Welcome to Foxes class
We are the Year 1 and Year 2 class
Our teachers are Miss Steer and Mrs Copping
Our Teaching Assistants are Mrs Smith and Mrs Sweeney
Please see the Summer Term Curriculum Newsletter. Please share with your children and look at all the exciting things we have to come!
Foxes Summer 2 Newsletter 2024.docx
Geography in Foxes
This week we are preparing for our trip to the beach by learning all about the coast lines of the UK. We spoke about what a coastline was and then spoke about the different oceans and seas that surround the UK. We learnt the capital cities of the 4 countries within the UK and then even looked at different important landmarks such as Giants Causeway and Edinburgh Castle. As a class, we plotted these on a map of the UK. We are getting very excited to visit the beach to identify why the beach is a coastline, looking fore the key features of a coastline and identifying which sea we are visiting.
PSHE – Relationships
This term we have been focusing on Relationships and how these are important in school as well as at home. We need to make sure we feel safe within school and have a nice relationships with our peers so we can learn and play nicely on the playground. We have spoken about what it means to be a good friend, discussed about all the people who help us inside and outside of school and we looked at how we can praise people with compliments and we should always use kind words when speaking about people. To finish off this terms work, we have been writing about the special people in our life and why they are important to us.
Safety First!
Year 1 got to participate in a safety workshop in the Village Hall. The children discussed how to safely cross the road, what the colours on a traffic lights mean and how to be safe around roads. The children had a lot of fun and enjoyed using the zebra crossings.
Positional Language
Today in Maths we went outside and we focused on writing a set of instructions using all of the excellent positional language we have learnt. We spoke about walking or jumping forward, backwards, left, right and then focused on turns such as a full turn, half turn, quarter turn and three quarter turn. We also discussed clockwise and anti-clockwise and used this to help understanding which direction we needed to go. The children wrote an algorithm using the key vocabulary and then worked in pairs to make sure it worked. We then chose some children to read theirs aloud whilst the whole class followed the set of instructions! Excellent work Foxes!
Butterflies in Foxes!
Our caterpillars have finally turned into butterflies. We have kept them alive by feeding them sugared water and fruit and watched their transformation into the beautiful butterflies. They first arrived to us as little caterpillars and we watched them grow into bigger ones and eventually they created a chrysalis and then evolved into a butterfly. The four stages of the life cycles are:
- The Egg Stage
- The Larva Stage (caterpillar)
- The Pupa Stage (chrysalis)
- The Adult Stage (Butterfly).
We set them free and keep trying to spot them again!
Breaking at Newton Tony!
We has a special treat for the whole school this week with a special break dancing teacher coming to school. “Breaking” is the only new sport making its debut at the Paris 2024 Olympics. The children learnt some new funky dance moves and enjoyed watching Jack Stephenson do his very own routines. The hcildren loved seeing him doing some back flips!
The Wright Brothers
This term in Foxes Class, we have been learning about aviation and where and when the first airplane was developed. We have learnt that the first flight was in 1903 by two American brothers called The Wright Brothers and it only lasted 12 seconds. We acted out how we would feel seeing the very first flight. We then spoke about the design of the airplane and how it is different from the ones we see today.
Instruction Writing
This week in Foxes, we have spoken about how to write a set of instructions. We have looked into what is needed to write instructions and how an ‘imperative verb’ can sometimes be called a bossy verb as it tells us what to do in the instructions. Year 1 wrote a set of instructions on how to make a pattern whereas Year 2 wrote a set of instructions how to make a shape monster. This links nicely to our story of the week which is How to Wash a Woolly Mammoth by Michelle Robinson. This story explains how to wash a woolly mammoth using a set of instructions however remember not to get any soap in its eyes or it might escape up a tree! We also made masks and acted out the story whilst following the instructions.
Fractions
The past two weeks, Foxes have been learning all about Fractions. We have been investigating what a half and a quarter is. We have spoken about how a unit fraction always has 1 in the numerator and looked into how fractions are made up with a numerator and a denominator. Here are a few pictures of us investigating what a half is and a half of a group amount. We know that when we are looking for a half we need to make 2 equal groups and when we are looking for a quarter, we need to make 4 equal groups.
Shapes everywhere!
