Friday 22 November 2013


Autumn term 2 week 3
What a busy week we have had!
 
In Literacy the children have certainly enjoyed listening to the story of 'Can't You Sleep Little Bear?' We have talked about feeling scared and thought of amazing adjectives to describe lots of different woodland creatures such as prickly hedgehogs and sly, cunning foxes. This is in preparation for next week when the children write their own story based on a character of their own.More of that later.....
 
In Numeracy we have continued to practice mental maths and addition using partitioning and the column method. It is good to see that the children are growing in confidence and have even tackled adding 3 numbers together ! This is the focus of the homework and once again we thank you for supporting your child in this as it really does make a difference.
 
You may have noticed your child coming home singing songs? Yes it's that time of the year again -we have started rehearsing our Christmas production! The children are as enthusiastic as ever and we know it will be wonderful. Please could we ask that if your child has a speaking part they practice at home? All the children concerned have taken words home with them, however if these have been mislaid we can provide a copy. Also, we have been busy making Christmas cards and decorations for the Christmas Fayre. How many shopping days are left?
 
Now what have we got in store for next week?
 
Literacy
In literacy the children are going to be thinking about the beginning, middle and end of the story 'Can't You Sleep Little Bear?' They will sequence pictures from the story and write super sentences to go with them. The idea is that they will then write their own version of the story with different characters.
 
Numeracy
In numeracy this week, we will be moving onto subtraction using maltesers. Miss Golia briefly outlined the method in the recent meeting. The idea is that the children partition the first number and then cross out the number to be taken away. The remaining maltesers are grouped together and then counted to give the answer. We will also be working with money.
 
  
Have a great weekend
 
The Key Stage 1 team
 

Sunday 17 November 2013

Autumn term 2 week 3

Firstly, let's have a look at what's been going on in Key Stage 1 this week...

In Literacy the children thoroughly enjoyed the story of 'Peace at Last.' It was fantastic to see the children retelling the story to their partner, ensuring that they included all the sounds that Mr Bear had to try and sleep through.

On Wednesday, Mr Bear ( actually the class teachers) visited the children in class and they had the opportunity to interview him. They questioned how he was feeling in the different parts of the story and all the children were eager to ask Mr Bear their question (although the children did say afterwards - "we knew it was really you and not Mr Bear!")
One of the children asked,
 "Is that why you've got big black bags under your eyes because you couldn't sleep?" (It should be noted that this was a natural effect and not theatre makeup!!!)

In Numeracy the children are really starting to get to grips with mental addition strategies - putting the biggest number in their head and counting on or adding the units then the tens and counting on to find the total.
This was the focus of this week's maths homework and we ask that you keep practising these strategies with your child at home as this is a big help in developing their understanding of other concepts in maths.
By the way, many thanks to all those parents who attended Miss Golias' Number workshop which was on Tuesday after school. We hope that you found it beneficial seeing how number is taught in school.

Well we couldn't have planned our half term topic of All About Bears better as this coincided with our Children in Need activities on Friday. The children looked super spotty and they thoroughly enjoyed placing their pennies on Pudsey's face on the playground; eating their scrummy buns at playtime and then nicely jigging up their lunch taking turns dancing on the Wii!!!
Thank you so much for all your contributions.

Now what's happening next week?

Literacy 
In literacy this week, we will be reading the book Can't You Sleep Little Bear? by Martin Waddell .

Our focus in literacy is to continue looking at characterisation and we will be thinking about using AMAZING ADJECTIVES to describe Little Bear and Big Bear's physical appearance and their thoughts and feelings.

Numeracy
In numeracy this week, we will be continuing to practice our calculating skills! We will develop our addition skills by beginning to add three numbers together. Also we will continue to apply this knowledge of addition to solving word problems.
Can you use your mental addition skills to quickly add these three numbers?

14 + 9 + 6 =

23 + 8 + 17 =

(Remember use your knowledge of addition facts for making 10 to help you.)
 

Have a fantastic week :)
The Key Stage 1 Team

Sunday 10 November 2013

Autumn 2 Week 2

Week 2 starts tomorrow and it is another busy week in KS1. This week, we will be continuing with our topic All About Bears! We started our clay work last week and we will be busy this week finishing off our clay bear sculptures. In addition, we will brushing up on our ICT skills and starting some word processing using Clicker 6. We will be writing non-chronological reports about different bears and learning how to put pictures into our documents. 

Literacy 
In literacy this week, we will be reading the book Peace at Last by Jill Murphy. Our focus in literacy is characterisation and we will thinking about using AMAZING ADJECTIVES to describe Mr Bear's physical appearance and his thoughts and feelings.

Numeracy
In numeracy this week, we will be continuing to practice our calculating skills! We will be using malteasers to partition numbers to help us add them together. As the week goes on, we will begin to apply this knowledge of addition to solving word problems. Can you solve the word problem below???

On Monday I ate 21 sweets and on Tuesday I ate 31 sweets. 
How many sweets did I eat altogether? 

Lastly .... please remember it is a training day on Thursday and school will be closed. We will be open again, as normal, on Friday where we will be raising money for Children in Need. 

Have a fantastic week :)
The Key Stage 1 Team

Thursday 7 November 2013

Special Visitors

This week, in KS1 we have had some surprise visitors in our classrooms. We have had three mystery teddy bears turn up to school and join each of the three classes. Here is Class 3's bear .... they named him Timmy and have been helping him to settle in to life in Class 3!!

They have even made him a car, a bed and a new name tag :)

Sunday 3 November 2013

Autumn 2......

Hi and welcome back to a busy and exciting half term. Over the course of this half term we have some exciting literacy to complete, careful calculating to do,bear books to read, clay bears to make, investigate bear prints, practice for the Christmas Production, make Christmas Decorations have Christmas party... I am sure you will agree it's not just the children that are going to be tired by the time we break up for Christmas!

Literacy

This half term we are going to writing lots and lots of bear stories with inspiration taken from some favourite bear picture books, such as, Whatever Next, Peace At Last, Can't Sleep Little Bear, Old Bear stories and Paddington Bear.


Numeracy

This half term we are going calculating mad.....!!! We are going to be learning how to calculate quickly through mental strategies. We are also going to be learning how to add and subtract through partioning numbers and counting.

We will revisit how to write and recognise numbers. Teachers in KS1 have high expectations and we are looking for children to work independently on given tasks and apply their knowledge through a range of different contexts.
I will be holding a numeracy workshop on Tuesday 12th November in Class 2 at 3:15. This will enable you to see how we teach addition and subtrction in order for you to support your child at home.

Topic
This half term we will be exploring a Word Processing programme called Clicker in which children will be expected to write a report about a variety of bears.
They will also be making clay bears, finding out how the teddy bear got its name and investigating bears habitat and prints.

We will also be making Christmas crafts during the course of this half term and production will be in week 7.
Please look out for exact dates.

Children will be learning their Christmas songs and will be taking words home for them to learn. Please support the team and help your child learn these as they bring them home.

It looks set to be a fantastic half term... We are excited - I hope you are too...

Sam Golia - Key Stage 1 Phase Leader
and the KS1 teaching team.