Latest news in Reception/ Year 1

Cricket session 2

It was very hot for our second session of cricket! The children enjoyed some relay challenges and focusing on hand-eye coordination in this session. 

Volcanic eruption!

In Science, we are focusing on Working Scientifically. This week, children were tasked with building volcanoes in groups. One the volcanoes were made and decorated, we took them outside to watch them erupt! Head over to our Facebook page to see a video of the eruption.

Cricket

In Summer 2, we are learning how to play cricket! We are very lucky to have a coach come in to teach us how to develop the skills needed for cricket. In our first session, we had great fun in our warm up before having a quick bowling session to hit the stumps and having a first go at batting!

Celebrating the birthday of Our Lady

To celebrate the birthday of Our Lady, we gathered as a school to crown our statue of Mary and pray together. We prayed a decade of the rosary together. It was a moving and lovely event. Thank you for sending your child(ren) in with beautiful flowers.

Outdoor Learning

Wonderful Writing

This week, our writing focus has been the fable The Hare and The Tortoise. We have listened to different versions of this story, acted it out, character descriptions and created beautiful story maps all before writing up the fable. The children have worked exceptionally hard and their work definitely reflects this. I am very proud and the children should be proud of themselves! Well done children, keep up the hard work! 

PE

This week in PE, we worked on a variety of skills. One station was where we focussed on skipping with a rope; another one was moving quickly down a ladder and the final one was a hopping challenge. 

Outdoor Learning

This weeks Outdoor Learning session called us to be nature detectives! We searched our learning area for a variety of different leaves and signs of spring. We were very lucky with the weather after not going last week due to a storm! Some of the children also completed some phonics challenges. 

Caring for our plants

Science

This week as scientists, the children of Reception and Year 1 were tasked with identifying different types of trees. We learnt all about the features of trees (e.g., trunk, branches etc) before going on a hunt around school to put our knowledge to the test. Year 1 children were challenged with spotting the difference between deciduous and evergreen trees and Reception were tasked with finding different types of trees based on the shape of their leaves. We were lucky we didn't have another storm and really enjoyed this opportunity to learn outside.

PE

In PE we have been working on striking a ball whilst it is airborne. This was challenging but all the children persevered and succeeded in the end. Well done Reception and Year 1!

Fantastic fractions!

This week in Year 1 we started our Fractions topic in Maths. We worked practically to find a half in shapes, objects and quantities before challenging ourselves to do it without the practical support. Well done children!

Writing to King Charles III

This week, the children of Year 1 (and some lucky Year 2s) focused on the art of writing a formal letter. After lots of research, we decided to write a letter to King Charles III to congratulate him on his coronation. We also seized the opportunity to ask him questions about being a monarch and how to care for our environment. The children's letters were so good that Miss Morgan decided they should be posted to His Majesty! We had a quick walk to the local post-box where we sent off our letters. We are eagerly waiting to see if we get a response! A massive well done to every single child who wrote a letter, they were very thoughtful in their contents and their presentation. You all have worked so hard this week and walked beautifully to the post-box. Keep up the hard work!

PE

Today in PE we worked on our throwing and teamwork skills. The children had a great session where they focused on throwing into the furthest hoop possible. We added a hint of competition throughout the lesson to push the children to try their hardest to aim and be accurate in their throwing. Some found it trickier than others but everybody persevered and made the staff very proud! Children, you all showed our sporting values today and you should be so proud of yourselves! Well done! 

Easter Crowns

As we are in the joyous season of Easter, Year 1 children created some wonderful Easter crowns. They took their time decorating them beautifully with the Paschal Candle, Alpha, Omega and Alleluia. The children looked at some photos for inspiration before creating their crowns.  

Master Mathematicians!

Today in Maths Miss Morgan was amazed by how quickly Year 1 grasped the concept of doubling. The children utilised dice to roll doubles and then wrote STEM sentences in their books. Year 1, you are Master Mathematicians and should all be very proud of yourselves!

Observational drawings

Reception Class practiced their observational drawing skills. They looked at photos of Buddleia, Fuchsia, Iris and Roses and drew each one. We were very impressed with their drawings. We definitely have some budding artists!

