WELCOME to Year 1 2022-23

First week back and we’re getting into the swing of things again. We have introduced our new topic of ‘At Sea’, the children have made some brilliant artwork and a massive fish using teamwork. In music this week we have used the glockenspiels again, playing three different notes in the correct rhythm, getting ready to start composing music of our own. In computing, we have started to use Microsoft Paint to paint portraits of ourselves. In maths, we have been talking a lot about directions and using our left and rights to describe positions. In literacy, we have started our new model text of ‘No-Bot the Robot’, which we are loving already.

Few notes:
Next week Miss Sartain will be on the school residential with Year 6. The phonics screening check will be taking place next week, with Miss Jones leading. The children have already been made aware of this. The spelling quiz for next week will take place on the Thursday instead of the usual Friday.

26/05/23

Last week of summer 1, where has the time gone? The children are all flourishing in year 1 and are doing really well. This week we have continued our learning of fractions, looking at quarters. We have solidified our knowledge that names of people and places need capital letters as well as the start of a sentence. Our hot writes we did on Monday were phenomenal, we have become very confident and imaginative writers.

In our continuous provision this week, we have been exploring high frequency words and writing words for each digraph/trigraph that we know. We have used the story dice to give us the subjects for different short stories. We have made our own aboriginal inspired rain sticks and have replanted some plants. Finally, we have all had a chance to use timetable rock stars to practice our 2, 5 and 10 times tables.

Unfortunately, this will be our last week of continuous provision and busy jobs. In summer 2 we will be moving on to carousel learning instead in preparation to be in year 2.

As the phonics screening check is just after half term, it would be appreciated if the children can continue with their reading and phonics practice at home over half term.

19/05/23

We were lucky enough to go and visit the planetarium in the school hall on Tuesday morning. We learnt so much about the solar system, learning the order of the planets and that it rains diamonds on saturn! We had such an amazing time flying through space.

In maths, we have been learning all about fractions starting with identifying a half. We have completed our warm write this week all about not prodding a polar bear. In science we learnt how to sort fruit and vegetables, learning that a tomato is sneaky and pretends to be a vegetable but is actually a fruit.

In our continuous provision this week we have been washing clothes and hanging them out to dry in the sun, we have also dug up some vegetables and given them a wash too. As we have been learning about the different layers of the rainforest in out topic lesson, we have ordered the layers and added the correct animals in the right places of the rainforest. We have made special half and half pizzas to continue to practice our fractions. We have also used a text all about a polar bear to gather facts and assist our comprehensions skills. Finally, we got to write our common exception words out on the table!

Our spelling quiz is likely to take place on Thursday next week instead of Friday due to the fun run on Friday.

12/05/23

The children have done so well this week. We have started to group numbers in maths, using our timetable knowledge to calculate the totals. We have looked at alliteration in literacy and we were amazing at using alliteration with our names. We did a bit more music this week in lessons, we can’t wait to innovate and compose our own songs.

In our continuous provision this week we used our comprehension skills to write a fact file on a tiger. We grouped counters to extend our maths and played a phonics and timetable game. Outside we had the challenge to design and build a bridge to go over the water tray, we also got the opportunity to fill up the bird feeders. Finally, we sequenced the correct order in which to grow a plant and extended our fine motor skills with a threading activity.

5/05/23

We had an amazing Friday celebrating the king’s coronation. We had a fantastic parade to show off our brilliant crowns and had a lovely picnic in the sunshine. We got an opportunity to have a proper party and played some board games at school.

28/04/23

We completed our hot writes for our journey stories inspired by Mr Gumpy’s Outing this week. We have become excellent little authors. We started our times tables this week, completing our 2s, 5s and 10s. We are still practising our handwriting and phonics, especially with spellings. We are still very interested in our Australia topic, learning more about famous landmarks.

IN our continuous provision this week we have managed to get outside a bit more. We planted some seeds and experimented with capacity in the water tray. We wrote a fact file of everything we could remember about Australia. We have had a go at matching objects together that rhyme and have completed some multiplication work. We wrote a little story about out new model text ‘Never Tickle a Tiger’.

