Good afternoon everyone,
Parent Consultations
It has been lovely to see that everyone has booked in their appointments for our parent consultations on Friday 22nd October so quickly. I am looking forward to meeting with you all.
A few parents have asked how the video meeting is facilitated. As far as I am aware, you should receive a link 24 hours before your appointment which can be used to access the platform for the meeting.
If there are any urgent questions you have, please be ready to ask these as we only have a 10 minute time-slot at which point the link will disconnect. As class teacher, I will be letting you know how your child has settled in, how they are doing academically in reading, writing and maths and any other comments I may need to make specific to your child. Any non-urgent questions or questions we do not have time to address can be sent to me via Class Dojo and I will reply when available during my working hours.
This Week…
In English this week, we have explored ways of mapping stories and have used the story mountain technique to map the story of Sister for Sale. We have also began to make tweaks to this in order to plan our own story based upon Sister for Sale. Our grammar focus has been upon expanded noun phrases.
In Maths, we have completed our work on counting in 2s, 3s, 5s and 10s, as well as completing work on partitioning numbers into different combinations. We will now move on to work on addition and subtraction by looking at related facts we know (a homework task has been set for this).
In Science, we explored the basic needs that animals have (air, food, water and shelter) and have explained how our chosen animal meets these needs. We also explored additional needs that different animals may have, such as space to walk, the need for protection and love/care.
In RE, we have been learning all about baby Moses and have written a diary entry from the point of view of his sister, Miriam, when Moses was put in a basket on the River Nile to escape the cruel Pharoah. These were fantastic to read! We have also explored the story of Daniel and the Lion’s Den and talked about how important our faith in God is.
In History, we learned about how we know so much about The Great Fire of London – diaries! We looked at extracts of Samuel Pepys’ diary, learned about his life and created posters to inform others about him.
In PE, we have been continuing our dance sequences in our indoor session and have been considering how different vehicles might move and putting these into sequences by counting 8 beats. In our outdoor session, we have been learning the skills of passing and moving, as well as blocking and defending.
Homework
Our homework this week is a spelling test, which we will undertake on Thursday instead of the usual Friday.
We also have a counting in 3s tasks to ensure the children are confident with this sequence of counting.
There is a number bonds to 20 worksheet too. We have done this at school but I feel the children would benefit from more practice.
There is also a ‘fact family’ sheet. The children must use the 3 numbers in each triangle to make 4 facts: two addition and two subtraction. Remember, we can add in any order but we need to subtract always with the largest number first.
I have also sent home a small, simple, phonics screening practice sheet. We will be undertaking our phonics screening check a few weeks into next half term and it would be great if you could practice reading the words by sounding out with your child. There are some real words and some alien words. The alien words still follow the usual conventions of sounding out so the children can sound them out accurately. I will send another phonics screening practice after half term.
There will be no homework next week (other than spelling practice) as I feel it is important for the children to have a break over half term.
Inappropriate Discussions/Play
We have noticed in school that several children have been talking about inappropriate computer games and television shows. THere seems to have been a lot of children across school discussing a TV show called ‘Squid Games’. Miss Haggerty has drafted a letter to ask you to ensure you are aware of what your child is accessing and whether it is appropriate. It can be read here.
Award Winners
Golden Award – Willow - for her wonderful manners, polite attitude and hard work.
Writing Award – Roma - for ALWAYS presenting her writing beautifully, no matter what she is doing.
Maths Award – Ellenie - for her excellent systemic work in number bonds to 20.
Have a lovely weekend,
Mr Whetnall, Mrs Bowdell and Miss Collins
