10 Nov 2017

Year 1 Update – Wk 12

Friday 17th November Visiting Musician

Tuesday 21st November – Pizza lunch

Thursday 30th November – PTA Disco – Year 1 -3 (More details to follow)

Thursday 14th November – Christmas Concert and Christmas Bake Off

Friday 15th December – Last day of term. School finishes at 12.00.
Other pitch dates :   Wednesday 15th, 22nd, 29th and 6th December
Children should wear their normal PE uniform for these sessions and will take their water bottles and hats with them.
If your child has not got a hat or regularly forgets to bring it to school please make an extra effort to help them bring it to school.
Imagination Station
This week in Year 1, the children have been preparing for our next unit of inquiry by using their imagination to turn an egg box into something else. Some of the ideas that they have come up with have amazed us! Their ideas included, treasure boxes, a dance floor, jewellery boxes, trains, a drum and a bus. All of the children have enjoyed mixing paints and using the collage materials freely to create and make.
Pitch
This Wednesday the Year 1 children enjoyed their first pitch session. They engaged in free play using a variety of equipment such as, footballs, skipping ropes, bats and balls and hoops. It was lovely to see the children enjoying the space to play freely, practising skills using the equipment and working together to come up with their own games. Over the next few weeks the children will be taught a range of playground games which they can then use back in the playground at school. Through these games, we are hoping to enhance the children’s social skills of turn taking, sharing and co-operating in a group.
Central Idea:
 Individuals contribute to the way communities function
This week in Year 1 we have been busy taking action in our school community. The children have been working in small groups to think of elements of our community that cause them difficulty, come up with a plan to make a change and implement their plans. We have been really impressed by the children’s fantastic ideas of how they can contribute to the community they work in. We have also been amazed by the way in which they have implemented their plans and worked together to make their ideas a reality.
Next week the groups will be finishing their action projects and will be reflecting on what went well and what they would do differently next time. We are looking forward to seeing the children’s action projects take shape and make an impact in our school community.
Next week Mr Melsom will come into school to help some of the Year 1 children who have taken an interest in the Butterfly Garden to re-pot the plants that they have been looking after over the past few weeks into the newly made plant beds.
Christmas Bake Off
Do you or your child like baking? If so, why not join the BHS Christmas Bake Off. The Bake Off will take place on Thursday 14th December. Bake your favourite biscuits, cakes or desserts and deliver them to school in the morning. The winners will be announced in the evening at the BHS Christmas Carol Concert. See the newsletter for further details.
Christmas Disco
This week the children brought home a letter about the PTA disco. Please note that the date printed on the letter was incorrect. The date for the Year 1-3 disco is Thursday 30th December. If your child would like to attend please return the permission slip and cheque to your child’s class teacher.

maths

Our main focus over the coming weeks will be to :

Recognise, model, read, write and order numbers to 100

Next week we will be continuing with our maths focus on place value. The children will be learning how to decompose teen numbers using manipulatives such as, numicon, deines blocks and unifix cubes. We are teaching the children how the teen numbers can be broken down using the ten as the base, eg: 10 + 4 = 14, 10 + 7 = 17. The children will also be fixing broken hundred number squares and continuing to work on 1 more and 1 less.
Through our observations we have noticed that many of the children are reversing their numbers from 1- 10 so next week we will focus on correct number formation.

 

Mathletics: Please spend some time each week exploring the different activities that we have set for the children. Under the ‘play’ section, children can practise their basic facts by playing games with partners from around the world.  It is not intended that the children will do these tasks totally independently so please help your child to become familiar with the layout of Mathletics and how to go about completing the tasks.

 

Next week during our Reader’s Workshop lessons, we will be wrapping up our focus on retelling. Over the past few weeks, all of the Year 1 children have had a great deal of experience of retelling stories using picture cards, retelling sticks and the retelling rope. We have encouraged the children to retell by breaking down stories into the main points and talking about the characters and setting. It has been pleasing to see the children become more familiar with using time connectives such as, first, next, then, after, finally.

During writing sessions, the children will be writing about the action they have taken in the school community and will be writing reflective tags for their portfolio work.

Phonics                      Phonemes:   r l d b f h i u .                                           Camera Words:  day of a he today for
Not all words can be decoded phonetically. We call these tricky words, ‘camera words’ because children must learn them as though they were taking a photo of the word with their ‘mind’s eye’. They are encouraged to memorise the part of the word which is tricky.

Due to the Year 3, 4 and 5 camps there was no Golden Book assembly this week. Golden Book certificates will be given out next Monday.

 

Maths at Home

Helping your child at home with maths can sometimes seem daunting. The methods that the children are learning and the experiences they are having with maths at school can be very different from our own memories of maths lessons from when we were at school. As well as supporting your child with Mathletics tasks that have been set, you can also use everyday tasks at home to enhance mathematical concepts and understanding, Below are a few ideas of things that you could do at home.

  1. Cooking – Cooking is a great activity for developing mathematical understanding of weight and capacity. Encourage your child to help weigh out the different ingredients using measuring scales and measuring spoons or cups.
  2. Shapes Everywhere – When you are out and about you can look for shapes in the environment. The children could take photographs and keep their own shape scrap book. Discuss the properties of shapes they see by using language such as, edges, corners and faces.
  3. Money – Encouraging your child to help pay for items when they are out shopping is an easy way to incorporate maths into everyday life. You can ask them to count out the correct coins for small items that they want to buy. You can also slowly incorporate addition and subtraction when talking about the change they will get when paying for items. Using money can also help with counting in 2’s, 5’s and 10’s.
  4. Counting – There are opportunities for counting all around us. From counting cars to counting pairs of socks when they are helping to sort out the washing. The children still need regular practice of 1 to 1 correspondence and counting.
  5. Storybooks – There are many maths related story books that can help support mathematical concepts. Below are some of our favourites.