20/04/23

What a welcome back to school we have had. We have got stuck in straight away, coming up with our own ideas inspired by our story of ‘Mr Gumpy’s Outing’. We are finishing our topic on measurement within maths lessons, looking at capacity and comparing different capacities. We started off our topic lesson strong, being really engaged and wanting to learn so much more about Australia. In science we talked about different plants and what we knew already about how to keep plants healthy to help them grow.

In our continuous provision this week we have been using watercolours to design our own pictures of different plants. We have written postcards from Australia to special people in our lives. We have sorted through alien words and real words in teams and have used amazing adjectives to describe different parts of a tiger, getting ready for our next model text. We have really enjoyed designing a mode of transport to put down the zipline. If our design didn’t quiet work we tweaked it to make sure we could get a figure from one side to the other with excellent problem solving skills.

31/03/23

I hope you all have a fantastic Easter break!

24/03/23

This week we have explored algorithms in computing, instructing our robot friend on how to make a tower. Our cold writes in literacy were outstanding, Miss Sartain was very pleased. We have started to look at the story of Mr Gumpy and were introduced to speech marks in writing. We have done very well with our measurement topic in maths measuring our heads, wrists, ankles, tables, books, etc.

In our continuous provision this week we have played a maths game, drawing out lines using a ruler for different measurements that we landed on. We made Mr Gumpy puppets to act out our story with. We used the phonics letters to spell different words to match the images on the cards. Finally, we used the globe to find out different facts about different countries.

17/03/23

This week started off very strong to begin British Science week. We were fortunate enough to have some children from Wollaston school in to teach us some interesting things about light, sound, taste and reactions. We also did an experiment to find out how to get a tin can to roll further, we came to the conclusion that we’d have to build a steeper ramp.

We haven’t had any busy jobs this week as we have been doing special quizzes instead, we will go back to having busy jobs next week.

We wish all the lovely mummies a very happy mother’s day!

10/03/23

Wow, what a week, topped off with snow on Thursday! This week we have used the laptops a lot to do research. We researched Florence Nightingale, writing some fabulous facts and drawing some incredible pictures of this amazing lady. In science we have had a really fun lesson, exploring all our senses and what body parts we use for each. In maths, we have moved onto our measurements unit, looking at bigger and smaller as well as measuring using non standard measurements such a multilink cubes. On Wednesday, we finished our current literacy topic, writing the most amazing instructions on how to take care of a cat. Some of us who tried really hard with our writing even got a special pencil buddy to help us continue our concentration. On Thursday, some of us got the chance to play outside in the snow at breaktime, making incredible snow people and having lots of fun. We have had lots of great PE lessons this week, one with Mr Roberts and one with Miss Fraser.

In our continuous provision this week we have used our computer skills to research Christopher Columbus and created a fact file about him. We estimated them measured different objects such as the tables, pencils and book with multilink cubes. We wrote some great instructions on how to brush our teeth. Additionally, we wrote about our favourite smells, tastes and sounds, including which body part we use for each. To develop our fine motor we have been trying to link paper clips together to create a chain, we also threaded some penne onto spaghetti, trying our hardest not to break the spaghetti as we did so.

03/03/23

In maths this week we have been talking about splitting numbers into tens and ones, which we are getting really good at, this allows us to work with larger numbers. In literacy, we boxed up our model text and started to innovate the instructions to state how to care for a cat. In science, we are continuing with the human body, looking at different body parts and singing heads, shoulders, knees and toes. We have had some excellent PSHE lessons with Miss Fraser, discussing health and safety, basic first aid and road safety. We also have been learning about Christopher Columbus and ordering key information about his explorations.

In our continuous provision this week we have all had an opportunity to follow instructions and make some playdough! Additionally, we have been working with tens and ones using the practical resources. We have played a body parts game where we have to describe a body part for our partner to guess. We have enjoyed using the story dice to write some super silly sentences based on the images on the dice. We have practiced our fine motor skills by threading beads onto a string in a repeating pattern. Finally, we drew a map to help Christopher Columbus explore different places.

