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Learning about time

Thanks to everyone for sending a photo of your child as a baby. This topic is always fascinating for young children, especially when they realise their teachers were babies too! Most children find the concept of time diificult because of its abstract nature. In the early years, the focus is mainly on the aspect of sequencing events and using the vocabulary of time.

This week, we’ll be learning how to read o’clock times as well but it’s important that children have the concept of time.

For many children time only exists in the present and they find it more difficult to remember past events than to imagine a future event such as a birthday.

Talk to your child about past events and use the language of time, such as:

• yesterday,
• today,
• tomorrow,
• last week,
• last month,
• quicker,
• slower,
• before,
• after,
• earlier and
• later.

Set your child challenges and time them. For example, ask them to tidy their toys away and time them. Talk about how long it took. Were they quicker or slower than yesterday?

As you begin to tell a story emphasise the opening phrases ‘once upon a time’ or ‘a long time ago’. When you have finished reading the story discuss the sequence of events. Use the language first, next, and then, and finally.

As always: have fun and keep it playful!

26 April 2013

This week’s homework is Practice Makes Perfect. Your child will have a worksheet to complete. In this worksheet, your child will have to join two sentences using one of the words given.

It’s due in on Wednesday 01 May 2013.

26 April 2013

We’re reviewing our learning on split digraphs this week: the ‘e’ at the end makes the vowel in the word a longer sound – compare ‘rid’ with ‘ride’, for example.

These words will be tested on Friday 03 May 2013.

26 April 2013

This week’s spellings are homophones again. This time we are thinking about ‘n’ and ‘kn’ words. Your child will be tested on Friday 03 May 2013.

• know
• no
• knew
• new
• knot
• not
• knight
• night
• knit
• nit

26 April 2013

This week’s homework is creative. It’s due in on Wednesday 01 May 2013.

I know about nocturnal animals.

In science, we’ve learnt about some nocturnal animals. Your child could choose different nocturnal animals or just one and show what they know about them.

They could:

• produce a spider diagram of information
• draw pictures with labels
• write a fact file

…or think of another creative way of presenting their information.

26 April 2013

There will be no new words to learn this week. Instead, there will be SATs style spelling tests of words that the children are unfamiliar with.  I suggest children spend time each night looking through old spelling lists and trying to remember rules, especially:

• drop the ‘e’ for ‘ing’ eg hope / hoping, accommodate / accommodating
• drop the ‘y’ for ‘i’ eg happy / happiness, fury / furious
• double up for short vowel sounds eg diner / dinner, coma / comma

Spelling tests will be given at several points in the week.

26 April 2013

Homework this week is a mix of talk time and creative.

I can do something that makes me feel proud is our SEAL statement.

Your homework is to prepare a speech to deliver to the rest of the class about when you have felt proud of yourself.  Your speech should last one minute and describe the following:

• what you did that you were proud of
• how you felt
• how other people reacted to you

You’ll deliver your speech to the rest of the class on Wednesday or Friday of next week but homework has to be done by Wednesday.

You can prepare notes to help you but your speech should be spoken to the class, not read.

26 April 2013

The spellings this week continue to focus on a familiar set of letters (eg ough, ight) that are pronounced differently depending on which word they feature in (eg cough, through).

This week, the set of letters are ight.

Encourage your child to think about the different sounds they hear when they say the words, and encourage them to think of others, too.

26 April 2013

The spellings this week all us the rule double up for a short vowel sound.  Just before the double letters in the words below, the vowel has a longer sound – it’s the difference between dinner and diner, for example.

I know it feels like we’ve done this rule loads already this year but it is one of the crucial spelling rules and we still need to practise!

Children will be tested on eight out of the ten words on Friday 03 May.

26 April 2013

The homework this week is talk time and is due in on Wednesday 01 May.

I can talk about a time when I have felt proud of myself or others.

This homework links in with our weekly SEAL statement and also the wider SEAL theme of ‘It’s good to be me’.