Welcome to Chestnut Class!
Miss Lloyd, Miss Kirwin & Mrs Jones
I am so excited to get started and stuck in with lots of new learning, develop new skills and work with a variety of new children! Chestnut will have many opportunities for new friendship building, teamwork, independent opportunities and sharing their voice! So let's have an incredible year together! :)
Website will be updated weekly, every Friday, with pictures of our learning and any other exciting stuff we get up to!
Please Note: I will be deleting all updates every 2 weeks. This is to help ensure that accessing the website isn't too slow due to the amount of photos uploaded. So make sure you've caught up each week :)
Week 4
Another fun packed and buy week! Please Note: Christmas card designs will be sent home on Monday (5th) due to forest school on the 2nd and not wanting any to get lost in transit.
In English this week, we continued with our story 'Leo and the Octopus', but included in a new story which we were able to compare with this one. We read 'I'll take you to Mrs Cole!' and found many similarities to 'Leo and the Octopus', including with the main character being a boy who starts out lonely and makes a friend. The year 1s wrote some sentences together comparing the stories and the year 2s continued on with 'Leo and the Octopus', writing setting descriptions with newly learnt grammar, in preparation for their story writing in a few weeks!
In Maths, the year 1s continued with their 5 and a bit learning, representing it on rekenreks (pushable beads on a frame) in different ways, practicing making the number in 'one push', with the idea that the children are able to see/make the number quickly rather than just counting each individual bead to make it. The year 2s were looking at even and odd patterns within the number 10 , recognising that to make 10 you add either 2 even numbers together or 2 odd. We showed this on 10 frames with counters.
In Geography this week we were looking closely at maps , specifically looking at different types of map symbols. To explore this we looked at a variety of maps, including google maps which has symbols on for each place. We learnt that print out maps have a key on the side explaining what the different symbols mean.
Using these symbols, children built their own town/village and included on the map symbols to show what they are.
In Science this week, we were focusing on the sense 'touch' and the children really enjoyed our activity of having to be blindfolded and feel around outside for different things! The aim wasn't to just guess what it was they were feeling, it was to describe the textures they felt to help them with their guessing!
Choose and learn time this week:
For our Science we had a senses activity, exploring different things with our senses.
Along with the theme 'people who help us' , we made some different people who help us in the creative area.
Some children had a go at constructing a large fire engine, using tyres, blocks and a hose! Some children in the creative area had a go with colour mixing!
Week 3
We are really getting into the swing of things here in Chestnut class, with another busy & exciting week!
In English we continued with the story Leo & the Octopus and focused this week on character sentence writing. We wrote sentences about what Maya, the octopus, was doing in the story. The year 1s learnt about capital letters for names, so we ensured anytime we spoke about Maya or Leo, they would have a capital letter. The year 2s focused on coordinating conjunctions (but, so, or, and) , so were able to extend their sentences further to make them more interesting.
In Maths this week, we learnt about doubles, focusing on understanding adding the same number twice. We looked at this through 10 frames and rekenreks , as the the 2 rows helped us to see the clear double of each digit.
The year 2s completed their first independent task this week. This was a task given to them to complete across the week in choose and learn time, ticking on a tick list when they completed it! It was set on Monday and they had the whole week to complete it.
They used the resources in the math's area independently to help them, demonstrating excellent initiative and ownership of their learning.
In Science this week, we continued using our senses, and used each of them to describe fruit! We discussed what it looked like, smelt like, tasted like and felt like! We worked out it was quite difficult to describe what it sounded like!
In Art this week, we continued to be collectors and explorers but had a go at sketching some of the items we collected. Year 1s had a go at doing some continuous line drawings of their objects, trying their hardest not to remove their pen from the paper and year 2s had a go with some feely drawings, sketching what they can feel not what they can see.
In Geography this week, we were focusing on map skills and were looking at the compass directions, North, East South, West. We played some games moving in the different directions and learnt a fun rhyme to remember were each direction was! Naughty Elephants Squirt Water!