24/02/23

Our first week back for spring 2, and we’ve packed so much in already. We’re starting to learn about people from the past in our topic sessions, figuring out what questions we wish to ask. We are starting to look at the human body in science, even making our own skeletons as part of our continuous provision. We had a super fun literacy lesson, understanding the importance of being specific with instructions we were telling Miss Sartain how to make a jam sandwich, she ended up with jam everywhere as we forgot to mention to use a knife to spread the jam! In maths we have been superstars at understanding our tens and ones.

In our continuous provision this week we have had a focus on verbs, adjectives, nouns and imperative verbs (bossy verbs). Additionally we have done some practical maths.

Our spellings are in our reading diaries for next week.

We can also have a go on SpellingShed and Numbots (passwords are on the front page of our reading diaries) to help our learning at home.

Just a few notes for parents:

PE will now take place on Tuesdays and Wednesdays each week.

The children will now be visiting the library every Friday to take home a reading for pleasure book. This is a book that you can share togehter with your children that is not staged, it is purely for them to enjoy.

10/02/22

The last week of Spring 1, halfway through Year 1 already. We’ve had a very exciting week this week. We had NMPAT come in and play their instruments for us, we got to see a violin, viola and cello! In maths, we have looked at fact families again, working with bigger numbers this time. We represented these with part-whole diagrams, bar models and rekenreks. We started a new unit in literacy, we are learning to write instructions. Our model text tells us all how to look after a dog. Science was really fun and arty this week. We solidified our knowledge of grouping animals, even acting out different animals and grouping them. We then got a chance to look at the different features of these groups and replicated these in our artwork. We made clay snakes, we collaged fish, used watercolours to paint a parrot and used to drawing pencils to draw a tiger.

In our continuous provision this week we used our subtraction knowledge to colour in a picture. We sorted alien and real words in a phonics game. We wrote our own recipes and got to fish for the missing digraphs to help our spelling.

Our spellings are in our reading diaries, these are recapping previous alternate sounds we’ve already learnt.

We can also have a go on SpellingShed and Numbots (passwords are on the front page of our reading diaries) to help our learning at home.

03/02/23

This week we have been finishing off our topic on flight, exploring different oceans. We also are finishing off our science topic looking at animals, specifically their offspring. In maths, we are looking at subtraction within number up to 20. We are using what we already know to so we don’t have to count each time, e.g. if we know 4-2=2 then 14-2 must = 12. Additionally in maths we have looked a doubling numbers. We completed our hot write this week, writing about a journey through the deep dark woods.

In our continuous provision this week we have located the oceans of the world and the different parts of the UK using the atlas. We have practised doubling our numbers using spots on a ladybird. We have matched the adult animal with the correct off spring. We made a picture of the deep dark wood, using natural materials we found on walks or in the playground. We have used our computing skills to have a go at numbots on the laptops and we also used our fine motor skills to do some threading.

Our spellings are in our reading diaries, these are all alternate sounds.

We can also have a go on SpellingShed and Numbots (passwords are on the front page of our reading diaries) to help our learning at home.

27/01/23

This week we have completed our shared write, adapting our story map of the Gruffalo. We wrote about going on a walk to look for berries and to beware of the crazy Miss Fraser! We have talked about the different diets of animals such as herbivores, carnivores and omnivores. In topic, we discussed past and present modes of transport, identifying and sorting which are which. In maths we have been superstars with our addition, we are getting really good a writing directly in our books in the squares on the paper!

In our continuous provision this week we have made up our own silly sentences using the story telling dice. We have designed our own hot air balloon and sorted acceptable and unacceptable behaviours. Additionally, We have used our addition knowledge to complete a colour by number activity. We also have played a phonics four-in-a-row game. To link in with our science topic we sorted different animals into herbivore, carnivore and omnivore based on their diets.