Year 1 Summer Term Homework

Year 1 KIRFs Summer Term

Planting

The children of Reception and Year 1 had a fantastic afternoon learning all about what plants need to grow before getting stuck into planting! We planted flowers, grass, broad beans, spinach and lots more which we can't wait to see grow. The children will be in charge of remembering to water our plants and keeping a plant diary for one of their pots. 

Daffodil art

To celebrate our new Science topic (plants) the children of Reception and Year 1 created some beautiful artwork to display. The children selected appropriate colours to help them collage daffodils and some children challenged themselves to complete observational drawings. Their artwork is absolutely beautiful and looks great on our display! 

Duckling update

The children have been very inquisitive about how our ducklings have been getting on. Miss Morgan shared some pictures in Class of how they are getting on in her garden but here are a few more photos of them in their forever home. 

The Gingerbread Man

Year 1's Phonics book this week has been the Gingerbread Man. After all their hard work to decode the story, the children quickly gained fluency and brushed up on their story-telling skills. On Thursday, we discussed how Traditional Tales can change over time and compared three different versions. We then created some beautiful story maps to help us to re-write the story. On Friday, the children started to re-write the story and we will continue this on Monday!

PE

This half term in PE we are focusing on Locomotion. In our first session we explored many different ways of jumping. We worked on the skills to jump and land safely. We focused on jumping for height; hopping, star jumps and long jump in this first lesson. As a quick fitness test we challenged ourselves to star jump for an entire minute! The children found it quite difficult and could discuss the affect of exercise on our bodies. After taking some time to catch our breath, we challenged ourselves to hop for one minute which was much easier than star jumps! 

Outdoor Learning

We have had a very busy first week back after the Easter Break. In our first Outdoor Learning session of the term, we went on a nature hunt to look for different plants. We learnt all about what plants need to grow. This knowledge will come in useful for our new topic in Science and for when we start planting seeds next week! The children adore the Outdoor Learning sessions and gain so much knowledge by learning outside. 

Leading an assembly about Palm Sunday

Today, Reception & Year 1 paired up with Year 2 to share their knowledge of Palm Sunday in front of the rest of the school. The children understand why Palm Sunday is so important and did a brilliant job at waving their palm leaves and shouting 'Hosanna!' We had a wonderful introduction to this assembly by Mrs Savage who gave us lots of meaning surrounding the importance of Palm Sunday and the importance of sharing our knowledge with our older peers. 

Duckling update

Here are some more photos of our beloved ducklings! The children love the opportunity to hold, touch and watch our cheeky ducklings. 

Year 1 Maths

Every Maths lesson begins with our KIRFs, the children absolutely love the active start to our lesson with the counting in 5s song!

This week in Maths, the children of Year 1 have been learning about mass. In today's lesson they used practical resources to compare masses. They all worked very hard and could explain how they know which is very important. Well done children!

PE

The children of Reception and Year 1 had a fantastic time in this week's PE lesson. They could recall the types of throwing and methods of catching we have been looking at before the lesson. After our warm-up, the children could discuss why warming up is important and what effect exercise has on our body. The children then practiced our focus skill in pairs before we had a few rounds of dodgeball. We finished our lesson with a calming cool-down where we used general stretches and some yoga poses to help stretch out our muscles. The children generated great answers to the effects of exercise and why it is so important to cool-down after exercise. 

Outdoor Learning

During this week's Outdoor Learning the children completed a range of science tasks. Our first challenge was a five senses spring scavenger hunt. The children had great recall of knowledge that we learnt way back in September! They enjoyed this sensory take on our lesson. The second task was to spot the signs of spring around the Forest area. The EYFS/Year 1 staff were delighted by how beautifully the children listened to what sorts of things they could look out for and how engrossed in the task the children were. Our final task was to plant sunflowers ready for our plant focus next term. The children love their Outdoor Learning sessions and have learnt so much about the world around them! 

Ducklings update

The ducklings are nearing a week old now and have started to become more mischievous and adventurous! The children adore watching the ducklings grow and have created some beautiful pieces of work related to them. It is a joy to watch the ducklings swim and the children are delighted by the amount of splashing the ducklings do!  In our RSE lesson we gave thanks to God for creating these delightful ducklings. The children are so calm and mindful when holding and watching our ducklings, the staff are so proud of every single one of them for being so mature. Well done children!

