Was the Great Fire Of London actually ‘great?’
We are all well and truly on the Topic train now. This half term our Topic is all about History and in particular, The Great Fire Of London.
We started our History journey thinking about timelines. We looked at the timeline for the day which we have in our classrooms. Using this, we learnt how important it is for events to be plotted in chronological order.
In class we discussed similarities between houses now and houses in the past. We sorted some of their features into a Venn diagram.
After learning how long ago The Great Fire Of London happened, we began to unpick some of the events that occurred during that time and ordered them in our groups. We wondered why people call it the Great Fire Of London because it doesn’t sound very great! We learnt that the word ‘great’ can also mean big.
This week we have begun to learn about Samuel Pepys and why he is such an important historic figure.
Here are some facts that we have learnt so far:
- We know that The Great Fire Of London happened in 1666
- We know it started on the 2nd of September.
- We know the fire blazed for three days.
- We know that the fire started in a bakery on Pudding Lane.
- We know it was Thomas Farrinar’s bakery.
- We know that the fire spread quickly because the houses had been built from wood. They had also been built very close together.
- We know that houses today have been built in a much safer way!
- We know that 87 churches were destroyed.
- We know that there were no telephones or a Fire Brigade back then so people could not have called 999 for help.
Help at home: Discuss the facts around The Great Fire Of London with your child. Can you find out any more interesting or unusual facts? You could visit your local library to find out more.
Collaborative learning in 1,2B
In one of hour history lessons this week, we worked with a partner to discuss how people might have felt and what they did during the Great Fire of London. Year 1s and 2s are often doing different learning, but today we worked with a partner from a different year group. It helps children to get to know everybody and builds our ‘class community’ feeling too.
KS1 Dictation for writing
All the children have made a great start to their writing journeys this year. We have been really pleased with their enthusiasm.
In Key Stage One, we use dictation as a tool to help children with their writing. During dictation, the teachers will either have sentences already in mind or they will discuss and decide on a sentence with the children. Dictation allows children to watch as an adult models using different writing skills effectively. Together we practise letter formation, spacing between words, spelling, where and when to use punctuation such as capital letters and full stops. Teachers also model how to listen to sounds in words and write the corresponding letters.
Here are some examples of our dictated sentences:
Help at home: You could think of some simple sentences to write with your child at home. These could be about anything at all from writing about what you did at the weekend or a sentence about a film or a program you have watched on the telly.
Ask them about the process and how they do it school. I’m sure they’d be happy to share with you how skilful they are at counting the words in the sentence and using their Phoneme Fingers to listen for sounds in words. You could also include some tricky words or some of your child’s spelling words.
Living and learning : manners
We highlighted manners in our Living and Learning lessons last week (but the message will continue all year).
Small words can make a big difference.
We also talked about greeting other people and also how powerful smiling at other people can be.
Help at home by modelling good manners.
Year 6 high school taster day
Today, the year 6’s enjoyed the opportunity to spend a day in the life of a high school student. Upon arrival, we kicked off the day with PE and and food technology. The children were challenged to beat their best times possible on the rowing machines. This resulted in lots of sweating and competitiveness. In food technology, we cooked a healthy vegetable stir fry. The children were able to apply their cutting and chopping skills that they had learnt at Scholes to this lesson.
Drama gave the children an opportunity to work collaboratively to create freeze frames to express their interpretation on different images. Finally, we applied our coding knowledge to crack a code and create a game.
English – reading and writing
We have been reading several versions of Little Red Riding Hood in the first few weeks of September. Most of the children have heard the story before and we enjoyed comparing different versions. Bethan Woollvin has written several ‘twisted tales’ and we enjoyed her version – Little Red.
We decided Little Red is a fearless, brave and clever character in this story. We had to use our inference skills because the story does not directly tell us this.
We have also used these books to give us ideas to write sentences, discuss new words and read with prosody (expression).
What big teeth you have grandma!
Help at home by reading stories out loud to your child and showing a love of reading.
KS1 Maths-Numbots time!
All children in Year 1 have been given an account and login for Numbots. This is an interactive tool that school heavily invests in for your child. It is an engaging platform to help your child learn the foundations of maths.
Numbots is all about every child achieving the ‘triple win’ of understanding, recall and fluency in mental addition and subtraction, so that they move from counting to calculating.-Numbots Innovators.
We have seen the amazing impact that Numbots can have on a child’s knowledge and confidence in Maths. Numbots is part of the weekly homework for Year 1 children. Please can we ask that you make this tool a part of your weekly family routine. Once children have logged on a few times, they’re hooked and really enjoy ‘playing’!
We have class leader boards that tell us the amount of time, amount of correct answers etc for each child. In our weekly celebration assembly we reveal the weekly winners and give certificates. Who will it be next week?
(For Your Information: Once children have completed the Numbots levels they can then move on to TTRockstars which is based on multiplication and division.)
If you are experiencing an difficulties with logging on, please chat to your child’s teacher.
Help at home: Help your child log on to their Numbots account. Guide them to navigate the devise being used and let them impress you!
Living and Learning : 8Rs for learning
Last week’s Living and Learning statement is ‘I use the 8 Rs to help me learn.’
In KS1 we have been discussing each of the 8 Rs and how they are important in supporting our learning. They are:
- being ready
- being responsive
- being reflective
- being resourceful
- remembering
- risk-taking
- being resilient
- being responsible
Being ready is one of our school rules. We are learning our new routines really well and getting better and better at being ready.
1A Class Reward
In 1A we have a class motto: ‘We’re not collecting warnings, we’re collecting marbles!’ For the past 3 weeks children have been putting marbles into a jar for excellent behaviour, good manners, superb work, listening to instructions, lining up beautifully…the list goes on. In short, our marble jar was filled to the top and because of this we had a class treat. The adventure playground in KS2 was a well deserved reward for everyone in 1A.
Living and Learning : school rules
We have been talking about our school rules since we came back to school. They are useful rules for life too and help make our school a happy and healthy place to learn.
Help at home by talking about why we have rules.
