Holly Class w/b 6th March 2023

What a lovely week Holly Class have had! This week we have used the book ‘Country mouse and Town mouse’ to kick start our learning about different settlements. Reception have worked in groups to create a city, village or a town and have discussed as a class all of the differences between them. Year 1 have focused on the features in each settlement and worked together to create lovely posters that tell us all about their differences. This linked lovely to our forest school activity this week- to sketch the view of the village from the meadow. We found this very relaxing!

In phonics this week Reception have learnt the new phonemes ‘oo’, ‘ar’ and ‘or’ and practiced writing these as well as reading words that contain each sound. We noticed that ‘oo’ can be either a short or a long sound depending on the word. Year 1 have been learning alternative spelling patterns for the phonemes ‘sh’ such as ‘ti’, ‘ci’ and ‘ssi’ and how in some words the letters ‘wa’ can sometimes sound like ‘wo’ (for example, in the word was). They have also looked at other alternative spelling patterns. Lots of tricky concepts which they have worked through very well.

In maths this week Reception have been continuing with their number bonds to 5 and are steadily moving their way up to 10. They have used the song ‘5 little aliens’ to help them remember and lots of activities in the classroom to help with this. We even found 5 little frog hats in the garden centre so we can act it out for ourselves! Year 1 have been continuing with grouping into 10s and 1s and are making excellent progress. We have ended the week by recapping number lines and linking this to previous learning.

In literacy we started the week by reading the story ‘Dogs Day’. All of Holly class made excellent predictions about what might happen as we read on. We noticed that this book is special because it is a flipbook with 2 points of view! Year 1 have written all about how each character might feel, as well as practicing their question writing and punctuation. Reception have sequenced the story and came up with excellent actions that we can use to story tell. Reception have also practiced their segmenting and blending using magnetic letters.

For science this week children learned all about plant habitats and what habitats need to provide for plants to survive

We have also started our DT topic all about telescopes! We talked all about who invented the telescope and what they are used for. Reception children drew what they would see through their own telescope and Year 1 started to design their own. They had to plan what equipment they might need and what materials would be the most suitable to use. We can’t wait to get making!

It was lovely to meet some of you on Thursday, make sure to contact us if you have any queries or concerns at all. Have an amazing weekend!