Science – John Dunlop
As homework this week the children have been tasked to talk all about John Dunlop, our features scientist for the half term. John Dunlop invented the pneumatic tyre when he saw his son riding his tricycle very uncomfortably around his garden! He used a garden hose filled with air to test his ideas.
In Science this week we have experimented with different balls to see which would make the best tyre. We rolled the balls down a ramp and measured how far they bounced back off the wall. We were careful to keep everything the same apart from the ball.
We found that the soft, rubber ball bounced the furthest. I wonder if you can think of a reason why that was?
Then we used three of the same balls but filled with different amounts of air. The ball with the most air bounced the furthest – can you think how John Dunlop’s invention matches our results?
Christmas fun!
It’s felt very Christmassy in Reception this week.
Take a look at what we’ve been up to…
On Monday, we made a bag of reindeer food in case the Santa’s reindeers are hungry on Christmas Eve.
The children have been very busy wrapping presents in Santa’s workshop.
Writing letters to Santa.
Looking at Christmas books with our friends.
Making paper chains in the finger gym area.
Playing Christmas maths games.
On Wednesday, the children decided to start a conga line. Why not? It’s Christmas after all!
After our final gymnastic session, it was time to sit down for our Christmas dinner. We had lots of fun dancing away to the Christmas songs.
Poetry Picnic
Click here to watch this week’s poem.
Phonics
This, we recapped all of the phase 2 graphemes and tricky words.
Next half term, we’ll be starting phase 3. In this phase, the children will continue to learn more digraphs (two letters making one sound) and they’ll be introduced to some trigraphs (three letters making one sound).
Maths
In maths, we’ve been learning about 3D shapes. We’ve looked at some common 3D shapes such as cylinder, sphere, cuboid, cube, square based pyramid and cone. We looked carefully at the shapes and talked about the properties of the 3d shapes.
Ask your child if they can find any 3d shapes around the house. Can they remember the name of them?
Finally, looking forward to seeing you all at the learning journey drop ins next week.
Reminders
Christmas production – Tuesday and Wednesday at 2.15pm
Christmas party – Friday
Your child can come to school in non-uniform.
Have a happy and healthy weekend.
Science
This half term, we’ve had two parts to our science learning – seasonal changes and the scientist, John Dunlop.
Here’s the vocabulary we have been using in our learning.
First of all, we thought about what changes across the seasons. We learnt some information from this video.
- weather
- temperature
- clothes we wear
- how much sunlight there is
- animals and other living things
We also read this poem as one of our weekly fluency texts.
We’ve been checking the weekly temperature and weather on a weekly basis. Ask your child about the temperature this week and how we measure it.
We’ve also been learning all about the famous scientist, John Dunlop and for homework this week, you can find out more about him with your child.
Topic – Art
During our Topic lessons, we have been learning about architecture (the history and the skills!).
Our skills lessons have been focused on creating digital art – art that is made using digital technology. We have been photographers, photo editors and graphic designers. But this week, we have been “collagers”! The children used photographs of the school and its architecture to create their own buildings. They used collage as their method.
The adults were blown away by the how fantastic they were. The children experimented with different layers and colours and building shapes. Here are just a few:
Next Friday, Year 3 and 4 will be creating their own art galleries for display. Other classes and teachers will be able to visit to celebrate their hard work! We are looking forward to it.
Living and Learning – Mental Wellbeing
What is mental health?
We all have mental health.
Mental health is about our feelings, our thinking, our emotions and our moods.
Looking after our mental health is as important as looking after our physical health – if not more!
In our Living and Learning lessons and circle times over the last three weeks, we have focused on our mental health and wellbeing. We have discussed what we can do to identify when we are feeling down or feeling a strong emotion. Then we have shared what we can do to help bring us back to feeling calm and positive: talk with friends and family; play a game; drawing; sport or go for a walk. The children then had many different ideas for how they can improve their mental wellbeing.
Our circle times have become a staple in our week where the children can listen to others, work together and understand each other on a different level. The third stage of our sessions are where they share worries and give advice. Year 4 have been mature and respectful to one another throughout each session. It’s been fantastic to watch them become more and more confident in this.
Decorating the Christmas tree
This morning, we had a very important job to do. Mrs Weekes asked us to decorate the Christmas tree in the hall. We worked as a team and used our fine motor skills when hanging the baubles. We can’t wait for you to see it at our Christmas Fair.
World Cup Geography
We’ve had a topical challenge this week relating to the World Cup. Our challenge was to identify the time zones of the different football teams in comparison to GMT (Greenwich Mean Time).
If you’ve ever been abroad, have friends or family who live abroad; why not identify which time zones they are in.
Living and Learning: Mental Health
Over the last few weeks, we have been learning about mental health in our Living and Learning sessions.
Year 3 know that mental health encompasses our feelings, our thinking, our emotions and our mood.
In our first L&L session, we talked about different feelings and emotions and whether they were positive feelings, negative feelings, or both.
This week, we progressed to talking about how we manage feelings – particularly feelings that we may associate with being negative. The children were great at coming up with strategies for managing difficult feelings. Some of their ideas included mindfulness techniques and taking deep breaths.
Ask your child what techniques they can use to manage a tricky emotion!
Wriggly Nativity
The children are very excited about our upcoming production of ‘Wriggly Nativity’ in the last week of term.
We have found a playlist of all the songs we have been learning in school on Youtube. (link here) We would be really grateful if you could practise the songs at home.
Thank you for your support,
Year 1 and 2 team.
It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas…
The Cheeky Elf has arrived!
Yesterday, we noticed a plain Christmas tree in the home corner. When we looked closer, the Elf was swinging on it.
This morning, we noticed tape across our classroom door. After ducking under the tape, we saw the Cheeky Elf holding a roll of tape!
I wonder what he’ll get up to next week…
We’re definitely getting into the Christmas spirit in Reception. Yesterday, we had lots of fun listening to Christmas songs and decorating our Christmas tree.
We’ve also been busy making and writing our Christmas cards. We hope you like them!
Maths
This week, we continued to explore the purpose of counting – to find out ‘how many’ objects there are. We revisited the concept of 1:1 correspondence by making sure that we match collections of objects to the correct representations. We developed our understanding of the concept of cardinality – that the last number in the count tells us ‘how many’ things there are altogether. We also applied this concept when counting more abstract things, such as claps and jumps.
Phonics
We’ve come to the end of phase 2. Next week, we’ll be revisiting and consolidating all of phase 2 graphemes and tricky words. There’ll be no phonics home learning sheet next week. However, it would be great if you continued revisit these graphemes and tricky words at home.
Stamps
Next week, we’ll be your child will be learning all about what happens to our post when reading the story ‘The Jolly Christmas Postman’. We sent a letter home about bringing in a stamp. If you would like your child’s postcard to be posted by Royal Mail, please provide a stamp in a named envelope by Thursday 8th December.
PE
Yesterday, the children made safe risks when climbing and travelling on the big apparatus. The gymnastic coaches were very impressed! They showed great determination and perseverance especially when climbing up the ladders.
Poetry picnic
Click here to watch this week’s poem.
Christmas reminders
Monday 05 December – Non-uniform day
To help us get ready for our Christmas fair, please bring a prize to school on Monday.
Thursday 08 December – Christmas dinner day
Friday 09 December – Christmas fair
Tuesday 13 & Wednesday 14 December – Christmas production
Friday 16 December – Christmas party day
Your child can wear non-uniform.
Home-Link Challenge
