15th November 2024

Wow! What a busy week we have had in year 1. We started the week with a visit to the church to pay our respect to all those who fought for our freedom. The children were incredibly sensible and respectful and were very proud of them.

During art this week the children all worked together to create a fantastic piece of work based on the artist Bridget Riley.

During our fire practice on Thursday they were exemplary and again we couldn't be prouder. 

As part of Year 1 Science and senses we will be focusing next week on taste. Your child will have the opportunity to sample a range of flavours.

8th November 2024

We had lots of fun and laughter from the children during their outdoor learning session this week. They made a picture of a bonfire using twigs and leaves from the garden. Then they pretended to heat up marshmallows, before becoming leaf fairies!

Lots of fun and learning packed into a short time. It was lovely to hear so much laughter from the children.

28th June 2024

We have had a very exciting week at school! On Wednesday morning we found a large egg in our classroom! It had cracked open and we all wondered what had hatched from it. We looked at information about different eggs and the children realised it is an ostrich egg! The ostrich was nowhere to be seen so the children made maps and plans to find it. We went on a walk to see if we could spot any clues - there were lots of course! The children then decided they ought to build a nest, just in case the ostrich returned and needed to have a rest. They really enjoyed drawing pictures and writing sentences about the event too. We will be keeping our eyes open for more clues!

The children also really enjoyed having a paddle in our little pool - what a lovely way to cool down in the warm weather!

21st June 2024

The children have produced some lovely paintings of animals this week. They thought carefully about their choice of colour and used fine brushes to add detail. They practised using short and controlled brush strokes too. Next week they will continue to practise these painting skills freely in the creative area.

14th June 2024

The children have continued with their work on shape this week and have enjoyed making pictures using 2D shapes. They have explored boats as part of this term's topic and particularly enjoyed making rafts using natural materials during their outdoor learning session. In our P.E. session on Friday, the children had a go at line dancing - we all had lots of fun learning the steps and putting these together as a sequence!

7th June 2024

What a super week we have had! On Wednesday we had another visit from the fire engine. The highlight was definitely using the water hoses!

We have been rotating and manipulating shapes this week to make the shapes fit inside pictures or larger shapes.

The children have used our space station role play area and made a large fire engine to use as part of their role play too.

The children really enjoyed our D-Day picnic on Friday - it was lovely to see so many of you attend. We hope you enjoyed the afternoon too.

24th May 2024

The children have really enjoyed learning about life under the sea this week. We have finished our class octopus and the children have also produced some lovely artwork. They have enjoyed finding out about different sea creatures and have enjoyed using the water tray as part of their role play, bathing the dolls.

3rd May 2024

This week the children have explored more complex patterns, particularly those found in the natural environment and those used in different cultures and other parts of the world. As part of our learning about different places, we have enjoyed finding out about some of the animals in Australia and New Zealand. We are learning more about underwater creatures and the Great Barrier Reef; the children really wanted to make a giant octopus for the classroom so this is an ongoing project! The children have also enjoyed making up their own games in our outdoor area using P.E equipment - we are hoping for more sunshine to really make the most of our outdoor learning. As part of their learning about endangered animals, the children have made their own cards. This week we will set up a little stall in our outdoor area at the end of each afternoon, and some of the children will 'sell' the cards for a small donation which will be sent to a local animal charity. We want our young children to learn that they can make a big difference!

19th April 2024

What a super week we have had! This term we are learning that there are different countries in the world that may be different from our own. We began our journey this week in Mexico! The children set up their own taco restaurant in the creative area on Monday so we just had to taste some wraps with salsa on Tuesday! We have listened to Mexican Mariachi music and looked at some paintings by Frida Kahlo. Frida is well-known for the flowers worn in her hair, statement jewellery and brightly coloured clothing. The children then dressed up ready for their own self-portrait - we took a photograph and the children have been working on some wonderful paintings inspired by their own photo! I wonder where we will travel next week.

12th April 2024

It's lovely to see the children back at school after the Easter break. We are really enjoying our Science week and will continue to introduce some different scientific investigations in the coming weeks. Some of the investigations were child-initiated and the children had some great ideas - we definitely have some scientists in our class!

15th March 2024

What a busy couple of weeks we have had! The children have continued making structures using a range of materials; some of the children have made belts and handbags using boxes and materials - as this idea caught on, it was lovely to see the children helping each other; we have also continued exploring threading and weaving.