Ducklings

On Tuesday, we had a very special delivery into our Year 1 classroom. The children were brilliant at helping to set up a space for the incubator and pen to go for our ducklings! 3 little ducklings hatched late on Wednesday and the children of Reception and Year 1 were lucky enough to witness our fourth duckling hatch during the day. The children have been brilliant at caring for the ducklings, creating safety posters to inform others about how to look after them. The children of Year 1 have been learning lots of facts about ducks; writing fact files; labelling features of a duck and knowing the life cycle of ducks. The EYFS/KS1 team are so proud of how sensible the children have been when they've been able to hold them even when it is so exciting! After lots of thinking, the Year 1 children had a democratic vote for their names. We are delighted to announce the ducklings are called: Eggs, Jumpy, Flappy and Flash! 

A turtle in school!

To end a wonderful week in Reception/ Year 1 we were lucky enough to have a turtle in class with us! One of the children in our class brought in their pet turtle Squirt for us to look after and learn about for the day! Squirt was very well behaved and loved by all of the children (and staff.) Squirt's owner was very brave and stood up in front of the class and told us lots of brilliant facts about turtles. This was a wonderful opportunity to bring more 'real life' into our animals topic. Thank you so much to Squirt's owners for letting us look after him today. We are very excited for our turtle art next week as well as new egg-citing guests in our class!

Maths- measuring heights and lengths

Year 1 have been hard at work measuring heights and lengths in non-standard units in Maths lessons this week. We have some Marvellous Mathematicians in the making!

Healthy eating

In PSHE, we have been learning how to stay healthy. The children were brilliant at listing ways to stay healthy and came up with a long list of healthy foods. To bring to life the concept of healthy eating, we created fruit kebabs. The children selected from an array of fruit and used their fine motor skills to chop the fruit and push them onto their kebab stick. What a delicious way to consolidate our learning! 

PE Throwing and Catching

This week in PE we focused on the Fundamental Movement Skills of throwing and catching. We used the balloon balls as they fell slower than beanbags or foam balls and the children used different throwing and catching styles. To end our session we had a quick game of dodgeball which the children absolutely loved! 

Outdoor Learning

This week in Outdoor Learning we went on a scavenger hunt for the first signs of Spring. We compared the seasonal changes between Winter and Spring. 

There was also a fantastic opportunity to discuss life cycles as we found frogspawn! The children loved looking at the frogspawn and even compared it to the lifecycle of the caterpillars in the Reception Classroom. 

 

The children also got to go inside the Forest Hut for the first time, the Reception children loved the opportunity to utilise role-play in an outdoor session. 

World Book Day!

On the 2nd of March, we celebrated World Book Day! Reception and Year 1 children dressed up as animals and our book focus was A Squash and a Squeeze by Julia Donaldson. We started the day with a whole school assembly where we showed off our costumes to the rest of the school. 

In Year 1, we had a book tasting session where we read lots of different books whilst completing a scavenger hunt. We then learnt about the art of storytelling, we practiced reading our focus book aloud so we could share it with Reception in the afternoon. Before lunch, we became storywriters! We got to select an animal to put into the Little Old Lady's house and imitated the writing style of Julia Donaldson.

In the afternoon, Reception children listened to our Year 1 storytellers before completing an art challenge! The children were given the task of creating characters from our book out of a cardboard tube. We ended the day with a Go Noodle in the hall before prizes were given out for the best costumes. It was a very busy but lovely day where every child got to experience the joy a good book can bring!

Wellbeing Day

Children's wellbeing is at the heart of everything we do. To raise the children's own understanding of how to care for their own wellbeing and the wellbeing of their peers. There was a wonderful carousel of activities for the children to do including: yoga, team games, running, reading, colouring and decorating a biscuit. I'm sure the children can tell you lots of ways we can look after our wellbeing! 

Animal Mania!

To launch R/Y1's new topic 'Animals' we had a visit from Animal Mania. The children were thrilled to have the opportunity to hold and learn about the different animals. We learnt so many new facts about chinchilla's, bearded dragons, corn snakes, millipedes, tortoises and bullfrogs! Our favourite animal was Charlie the Chinchilla because she was so soft and friendly!

