The ‘Big Brain’ Art Gallery!
This morning, Year 3 and 4 hosted their first art gallery where they were able to showcase all the amazing art they have produced this half term.
We displayed all the pieces across the two classrooms and gave the children the opportunity to look around and comment on their classmates artwork.
A fantastic end to a fantastic half term!
All of the Year 3/4 team wish you a Merry Christmas and happy and healthy holiday.
See you in the New Year!
Living and Learning: mental health
Over the past three weeks, we have been discussing mental health: why it is important and how to look after it. We spoke about mental health being “about our feelings, our thinking, our emotions and our moods – things you can’t see, but affect our lives in lots of ways”.
We talked about how sometimes big emotions (strong emotions that stay for a long time and can stop us from doing what we want to do in our lives) can become very overwhelming but there are strategies to help us. The children talked about taking deep breaths; thinking of happy memories; taking part in something they love or completing a self-care activity.
Help at home: discuss which self-care activities your child might use to help deal with their emotions.
09 December 2022
This week’s Talk Time relates to our Science learning. Each class has been finding out about one or two scientists as part of their Science lessons.
I can show off my knowledge of different scientists.
Year 1/2: John Dunlop
Year 3/4: Jane Goodall
Year 5/6: Carl Linnaeus and Sarah Fowler
Have a chat with someone at home about the scientist that you have been learning about in your Science sessions. Some things to consider when talking about a scientist is:
- who they are
- what they did
- why their work was important
- whether their work has an impact on life today
Challenge: Do you know of any other scientists? Can you talk about their work and say how it has impacted on life today?
World Cup Geography
We’ve had a topical challenge this week relating to the World Cup. Our challenge was to identify the time zones of the different football teams in comparison to GMT (Greenwich Mean Time).
If you’ve ever been abroad, have friends or family who live abroad; why not identify which time zones they are in.
Certificates
The children are always excited and proud to get their Lexia and Numbots certificates on a Tuesday.
Can you believe we’ve had 87 Numbots certificates and 73 Lexia certificates so far in Year 2!
This is fantastic learning – well done, Year 2!
25 November 2022
This week’s Talk Time relates to this half term’s Art topic.
I can compare and contrast different artworks, architecture and designs.
I can give my opinions, and back them up with reasons.
In our Art lessons, we’re thinking about the work of these artists, architects and designers and we’re using the following vocabulary:
Y1,2 Artists:
George Seurat
Bridget Riley
Vocabulary: pointillism, op art
Y3,4 Architects:
St Paul’s Cathedral, Sir Christopher Wren
London Aquatic Centre, Zara Hadid
Vocabulary: architect, architecture
Y5,6 Designers:
William Morris
Orla Kiely
Vocabulary: pattern, repetition, symmetry, foreground, background
The key to this task is being able to explain thoughts and opinions. It’s worth remembering that the opinions of one person may not match those of another and that it’s okay to disagree.
We’d like your child to speak confidently and passionately about art. Using ‘because’ will encourage your child to think carefully about their own interpretation of the art. Offering your own opinions may also help your child to consider alternative viewpoints and perspectives.
Discussions about the art could take place in a number of ways. Here’s a couple of suggestions:
- Discuss each piece separately before then looking at them side by side.
- Have both pieces side by side from the start.
Whichever approach you opt for, referring to these questions and the vocabulary above will help to focus your discussions at home:
- Explain what you like about each piece.
- Explain what you dislike about each piece.
- How are the two pieces similar?
- How are the two pieces different?
- Considering what is most important to you, which piece do you prefer?
25.11.2022 – Spellings
Practise adding the suffixes -er and -est to these words for your spelling test next Friday:
nice
happy
funny
brave
tall
warm
rude
lonely
You could use rainbow writing to help you learn them!
Science – What’s that sound?
This half term, our Science topic is called ‘What’s that sound?’. We are physicists because we are learning about physics.
So far, Year 4 have learnt how a sound travels into our ears and that is because of vibrations. For example, if an object like a car door is slammed shut, the car door vibrates and the vibrations travel through the air to our ears! To find out more, we went on a sound walk around the school to find as many different sound sources as possible.
The children heard lots of things, such as;
- children talking/shouting
- car horns
- ambulance siren
- car engines
- trees rustling
- foot steps
- fridge humming.
We worked out that we heard most of the sounds in the front playground due to being nearer the road.
Some sounds were high pitched and others were low pitched. The sounds that are there to catch our attention (ambulance sirens) are high pitched and the sounds that are more common (car engines) are low pitched.
Our second lesson was exploring sounds further and fortunately for the children, making sounds with our bodies! We tried to compose a “song” using our bodies. We clicked, stomped, hummed, thumped and shouted. We then experimented with the drums by placing rice on the top and seeing what happened when we hit it hard and hit it softly. In conclusion, the harder we hit the drum, the higher the rice flew and the softer we hit the drum, the lower the rice flew.
Have a look at us in action:
Anti-bullying day!
Today for our anti-bullying day, we joined the nation by focussing on the message of “reaching out”. We discussed how this had several meanings: reaching out to a trusted adult for support/advice, reaching out to the victim to see if they are okay or reaching out to make a change.
We looked at the definition of bullying which our JLT members created:
“Bullying is when you hurt someone physically or emotionally (including online), Several Times On Purpose”
Whilst we hope this would never be the case in our school, we also discussed what you can do if you were to experience bullying at Moortown Primary School:
“Start Telling Other People. You could use the Living and Learning box, the worry box, email stayingsafe@spherefederation.org or even call Childline (0800 1111).”
We celebrated the message that everyone is different and equal by wearing odd socks to school:
Living and Learning: Me and my community week
This week has been very busy in Year 1! We have been working all week learning about our identity and our community!
On Tuesday two Police Community Support Officers came into the classroom to talk to us about staying safe using fireworks and sparklers. We listened really well and even found out you should put your sparkler in a carrot!!
On Wednesday, as well as our amazing class assembly (Well done everyone!), we also had a visit from the RNIB. They brought along a guide dog with them and we learnt all about the job of a guide dog.
On Thursday, teacher for the deaf came to visit to talk to us all about how we can help deaf adults and children understand us more clearly. We learn some sign language too.
We have had an amazing week learning all about how we are the same and how we are different. It has all been topped off by everyone showing off their identity today! Amazing work everyone!
