Wow! What an amazing day we had on Friday at Cannon Hall Farm! The children's behaviour was exemplary and they were a credit to themselves and school!

During the morning we;

• had a guided tour of the farm and learnt some interesting facts about pigs, highland cows, alpacas and llamas and we also got to feed the animals!
• went on a tractor ride
• played in the tube maze
• watched the sheep race!

Our learning question this week has been “Where do you on holiday and how do you get there?”. We started the week listening to the story “Faster, Faster, Little Red Train”. We know that some countries are hot such as; Spain, Africa and Greece and we know that some countries are cold such as Russia, Arctic and Norway. We have recapped that there are 7 continents and we enjoyed singing the continents song. We listened carefully to the story “Where in the World Shall We Go”. We have also been singing ‘We all go travelling by’ and ‘Up, up, up’. Our Talk through Stories unit this week has been “Billy’s Bucket” – we have enjoyed listening to the story, joining in with favourite phrases and taking on the role of Billy in freeze-frame feelings for given situations!
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Our learning activities this week have included; writing a list of what we would pack in our suitcase, writing a sentence about each of the transport pictures, building a ramp and pushing cars down it, junk modelling different types of vehicles, identifying vehicles of past and present and using the small world train, cars and people.

Reception continue to work hard in their RWI groups and are becoming such confident readers! In Literacy, our Year 1 children finished writing their letter to their new class teacher and they have shared them with Miss Fury today during transition day! Year 1’s have also been tested on spelling the days of the week correctly.
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In Maths, Reception have counted beyond 20, solved problems using a number line, recapped number bonds to 10, explored the composition of numbers to 10 and solved addition problems using the story “How many legs?”. Year 1 children have recognised and explained the value of 5p in pence, recognised and explained the value of 10p in pence and calculated the total value of a set of 2p coins.

​In Science, we found out about and described how plants need water, light and a suitable temperature to grow and stay healthy. Our Year 1 children produced some wonderful learning where they drew a picture of a healthy plant and wrote about the 3 needs of a plant and why they need them!

​In PE, we continued our learning in our Athletics unit. We started by playing a game of ‘scarecrow tag’ – two children were chosen to be the ‘farmers’ and the rest of the group were ‘crows’ when a ‘crow’ got tagged by a ‘farmer’ they became a ‘scarecrow’ and had to freeze until a ‘crow’ freed them. Next, we practised our target throwing. We had to carefully aim to get the bean bag into a hoop. We had to make sure we held the bean bag lightly in our throwing hand with our opposite foot forwards before taking our throwing arm back before bringing it forward and focusing on the target! To conclude our lesson we worked in pairs to practise our throwing and catching skills!

On Wednesday, our Year 1 children met up with Team AC for an important job - celebrating their hard work and amazing progress in their phonics learning this year!
The staff in Team EO and Team AC could not be more proud of the Year 1's effort and progress this year and as a little treat we all met in the Nature Reserve for ice-pops (thanks to Mrs Allen) and time to have fun with each other!
​Well done Year 1's!

Our learning question this week has been “What’s it like in space?”. We started the week listening to “Whatever Next!”. We know that in the sky we have the moon, stars, sun and planets. We learnt that a solar system is a group of planets and moons that travel around the sun. We have learnt that Earth is always spinning/rotating on its axis and this is what gives us day and night. know that it takes a full year to complete one orbit. We know that as the Earth orbits the sun that it creates a pattern which happens over and over again which is what creates seasons. We have worked hard to try and recall the order of planets in our solar system from closest to the sun to further from the sun – they are; Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune. We have used this song to help us - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mQrlgH97v94.
We have also learnt about what it is like to be an astronaut in space using the story ‘If I Were an Astronaut’ which was read by an astronaut onboard the International Space Station. We then learnt about the following famous astronauts; Yuri Gagarin – first human to travel into outer space, Valentin Tereshkova – first woman to travel into outer space and orbit Earth, Neil Armstrong – first man to walk on the moon, Mae Jemison and Major Tim Peake – famous for spending 186 days in space!
Our learning activities have included; labelling the parts of a rocket, writing a list of 10 things we would take to space in a rocket, designing our own alien, making our own rockets and spaceships, using the dough to make aliens, making 2D shape rockets, making a split pin astronaut and completing a “what’s in space?” jigsaw. We have also used black card and chalks to make our own ‘solar system’ pictures. 

​Our Talk through Stories unit this week has been “Aliens Love Underpants” – we have enjoyed listening to this story! We have joined in with the favourite phrases, expressed feelings for given situations and been able to identify which is the right sentence about the story out of 2 given sentences!

​In Literacy, our Year 1 children have finished planning their letter to their new class teacher (who we still don’t know the name of) and have begun to write this. We have been working hard to show off all our fantastic writing skills we have learnt this year.

​In Maths, Reception children have been recalling number bonds to 5, identifying odd and even numbers, drawing aliens with only odd body parts, recalling number bonds to 10 and recalling doubles to 10. 

​Year 1 children have completed an arithmetic and reasoning paper, explained the value of a 1p coin in pence and recognised and explained the value of 2p coins in pence.

​In PE, we warmed up by practising travelling in a variety of ways such as; running, skipping, jumping and side-stepping. Next, we played a variation of the game “Domes and Dishes”. This time we were split into two teams and everyone was active for a given period of time. The ‘domes’ had to turn the ‘dishes’ into ‘domes’ and vice versa. Next, we practised running for speed and finally, we practised kicking with accuracy – aiming for a cone to hit!

On Friday, we were invited to wear 'red and yellow' to school to celebrate Spanish Day! We all looked fabulous! We started our day saying "Buenos Dias" for our register!

Next we headed into the hall with the Rainbows to learn the 'Paso Doble' - the Sunshines listened well to the instructions given to copy and perform the dance. We have some budding future dancers!

Back in class we learnt some Spanish greetings such as:

• Hola
• Adios
• Beunos dias
• Buenas tardes
• Buenas noches

We also learnt to ask someone names "¿Cómo te llamas?" and we learnt to reply saying "Me llamo...".
Then we learnt to ask how someone is "¿Cómo estás?" and we know we can reply saying "Estoy bien" which means I am good.
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Next, we had a food tasting session:

• Spanish picos (breadsticks and passata sauce)
• Cantaloupe melon

The children enjoyed trying the new foods. We said the melon felt a little bit slimy but smelt sweet. Most of us rated the melon 10/10!

Before we spent some time in provision we learnt the names of colours in Spanish. Here we are making Spanish flags and fans!

Next up was learning to count in Spanish and a game of Bingo!

In the afternoon we took the parachute onto the courts and played some games use Spanish words for colours and numbers - we had lots of fun!

Our learning question this week has been “What’s it like in Kenya?”.

We started the week listening attentively to the story “Mama Panyas Pancakes”. We have learnt that Kenya is a country on the eastern coast of the continent of Africa. We know that Kenya lies on the Equator and we could recall from our previous Geography learning that countries which are close to the equator are hot countries and countries that are further away from the equator are colder. We learnt that there are two official languages in Kenya these are English and Swahili. We learnt that the capital of Kenya is Nairobi and it has the Nairobi river flowing through it - just like the River Thames flows through London! We learnt that it has just 2 seasons – dry and wet and we spoke about how this is different to England. We learnt about the landscapes and the animals that we would find in Kenya – we have watched videos of safaris in the Maasai Mara. We have enjoyed listening to and learning the call and response song “Che Che Kule” – we know that this song originates from a different African country called “Ghana” which is on the western coast of Africa.

​Our learning activities have included; using the watercolour paints to paint an African sunset and then carefully cutting and sticking an animal shadow on to it, creating our own stories using the safari animals, carefully attaching pieces together to create a hot air balloon, looking at pictures to compare a Kenyan landscape to a UK landscape and creating repeating patterns by threading cotton reals onto thread.​

Our Talk through Stories unit this week has been “Handa’s Hen”. We have enjoyed joining in with the favourite phrases and for our freeze-frame feelings this week we took on the role of Handa and showed our feelings in the following situations:

• Mondi doesn't come for breakfast (upset/worried)
• Akeyo wants to catch crickets instead of searching for Mondi (cross/irritated)
• You look under the bush and see Mondi and ten chicks (delighted/thrilled).
  

​Reception continue to blow me away with their amazing writing whether it be through ‘hold a sentence’ or sentences that they have independently composed! 

​In Literacy, our Year 1 children have begun their next unit. Our text driver for this unit of learning is “The Smartest Giant in Town”. Our text that we are going to write is a letter, our audience is our new class teacher (we do NOT know who this is yet) and our purpose is to tell our new class teacher all about ourselves! This week we have listened to the story and drawn and labelled our features using adjectives.

In Maths, Reception children have spent the majority of the week exploring sharing into groups – we have discussed how when we share it has to be fair and equal.
​Our Year 1 children have counted efficiently in groups of two, counted efficiently in groups of ten, counted efficiently in groups of five and counted efficiently by counting in groups of two, five and ten.  

​In Science, we carried out our “identifying and classifying” enquiry. We know that when we classify we make observations to name, sort and organise items. Our big question was “Do most of our foods come from plants?". We worked in pairs to make predictions – Year 1 children recorded these on an investigation record sheet. Then we worked as a class to name food, say whether the food came from an animal or plant scored this as a tally mark and then sorted it into the correct food group! We concluded that most food does come from plants. 

In PE, we carried on with our learning in Athletics.
We started by playing a game of 'domes and dishes' but this time instead of running to retrieve a dish/dome, if we were on the 'domes' team we had to turn a dish into a dome before returning and vice versa!
Then we practised our throwing skills. In this activity we had to throw for distance at a target (a hoop). We had to keep our throwing arm straight, long and back and transfer our weight from out back to our front as we released the bean bag for the target!

Our learning question this week has been ‘What’s it like at the seaside’. We started the week listening to the story “Lucy and Tom At the Seaside”. We have also enjoyed listening to different stories set at the seaside. We know that the seaside is called the ‘seaside’ because the sea is beside the beach. We have discussed things that we can see at the seaside and what we might do there. We have also discussed how seaside holidays were different in the past to now.

Our learning activities have included; writing a beach bag list, writing ‘I can see’ sentences about the seaside, making an aeroplane/boat, using the watercolour paints to create a seaside picture and we have been carefully tearing and sticking tissue paper to decorate our own beach ball!

​Our Talk through Stories unit this week has been “The Scarecrows Wedding” – we have joined in with favourite phrases and taken on the role of Betty O’Barley to carry out freeze-frame feelings! We showed expressions for each of the situations below:

• Harry asks you to marry him.
• Harry is missing for two days.
• Reginal Rake drops the burning cigar next to you.

Can you work out which situation we are showing the expressions for (terrified, delighted and upset)?

​On Monday, we held our Sports Celebration and we had lots of fun carrying out our different races. Once again I would just like to say a massive thank you to all of you who came who supported us and celebrated our successes! 

​Our Reception children have continued to access appropriate RWI groups and are enjoying choosing to write in provision – they are producing some amazing independent writing. In Literacy, our Year 1 children have been working hard to write their sequel to "The Smeds and The Smoos” using the details from their plan.

​In Maths, our Reception children have been practising making doubles, doubled numbers and recognised doubles. Here we are trying to roll doubles - we worked with a partner to each roll a dice, we had to spot whether we had rolled a 'double' or 'not double' and if it was a double say what the double made.

​Year 1 children have been measuring length from zero cm using a ruler, estimated length in cm and estimated length, measured length and recorded the values in a table.

​In Science, we have learnt to describe how seeds and bulbs grow into mature plants. We know that flowers on trees are often called blossoms and we know what a bulb is. 

​In One Life, we have learnt some ways to prevent illnesses and disease in our One Life – we have focused on our oral hygiene and how to care for our teeth.

​In PE, we warmed up by playing a game of domes and dishes and then we practised running fast from a standing start. For our starting position we had to ensure we placed one foot behind the line and the other foot behind it with both feet facing forward.

​In PE, we warmed up by playing a game of domes and dishes and then we practised running fast from a standing start. For our starting position we had to ensure we placed one foot behind the line and the other foot behind it with both feet facing forward.

​Our learning question this week has been ‘What is it like in the city?’. We started the week listening to the story “All Aboard the London Bus” by Patricia Toht – we know that in London they have big red buses called ‘London buses. This book introduced us to England’s capital city and it’s well-known landmarks like Buckingham Palace, Big Ben and the London eye. We have also started our core book for the half-term “A Bear Called Paddington” which we have enjoyed listening to and answering questions about. 

Our learning activities this week have included; making a mini-book about what we can see in London, using the ‘how to draw…’ step by step instructions to draw a bus, creating a red London bus, making a busby solider, using the blocks to create London landmarks and choosing a London landmark and drawing it. We have also enjoyed having the Beebots out and we have been practising inputting directions – we have begun to use the direction words; forwards, backwards, left and right.

​This week our Talk through Stories book has been “Cops and Robbers” – we have enjoyed joining in with the favourite phrases!

​In Literacy, our Year 1 children started the week using regular past and present tense by adding the suffixes ‘ed’ and ‘ing’ to words, we have practised forming capital letters and saying the names of the letter and the sounds they make. We have spent the past two days putting a plan together for our sequel to ‘The Smeds and The Smoos’ – we are very excited to write it next week!

​In Maths, our Reception children have been learning all about addition and subtraction using ‘first, then, now’ stories and have independently been able to work at tables to write addition and subtraction equations! Reception have also begun to explore telling the time. We know we use clocks to measure time and that when the big hand points to 12 it is “o’clock”. 

​Our Year 1 children have used their knowledge of addition and subtraction within 10 to add and subtract within 20, measured length using cubes and recorded results in a table and measured length in centimetre cubes!

​In Science, we have learnt the names of parts of a tree and the function of each part. We worked in pairs during carpet time to label a diagram of a tree, then Y1’s drew their own diagram of a tree and labelled it and were confidently able to talk about the function of each part. We have also begun to name fruits that grow on trees! 

In One Life, our lesson was built upon the story “Hurry Up” which is a book about slowing down. We spoke about how we must balance doing with time to just be.

In PE, we continued practising our races for Sports Day!
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On Welly Walk we continued our learning from last week on caring for our environment and carried out a litter pick in the Nature Reserve. The Sunshines were shocked at how much litter they found in our wonderful Nature Reserve!

We have started our new topic ‘Off We Go!’. Our learning question this week has been on ‘How do we care for the environment?’. We started the week listening to the story “Somebody Swallowed Stanley” and over the course of the week we have listened to the stories “Dinosaurs and all that rubbish” and “Micheal Recycles”. We have learnt about different ways in which we can show care for the environment such as; not littering, recycling, turning the tap off when we are brushing our teeth, walking instead of using the car and using both sides of paper! We enjoyed learning a song called “I recycle” to the tune of Frere Jacques. This week our Talk through Stories book has been “Stick Man” – we have enjoyed joining in with the favourite phrases!

Our learning activities this week have included; creating a litter bug, writing a recycling list, making a poster to show how to care for our environment, sorting images of rubbish into the correct recycling bins and sorting the Numicon into odd and even. For our funky finger activity this week we have been practising our cutting skills to cut out our own jellyfish!

Our Reception children have been accessing their new RWI groups.

​In Literacy, our Year 1 children have started a new unit of work our text driver is “The Smeds and the Smoos”. Our text is a short narrative, audience is Team CW and our purpose is to write a short sequel to the story. We started the week by exploring the front cover and making predictions together using a class thought board, we attentively listened to the story and answered questions about it. We have learnt that capital letters don’t just come at the start of the sentence – we know that capital letters are used for the names of people, places and days of the week and for the personal pronoun ‘I’. We ended the week learning about an exclamation mark – we know it is a different type of punctation that comes at the end of the sentence to show shouting and excitement!