Outside, we have used pipes and guttering to get water from one place to another - lots of problem solving and teamwork was involved! Our wormery is coming along and we now have a few guests! We have looked for signs of Spring, observing carefully to draw and paint pictures of daffodils.

Our floor robot has been popular and again the children have helped each other to give the robot instructions.

In maths, the children have deepened their understanding of numbers 9 and 10, for example sorting representations of 9 and 'not 9'.

1st March 2024

We have continued with our work on maps and the children have been busy adding the finishing touches to their model houses this week.

They have enjoyed using our indoor water tray to explore capacity and different materials.

We have continued making pairs, exploring doubles and combining two groups in maths.

The children have enjoyed writing for different purposes, including about pets, shopping lists and various signs and labels.

Our new sounds in Phonics this week are ‘dge’ as in bridge and ‘ve’ as in glove.

We have some dress designers of the future in our class. Look at these fabulous creations!

23rd February 2024

We have had a very creative week! The children have had a go at weaving, making houses using boxes and other materials as well as following their own ideas.

We have started our topic on ‘Healthy Me’ by finding out about looking after teeth. The children have enjoyed brushing the large set of teeth we have in the classroom as well as using play dough to make teeth, pretending to be a dentist. We have watched clips about visiting the dentist and talked about what we can do to make sure our teeth are healthy and strong.

We have also enjoyed getting out in the fresh air too!

16th February 2024

Happy Chinese New Year!

We really enjoyed our activities and even celebrated the Chinese New Year in our outdoor learning session.

2nd February 2024

We had a super ‘Wear Red’ day! Here are a few photos of the activities the children enjoyed. We talked about children who have heart surgery and why we were wearing red. We shared a book called Zip-Line about children who have a scar on their chest following surgery. The children made some lovely heart-themed artwork in the creative area and we tasted delicious strawberries. We also had a go at circuit training to keep our bodies healthy. The children did really well with this activity!

29th January 2024

As part of our learning around life in the past, our book last week was Peepo by Janet and Allan Ahlberg. We explored the pictures and compared life in the 1940s with today. The children used viewfinders to focus on certain parts of the pictures and practised adding detail to their own drawings. They also enjoyed using role play to explore some aspects of family life in the past. We will continue finding out about life in the past this week, looking at old photographs and some artefacts.

Activities involving ‘challenges’ continue to be popular in our classroom and the children have had some super discussions on how to solve certain problems.

19th January 2024

The children have listened to more of our traditional stories this week, with a focus on The Elves and the Shoemaker; we have set up a shoe shop in the classroom and the children have enjoyed trying on different pairs of shoes! They have also designed shoes as part of our creative work. As part of our learning around ‘No Outsiders’, we have talked about the story Red Rockets and Rainbow Jelly and discussed how we can all like different things and have different ideas but we can still be friends. The children thought about what they like and this formed part of our drawing and writing activities this week. In our creative area, the children have explored print-making materials this week; they have also used natural paint brushes made of leaves and twigs to explore painting techniques. 

We have expanded our use of sticks and joining materials to make structures and this has been so popular we have made a special area for this in the classroom where we can continue to add different materials. In phonics, our new phonemes (sounds) this week are ‘w’ and ‘x’; we have also taught the words he and she. Our maths activities this week have involved finding and representing numbers to 5 as well as exploring the composition of the number 5 (how we can make 5 using smaller numbers). Reading continues to be an extremely important part of our daily routine - whether this is through our daily phonics activities, choral reading or reading with individual children. Thank you for supporting your child with their reading at home - this regular practice really makes a huge difference to the confidence of the children. Please could the children bring their books and reading records to school everyday so that we can maintain the partnership between reading at home and school, as well as change books when needed.

12th January 2024

What a super first few days back at school! The children have settled back into the daily routine and have been keen to show what they have remembered. We check our knowledge is ‘sticking’ in our minds regularly throughout the week and the children enjoy using our ‘knowledge’ display to recall things they have learnt in our different topics. As a class they are able to talk about Autumn, Winter, Remembrance Day, Guy Fawkes, Diwali, Christmas, parts of the body and the five senses. 

