weekly news 26th February

We have had a very busy first week back after half term. We have started our daily challenges which the children have completed really well so far.
In Letters and Sounds this week we have been learning all about how to write a super sentence. We have learnt that we need to start each sentence using a capital letter. We need to remember to leave a 'finger space' in between each word we write so that it can be read by ourselves and other people. We need to read it and check that it makes sense. We need to remember to put a full stop at the end of the sentence as well. The children are doing really well at using the sounds they have learnt to read words by blending all the sounds together. They are also learning to look at the sounds in the words to see if they can spot a 'digraph' which has 2 letters but only makes 1 sound. Have a look at your child's latest writing on their display board. This week we are learning 2 new digraphs: ooOO and ow/ou. We are learning how to hear, read and write these digraphs in words and sentences. We have been practising our tricky words by playing a tricky word bingo game too !
In Maths we started the week by getting ready for Shrove Tuesday or Pancake Day. We made the pancake batter together by using our measuring skills. We used scales to weigh the flour and we used our capacity skills to measure how much milk we would need. We had to do some problem-solving too because the pancake recipe we used was not going to make enough batter for us all so we had to 'double' the quantities. Our recipe stated we needed 1 egg but we had to double it to use 2 eggs ! Our recipe stated we needed 100 grammes of flour, can you ask your child if they can remember how much we needed ? Our recipe stated we needed 300 mililitres of  milk, can you ask your child how much milk we needed to measure ?
We were very excited about cooking the pancakes and choosing a topping for our pancake too. Ask your child which topping they chose.

We have been thinking about our school's Golden Anniversary by learning all about the number 50. We have been counting to 50 in 1s, 2s, 5s and 10s. We have been looking for number 50 on number lines and 100 squares. We have been using Numicon and cubes and counters to show the value of 50.

We are looking forward to dressing up in clothes similar to the fashions of 50 years ago in 1970.

We have also started our new topic all about African animals called 'Why do zebras have stripes ?'
If you have anything at home about Africa we would love to hear from you !

We are looking forward to  ''Show and tell' in which each of the children will be talking about an animal they have found out about !

weekly news 12th February

We have learnt the sounds ee, or, ie/igh and ar this week in Phonics and the tricky words are and all. the children have been reading with us and we have been carrying out a full reading and sounds assessment. We are very impressed with their blending and segmenting skills which are really starting to click.

In maths we have been learning how to work out number problems with a Chinese new year theme. We have been asking questions to help us find missing numbers and learning to share and divide with practical items t help us work out the number problems. The children have also worked with an adult to show what they know about numbers and how far they can count.

We have taught the children about internet safety this week and how to stay safe online. We spoke to the children about all the devices that use the internet and they shared what games they play on devices at home. They learnt they should never talk to strangers online or click on anything if they don't know what it is, they agreed they should only go on the internet if they are with their parents.

We have been learning about basic personal hygiene and how to wash our hands. The children were fascinated to find out about invisible germs. We discussed when we need to wash our hands and after what activities  and then practiced washing hands thoroughly to stop germs spreading. In the second session, we learnt about keeping our teeth clean and read the story 'Topsy and Tim Go to the Dentist'.

Your child should have brought home their next 'Show and Tell' homework sheet which we will start on the first week back after half term. Also we would like to remind you that as mentioned in the school news letter last week,  we will be celebrating the school's 50th birthday after half term. The children and staff have been asked to come dressed in 70's clothes on Friday 28th February.

We hope they children have a lovely half term.

