: Blog items
Date: 29th Sep 2022 @ 7:56am
Today we began to practice the skill of sewing because we had decided this was the best method to join our material together to make a puppet. We began by threading the cotton thread through the eye hole of the needle before carefully tying a knot at the end of the thread. Next, we began to practice our sewing focusing on a running stitch. We had to demonstrate lots of patience, determination and perseverance as it was quite difficult but we displayed a growth mindset and never gave up!
Date: 28th Sep 2022 @ 10:05pm
Nursery have enjoyed reading "Owl Babies" by Martin Waddell. The story is all about three baby owls who worry that their mummy won't come back when she flies off to hunt for some food. Of course everything is ok and their Mummy comes back! The children have been doing lots of owl based activites in continuous provision including making playdough owl babies, making owls at the craft table, building nests for the owls, using tweezers to pull worms out of the mud and retelling the story using our beautiful Owl Babies tuff tray. As well as all of this, we have also been practicing counting to 3 by putting 3 owls on a branch.
Date: 28th Sep 2022 @ 9:31pm
To help to support gross and fine motor development, the children take part in daily Dough Disco and Squiggle While You Wiggle sessions. During Dough Disco, each child is given a piece of playdough and they then carry out a number of exercises with their fingers. There are lots of videos on YouTube for the children to follow, you could even try some out at home. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qnpILg6I6Nk During Squiggle While You Wiggle, each child is given a pair of flappers (2 pieces of material) and the then carry out a sequence of moves that help to strengthen their arm and shoulder muscles and is the beginning of their journey in to becoming a writer. Have a look at the video to see how it's done! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3W5KWnhWwzs&t=7s
Date: 28th Sep 2022 @ 12:16pm
Reception have been busy learning out new letters sounds in phonics. We have been working hard to orally segement simple words and then blend the sounds together. We are beginning to recognise some of our phase 2 sounds and trying our best to hear the initial sound and form the letter sound correctly using our letter rhymes..
' s s s sock" Alfie
"p p p penguin" Nikodem
"t-a-p it's tap" Lana-Rose.
"Around the astonaunts helment, down and out into space. It's a a" Michael
The children have been completing a range of different phonics activities in continuous provision. Have a look at some of our work!
Reception Rosie the hen went for a walk
Date: 28th Sep 2022 @ 12:05pm
Reception have been reading the story 'Rosie's Walk'. It is all about a little hen who goes for a walk around the farmyard. However, Rosie the hen isn't aware that she is being followed by a very sneaky fox. She goes all over the farmyard "around the pond' 'over the haystack' and 'under the beehives'. The fox gets himself into allsorts of trouble including falling into the pond and it finally ends in him being chased away by the bees.
The children have been using the props at the storytelling table to help them sequence the story and used the correct positional language. That have made their own story maps and have been trying hard to hear the initial sound in words e.g. f for fox and h for hen.
Outside the children made their own obstacle course for Rosie and enjoyed acting out the story together.
Year 6 - How did the Maya empire grow to be so successful?
Date: 28th Sep 2022 @ 11:42am
Our History lesson today involved looking at how the Maya managed to survive in jungle conditions for such a long period of time. We learned that they were skills at clearning large areas of woodland in order to create flat land. They also learned how to farm the land and when the best time to grow crops was. Over time, they were able to gather precious raw materials in order to sell and trade with other Maya states. In turn, as states grew powerful, they were able to attack and conquer neighbouring cities and claim their land.
Date: 28th Sep 2022 @ 11:28am
In Year 6 we have finished our first Reading into Writing journey - explanatory texts. We followed all the stages of the journey:
- Cold write
- Looking at a WAGOLL for features
- Immersion in Reading
- GPS linked to the genre
- Teacher model/Shared write
- Improving a WABOLL
- Plan
- Draft
- Edit
- Hot write
We produced some excellent writing for our first piece in Year 6. Our end piece of writing was to explain how to use a 'Teacher Pleaser' machine. We think our teachers would be very happy if they had a machine like the ones we invented!!
Year 4 - Fantasy setting descriptions
Date: 28th Sep 2022 @ 10:42am
This week, we have started our next writing journey. For the first few days, we will be immersing ourselves in examples of fantasy setting descriptions. The children have been brilliant at picturing what the setting descriptions have been describing.
Date: 28th Sep 2022 @ 9:23am
In year 4 this year, we are really focusing on handwriting. We are doing handwriting lessons daily to try and help improve the children's handwriting. We are mainly focusing on letter formation, but we are also pushing the children to write the neatest they can and not to rush. You will notice when the children bring their spelling homework home each week, there is an opportunity for them to practise their handwriting with their spellings.
Date: 28th Sep 2022 @ 8:04am
Year 6 - Partitive Articles in French
Date: 28th Sep 2022 @ 7:36am
In this week’s French lesson, Year 6 have continued their French grammar unit. We started the lesson by recapping on French vowel sounds and numbers to 50 before reminding ourselves of the definite and indefinite articles we learned about in the last couple of lessons. We then went on to learn about partitive articles – the French word for ‘some’. Did you know there are four different words for 'some' in French? A different word is used for nouns that are masculine, feminine, plural and those that begin with a vowel or the letter h. We continued to work with French dictionaries to find the gender of nouns.
