Whatever Next!
This week, we listened to another of Jill Murphy’s stories titled ‘Whatever Next!’. It’s about a little bear who went on an adventure to the moon. This story led to lots of conversations about space and rockets. We watched a rocket blast off into space and joining in with the countdown from 10. We created our own space station in our small world area and blasted our own rockets in to space ….. blast off!
In the story baby bear makes his own space rocket from a cardboard box. We decided to make our own rockets in the creative area using different shaped boxes and bottles. It was quite tricky working out how to attach the different parts together.
We enjoyed singing the number rhyme “5 Little men in a flying saucer” this week. Showing the amounts on our fingers as we sang the song. The children are getting really good at this important mathematical skill.
Help at home: Can you sing a number song at home and use you fingers to show the amount?
Here are some number songs to try.
1,2,3,4,5 Once I caught a fish alive.
Next week’s learning:
We are looking forward to reading ‘Stickman’ by Julia Donaldson in our story times next week. If you don’t have a copy of the book at home, you might enjoy watching the BBC animation together.
In maths, we’re learning about length so will be using the words long, short, longer and shorter to compare different objects.
Sound of the week
i for iguana
Pull your lips back and make the i sound at the back of your mouth.
Nursery rhyme of the week –
Twinkle, twinkle little star
Reminders
Please return the Christmas slip to let us know if you can attend one of our ‘Stay and Decorate’ sessions in December. Please see the letter for more details of dates and times.
We hope that you have a happy and healthy weekend.
2C at The Hepworth
What an incredible day! 2C were excellent ambassadors for our school. We had members of the public commenting on how superb their behaviour was. There were so many highlights, as already posted by KS1 classes, but we enjoyed the coach saying our school name as a start!
Learning about Barbara Hepworth and being surrounded by her mesmerising sculptures really did inspire us to be creative. We were sad to learn that Barbara actually died in her art studio owing to a fire. It felt like a privilege to stand next to the tools she used to create her sculptures.
Our sketches from the gallery walk were transferred into our print making workshop.
We have brought our prints home so we will explore turning them into our 2026 calendars-watch this space!
Of course, a trip wouldn’t be a trip without a lovingly thought through packed lunch. We were more than ready to eat!
We arrived under bright blue skies but sadly the rain poured in the afternoon so we didn’t get the chance to explore outside. Instead, we had some time in the gallery before returning to school for a run around our playground. 2C had the most enjoyable day.
A HUGE THANKYOU to our wonderful adult volunteers-you were A*
1,2B trip to the Hepworth Art Gallery
We had great school trip to the Hepworth Gallery in Wakefield.
We took part in a print-making workshop which included looking at some Barbara Hepworth sculptures and finding inspiration from their shapes. There were some great outcomes and the children enjoyed seeing all their masterpieces.
We also spent time looking around the garden, the different galleries and sketching some of the sculptures. There were a variety of pieces of art and sculptures to see with different textures, shapes and colours. We even got to see the brand new exhibition that opened last week.
Our trip to the Hepwortth, Wakefield
What a fantastic day we had yesterday on our school trip to the Hepworth Art Gallery in Wakefield. This was the first trip of the year for our Year One children. They behaved brilliantly and represented the school very well.
We had so much fun on the bus! We then took part in a workshop where we looked at lots of sculptures made by Barbara Hepworth.
We then had a go at making our own art and did some fantastic printmaking.
After that, we had lunch before looking around the art galleries and spotting lots of primary and secondary colours.
Thank you so much to our adult volunteers for coming on the trip yesterday. We had so much fun!
Design technology – food
This week we’ve been putting out culinary skills to the test. Each child has had the opportunity to make tomato and lentil soup – perfect for the cold days we’ve had this week. They used knives to safely chop and dice the vegetables and fried them on the hob. Adding lentils and chopped tomatoes then created the base for the soup. They sneakily added some seasoning and then left it to simmer. It was great to see how confident the children were with their cooking skills, especially the ones who obviously cook at home. It was also great for those children who don’t often get to cook at home. When they tasted the soup, most children thought it was very yummy. I thought it was delicious and I’ve already consumed three bowls so far this week.
Help at home: Here is the recipe in case you would like to cook it at home. I highly recommend it.
Y2 football
Well done to our fantastic Year 2 children for taking part in the tournament at Fives yesterday. It was very chilly but the team showed great enthusiasm and determination! Thank you to everybody that came to support the team and to FOSP for providing the kits.
- The next game will be Monday 9th February.
Snow and Ice
On Wednesday morning our Nursery garden was covered in a thin layer of snow. We were so excited and couldn’t wait to get outside. We tried to catch the snowflakes, it was very tricky!
On Thursday morning we found ice everywhere! We collected it all to explore. It melted quickly when we broke it up.
We decided to try to make our own ice. We put some water in a tray and left it outside in the Nursery garden. Would it turn into ice over night?
Yes, it would!
We felt the ice.
“It’s so cold”
” It is wet and slippy”
We looked through the ice.
“It’s like a window”
“I see through it”
Help at home: Can you make some ice at home? You could try and make some outside overnight or use your freezer. Try freezing a small toy or object in the water and watch it appear as the ice melts. Let us know how you get on. As always send us in your photos to scholesnursery@spherefederation.org
Next week’s learning:
Next week, we’re going to read another of our favourite stories written by Jill Murphy. It’s called ‘Whatever Next‘
Nursery rhyme of the week – 1,2 ,3 ,4 5, Once I caught a fish alive.