weekly news 5th February

What an exciting week we have been having in Reception ! We all really enjoyed our Chinese New Year Music and Movement workshop in which we learnt all about how new Year is celebrated. We passed a Chinese singing bowl around and said our name. We found out that Chinese children get a special red money purse if they go to sleep on time.
We moved around the hall in different ways pretending to clean and get rid of all the dirt and unhappy things that had happened in the old year. We pretended to eat a Chinese feast to celebrate New Year, apparently this can include 10 different courses !
 We danced with big pom poms pretending they were fireworks going off in the sky. We passed around a Chinese dragon puppet and then had turns parading around waving our Chinese fans to help the dragon to fly. We used wooden claves to create the beat of the dragon dance. We learnt how to perform a special Chinese dance and remembered all the different moves really well.
This week we have been completing 10 different challenges and collecting stickers in our special challenge passport when we have finished each one.
It has been brilliant to see how motivated the children have been when making sure they find the challenge that they need to do. When doing these challenges the children have been developing lots of new skills and using techniques to make and assemble a variety of Chinese themed crafts and activities. We have been tasting Chinese food, making a rat finger puppet, painting a New Year card, making a Lucky fish, a Chinese drum, a dragon puppet, a lantern, a money purse, a Chinese fan, and working as a group to make a model of the Great wall of China. Our Chinese New Year role play area is fantastic fun too as we can get dressed up in traditional Chinese clothes !
It has been wonderful to have such a lot of very willing parents who have come along to help us carry out our challenges. Thank you very much.


Ask your child what they have enjoyed most about our Chinese New Year week.

Weekly News 30th January

We have learnt the sounds sh, th and ai/ay and ng this week in phonics. In maths we have been learning how to make tally and bar charts. We have collected data from each other about how old we are, what our favourite car colours are and we also compared the house point totals in a bar chart to find out the winning team. On the last week of this half term we will be doing a full sounds and Maths check with the children. 

This week we have been focusing on air vehicles and have learnt about transport ‘then and now’. The children have enjoyed finding out how much air vehicles and technology has changed over the years. 

We have been hearing the children read this week with our new phonetically decodable readers. There are some lovely new books and it's great to see the children use their blending skills to read words and sentences of the sounds they know. The children have also finished off their stories this week and we were so impressed with the children’s writing. They enjoyed choosing friends to help them act out their stories to the class afterwards. 

Next week we are celebrating and learning about Chinese New Year and would like to immerse the children in another culture.  We will be doing lots of cross curricular challenges for the children to complete and we will be teaching the children lots of new skills for DT through the craft activiities a well as food tasting Chinese food. At the end of the week they will be bringing home a folder with all their creations for you to see.  

We would like to remind you we have asked the children to wear red clothes on Monday. (They do not have to wear any of their uniform.) 

weekly news 22nd January

This week we have been continuing our topic about transport and our focus has been on boats and vehicles which travel on water. One of our challenges has been to try to construct a vessel which can carry a toy person and is able to float on water. The children have been choosing what they use to make their vessel with from our collection of reclaimed materials. Thank you for continuing to send small containers in for us to use.
In 'Power of Reading' this week we worked as classes to create a new version of a journey we had been on in a similar style to our book 'The Train Ride'. We used our 'Winter Welly Walk' to help us to make up a new story copying the rhythm from ' The Train Ride',  'What shall we see ? What shall we see ?'.... a big red robin with a bright red chest '. The children showed their brilliant imaginations when making their suggestions of what we might see in Mulbarton on our walk eg 'a rainbow and a unicorn' and a 'Ninja dragon'.  The children have started to create their own stories during our story scribing sessions with lots of the children being very motivated to try to write the words themselves ! The children use 'robot talk' to stretch out the sounds in the words that they want to write and this helps them to identify which letters to write. Perhaps you could ask your child whether they have written their story yet as they will be displayed on your child's display board. The children always love choosing their classmates to be the characters in their story so that they can act it out in front of their class !
Please check your child's display board to see their reading 'next step'.
In Letters and Sounds this week we have been learning  z, and also introducing the first of the 'digraphs' that we will be teaching  qu and ch. We explain to the children that 'digraphs' have 2 letters and when they are together in words they only make 1 sound. These 'digraphs' need to be read as 1 sound when they are found in words. We have been practising blending sounds together to read words which the children can also practise at home when they have been given a word bag. The word bags are started by your child's teacher when your child has learnt the first 4 sets of sounds and been given the first 4 stickers on the back of their sound book. Please continue helping your child to blend sounds at home and to change their word bags as often as you like. This week the tricky words we have been learning are 'was' and 'my'. We will be doing individual reading again next week with the children but will no longer be sending home books for your child to spot their tricky words in. Please continue to help your child to learn their tricky words by remembering them by sight. The children will continue to receive a phonics book which they should be able to use their phonic knowledge to read using their blending skills.
In Maths this week we have been learning about the capacity of containers and having lots of fun measuring water, milk and rice! We were challenged to try to estimate how many children could have a cup of milk from various sized milk bottles and we enjoyed carefully pouring milk into cups and counting the total amount. Perhaps your child could continue this learning about the capacity of containers at home ? We would love to see any learning that your child is doing at home about measurement, so perhaps you could take a photo and add to tapestry so that your child can explain to their class what they have been learning about at home ?
Thank you very much for sending your replies into school about helping during our Chinese New Year challenge week.