Year 5 Exploring mountains of the UK through Maps
Date: 27th Sep 2022 @ 7:29pm
We have been looking at the atlases to find the Mountain ranges of the UK and the highest peaks in the 4 countries. We practised a loop card game and continued to learn through the use of Kahoots quiz!
Date: 27th Sep 2022 @ 7:24pm
As we continue our unit Dancing Through the Ages, we have looked at some common dance moves from the HipHop genre and created our own motifs in time to the music. We tried to work at different levels, in unison and in canon so that we could add some interesting dynamics to the dance routine. We had to negotiate and work together as a team to create our motif and perform it to the rest of the class.
Date: 27th Sep 2022 @ 6:45pm
Today we worked practically to count forwards within 10 from any given number. We found given numbers on our number lines and learnt how to use them to find the number after, stating the oral sentence, ‘the number after __ is __.’ We looked at different representations, including number lines and tens frames, to find missing numbers and explain the mistakes.
Date: 27th Sep 2022 @ 5:27pm
Monday 26th September was European Day of Languages. Miss Ashton started the day with an assembly, which focused on the characteristic of perseverance. This links to learning a new language, as you need to persevere when learning a new skill. She talked about the benefits of learning a new language including communicating and developing a better understanding of different cultures. In class the children have been learning some simple phrases in European languages such as Polish, Spanish, Romanian and German.
Date: 27th Sep 2022 @ 8:31am
The 26th September is European Languages Day! We celebrated by discussing why we have different languages and how many there are across Europe. We had a go at saying Hello and Goodbye in numerous languages and then we focused on Spanish phrases. The children were brilliant!
Date: 26th Sep 2022 @ 7:29pm
Today in Science we focussed on our sense of taste. We learnt about the different parts of our mouth and what these are used for. We also learnt new vocabulary to describe how things taste. We then tasted a range of foods, using these new key words to explain what we could taste and to enable us to categorize them.
Date: 26th Sep 2022 @ 4:58pm
In this week's science lesson, pupils in Hawthorn and Rowan continue to learn about the properties of different materials. Pupils carried out an experiment using water as a solvent, to find out which materials were soluble and which were insoluble. We also noticed that the soluble substances were edible.
We also melted and solidfied white chocolate, dark chocolate and milk chocolate by heating and cooling it. We obseved that it it was still the same substance after these changes in state - they were reversible changes. The chocolate looked and tasted the same too!
YEAR 5 (A Very Wet) Forest Schools Session
Date: 26th Sep 2022 @ 12:34pm
On Thursday, pupils in Hawthorn and Rowan had to show resilience and toughness as our Forest School sessions were interrupted by heavy rain. Pupils built dens (which were tested by the weather), made tie-dyed strips of material, and had a snack of apple and soft cheese. We were proud that the children persevered in the challenging conditions and still had an enjoyable time.
Date: 23rd Sep 2022 @ 5:00pm
We started our Computing journey today and the children impressed Miss Crystal and Mr Bamber immensely! They listened extremely carefully and followed instructions so well. The children learned how to use Google Slides to make a Stop Motion Animation. They used one slide per frame of animation to create an animation of the sun rising and moon.
Date: 23rd Sep 2022 @ 4:12pm
Throughout Autumn term, we will be exploring the key question 'How does Music help us to make friends?' So far, we have listened to two contrasting pieces of music- Music is in my Soul and Bolero. We have practised keeping the beat of these songs and thought about what we liked and disliked about them. During our music sessions, we have been learning to sing the song 'Music is in my Soul' and have practised the chorus and first verse trying to keep in time with each other as well as sing in tune. Lastly, we have been improvising to the song using the glokenspiels which has been lots of fun!
Date: 23rd Sep 2022 @ 2:13pm
There are always lots of opportunities for children to develop their gross motor muscles in nursery. This is so important as it has a big impact on their fine motor muscles and how they can grip a pencil. There are many ways for children to do this from climbing, jumping, stretching a pouring. The children always have a great time!
Nursery Meet The Colour Monster
Date: 23rd Sep 2022 @ 2:02pm
Nursery have been enjoying the story "The Colour Monster" this week. The story is a great way for children to explore all the different emotions they might feel including happy, sad, frightened and angry. We talked about when we might feel certain feelings and what we can do to make us feel better. Have a look at the photos below to see if you can spot the different emotions!
Date: 22nd Sep 2022 @ 8:35pm
This week Reception have enjoyed listening to the story No Bot - The Robot, an uplifting story of friendship.
Bernard is a robot with a very unusual problem- he has lost his bottom! Luckily, Bernard's friends offer to help him look for his bottom- but it is not an easy job!
The children then enjoyed making their own robots at the creative table, using loose parts and play dough, as well as continuing robot shape patterns.
Take a look at our photos!
Date: 22nd Sep 2022 @ 8:31pm
For our final day we took part in activities such as: low ropes, challenge course, survivor and trapeze. We have all had a great time on our residential and have made memories that will stay with us for a long time!