This term we begin with a focus on traditional stories. This week we have read and talked about The Magic Porridge Pot, The Gingerbread Man, Jack and the Beanstalk, and The Enormous Turnip. The children had fun in their outdoor learning session, making houses for the Three Little Pigs, icing a gingerbread person then carrying their ‘person’ across a ‘river’ by following an obstacle course, before eating it - just like the fox in the story! They then tasted porridge made on the fire. 

In our phonics session our focus has been on the letters j and v; the children are also working really hard on recognising the ‘Helpful Words’ I, to, the, no, go, into, ten, of, little. We will add new words to the list this term.

As part of our Jigsaw unit on Dreams and Goals, the children have had a go at some challenges today including building a tower using only playing cards, building a tall tower using only sticks and blu-tac and picking out sequins from other small items while wearing a blindfold. They thoroughly enjoyed these activities so we will be including more next week!

8th December 2023

The children are almost ready to perform their Christmas play to parents on Tuesday 12th December at 2pm in the school hall. The stage is up, the children have tried on costumes and are all ready to show their singing, dancing and acting skills! We look forward to seeing you all on Tuesday - we have allocated up to 3 seats per family. Please could the children wear their P.E kits (white t-shirt and navy/black shorts or leggings) to school on Tuesday rather than outdoor learning clothes, so they can wear their costumes over the top if necessary.

We also look forward to our Glitter and Sparkle morning on Thursday 14th December from 9:00 am; parents and/or grandparents please come and join us. The session will last approximately an hour. Weather permitting, we will use our outdoor learning area again for a campfire food activity so please come suitably dressed for a possible walk across a muddy field! The rest of our activities will take place under our outdoor canopy, in the classroom or the school hall.

Alongside all of our busy Christmas preparation, the children have also covered the sounds l, ll and le this week in our phonics session; in maths we are finding, comparing and representing the numbers 4 and 5 at the moment. Our class story this week has been Stick Man - we have even watched the animated film which the children loved.

27th November 2023

This week we will get into the swing of our rehearsals for the Nativity - the children have already started learning the songs and we have had a little go at some of the lines and actions. Costume letters will be sent home early this week - we hope to keep costumes really simple and we already have a few in school which may be suitable.

As part of our R.E sessions, we will be reading the Christmas Story and the children will draw pictures to show different parts of the story. They will have a go at writing labels and captions for their pictures by matching some of the sounds they know to letters.

In phonics this week the children will learn the sounds for b, f and ff. Sheets were sent home on Friday with the ‘grapheme tiles’/sounds we focused on last week, along with ‘Helpful Words’ I, to, the, no, go, into. These words can be cut up and used for a game - turn them over and choose one to read or place them around the house and see if your child can go on a word hunt to find a word you tell them.

In our maths sessions this week, we will be exploring circles and triangles in lots of different ways. We will also continue to practise counting, recognising numbers and identifying representations of 1, 2 and 3. We will also begin our creative projects, ready to send home some lovely Christmas treats at the end of term!

13th November 2023

Our first week back after the half-term break was a busy one. We started the week with some work around Bonfire Night and the children learnt some very simple facts about Guy Fawkes - who he was and what he tried to do. The children also talked about their own experiences of watching the fireworks and created some lovely paintings and chalk drawings as part of their independent learning. After all of the talk around ‘bonfire’ food, we could not resist making chocolate apples as a treat!

We then changed our focus to Remembrance Day in preparation for the Remembrance Assembly on Friday. Again, in very simple terms, the children learnt why this day is special and why we wear poppies. It was lovely to see them create their own representation of a poppy for our wreath, which they then took to the church with Mrs Pearson - thank you to the parents and grandparents who were able to accompany the children on their walk. In our assembly, the children sat and listened really well and were respectful during the silence held at the end - I felt really proud of them.

This week we will be celebrating World Kindness Day and lots of our group discussions, stories and activities will be based around this.

