Nativity time

I had the wrong end of the stick over the Nativity open dress rehearsal this afternoon- we’re starting at 2.30pm, not 2pm. Apologies for any inconvenience.

Newsletter- week ending 12th December

Dear parents/carers,

This week in English we have been writing our own mystery stories, based around “The Lost Thing”. I have been showing the children the importance of the editing process to help them to make their stories more exciting. The stories are really fantastic, I’m very impressed with how they’ve all been taking my feedback on board and trying to improve their writing. Next week we’ll be writing the stories out in a final copy, to make into our own class book of lost thing stories.

In maths this week we’ve been looking at division methods. These have included repeated subtraction, dealing with simple remainders and using known multiplication facts. The children were very good at simple division in practical circumstances, including dealing with remainders. Next week we’ll be having a Christmaths challenge, incorporating some of the maths work we’ve done so far this year.

We’ve been making some Christmas crafts this week, including cards and stained glass windows. The stained glass windows look fantastic, and this year we made smaller versions which I laminated. This would be a great project for over the Christmas holidays. Next week we’ll be making calendars as well as having lots of end of term fun!

Next week will be incredibly busy though, so here’s a quick run down of what’s going on…

Monday: Christmas lunch
Tuesday: Panto trip (Oh no it isn’t! Oh yes it is!)
Wednesday: Nativity play performance with class 1 (in the church, 2pm).
Thursday: Carol concert (including our nativity performance) 6pm
Friday: 1.15pm, the end of term!

The Wednesday afternoon Nativity play performance is mainly for parents/grandparents who can’t make it on the Thursday evening to see the nativity. If you’re able to attend the carol concert you’ll be hearing our versions of “Away in a Manger” and “Little Jesus, Sweetly Sleep” with Class 1, so you won’t be missing out! If you can’t make the main carol concert but are free on Wednesday afternoon, please do come down to the church, we’d love to see you.

Mrs B

Three things to ask your child this week:
1 How do you make a switch for a circuit?
2 Where did you find your lost thing?
3 How can number families help us with division/sharing problems?

Viking Homework Project

Here’s a quick slideshow of the Viking homework projects. I’m sure that you’ll agree that this work is very impressive indeed.

Newsletter- Week Ending 5th December

Dear parents/carers,

The children were incredibly excited as they came into class this morning with their fantastic homework projects. It was wonderful to see the time and effort and imagination that had gone into the projects. I was very pleased that the children were all able to explain who their character is and what adventures the character experienced. Thank you to all of you for your help and support with the projects, they really did exceed my expectations. A slideshow of the work will be available on the blog shortly.

In maths this week we have looked at multiplication, using what we already know about addition to help. The children have also created rhymes, sings and poems to help them remember tricky multiplication tables, inspired by some vintage Sesame Street clips. The results were very funny and will hopefully help some of those tricky tables to stick. Next week we will be looking at division, and using what we already know about subtraction and multiplication to help.

In our English lessons this week we have been exploring a wonderful book called “The Lost Thing” by Shaun Tan. The children have put themselves into the characters’ shoes and explained how they might be feeling, and given advice to the main character in the story when he needed to make a decision. You might have spotted some of their “Found” posters around school which they created as part of the project. On Wednesday and Thursday we used Google Maps (particularly the “Street View” feature) to put ourselves into the story setting. The children then described what they would be able to see, hear and smell if they were stood there. This is a really powerful technology for story writing and something I’m going to be looking into further. Next week we’re going to be writing our own mystery story.

In science this week we have continued with our work on circuits, looking at which materials conduct electricity and starting to explore circuit diagrams. Next week we will be using what we have learned so far to build our own switches.

Next week we will also be creating some Christmas crafts, including some “stained glass” style window decorations.

Mrs B

Three things to ask your child this week:
1 Which materials can electricity pass through? How do you know?
2 Where did the Lost Thing come from?
3 What’s a good way to learn your times tables?

Homework Reminder

Don’t forget that homework is due in tomorrow morning. Straight after assembly we will be looking at the projects and talking about the children’s ideas.

Into the Forest display

Here’s our new class display, showcasing our character work inspired by “Into the Forest”, by Anthony Browne. The children wrote a letter in character as the hero of the story, explaining how he felt as he experienced his journey through the forest.