20/01/23

This week we finished our book in book talk, and have had lots of discussions about it. We’re also almost at the end of our literacy topic on the Gruffalo, getting ready for our hot writes next week. In science we discussed the different groups we can categorise animals into; in addition, we explored some of their similarities and differences. Topic was great fun this week, learning about the Wright brothers and talking about different ways of flying. In maths we’ve been exploring greater than and less than as well as ordering numbers up to 20.

In our continuous provision this week we created our own passports, completed a tricky word word search and grouped animals into each category. Additionally, we have made and tested paper aeroplanes, created characters from the Gruffalo to act out the story with and played a fun maths board game.

Our spellings are in our reading diaries, these are all alternate sounds.

We can also have a go on SpellingShed and Numbots (passwords are on the front page of our reading diaries) to help our learning at home.

13/01/23

This week we all started to do book talk each day. We sit in groups to read the story together, we then get a chance to talk about what we’ve read, discussing how it makes us feel and different things we have noticed. We are all really good at this already, analysing the text to gain a deeper understanding of what we read. We have drawn our story maps for our new model text of the Gruffalo and know this story well already. We have started looking at grouping animals, knowing what group our favourite animals belong to, such as a tiger being a mammal.

In our continuous provision this week we have written about our worries and courageous thoughts to overcome them, one more and one less than for our maths task and even got to design and build an aeroplane. We have looked at similarities and differences between two different animals and wrote what we believed the owl and mouse might think about the Gruffalo.

Our spellings are in our reading diaries, these are all alternate sounds.

We can also have a go on SpellingShed and Numbots (passwords are on the front page of our reading diaries) to help our learning at home.

06/01/23

We kicked off 2023 in Year One with style. We have began our new literacy topic of the Gruffalo and already know the story very well (this is a little different to the original book – it has been adapted). Additionally we are looking at number up to 20 in our maths, understanding tens and ones. In science we have started to explore animals and will start grouping them shortly. In topic we will be looking at flight, we will start by looking at Amelia Earhart.

In our continuous provision this week we have compared numbers using our greater than and less than symbols. We have designed and described our own creatures inspired by the Gruffalo and have labeled different animals, exploring what they might eat. To support our topic learning, we created a brochure to describe a special place of our choose, some of us wrote about a trip to Jupiter, while others talked about a holiday to Disney Land!

Our spellings are in our reading diaries these are all alternate sounds.

We can also have a go on SpellingShed and Numbots (passwords are on the front page of our reading diaries) to help our learning at home.

16/12/22

Last week at school before Christmas! We have had such an amazing week, having Christmas parties, going to see the panto and making lots of Christmas crafts.

In our continuous provision this week we have written letters to Santa, created our own planets, did some Christmas themed addition and subtraction as well as writing about each season of the year. We also used cotton buds to decorate our own presents and made our own snow men.

Our spellings are in our reading diaries ready for our first week back next year. We will be recapping the sounds a-e, e-e. i-e, o-u.

We can also have a go on SpellingShed and Numbots (passwords are on the front page of our reading diaries) to help our learning at home.

05/12/22

Wow… what a week. We performed our nativity to a live audience and were amazing for both performances. Even managing to make Miss Sartain and Miss Jones cry happy tears. This week we are consolidating our maths knowledge, revisiting addition and subtraction. The Christmas fair on Tuesday after school was brilliant for all those who could attend.

In our continuous provision this week we have described the season with the most and least sunlight, made our own astronauts and sorted 2D shapes by size, colour and type. Additionally, we have been using the numicon to count and make images with, using the masks to act out the 3 Billy Goats Gruff story and played a compound noun board game. Finally, We have had the opportunity to use the tuft tray to act out the Christmas Story, looking at the birth of baby Jesus.

We will not have any spellings next week, so we get a week off.

02/12/22

It has been a fabulous week this week! We have practised our nativity all dressed up, we can’t wait to show our adults at home as we’re so very proud. We have started looking at 3D shapes in our maths lessons, we got to use the feely bag to describe the mystery shape to our peers. We have finished our literacy unit and have written the most amazing stories about ninjas, koalas, tigers and owls going over the bridge.

We also had a surprise visited of an enormous spider in our classroom. We decided to get a really good look at it before we released it back into the wild.

in our continuous provision this week we have looked at shapes making them on peg boards. We have written about different seasons and described a rocket. We focused on our emotions and how our faces look with different emotions, making our own faces for our learning journals. Finally we have been practising our compound nouns.

Our spellings this week will be in our reading diaries, revising our previous sounds of y(ee) and al (or).

We can also have a go on SpellingShed and Numbots (passwords are on the front page of our reading diaries) to help our learning at home.

24/11/22

We did so well this week, especially as it was not the most fun of weeks. We were absolute superstars! We practised our nativity in the hall for the first time and we were fantastic. We can’t wait to show you! Just a reminder that it is teacher training day on Friday and Monday, so we will not be back in school until Tuesday the 29th November.

Our spellings this week will be in our reading diaries, revising our previous sounds of i-e, o-e, u-e and c(s).

We can also have a go on SpellingShed and Numbots (passwords are on the front page of our reading diaries) to help our learning at home.

18/11/22

We’ve really spent some time getting to know our model text in literacy this week. We even adapted the story in our shared write session to have 3 dogs who defeat a red, squishy and slimy octopus. Our own story maps have been so imaginative, we are becoming professional writers.

In our continuous provision this week we have done so much learning. We have worked as a team to build a bridge for our Billy goats, reciting the story as we did it. We have made our own model rockets to launch into space, what planet will they reach? We have turned the role play corner into a cafe, writing menus, recipes and taking orders.

Our spellings this week will be in our reading diaries, revising our previous sounds of au, ey, a-e and e-e.

We can also have a go on SpellingShed and Numbots (passwords are on the front page of our reading diaries) to help our learning at home.

11/11/22

This week we have introduced a new way of learning to our classroom and have been really enjoying the range of different activities available to us. We have four must do jobs in, literacy, maths, science and topic. Additionally, we have access to fine motor, contruction, phonics, handwriting and computing based activities.

Letters have gone home regarding our Christmas nativity, if you have not received one, please let me know. This letter indicates which character your child will be in the nativity and what costume they will require.

Our spellings this week will be in our reading diaries, our new sounds are y (ee, baby) and al (or, talk).

We can also have a go on SpellingShed and Numbots (passwords are on the front page of our reading diaries) to help our learning at home.

Autumn 2 – 03/11/22

What a first week back we have had! Started our week off with some spooky themed maths and literacy especially for Halloween. Who could forget our horrifying Halloween disco and perfect pumpkins. We got the opportunity to draw the solar system using pastels, platter paint to create stars in the universe and even did some marbling to create planets for our display. Miss Sartain has been super impressed with our handwriting this week, as we are trying really hard to use the correct lines, finger spaces, full stops and capital letters.

Our spellings this week will be in our reading diaries, our new sounds are i-e, o-e, u-e and c (s, ice).

We can also have a go on SpellingShed and Numbots (passwords are on the front page of our reading diaries) to help our learning at home.

Last week of Autumn 1 – 21/10/22

Our last week of Autumn 1. This week we have been superstar writers as we finished our writing all about a special person in our lives. We completed our Great Fire of London booklets; we are now experts on the subject. We finished off our topic by making our own tudor houses, complete with straw thatched roofs. We have had a lot of fun in phonics this week, using fly swatters to slap the phonics sounds and creating phonics spiders. In maths we have been focusing on addition, ensuring to write in full number sentences.

Our spellings this week will be in our reading diaries, our new sounds for after half term will be au, ey, a-e and e-e.

We can also have a go on SpellingShed and Numbots (passwords are on the front page of our reading diaries) to help our learning at home.

Harvest Art – 14/10/22

Our week started off super fun, we had a harvest festival art afternoon on Tuesday, which we thoroughly enjoyed. We loved learning more about the Great Fire of London, we even started to create our own little book to describe the main events of the fire. We have almost finished our second literacy topic of Year 1, starting our hot write next week. We have enjoyed talking about the special people we have in our lives, using adjectives to describe them. We are turning into little mathematicians. In our lessons, we have been exploring part-whole models and have begun to look at addition.