Outdoor Learning

During our Outdoor Learning session this week the children created some bark rubbings. They used a crayon and discovered the patterns the bark left. We also played a listening game where we had to listen out for birds and see how many we could count in a minute. We were very lucky to have a robin perch on the branch near to us whilst we listened to its lovely tune. 

We are Scientists: Observing melting

As Scientists, we predicted whether ice would melt quicker on a plastic chopping board or on a metal frying pan. All of the children predicted that it would melt quicker on the chopping board as it felt warmer when they passed it around. We then observed the experiment and noticed that the ice actually melted quicker on the frying pan. We discussed why this happened in lots of detail. Super Science work Reception and Year 1!

Gymnastics

In PE, children put their gymnastic skills to the test! It was quite tricky to balance on the apparatus to begin with but their confidence grew over time. It was lovely to see so many of our sporting values present during this lesson. Well done children!

Boat building

During boat week, Reception and Year 1 planned, designed and created boats. Here are some of their brilliant creations! 

St Wulstan's Day

On the 19th January, we celebrated our school's Saint's Feast Day. We had a lovely assembly where we learnt that St Wulstan was responsible for overseeing the building of Worcester Cathedral. We then wrote prayers to offer to Saint Wulstan in our whole school Mass before spending the afternoon creating beautiful artwork. We coloured in Saint Wulstan, recreated the beautiful floor patterns of Worcester Cathedral and then painted our own stained glass window designs. 

Outdoor Learning

This half term we have started our Outdoor Learning sessions. The children absolutely love being outdoors and discovering more of the world around them. Soo far we have had stories around the (unlit) firepit, learnt outdoor safety, created tree people and witnessed seasonal changes. We are so looking forward to what our future Outdoor Learning sessions hold.

We are gymnasts!

This half term our PE focus is gymnastics, in our first two sessions we have been learning to do patch balances, spins and transitions between spins. We have some very able gymnasts in our class!

Spring 1 KIRFS (Key Instant Recall Facts)

Please see the PDF below to view Year 1 KIRFS for Spring 1.

Merry Christmas!

Reception and Year 1 wish you a very Merry Christmas and a happy & healthy New Year! We can't wait to hear all about the Christmas break when we see you all on Wednesday 4th January 2023! 

Have a lovely break!

Last week of term fun!

This week we have had lots of fun playing games, singing songs and reading Christmas stories. We also have made lots of crafts: candy canes, puffy paint snowpeople, gingerbread people, puffy paint presents, Christmas trees, Christmas cards, party hats, calendars and ornaments! The children loved playing in the Grotto in the Reception Classroom. 

On Thursday morning Miss Morgan found out that Santa had been looking round the Year 1 Classroom to see if Year 1 and Reception have been working hard! The video link is below.

 

The Reception and Year 1 team want to wish you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Superhero: Grace Darling

Reception and Year 1 learnt about Significant Individual: Grace Darling in History this week. They loved learning that she saved people from a shipwreck by looking out of her lighthouse early one stormy morning and being brave enough to row across the stormy sea to rescue them. Reception challenged themselves to build boats out of tin foil and test them in the water tray to see if they would be the shipwreck or the boat that Grace Darling rowed to save nine people from the shipwreck. Well done Reception children! Year 1 recalled some amazing facts before creating lighthouses and painting them.

Super Scientists!

This week, Reception and Year 1 have been Super Scientists! They worked scientifically to test a range of materials to observe whether they would sink or float. Well done children!

Reception and Year 1 Class Mass

Was at 9.15am on Friday 25th November. Thank you to all who attended, it was lovely to have you with us.

A special visit from the Police

This week Reception and Year 1 had a very special visit from the police! We learnt all about how the Police work to keep us safe and how they work with other people to look after us! We got to hold some handcuffs and we even got to sit in the police car! The children had great fun trying out the flashy lights and sirens! Thank you to our local Police Officers and Police Community Support Officers for coming to tell us more about what you do! We know what number to call if there's an emergency!

Making fire engines!

Reception and Year 1 had a lovely hour of DT this week. To enrich our Superheroes topic, we focused on fire fighters and how they help us. We then worked as groups to create some fire engines by junk modelling, painting, cutting and sticking! As Geographers, we then focused on our local fire station and used map symbols to locate it.

