Animal Antics
We really enjoyed getting up close and personal with some real life animals as part of our Life topic this week. We wore a snake as a scarf and learnt all about how the patterns of its scales help it to hide from its prey.
We also used our maths skills to estimate how long it was and then measured it against our own height to compare.
Next, we met some rainforest chickens and learnt all about how the mother has to sit on her eggs to keep them warm so that they’ll hatch.
Finally, it was time for the creepy crawly – a tarantula. Only the bravest dared hold this little creature.
What a fantastic experience for us all. Thanks to Miss Valentine for organising it!
School dinners
Our school dinner menu was discussed by our School Council this week. They also talked about ways to encourage others to try some of the new meals that are on the Spring term menu.
Did you know the menu is available to view on our website and also displayed on our dining room window. This is a good way to make your child aware of what the daily meals are.
The menu follows a three week cycle and it changed on a termly basis.
Here are the options for today.
Chinese New Year
Chinese New Year begins on 08 February 2016 and this year it is the Year of the Monkey.
Year 1 found lots of similarities to celebrations that we may experience including spending time with family and friends, enjoying special food, wearing new clothes and sending cards and presents.
- ‘I wear new clothes for Diwali.’
- ‘We give presents for birthdays.’
- ‘We decorate our home when it is Christmas.’
- ‘We have special food when it is Eid.’
The Chinese zodiac follows a twelve year cycle, each of the years being named after an animal. The Chinese believe that people born in a particular year take on the characteristics of the animal associated with that year.
We watched the story of how the order of the animals was decided and the children were encouraged to find out what animal they are.
For Chinese New Year, there are lots of events happening in Leeds if you want to get involved.
Gong Hey Fat Choy!
Animal Antics
Mags, from Animals Intuition, came into school this morning to show us and teach us about her animals. Here are some pictures:
School Council elections 11 February
Our current school councillors held their final meeting today as we prepare to elect our new school council. This year’s election date is Thursday 11 February.
Children from every class, including Reception, are encouraged to prepare a speech to present to their class as part of the election process. Our whole school homework before the election date (05 February) will give children the chance to plan their speech.
Thank you to our existing school council who have been involved with many decisions and discussions throughout the year. On today’s agenda, there have been discussions around the new school dinner menu, classroom reading areas, e-safety and general suggestions put forward by children in each class. It appears they have enjoyed the role as they all intend to stand again at the elections.
22 January 2016
The homework this week is creative and is due in on Wednesday 27 January.
What is your favourite animal and why?
Leeds City Museum visit
We enjoyed our visit to Leeds City Museum on Friday morning. In three groups, we each focussed on one animal: polar bear, gorilla and sea turtle.
We started by visiting one of the museum exhibitions in order to find our animal and sketch it, noting what features it had and what it might use these for.
Then, once we’d had a chance to take a look around at all of the other interesting things inside the exhibition, we decided to take a closer look at some animals, exploring skulls and taxidermy.
We thought about how these animals were adapted to live in their environment before working as a team to create a 3D collage of our animal.
We had a great time and returned very excited to continue learning through our Life topic.
22 January 2016
For our Practice Makes Perfect homework this week, we’re working on skills we’ve been developing in Maths.
To be able to find missing lengths and work out perimeter and area.
The children need to use the information they already have to work out the size of the missing lengths. They can then use this information to work out perimeter and area.
This homework is due on Wednesday 27 January.
22 January 2016
This week’s Talk Time homework is linked to our Life topic and is due on Wednesday 27 January.
Debate: Choose an animal and prepare to argue that it is the ‘best’ animal.
You’ll need to think about the positive points about that animal and have evidence to back it up. Don’t forget to consider what negatives it might have so that you can counter argue any negative points brought up by any other debater.
Creative homework
Here are this week’s favourite creative homeworks, as chosen by the children:
