Self Isolating at Home?
Here is some home learning for when you can’t be with us at school.
Maths
This week’s maths learning is all about the number three.
- Lesson 1 – Count one, two and three objects.
- Lesson 2 – Count one, two and three abstract materials.
- Lesson 3 – Estimating and checking.
- Lesson 4 – Representing number three.
- Lesson 5 – Pattern and numbers to three.
Your child’s learning will be most effective if you sit with them to pause the clip and check / praise / support your child as the clip moves on.
Phonics
This week we will be recapping the sounds we have learnt so far and some new ones too.
Watch and join in the Jolly Phonics songs.
(This is a YouTube link. Top tip for watching YouTube with your child: go to the settings cog along the play bar and turn off autoplay – this avoids an inappropriate clip coming up automatically, and helps to discourage your child from passively watching clip after clip.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4VknD1I0Zc4
- Lesson 1: Screencast new sound o
- Lesson 2: Screencast new sound c
- Lesson 3: Screencast new sound k
Literacy
This week we are reading the story – The Three Little Pigs.
- Lesson 1: Read or watch the story. Recap the main events. What characters are in the story?
Draw a picture of your favourite character.
Challenge: Write a label or sentence to match your picture.
- Lesson 2: Read or listen to the story. What words could you use to describe each character? Create your own posters and add words to match each character. You can use the cards or posters below to support this activity too.
- Lesson 3: Read or listen to the story. Use this story map or create your own story map to retell the story.
- Lesson 4: Create your own story by changing the setting or characters in the story. Add your new characters/setting to the story map.
Topic
Choose some of these activities to complete throughout the week. They may spark other interests and ideas that result in other learning opportunities. Let your child lead the learning!
| Draw a pig.
Use your own imagination or this drawing tutorial. |
| Go on a shape hunt around your house. Name and discuss the different shapes you find.
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| Create your own three little pigs picture or model.
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| Scrunch foil, paper or any other items you can find around the house.
Can you use your scrunched items to make a number, letter or pattern?
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| Learn a song or rhyme.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/teach/school-radio/nursery-rhymes-songs-medleys/zf2792p
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| Move like a firework. Here are some ideas.
Firework action cards |
Living and Learning – Mental health
In class, we’ve been doing a lot of talking over the past few weeks about emotions and our mental health.
Here’s a round-up of what we’ve discussed:
- Emotions, or feelings, can change all the time.
- We all experience a whole range of emotions, from anger to happiness to fear.
- Different things happen every day that make us feel good and not so good.
- There are ups and downs all the time.
But there are some things we can do to help us have more of the good feels – simple ideas of things you can do every day…
• Go outside! Get some fresh air
• Run around or play – do something active that gets your body moving
• Have you got a hobby that you enjoy? Learn something new!
• Hang out with your family or friends
• Doing something nice for someone else
• Helping others – it feels good for you too!
• Read books you like
• Listen to your favourite music – sing and dance!
• Have a good night’s sleep
• Relax…
What to do if something feels not so good
If things happen that make us feel not so good… don’t worry! There are things you can do to
feel better. Here are some ideas…
• Talk to someone about it
• Take your mind off it – do something else
• Take some deep breaths
• Count to 10!
• Know that this moment will pass
• Choose something from the list above
• If it feels very bad or not right… tell a trusted adult – they can help you!
Potion mixing
We hope that you all had a great half term and are looking forward to returning to Nursery. Thank you to everyone who has emailed us a few photographs to show us some of your adventures. We’ve seen pictures of pumpkin carving, bat biscuits and some very spooky looking costumes. Lots of you have enjoyed going on autumnal walks and visits to parks. By now, everyone should have received an email with a Pic Collage attachment. Please remember to check your junk folder and let us know if you haven’t got it.
Did you enjoy watching the ‘Through the keyhole’ video of a morning in Nursery? Hopefully it gave you an insight into our daily life! Here are some extra photographs of our learning before the holidays. Children loved mixing potions in our cauldron outside and saying magic words to make spells. We’ll continue with this theme at the start of the week and we’ll begin to look for new interests, too. Before the holidays, lots of children began talking about space. We’ve added a new small world space area to the Sunshine room which we’re sure children will love.
Although celebrations will be very different this year, we know that children will hear and notice fireworks this week. We’ll incorporate this into our learning too; we love to paint firework pictures and talk about the different noises that they make.
Living and Learning – mental health
We have been looking at mental health over the last few weeks. Using mindfulness techniques (we like some of the Go Noodle ones) and talking about our feelings, moods and emotions is important. The SMILERS 7 steps to wellbeing is also a simple self-help guide.
What are we learning this half-term?
Short answer: loads of exciting stuff!
If you want a bit more detail, read on…
Topic: Ancient Greece
This half-term, we’ve loads of exciting learning planned. We start our new history topic: Ancient Greece. There’s loads to learn about this incredibly important – and interesting – ancient civilisation (our curriculum statement tells you exactly what we’ll learn).
Amongst other things, we’ll learn some new knowledge: When and where was Ancient Greece? What influence did the gods have on their citizens? What is a democracy? And, the learning I’m most looking forward to, we’ll learn about and then compare two of the main states in Ancient Greece: Athenia and Sparta.
As well as improving our historical knowledge, we’ll continue to practise the key historical skills: time and chronology, using historical sources to gain information and thinking about how people interpret historical events differently.
We’ll also enrich our learning with some art, some design & technology and lots of thinking about the spiritual, moral, social and cultural aspects of our learning.
If you want to get ahead of the game with your learning, check out BBC Bitesize.
Writing:
In writing, we’ll move on to writing with description. We’ll write character descriptions about an encounter with a mythical beast and we’ll have a go at re-writing part of an ancient myth. In our writing, we’ll use lots of adjectives for impact and learn how to use expanded noun phrases.
Reading:
We’ll read some Greek myths, lots of descriptive writing and some poetry to help us practise our reading skills. To supplement this, we’ll have some good old-fashioned story time where we read our class novel: Give Peas a Chance.
Maths:
We’ll build on our learning last half-term as we move on to addition and subtraction. We’ve a helpful guide to calculations on our website that can help you practise these skills at home – it shows parents how we teach these skills in school, too (something that cropped up a few times at our recent parent teacher evening).
PE:
Danny from 5 Star Sports will continue to help us improve our games playing skills – all at an appropriate social distance of course. in our other PE lesson, we’ll think about tactics – and, in particular, how to adapt our tactics to beat our opponents.
Living & Learning:
This half-term, we’ll remind ourselves about the importance of manners, think about Anti-Bullying Week and learn about happy and healthy relationships.
As always, we want to hear from you. If you have any questions, or think we can help in any way please get in touch. Because we want to keep everyone safe, our usual playground discussions aren’t ideal. Instead, remember that you can email us anytime…
3,4O – olliecatherall@spherefederation.org
3,4EV – emmamccormick@spherefederation.org & vickyrichardson@spherefederation.org
3,4NV – nicolawadsworth@spherefederation.org & vickyrichardson@spherefederation.org
Professor Myers
We had an exciting visitor in Reception-Professor Myers! We made predictions and observed two science experiments. We made a volcano using an apple, bicarbonate of soda, washing up liquid and vinegar. We also blew up a balloon by allowing sugar to react with yeast over time. Professor Myers was so impressed with our thinking skills that she will visit again soon.
Lost property
We have these items left over. (The cardigans are currently nameless). If they belong to you then please claim them during the first week back.
Golden Stars
Every half term, each class in the school can award one pupil with a Golden Star. The stars are awarded to those children who stand out for being exceptional in many ways. The star can be worn in school daily. It is an award to aspire to and pupils throughout the school wear them with great pride. Congratulations to our Golden Star pupils!
Half-term fun!
Well done Reception, a fantastic first half-term of school life. You have all been fantastic.
We want you to enjoy your time with family over the break, to relax and have fun.
You might already have lots of plans but here are a few suggestions of things to keep you busy (only if you want to be busy of course!)
Funny-Bones-Addition-SheetFunny-Bones-Addition-Sheet
funny-bones-pencil-control-path-activity-sheets
Happy holidays!
Wow! That’s the end of our first autumn half term in Nursery and we’re really pleased with how well children have settled.
It’s been lovely getting to know everyone but we have also missed being able to welcome parents and carers through our doors. We know it must be difficult to say good bye at the gate and that you must wonder what your child gets up to when you see them walk up the ramp and through the door.
To help with this, we’ve put together a video for you to watch (click on the link below). We hope that it gives you a snap shot of what life is like in Nursery once you say goodbye. We’re really proud of all of the children; they’ve quickly become familiar with our rules and routines and, as you will hopefully see in the video, they are all happy and very engaged whilst they learn through play.
Look out for our next Class News post soon – we’ll post some highlights from this week. Over the next week, we’ll also send some photos of your child at Nursery this half term. Look out for this in your inbox soon.
Parent Consultation Meetings
Zoom invites have already been sent to everyone for your Parent Consultation Meeting. Please let us know (email or speak to us after the holidays) if you haven’t received this.