Story time

After voting democratically, Reception and Year 1 enjoyed their end of the day story. To make it special we turned off the lights and had a fire on the interactive whiteboard. The children really enjoyed sitting in the dark listening to the story and the cracklng of the firewood.

Maths- finding a part

Today in Maths we learned how to find a part of a whole. This will help us as we progress on to subtracting later this week.

Autumn 2 Newsletter

Faith Friends

Today (11th October) Reception and Year 1 paired up with our Faith Friends in Year 4. We had a lovely, active afternoon where Reception/Year 1 learnt how to use the Trim Trail safely and had fun playing games with the parachutes!

This week in DT the children designed a fruit salad with the design criteria of using a variety of fruits of different colours. Once they planned these, the children got to create their product. In Science we explored the sense of taste and then carried out a simple taste test to evaluate their fruit salads. The children used lots of adjectives to describe what they were tasting.

This week in music, the children used Boomwhackers to play along to Believer by Imagine Dragons. We have some musicians in the making!

We are Planet Heroes

On Tuesday 4th October, we had the RISE Theatre in. The children loved joining in with the interactive performance and learning to join in with a song using sign language. We also participated in creative activities whilst learning how to protect God's planet.

Class Saint Feast Day

On Tuesday 4th October we celebrated St Francis of Assisi's Feast Day. The children voted democratically at the start of this term for our Class Saint and decided upon St Francis as they want to look after our planet and the animals. On St Francis' Feast Day we prayed, coloured in pictures of St Francis and scratched some animal pictures. The children reflected on the importance of St Francis and considered how we can become more like him in order to protect nature and animals.

Bright Lights, Big City

In the Bright Lights, Big City project, your child will take part in a royal garden party and learn about Queen Elizabeth II. They will learn about the countries that make up the United Kingdom, including their location, capital cities and some of their physical and human features. They will have the opportunity to do map work, using compasses and positional and directional language to plan routes around London. They will  look at some famous London landmarks. They will learn about other capital cities around the world, including Kuala Lumpur, and compare how they are similar and different to London.

Making Jubilee crowns for Ravenhurst Nursing Home

PE - Athletics - Jumping

Year 1 have had such an exciting day as they welcomed the first of their chicks who hatched this morning. We will update you over next week with their names and their progress

A group of Year 1 and Year 2 children have enjoyed participating in a cricket multi skills afternoon with Stourport Sports Partnership. As well as the PE it was long walk down and back to the riverside so we are sure they will sleep well tonight. Well done children on excellent participation, teamwork and being great ambassadors for our school

Year 1 have been looking at repeated addition and making arrays this week in maths.

 

Paws, Claws and Whiskers

Big cats, small rats, tiny fleas and buzzing bees!

This half term, we’re going to discover that animals come in all shapes and sizes! Meeting an animal expert will allow us to ask and answer questions, share information about the pets we have at home and write animal information booklets. We will watch as our chicks hatch and learn about what animals need to survive.  We’ll study animal artwork, draw detailed animal pictures to capture their special features and make collages, sculptures and prints. Famous animal fables will make us laugh, and we will have fun reading them aloud. We’ll spot similarities and differences between animals, look at different habitats around the world and investigate camouflage. Designing a zoo is even on the agenda

Year 1 have been refining their computer skills this week as they used purple mash to create art work and practice their maths.

Today the children enjoyed a cricket session in the Sun!

This week during our forest session, we have been making wonderful tree boggarts. We pressed  clay onto a tree trunk and sculpted a face into it using natural materials, such as sticks, twigs, leaves, stones and bark.

 In science we have been learning about plants and what they need to grow before planting our own sunflowers We can't wait to see how big they grow.

This week in music we have been learning about the different notes and how to change tone before using boom whackers and chimes to play along to songs. 

World Book Day 2022

The Enchanted Woodland

If you go down to the woods today, you’re sure of a big surprise!

This half term, we’ll visit a woodland, observe the wildlife, collect natural objects and take beautiful pictures of the things we see. After our woodland adventure, we’ll write about our experiences and learn all about trees. We’ll use information books to investigate woodland creatures and make mini-books of our own. Throughout the project, we will find out how to recognise different plants and animals and create detailed, observational drawings of them. The tale of Hansel and Gretel will inspire us to write our own stories with a woodland theme. We’ll build miniature dens, create woodland works of art and construct mini-woodlands from twigs, sticks, pine cones and leaves. 

