbrooke reminding us about spelling patterns, sounding words out, pointing out trickier parts and all sorts of other hints and tips). Then we spent ten minutes practising any words we’d found difficult or got wrong.
We’ve really enjoyed our spelling practice and have been getting more creative every day, trying to make sure we’re thinking of ways to remember the spelling rather than just write it over and over.
Here’s an example you could use in your practice at home.
Do you need wheels for the Big Pedal?
Big Pedal Day 3
MORE PRIZES announced for The Big Pedal!
Rainbow The Fox
Last week, when the children came back from their Easter holidays, there was a mysterious parcel left in the Year One classroom. We were all very excited and began to ask questions about what might be inside it.
The next day, we opened the box and inside was a cuddly, toy fox. After a vote, the class decided to name our new friend Rainbow. Rainbow spent a happy week in our classroom, inspiring us all to write about our favourite toys from home.
Missing!!
After the weekend, we came to school and Rainbow was missing! Year One were extremely worried about Rainbow and upset that he was missing. We decided to make ‘lost’ posters and put them up around the school, describing what Rainbow looked like.
The following day, Rainbow had still not returned to the classroom. We decided to take matters into our own hands and go on a hunt to look for our missing friend. We took a tour around the school in search of Rainbow. We visited the other classrooms and asked staff who we bumped into if they had seen Rainbow.
After a few conversations, we pieced together the clues and found Rainbow in the PE cupboard. He must have followed us during one of our PE sessions and got stuck there.
We couldn’t be happier to have him back with us, safe and sound.
Windswept and wonderful!
This afternoon, we made some fantastic kites and tested them out in the wind! We created different shapes in the air using ribbons and investigated whose kite flew the highest.
Computing with Kodu
LO: I can create and debug algorithms.
“Today we did coding with Kodu where we had different characters. We changed the heights of them and the settings of them by left-clicking and right-clicking.” – Sami
“First we clicked Kodu and pressed program. Then we had to click When… keyboard. We clicked the little add and used WASD. We went on the Do which was move and we kept it on move.” – Yusayrah
Not only did we have a go at programming our Kodus to move using algorithms, we found a bug in a pre-written piece of code and said how to fix the problem – this is called debugging.
“First we looked at them both and saw that both were arrows. We needed to change one of them to WASD because if we had both as arrows, it would control both of them.” – Albie
“I found the most challenging part was to control the Kodu because you might have pressed the wrong button and it went into the Rover.” – Phoebe
“I found moving the land the hardest because you could move it into the wrong place and do the wrong things. Remember to press F4 to put it back to the middle.” – Jasraj
“My favourite part was getting the Kodu and the Rover. They are really cute and you can change their colours.” – Jemima
“My favourite bit was moving Rover because sometimes when Safiya-Mishal was helping other people I tried to do 360’s around our other Kodu.” – Noah
Next week, we’ll design other sequences of instructions to achieve a goal. The aim for the end of the unit is to create our very own games!
Vocab – Words of the Week
This week, in Year 5, we’re focussing on a few words that might improve our vocabulary (both in speech and in our writing).
Our focus words are:
- uncouth (adjective)
- to inspire (verb)
- optimism (abstract noun)
We’ve been trying to use these words throughout the day in class and in our writing where possible. Today, Kai and Lewis managed to use the word inspire in an answer during our reading lesson. We used this article about Helen Sharman to help us improve our retrieval, interpreting and author’s choice skills. When asked what the purpose was, Lewis wrote: “To inspire and influence young people who may be interested in a career in science or space!” – great answer!
See if your child can use these words at home and help out by asking what they mean.
Shapes in the sun
Last week, we took full advantage of the lovely weather and took our maths lesson outside.
End of year 4 expectations for geometry and shape are that children can:
- compare and classify geometric shapes, including quadrilaterals and triangles, based on their properties and sizes
- identify acute and obtuse angles and compare and order angles up to two right angles by size
- identify lines of symmetry in 2-D shapes presented in different orientations
- complete a simple symmetric figure with respect to a specific line of symmetry
We focused on comparing and classifying 2D shapes. After discussing all the properties of various shapes, the children set to work on grouping them. It was great to see the class remember various ways of sorting from our previous topic
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PE
During PE, the children have been focusing on throwing and catching skills. They have used beanbags, hoops and various sizes of balls.
Today, we used balloons. Using the parachute, we worked as a team to control the balloons whilst creating different movements. 
The children had various challenges they had to complete with their balloon. We had lots of fun and all the class worked very hard.