Hello from Lilac and Willow, we hope you had a great half term. It has been a really lovely first week back as we begin our new topic about Space.
This week
The children watched a video of British Astronaut Tim Peake from his time on board the European Space Station. In the video, the children discovered that Miss Mouse (from CBeebies) has completed her astronaut training so that she could join Tim in Space. As a result of this our class mascots have seen that Miss Mouse went into Space and now they want to go too. So our aim for this half term is to find out everything that we can about Space to help Sam and Lucas get ready for a mission to Space! We found out what astronauts do, what they wear, what they eat and drink and where they sleep whilst in space. We also learnt about some famous astronauts throughout history. We then spent some time hearing all about Tim Peake including how he became and astronaut, what his role was in the European Space Station and also enjoyed the story Goodnight Spaceman which is inspired by Tim Peake and his sons. The children also wanted to find out if a cat had been into space. We researched and discovered that there were lots of animals that went to space. There were lots of fun opportunities for the children to develop their learning further such as making paper plate astronauts, creating split pin astronaut puppets and working as teams to create a paper mache moon in the tuff spot.
As mathematicians the children were learning to identify the number 9 using different representations and to understand the composition of 9. The children were using their prior knowledge about the part-whole model to help support them in this learning and they did such a great job!
In phonics this week, the children were learning the diagraphs /ai/ and /or/. A digraph is where 2 letters come together to make one sound. The children have continued working hard to apply their phonic knowledge in their reading and their writing. This week we have focussed on how best to write a sentence by following these steps:
- Say the sentence aloud.
- Count how many words are in your sentence.
- Say the first word aloud. Listen to how many sounds are in the word. Write down the sounds you can hear.
- Leave a finger space and repeat with the rest of the sentence.
- Read the sentence back and make any corrections.
In Jigsaw this half term our learning will centre around the topic Healthy Me. We started this week by looking at the need to exercise as a way of keeping our bodies healthy. The children really enjoying doing some activities and made some fantastic observations about how their bodies changed after exercise.
Next week
- We will be learning about Shrove Tuesday and enjoy the story Mr. Wolf’s Pancakes.
- We will be learning about St. David the patron saint of Wales and how people celebrate St. David’s Day.
- We will be continuing our research for the class mascots mission to space, by finding out about space rockets and satellites.
- We will be celebrating World Book Day.
- In Maths, we will be learning to compare numbers within 10 and different ways to make 10.
- In Phonics, we will be learning the digraphs /oa/ and /er/.
- In Talk 4 Writing, we will share the story ‘On the way home’ by Jill Murphy and retell it by creating a story map.
- In Jigsaw, we will continue our topic Healthy Me by learning how moving and resting are good for our bodies.
Supporting your child at home
- Read three times a week and record this in your child’s reading record.
- Read aloud books to your child that will extend their knowledge of the world and illustrate a current topic. This will help your child to engage with non-fiction books.
- Provide opportunities for children to tell each other about their work and play. Help them reflect and self evaluate their own work. This will support your child to show resilience and perseverance in the face of a challenge.
Any other information
- RECEPTION, YEAR 2 & YEAR 6 PARENTS EVENING – Wednesday 9th March 5-8pm and Thursday 10th March 4-7pm. Information about booking will be sent soon, so please put the date in your diary.
- BOOK BAGS – Please could book bags be in school every day.
- JUNK MODELLING – If you have any items suitable for junk modelling, we would be delighted to receive them. Thank you for your donations so far.
We hope you had a good weekend!
Mrs. Fisher and Mr. French
Willow and Lilac Class Teachers