Living and Learning: I know what a drug is.
Over the next couple of weeks in our Living and Learning sessions, we will be focusing on “Being Safe”. This week in Living and Learning, we discussed what a drug is and what might influence a person to take/not take them.
We learnt that a drug is: ‘a substance people take to change the way they feel, think or behave.’
We also talked about the term ‘drugs’ and how it refers to all drugs:
• all illegal drugs,
• all legal drugs, including alcohol, tobacco and volatile substances (those giving off a gas which can be inhaled),
• all over-the-counter and prescription medicines.
In small groups, the children created diamond nines of what they thought would be the biggest influence for taking/not taking drugs. Here is an example:
The children also gave reasons for their choices: “feelings/emotions might be the biggest influence as people might think it helps to relieve stress” and “family would not influence you to take them because they love you and wouldn’t want to harm you”.
Science rocks!
The first week back after Christmas has been a week of starting new topics and units. This includes our new Science topic – Rocks, soils and fossils!
Our first week began with the question – How are rocks different? We made careful observations of 12 different rocks and thought about what made them special.
This included things such as;
- Colour – is it one solid colour or does it have mixed colours?
- Texture – is it smooth, rough or both?
- Crystals – does it shine or sparkle?
- Weight – is it heavy or light?
- Layers – does it have stripes or clear layers?
Here are some of the class making their observations:
We then sorted a selection of the rocks into a Venn Diagram. The children had the choice of which features to sort the rocks by.
The class loved the lesson and already had fantastic knowledge in identifying the names of some of the rocks. One person remembered that one of the rocks (Basalt rock) is in the Earth’s Crust! This was from our first Topic lesson about the Earth.
Help at home by seeing if your child can identify any of these rocks based on their appearance!
Welcome back!
Happy New Year!
Year 3 have had a busy but brilliant first week back at school!
We started our new science topic about rocks, soils and fossils. Year 3 carefully observed a variety of different rocks in order to group them by their properties (appearance, weight, texture etc).
We practised our skipping skills during PE…
And started planning our new piece of writing where we write a recount about escaping from a volcanic eruption!
We are all looking forward to a jam-packed half term!
We are geographers!
This half term, our topic will focus on Geography. Our topic is called ‘The streets around our school’. We will be focusing on the environment we live in, any local issues and finding solutions to issues in our locality.
We are becoming geographers – a type of scientist who studies the Earth. Geographers study the land (the physical features of the Earth) and the people who live within it (the human features).
We looked on Google earth to see where we lived in comparison to the whole Earth. We know that we live in the continent Europe. The country England and the city Leeds. We looked at Moortown Primary School and Moortown park on Google Earth. We even spotted where our classroom was!
Try going on Google Earth at home. Can you find your house and places you like to visit?
We also looked at the different countries that make up the UK and their capital cities. Help at home by looking at a map of the UK with your child and talking about the different countries and cities.
Group Reading – What do you need to know?
Year 4 have begun their group reading today!
The class have been divided into 6 groups and each group has been given a book to read at home. This will last for the next half term.
During our Book Club sessions, each group will discuss what they have read and complete activities related to their book. This will be a fantastic opportunity for the children to explore characters and storylines more than they might do normally!
Each Friday during Book Club, each group will be given a new page to read to for the next Friday.
What to remember:
- Your child has a book that they need to read every week (up to a chosen point).
- The reading record activity needs to be completed using their new book.
- Group reading books and reading records need to be brought in every Friday.
Help at home by listening to your child read their new book and ask questions about the book to help prepare them for in class discussions.
We look forward to hearing the children’s discussions next week!
Welcome back!
Happy New Year! We hope you all had a fantastic break. It was lovely to see lots of happy smiling faces on Tuesday morning. This week, we’ve enjoyed sharing our wonderful Christmas memories and being back with our friends.
Literacy
Our focus story was Lost and Found by Oliver Jeffers. Throughout the week, we’ve learnt lots of interesting facts about Antarctica. We located it on a map, talked about the equator and found out what animals live there.
Our word of the week was iceberg. Ask your child if they can remember what an iceberg is.
For our writing challenges, we created missing posters and drew pictures of some of the things we would pack if we went on a journey to the South Pole. We used our phonics skills when labelling our pictures.
Yesterday, we worked together to sequence the story and talked about some of the key events.
Maths
This week, we’ve been using our ‘fast eyes’ to subitise (seeing the quantity without counting) more complex arrangements of dots. We took a picture of the arrangements with our eyes, closed our eyes and then explained what we saw. We used spatial language to describe the arrangements. For example, There are 3 dots on the top and 2 dots on the bottom.
Poetry picnic
This week’s poem was called Let’s put on our mittens. We hope you enjoy watching it.
Take a look at some of this week’s winter challenges…
Reminders
- PE is every Monday and Friday. Please make sure your child comes to school wearing the correct clothes. If you are unsure and need a reminder, please see our uniform policy.
- Funky Phonics Stay & Learn – Monday 16 & Tuesday 17 January
A letter will be sent out next week. Due to limited space, only one adult per child can attend this session.
Home-Link Challenge
We are geographers!
This half term, our topic will focus on Geography. Our topic is called ‘The streets around our school’. We will be focusing on the environment we live in, any local issues and finding solutions to issues in our locality.
We are becoming geographers – a type of scientist who studies the Earth. Geographers study the land (the physical features of the Earth) and the people who live within it (the human features).
To kick start the topic, we have been reading the book ‘Here we are’ by Oliver Jeffers. Talk to your child about the important messages in this book.
We looked on Google earth to see where we lived in comparison to the whole Earth. We know that we live in the continent Europe. The country England and the city Leeds. We looked at Moortown Primary School and Moortown park on Google Earth.
Try going on Google Earth at home. Can you find your house and places you like to visit?
Happy and healthy Christmas!
Everyone in the Year One team would like to wish all families and children a very happy and healthy Christmas. Whatever you are getting up to over the break we hope you take time to relax and enjoy the holiday with family and friends.
The children have worked so hard over the past term, which is always a really important one for Year One children, and we are very proud of all their efforts.
We hoped you enjoyed the Wriggly Nativity as much as the adults and children did performing it! We were all superstars!
Thanks again for your support and we will see you all in the new year!
Living and Learning: Mental Health
In a recent Living and Learning session, we learnt all about mental health and we recognised why it is important.
Firstly, we talked about what mental health means. It’s our thoughts and feelings, emotions and how we feel inside.
Next, we chatted about big feelings – ones that could stop us from doing things and small feelings – ones that feel big at the time but go away after time.
After that, we discussed and recorded different self care techniques. We can refer to these when we need to!
Here are some pictures of us during our learning!
The ‘Big Brain’ Art Gallery!
This morning, Year 3 and 4 hosted their first art gallery where they were able to showcase all the amazing art they have produced this half term.
We displayed all the pieces across the two classrooms and gave the children the opportunity to look around and comment on their classmates artwork.
A fantastic end to a fantastic half term!
All of the Year 3/4 team wish you a Merry Christmas and happy and healthy holiday.
See you in the New Year!