This week we have been focusing on learning 2D and 3D shapes. We have been drawing 2D shapes and making shape monsters, using the giant 2D and 3D shapes to make real life models, naming and exploring the differences between 2D and 3D shape, making repeating patterns and finally focusing on features of the shapes. With 2D shapes, the shapes that sides and vertices. For 3D shapes, they have faces, vertices and edges. The children were able to draw regular and irregular 2D shapes and identify that a triangle is still a triangle if it has 3 sides.
Instructions
Today the children in English have been learning how to write a set of instructions. We did our own class set of instructions to the song ‘Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes’ and then Year 1 created a set of instructions to make a shape and pattern out of multilink and Year 2 focused on drawing a picture and writing a set of instructions on how they drew it. The children worked together as a team and impressed us all!
Tasting in Foxes!
Today we tasted lots of different fruits. We tried strawberry, limes, lemons, oranges, avocado and bananas. We then decided after tasting the fruits which fruits we would like to add to our smoothies. Everyone did really well at trying them and Foxes as a whole loved the strawberries the best.
Dogs Trust
Dogs trust came in to speak to the children about how to care for Dogs. They had a school assembly on how to be careful around dogs and then a class assembly on how to care for dogs and other small animals. Thank you Dogs Trust for coming into our school to teach us more about dogs.
DT in Foxes
This term, DT has closely linked to healthy lifestyle choices in PSHE. The children have been exploring different fruits and their textures. Next week, we will be creating and tasting a mixture of different fruits and vegetables.
World Book Day in Foxes
We all dressed up as animals because we are reading and creating our own version of the “Interview with ….” books by Andy Seed. We made bookmarks, painted animal plates and lots more exciting tasks. We loved all of the outfits!
PSHE
In PSHE this term we have been focusing on how to stay healthy and make healthy balanced lifestyle choices. This week we focused on things that are safe and unsafe. We worked in groups to organise photos of different things in our house and had discussions about how certain things could be safe and unsafe.
Place Value
Year 1 have been focusing on place value and understanding how numbers up to 50 are created. We looked at comparing numbers such as 32 and 23 and looked into how they were different. We used the dienes practically at first to identify how the numbers were made up of tens and ones and then we started to pictorially create representations of the numbers.
Athlete comes to Foxes!
Kelly Simm, a famous English gymnast came to visit the school. We all did a round of exercises with her before she spoke about her journey into gymnastics. Foxes told her that they have been doing gymnastics this term too!
Christmas in Foxes!
We had an amazing time celebrating Christmas and loved our Christmas Craft Afternoon. All the children got to make different Christmas crafts such as a handprint holly wreath, Christmas cards and even some salt dough decorations! Thank you again to all parents who came to support their children.
Elves in Foxes!
This year, we took part in the Alzheimer’s Society’s Elf Day on Thursday 7th December 2023. We dressed as an elf for the day and raised a lot of money! Thank you to everyone who donated.
DT project in Foxes – We made puppets!
Have a look at some of the fantastic puppets we made in DT. The children looked at different ways of joining fabrics after they designed their own puppet. They made and joined their own puppets together, decorated their puppets and then evaluated the overall process. We currently have them at school and will be creating a fantastic display in our classroom with them.
PSHE in Foxes
We have come to the end of our topic and have created our very own Gingerbread person. Our topic was around ‘Celebrating Differences’ and we looked at how we are similar and different to our friends. We looked and spoke about what Bullying is and how we can battle it. We also championed and celebrated how we are all difference and unique! Here are some fantastic pieces of work below!
Looking after our pets!
We had a very special zoom today from the Blue Cross who were excited to tell us about how to keep our pets safe. We learnt how to make extra special dog treats for Christmas and what food dogs and cats should and shouldn’t eat. We even had a special visitor as Santa needed help deliver presents to the pets. He had lost the letters from responsible pet owners about what the animals needed and then we made sure the animals got their presents! Thank you to Blue Cross for running this zoom.
Fun Fact – Did you know that dogs cannot eat raisins, onions, sweets and chocolate as they are poisonous!
Giraffes Can’t Dance
The children in English have been looking into the story called ‘Giraffes can’t dance’ by Giles Andreae. The children acted out the story and even learn to dance like the animals in the story. We loved the rock and roll Rhinos! The children have also then been changing a part of the story and creating their own version.
Diwali Dancing
We had a fantastic visitor come into school to teach us some Indian dancing to help us celebrate Diwali. We learnt about the story of Rama and Sita and then proceeded to learn a dance with some popular Indian Bollywood dance moves. Here are some of the photos of our exciting visit!
Taking Art Outside!