We’ll also be singing a number rhyme 5 Little Men in a Flying Saucer
Sound of the week –P p (p for penguin)
Bring your lips together push them open and say p, p, p.
Reminders
- Check your child’s going home folder this week for a letter about Christmas in Nursery.
- Please make sure that your child has a warm coat, hat and gloves every day. All named please. We play in our garden throughout winter, so children need to be wrapped up to keep warm and enjoy learning outside in all seasons.
Night Monkey, Day Monkey
We’ve been reading Night Monkey, Day Monkey by Julia Donaldson.
The story follows two monkeys who find themselves awake at their opposite times of day. They are very confused by what they see and need help understanding everything! Our word of the week is: nocturnal. We know that nocturnal means “active at night”
We’ve been writing about nocturnal animals and features of day/night.
Understanding the World- Science; shadows
We’ve been investigating shadows, by spotting them outside and by exploring a ‘dark tent’. We know that to make a shadow, we need a source of light. When that source of light is blocked, it casts a shadow. We explored using mirrors to reflect lights differently and used colour paddles to change the colour being projected onto the tent wall. We’re looking forward to continuing our dark tent investigations next week.
Maths; part-whole
In Maths, we’ve been looking at the ‘parts’ that make the whole of something. For example, the parts of us that make our whole body. Our head, eyes, legs etc. are the parts and our body is the whole. Here is a detailed explanation of how this understanding is a crucial knowledge base for later mathematical learning:
“Composition of number is a key area of mathematics … By investigating their own bodies and familiar toys they will begin to understand that whole things are often made up of smaller parts and that a whole is, therefore, bigger than its parts… As part of their work on subitising, the children have previously begun to spot numbers within numbers, and this skill of de-composing and combining numbers (taking them apart and putting them back together again) will build firm foundations for later calculation strategies”
-NCETM Mastering Number 2021/2022
Maths Stay and Learn
A big thank you to all the parents and carers who joined us on Monday for our Maths Stay and Learn session. We hope you enjoyed seeing a lesson in action and taking part in activities with your child. Hopefully, you have also come away with some ideas on how to support your child further at home. If you do have any further questions or would like any further advice, please don’t hesitate to ask the class teachers.
We’d Love Your Feedback
Thank you again for joining our Stay and Learn session. We’d love to hear your thoughts! Please scan the QR code to fill out our feedback form.
Expressive Arts and Design; Artist Focus- Howardena Pindell
We’ve been discovering the art of American artist Howardena Pindell. Take a look at our thoughts about some of her artwork.
In Reception, we are focused on the art process. We try and replicate the art we see through exploring different methods and mediums. We also make comments on what we like or dislike about the art we see.
Much of Pindell’s art is based around ‘the circle’. This week, we’ve been using hole punches to make a stencil in squares of card.
Next week, we’ll use a sponge printing method and our pre-made stencils to create our art.
Phonics
Autumn 2 week 3 has focused on the single letter phoneme z and digraphs zz, qu, ch
We’ve learnt the tricky words; go, no, to, into
Tricky words are words that should be read by sight.
In provision, we’ve been playing what’s in the box and reading the words to match pictures we find.
Poetry Picnic
Each week we will be learning a new poem. We will recite this poem each day. By saying the poem out loud, we can focus on the sounds and rhythm of each word or line. We talk to the children about how this can help us become better readers. This week’s poem is called Basket of Apples.
We talk about how a poem sometimes has rhyming words and sometimes doesn’t. We also talk about how a poem can have a fast rhythm or a slow rhythm.
Click below to watch Rainbow class recite this week’s poem
Understanding the world; Snow much fun!
The turning weather and snow brought so much excitement this week. It was lovely to see the fascination and wonder, as we explored the snow and ice outside. The interest led us to creating our own ‘ice experiment’, leaving bowls of water overnight in the hopes that they would freeze!
Help at home; Stars
Next week, we’ll be looking to the skies again! We are reading How to Catch a Star and learning about the night sky.
We know this is a topic of interest for many children in Reception. If you have any books or resources to share that are linked to this topic, we would love to see them.
Reminders and Diary Dates
Learning Journey Drop in 01.12.25 & 04.12.25; 3.00-3.30pm – An opportunity to “drop into” school and share your child’s learning journal with them.
DT cooking
What a fantastic day we have had in 1A. The children have been making banana sandwiches as part of our DT Food. This is part of our curriculum and the children will be making two further recipes over the course of the year. We washed our hands and tied back our hair to make sure we were safe. After getting our ingredients together we used skills like cutting, slicing, spreading and sprinkling. Some of us loved the sandwiches, others weren’t keen. I am happy to say everybody had a taste! Well done for trying something new 1A!
Help at home by encouraging your child to join in with the preparation or cooking of food.
Design and Technology (Food) – 2C
We completed our DT Food learning for this term this week. This is part of our curriculum and the children will be making two further recipes over the course of the year. We made banana sandwiches using peeling, cutting, slicing, spreading and sprinkling skills.
Help at home by encouraging your child to join in with the preparation or cooking of food.
