Wow! What a busy few weeks!
In English, we published our own version of Monkey and Me. For the last few weeks, we have been applying our phonics in our Christmas writing. We have written lists for Father Christmas, thank you letters, and descriptive sentences about Christmas scenes. The children have worked really hard with their phonics and have written some brilliant sentences:
- “It is messy, but Santa doesn’t mind”.
- “Santa has a pretty present.”
- “There is a shiny Christmas tree.”
- “Santa is between the red and gold slay.”
- “The moon is shining bright.”
- “The white snow is falling fast.”
- “The slay flies by magic.”
In maths, after looking at addition we moved onto subtraction. We looked at fact families and challenged ourselves to find all eight addition and subtraction sentences in each fact family. We wrote subtraction number sentences, counted back on a number line and solved missing number sentences.
In science, we continued our work on winter. We discussed the different weather conditions throughout the year and then designed a suitable winter outfit which we labelled. We used our fieldwork and observational skills to describe the winter changes around us.
Our love of learning history continued as we compared Mary Seacole and Florence Nightingale, answering the question, ‘why is Florence Nightingale more famous than Mary Seacole?’. We also looked at the similarities and differences between the two nurses.
- “Mary Seacole was famous because she went to the battlefield.” – Ada
- “Florence Nightingale helped soldiers and so did Mary Seacole. Mary Seacole writed a book and they were both nurses and Florence Nightingale got a medal.” – Cissy
- “They had different colour skin. They were both a nurse.” – Hamish
- “Florence Nightingale was known as the lady of the lamp. Mary Seacole couldn’t go to the war in Crimea because she wasn’t allowed.” – Hattie
- “Florence Nightingale was the lady of the lamp and helped soldiers in the night time. Mary Seacole helped the soldiers with healthy food.” – Peggy
- “Florence Nightingale cleaned the floors as they were dirty and this meant that sick people got sicker. Mary Seacole fed the people good food to make them feel better.” – Toby
We also explored the story of Rosa Parks and the Montgomery Bus in 1955. We discussed what happened on the bus and why it happened. We talked about how people were treated differently because of the colour of their skin. We also discussed how Rosa Parks made a peaceful stand against this treatment and how this began to bring about change.
- “Rosa Parks wanted to not get off her seat because she didn’t want to give her seat to a white person. She wanted to change the world and for black and white people to be treated the same.” – Arlo (Hazel).
- “Rosa Parks is going to jail because she didn’t let a white man sit in her seat. She wanted to show that it was unfair for people with different skin colour not to sit together.” – Hal
- “She was sent to prison because she wouldn’t give the passenger her seat. The white skin people thought they were better than the black skin people.” – Eliza
In art, over the past couple of weeks we have learnt how to create tones, tints and shadows using our colour mixing skills. We then practised these skills by replicating a 3D picture of a ball. Finally, we applied the skills that we had learnt to create a section of Renoir’s Umbrella painting.
Along with all of our other learning, we have been practicing and performing our Christmas nativity, impressed Mrs Footer with our singing, and hopefully entertained you all with our Christmas performance! We watched a panto from our local theatre company, had Christmas dinner day, went on a Santa Canter, created French Christmas cards, had a film afternoon and made and decorated biscuits! Phew!
Next term:
- We are learning about places and spaces in the UK.
- We are going to learn about the four nations of the UK, their flags, flowers, capital cities, tradition dishes, landmarks and Saints.
- Exploring our senses in science.
- Looking at designing and making our own free-standing structures in DT.
Thank you for your support this term, we both wish you a very merry Christmas and a happy New Year! See you in the Spring!