In Maths, our Reception children have recalled composition of numbers to 10, used the rekenreks to build the numbers to 20, used positional language such as; over, under, around, through and followed directions using the vocabulary; forward, backwards, left and right.
​Our Year 1 children have explored odd and even numbers within 20, doubled the numbers 6 to 9 and halved the result, used our knowledge of addition facts within 10 to add within 20 and used our knowledge of subtraction facts within 10 to subtract within 20.

In Science, we continued our learning on ‘Plants and Life Cycles’. This week we have learnt the names of basic parts of a plant – leaves, stem, flower, roots and petals. We have drawn a diagram of a plant, labelled the parts and spoke about the functions of each part of the plant. 

In One Life, our lesson was built upon the story “Super Duper You”. We spoke about how it is important to like ourselves and how we all have different talents. We know there are things which we are good at and there are things we find tricky. We know that this is okay!
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In PE, we have begun practising our races for Sports Day!

This week we have been exploring “What foods are good for you?”. We started the week listening attentively to the story ‘Supertato’ and this has been our unit for Talk through Stories. We have discussed how exercise makes us feel and could name the following as things which are good for our health; exercise, sleep, washing hands, brushing teeth, personal hygiene and eating healthy. Each day we have tried a new fruit in addition to our normal snack time fruit – these have included; pineapple, raspberries, plums and strawberries! Here we are trying the new fruits. The Sunshines used words such as 'sweet' and 'sour' to describe the pineapple, raspberries and strawberries!

Our learning activities have included; writing a caption to match the Supertato picture, making a shopping list of different vegetables, creating a repeating pattern printing with a potato, making our very own Supertato, using puppets to create our very own Supertato stories, playing “Let’s Go Shopping” and sorting food items into ‘healthy’ and ‘unhealthy’. On Tuesday we noticed that Barnaby Bears’ house had moved and found Evil Pea hiding in it! Since then Evil Pea has been playing tricks in our classroom and we have been thinking of ways to stop him and predicting what else Evil Pea might get up to! ​

As part of our Talk through Stories learning we have; identified the characters and main characters, learnt about unfamiliar words, learnt favourite phrases, used freeze-frame feelings and joined in with favourite phrases on the fourth read! The Sunshines took on the role of 'Supertato' to express how they would feel in the following situations:

• You find Carrot stuck to the conveyor belt (cross/furious)
• You fall into the icy depths of the freezer (frightened/terrified)
  
• You trap the evil pea in the jelly (pleased/satisfied)

In Literacy, Year 1 children have learnt about the suffix ‘es’ to make a word plural and know they use ‘es’ rather than ‘s’ if a word ends in “sh”, “ch”, “x”, “z” or “s”. Year 1 have also learnt that we add the suffix ‘er’ to change a verb (doing word) into a noun (name of someone or something). We have also had a spelling test on lots of tricky red words so we know what to practise after the holidays!

In Maths, Reception children have found ways to partition a set of 5, used what we know about 5 to work out a hidden number and visualised and described double patterns up to ‘5 and 5’. 

​Year 1 children have explained that the digits in the numbers 11 to 19 express position on a number line, identified the quantity shown in a representation of numbers 11 to 19, used knowledge of 10 and a bit to solve problems and solved subtraction problems using knowledge of 10 and a bit.

​In Science, we carried out this half-terms line of enquiry on fair testing. The question we investigated was “Do different ramp surface materials affect the speed a car travels?”. We discussed how to make it a fair test only one variable could change and this was the material of the ramp and the car and height of the ramp had to stay the same. We made predictions about which material would make the car travel fastest and which would make the car travel the slowest. We carried out the investigation and recorded our results in a table. We concluded that the different ramp surface materials do affect the speed of the car!

In PE, on Tuesday we practised for Sports Day with Mr Smith.
​On Wednesday we played a game of beanbag drop, used the agility ladders, played hopscotch, practised throwing and catching whilst balancing on one leg and practised our relay race!