Year 1 News 19.925

Happy Friday Team!

In English, we have been continuing to read the story Dragons Don't Share at a very slow pace, as lots has been happening and we have received many different notes along the way. We worked together to help Ruby find her rule book by giving her directions to where it was. We also made predictions about what might happen next in the story, and created speech bubbles to show what the characters were thinking and feeling. At one point, we even became Ruby ourselves, acting very scary to step into her role! Finally, we wrote cards to Goose, Pegasus, and Prince Frog from Ruby, to say sorry for how she reacted and to thank them for finding the rule book.

In maths, we have been learning about ordering numbers and objects in different ways. We all had to get on the bus and think carefully about who was first, second and last in the queue. We have also been practising ordering numbers from smallest to largest, and we started exploring number lines. We noticed the difference between number lines and number tracks, realising that number lines always begin with 0. We have been finding the middle number on number lines, and then placing different numbers in the correct place using the clues we could see. Finally, we looked at clear number lines and had to work out where to add the numbers ourselves.

In RE, we have been learning about harvest. We started by looking at traditional harvest in the past and talked about how it has changed over the years. We then thought about how farmers harvest today, noticing how modern machinery makes the job much quicker and easier. We also learned that harvest is celebrated all around the world, as a way of saying thank you to farmers, being thankful for having enough food to eat, and sharing with those who may not have as much. To finish, we did some harvesting of our own in the school orchard! During continuous provision, we peeled the pears and apples we had collected, and Miss Willis kindly took them home to make a delicious crumble for us all to enjoy at snack time.

In our Heartsmart lesson, we learned about feelings and explored different emotions. We talked about times when we had experienced these emotions and played a fun game of feelings bingo. We also reflected on the Bible verse, "My dear brothers, always be willing to listen and slow to speak. Do not become angry easily" (James 1:19), which reminded us about the importance of patience and kindness. During our wellbeing session, we shared our favourite colours and discussed why we liked them, helping us to understand more about ourselves and each other.

In our Geography lesson, we listened to a song to help us remember all the oceans. We labelled the oceans near Antarctica and the Arctic Ocean on our maps. We discussed what it is like in the Arctic throughout the year and discovered that in summer it stays light nearly all day, while in winter it is dark for almost the whole day. We talked about when we would most like to visit the Arctic and explained our reasons. We also learned that in summer some of the ice melts, but some ice never melts and is called permanent ice. We found out about the different animals that live in the Arctic and created a small world activity for the Pre-School children to enjoy and learn from.

In our PE lesson, we began with a fun warm-up game of Traffic Lights. We moved around the space, remembering that red meant stop, amber meant change direction, and green meant go (or speed up). We had lots of fun dodging each other as we moved. After that, we played Spider's Web, where we passed the ball around our group in different ways--throwing, kicking, and rolling--to create a web shape in the middle. We also played a game called Tick Tick. In this game, we passed the ball quickly around the circle while one person ran around the outside, trying to get back to their place before the ball did. We had to work hard to track the ball carefully and not be distracted by the runner. We followed the ball to where it had been thrown and practised lots of passing skills, making sure our bodies were in front of the ball to help us stop it.

In Music, we listened to a new song called Find the Beat and followed the onscreen instructions. We stamped our feet, clapped our hands, and created movements that we felt comfortable with. Using the onscreen animals, we talked about how we could use movements and our voices to represent them. Then we each moved like our favourite animal while Miss Holland had to guess which one we were being--we were excellent at choosing zoo animals! To finish, we watched a pulse cartoon, which we all found very funny!

In our Computing lesson, we recapped the different parts of a computer and a laptop. We got a little bit tricked by the base unit at first, but we remembered what it was in the end. We then talked about the mouse and the trackpad, and listened carefully for the click sound to check it was working. We learned how to double click as well as click and drag. After practising, we used a paint app to try out our new skills and create drawings using the trackpad. There were lots of fantastic pictures, and even when we found something tricky, we didn't give up!

In our Art lesson, we discovered that our final sculptures are going to be creativity medals. We spent some time looking at different types of medals (thank you for bringing them in!) and then had the chance to draw them. We thought carefully about the shapes we would like our own medals to be. We are really excited and cannot wait to start planning our own designs!

In our Science lesson, we started our new topic all about materials. First, we shared what we already knew and talked about lots of different materials. We then went on a material hunt around the school, labelling objects as plastic, wood, glass, water, or metal. After our hunt, we matched the words to the materials, helping us to recognise and name them more confidently.

I hope everyone has a lovely weekend!

Miss Willis