weekly news 16th January

We have had a great week getting stuck into our new transport topic ‘Are we nearly there?’. We have continued to read ‘The Train Ride’ and listened carefully to the rhythm. We have practised retelling it using a story map to help us.

We have learnt the last set of single sounds this week in phonics: v,w,x and y. On Tuesday to help us to learn the ‘w’ sound, we had our winter welly walk around the village where we looked for signs of winter and used a spotter sheet as well as making a tally of the vehicles we saw. We came back to school for waffles which was a lovely treat. Thank you to the parents who came along to help.

This week we have been focusing on road vehicles and have had lots of interesting and unusual types of transport brought in the show the children. This has included a Morris Minor, a vintage tractor, a camper van, a Dutch cargo bike and a big van. We have continued to learn about measuring in maths and have been measuring our feet with cubes, using ramps for cars and measuring the distance and we also measured the big van and tractor wheels with meter sticks.
Thank you so much to those who brought in the vehicles, they provided an excellent experience for the children.

The children have enjoyed working with a partner to carry out an ice investigation. They had to think of ways to get the car out of the ice. We had some great team work and lots of good ideas such as using water, scraping and smashing the ice and one child suggested we need to warm it up so it melts.

We have also enjoyed listening to the first groups of children present their show and tell about a recent journey they have been on. They have been on some very exciting journeys and its been lovely to hear about them.

Next week we will be making boats and trying to get them to float. If you have any margarine tubs then please can you wash them out and bring them in for next week.

weekly news 9th January 2020

We have had a super first week back after the Christmas holidays ! The children have settled back into their school routines really well and are clearly enjoying seeing their classmates again.
The children have been sharing some news about what they did over the holidays and we have enjoyed seeing lots of observations which have been uploaded to Tapestry.

We have started our new 'Power of Reading' book called 'The Train Ride' by June Crebbin and in our first session we looked carefully at a picture at the beginning of the story and described what we could see and what we imagined the story might be about.

All of the children have had a turn learning how to play in our super new role play area which is set up as a train station. They have enjoyed getting into role as train guards, conductors and passengers !

 The children have been taking train bookings, selling tickets and driving the train !

 They have been using their measuring skills to check the size of parcels for the mail trains !

They have been writing on notices about cancelled trains and timetable changes !

They have been making and serving refreshments in the station cafe too !

In maths this week we have been learning about how to measure length. We used our 'measuring eyes' to decide who was the tallest and shortest children in our group and then we drew around them and estimated how many felt pens long they were. We talked about what sort of equipment people use to measure length with and the purposes of measurement. Perhaps you could do some more measuring at home with your child and take a photo to upload to tapestry so that your child can tell their class about their learning at home ?

On Friday morning we are going to be taking part in a tennis taster session which should be good fun.

Next week we will be learning all about vehicles that travel on roads and we will be exploring various vehicles which are being brought onto the school grounds for us to see. On Tuesday morning we will be going on our 'Winter welly walk' around the village. We will be looking for signs of winter and also doing a survey of the different vehicles which we see while we are walking. Please let us know if you are able to join us. We will be leaving school via the pedestrian gate near the Doctors surgery at 9:30am and should be back at 10:30am. On Tuesday afternoon we will be having a Road Safety talk.

We are always keen for parents to come and help in school so please do let us know if you are able to spare any time on an occasional or regular basis ! 

Also we would really appreciate any donations of spare underwear especially socks please !