20th October 2023

This week the children have enjoyed exploring patterns - we have looked at patterns in the environment as well as creating our own repeating patterns using actions, words and drawings. We have joined in with a clip of Michael Rosen performing We’re Going on a Bear Hunt - many of the children are familiar with this book and we used it to explore patterns in the language and illustrations. We have appreciated three pieces of artwork created by famous artists, depicting trees and leaves in the Autumn. Some of the children then had a go at a piece of collaborative art using a leaf painting by the artist Georgia O’Keeffe. We will continue to explore this next week. In our phonics sessions we have learnt the sounds d as in dog and g as in gate - the children wanted to count how many sounds they now know and are very proud that they know 9 sounds (phonemes) already and are beginning to blend some of these sounds together to read two and three letter words. We have continued to explore feelings and some of the children have started to ask “How are you feeling today?” It is lovely to see everyone in our class caring about each other - what a super team! We can’t wait for our Pumpkin Patch afternoon on Tuesday! We look forward to seeing as many parents as possible. Fingers crossed we have a dry and sunny afternoon!

13th October 2023

In our maths sessions this week we have been using the vocabulary tall, short, long, heavy and light. The children have explored a variety of objects and materials to explore size and measures - we have even lined up in height order! We will continue with this concept next week.

In phonics the children have learnt the sounds n as in net and m as in man. I have given the children a sheet to try at home as part of their reading activities this week. Please cut up the tiles into individual letters and pictures. The children can colour the pictures if they want to. See if your child can say the sound for each letter then match it to the correct picture. The children have loved ‘feeding’ words to our robot (now named Sam) - they have made a great effort sounding out the words to read them!

Our ‘pumpkin activity afternoon’ is fast approaching (Tuesday 24th October). The £4.00 towards the pumpkins and refreshments can be paid on the Weduc app.

6th October 2023

This week the children have enjoyed making a robot to use as part of our phonics activities - they will feed the robot sounds to build words next week! We have concentrated on the sound ‘i as in insect’ this week and have had a go at listening out for this sound in words, as well as blending some sounds together to make simple words. 

The children have really enjoyed sorting buttons of different types this week, following our story The Button Box. They have come up with some great ideas for sorting the buttons in lots of different ways. We had a lovely treat in our outdoor learning session on Tuesday and the children toasted their own marshmallow on a stick (we support the children individually to do this safely of course!) Thank you for your patience when you collect the children after outdoor learning - it takes us a little longer after these sessions to gather our belongings!

When using our outdoor area, the children have practised putting on their puddle suits and wellies as independently as possible; they are also working really hard at putting on their socks after our P.E. session. Our homework challenge this week is to practise getting dressed/undressed - especially turning clothes the right way if they are inside out and putting socks and shoes on.

29th September 2023

This week we have talked about our feelings during our Jigsaw session and have introduced some words we can use other than ‘happy’ or ‘sad’, such as excited, worried, nervous, tired or calm. In our Phonics sessions we have introduced the sounds for the letters t as in teddy and p as in pan. We have looked at some of the changes that happen in the Autumn and will continue to learn about this as well as Harvest next week.

We will continue to spend lots of time using our outdoor environment so please could you send wellies and a puddle suit if you have not done so already - stomping through those Autumn leaves or splashing in muddy puddles is just too tempting! The children love our water area and we have seen some lovely teamwork this week when arranging the guttering to send water from one place to another.

In our maths sessions this week, we sorted objects into two sets, for example putting a group of natural materials into a set of ‘leaves’ and a set of ‘not leaves’, or sets of ‘smooth objects’ and ‘rough objects’. We used our school library on Wednesday afternoon - we try to do this every week; the children are practising using their quiet ‘library voices’ and handling the books very carefully. They love sitting on the comfy cushions and sharing books!

22nd September 2023

The children are getting to grips with our daily routine and they have practised using good manners when choosing their lunches and answering the register, as well as practising being polite to each other when playing. Every morning the children have a ‘dough disco’ session to strengthen their fingers ready for the activities of the day. We are now having a daily phonics session and this week the children have learnt the sounds ‘s as in sun’ and ‘a as in apple’. They have enjoyed joining in with the Monkey Puzzle story and talking about their families. Thank you for the baby/toddler photos brought in so far - the children have loved guessing who is in the photograph! We have also talked about what babies can do compared to 4 and 5 year olds, as part of our learning around ‘past and present’. In maths, our activities this week have involved matching and sorting objects into sets. We have used the vocabulary ‘same’ and ‘different’. The children have also learnt how to form the number 1 using a straight line. We say the rhyme ‘start at the top and down we run; that’s the way we make a one’!

The first of our ‘Preston 70’ books have been sent home this week. Once you have shared the book with your child two or three times and they are familiar with it, it can be returned to school and we will mark off the book on their bookmark.