Last reminder, the interview with a family member sheet will need to come back into school by Wednesday 19th October. Could our grownups at home help us to interview a family member such as mum, dad or grandparent? This will really help us when we write all about our family member.

Our spellings this week will be in our reading diaries, focusing on recapping previous sounds we have learnt this term.

We can also have a go on SpellingShed and Numbots (passwords are on the front page of our reading diaries) to help our learning at home.

Great Fire of London – 07/10/22

We are really getting to grips with our model text, learning lots about Miss Sartain. We are working really hard with our everyday tool kit, ensuring to use capital letters, full stops and finger spaces in our writing. We have started to look at ordering numbers in maths and have been using practical resources in our learning. Following on in our topic we have started looking at the Great Fire of London in 1666, even painting our own burning London skyline with water colours. We had an exciting assembly on Thursday from the Norhtants Wambles Litter Pickers who told the school about litter picking in the local community and the main dangers of litter.

Another friendly reminder that an interview with a family member sheet was sent home last week. Could our grownups at home help us to interview a family member such as mum, dad or grandparent? This will really help us when we write all about our family member.

Our spellings this week will be in our reading diaries, focusing on recapping previous sounds we have learnt this term.

We can also have a go on SpellingShed and Numbots (passwords are on the front page of our reading diaries) to help our learning at home.

Celebrations all round – 30/09/22

This week in Year One we have finished our own story of the baby mouse, using a lot of imagination in our writing. We have started looking at greater than, less than and equals to in our maths lessons, imaging the symbols are hungry crocodiles who are always greedy and eat the bigger number. Continuing on with our topic of London, we have compared past a present ready to have a more history focus next week. We started the week off well in our celebration assembly, where we could celebrate all those who achieved certificates for showing this terms value of courage.

We will have an interview with a family member sheet coming home. Could our grownups at home help us to interview a family member such as mum, dad or grandparent? This will really help with our next literacy topic as we will be writing all about our family member.

Our spellings this week will be in our reading diaries, focusing on our four sounds this week (wh, ph, ew, oe)

We can also have a go on SpellingShed and Numbots (passwords are on the front page of our reading diaries) to help our learning at home.

23/09/22

Year One are doing a terrific job with their learning. We are thinking about what animals we might write about next week for our very own journey story inspired by baby mouse, some of us are writing about unicorns and others are writing about fish. We have learnt so much about London already, looking at some of the differences between London and Cogenhoe.

Our spellings this week will be in our reading diaries, focusing on our four sounds this week (oy, ir, ue, ow)

We can also have a go on SpellingShed and Numbots (passwords are on the front page of our reading diaries) to help our learning at home.

London – 16/09/22

This week in Year One has been fabulous, we’re all settling back into school lovely now. We’ve continued to look at our story of Baby Mouse, writing out story maps and acting out the story. We’ve been doing a lot of practical maths this week, working on counting forwards and backwards using; number lines, tens frames, numicon and even sand in our lessons. We’ve been looking at different properties of materials in our science lessons, even having a go at describing an item in a bag to the rest of the class for us all to guess. To support our topic of London this term, we’ve been painting the River Thames, making boats out of Lego to sail along our River Thames and building Elizabeth’s tower and measuring it.

Our spellings this week will be in our reading diaries, focusing on our four sounds this week (ay, ou, ie, ea)

We can also have a go on SpellingShed and Numbots (passwords are on the front page of our reading diaries) to help our learning at home.

First Week of Year 1 – 09/09/22

Our first week in Year One

What an amazing week we have had in Year One. We had a visit from a baby mouse, who left some cheese around the school for us to find. We have been doing some amazing writing and using our phonics knowledge lots when reading and writing. In maths, we have been counting forwards and backwards as well as representing our numbers using objects. In science, we have been experimenting to find out which material float and sink, looking closely at their properties. This week we were super lucky to have a chance to play lots of different sports such as, dodgeball, football and archery.

Our spellings for our spellings quiz are in our reading diaries so we can practice them at home.