🌟 Year 1 Weekly News 🌟
We have had the most amazing week in Europe and Asia, filled with fantastic writing, creativity and laughter.
As the weather begins to change and autumn starts to make an appearance, please remember to send your child to school with appropriate outdoor clothing and a pair of wellies. We love getting outside whatever the weather, and having the right kit means everyone can enjoy those muddy and wet adventures comfortably!
We have spent some time this week discussing our Curriculum Drivers - the things that make our curriculum more Strathmore! We have talked about what it means to be empathetic, courageous and resilient and have thought of examples of when we might be these things both in and out of school.
📚 English
This week we continued our learning about Puffin Peter, and created a Story S! This is where we sequence the events of the story and orally retell how they all unfold. We then challenged the children to write sentences describing three of the events, mainly the Beginning, Middle and End.
We also created missing posters for Paul! We discussed how sometimes people put up missing posters if someone they know, or a pet has gone missing. We wrote sentences describing what Paul is and what he looks like and what he is not and what he doesn't look like.
Throughout our writing journey this week we have continued practising:
- Using capital letters at the beginning of sentences
- Leaving finger spaces between words
- Checking that our sentences make sense
- Finishing with a full stop
🔢 Maths
In Maths, we have continued our work on place value.
This week the children have began to think about what is one more, or one less, than a number up to 10. We have used language such as 'forwards, backwards, more than and less than' to describe where our numbers may fit on a number track.
We used cubes to create a descending staircase! We worked together as a group and started with a tower of ten cubes before making a tower of nine cubes, followed by eight until we reached a tower made of one cube! This helped the children to physically see what counting back looks like, as well as what it sounds like when they say each number aloud.
🔤 Phonics
This week we reviewed a range of Phase 3 sounds, including:
ai, ee, igh, oa, oo (short and long), ar, or, ur, ow, oi, air, er, sh, zz, ss, ch, qu, ng, th and ear
We have also continued revisiting tricky words from Phases 2 to 4 to build confidence and fluency. No new tricky words are introduced during Autumn 1, giving children lots of opportunity to consolidate and strengthen their previous learning.
📖 Reading Practice Books
Reading practice books came home for the second time this week.
Please continue to read these regularly with your child. The books have been carefully matched to their phonics knowledge, so they should be able to decode them successfully. The focus at home is on building fluency, confidence and pace through repeated reading.
As always, we kindly ask that books are looked after carefully and returned to school every Friday so they can be exchanged.
If your child has a planned absence, please let the class teacher know and we will do our best to arrange an alternative exchange day.
Thank you for helping us ensure books are returned promptly, as late or missing books can impact other children's reading opportunities.
Science
In Science this week, the children have continued their learning about materials and designed their own toy by carefully choosing what it should be made out of and why. We had some fantastic metal and glass monster trucks, some strong metal robots and some soft, warm and fluffy cuddly toys!
History
The children have shown a huge interest in our topic about toys and whether they are the same now as they were in the past. This week we were able to play with a selection of old toys, from metal hoops to wooden Jacob's Ladders - the children had a wonderful time, sharing and playing so beautifully together. We then drew our favourite toy and wrote sentences about what these toys tell us about children and their lives in the past.
📌 Important Information
🏃 PE Days: Monday and Wednesday
📚 Library Day: Tuesday
Please remember that books need to be returned on Tuesday in order to be exchanged. Books brought in after this day will need to wait until the following week.
📖 Phonics Reading Book Exchange: Friday
💛 Gentle Reminders
- Please wait for your child on the path up on the bank at collection time. If you need to speak briefly with a teacher, we kindly ask that you wait until most children have been collected.
- Please send your child to school with their own water bottle each day. We have a very limited number of spare cups available.
- Please ensure your child has a spare set of clothes on their peg. These are useful not only for toileting accidents, but also for unexpected muddy puddles, wet weather and outdoor play adventures!
Thank you, as always, for all your support at home. We are absolutely loving getting to know both you and your wonderful children, and we are so excited for the year ahead!
The Year 1 Team 🌟