 

The Enchanted Woodland

100th Day of School

In science Year 1 have been investigating day light. The pencil represents the axis of the Earth, where it exits the orange represents the poles, and the line in the middle of the orange the equator. The orange represents the Earth. The Earth is tilted on its axis at 23.5o. We found out that one spin of the Earth is called  ‘a day,’ and it takes 24 hours for the Earth to make one complete revolution  and the reason why day and night are cyclical is because the Earth spins continuously

 

Moon Zoom

Our topic for this term is "Moon Zoom". After a visit to the mobile planetarium to launch our Discovery work for this half term, we may find that we have a visitor from another planet! We will create a 'Welcome to Earth' box for an alien explorer. What can we put in it to help explain what life is like on our planet? Would anyone like to be an astronaut? You'll need a pretty sturdy spacecraft if you do. We will start off small by making an air-propelled rocket. WHOOSH! How far can we make it travel? Find out the names of the planets. There's Mercury, Neptune, Mars and - do you know any others? I've forgotten the rest! Then, an alien is found! Can you help get him home? It's got the experts in a right kerfuffle. Professor Pong doesn't know what to do! Are you ready for take off Year 1? Hold tight. 5 4 3 2 1... LIFT OFF

Rudolph Run 2021

#Together with Amazon

CAFOD - Go Green.

This week the children have been learning all about our environment and our roles in protecting it. To raise money for CAFOD the children came to school wearing an item of green clothing.

2021 Autumn Term

Dinosaur Planet

Watch out everyone – the dinosaurs are on the prowl. They’re rampaging across the dusty earth, swishing their enormous tails and baring their fearsome teeth. Let’s explore the Dinosaur Planet. Imagine you’re a palaeontologist (that’s a scientist who studies bones and fossils). Dig deep and discover dazzling dinosaur facts. Create a dinosaur museum and invite visitors to see your awesome dinosaur artefacts. You could even do a dinosaur dance or produce some prehistoric percussion. Which is your favourite dinosaur? The Tyrannosaurus, the Brachiosaurus or the Micropachycephalosaurus? Doyouthinkhesawus? Yes, he did. Run!

PLEASE KEEP CHECKING THIS PAGE TO SEE OUR LATEST NEWS. TO FIND OUT ABOUT ALL THE EXCITING ACTIVITIES WE HAVE DONE IN PREVIOUS YEARS, PLEASE SEE BELOW.

Paws, Claws and Whiskers

We were lucky to be able to spend a PE lesson with the Harriers and learned some football skills.

We made bread rolls as part of our learning about the Great Fire of London and that the fire began in a bakery in Pudding Lane. They were very tasty!

To find more details on what the Year 1 children are learning this term, please go to "Welcome to Year 1", where all our curriculum letters are displayed.

Autumn Term 2020

Are all leaves the same?

This week we will begin our next topic, Are all leaves the same? During this project the children collect and investigate a range of leaves. The children will then use their observational skills to test each other by describing and drawing to compare the differenences. They describe a leaf to another person in their group who then draws the leaf based on the description. 

Remembrance Week

This week has been Remembrance week in school. The children have found out why we wear poppies and why it is important that we remember those that lost their lives through war. The children also found out about the memorials in our own town, including the memorial park which is so close to our school. The children also found out about a soldier called Walter Tull. Walter was a professional football and later lost his life at war. He will be remember because he was the first black Officer in the Bristish army. The children presented their weeks work in an assembly with Year 3.

 

Hinduism

This week we have been celebrating multi faith week. Across the school we have been looking at different aspects of the Hindu faith. Our focus in Year 1 has been the celebration of Diwali. The children have really enjoyed finding out about Diwali and how it is celebrated. Our work across the week has been to find out as much as we can about Diwali so that we could hold our own celebration at the end of the week. On Friday, the children all came in smart clothes, we tried a range of indian food, lit Deya lamps we had made from clay and watched some Diwali dancing. We had a wonderful time, ending the party by watching fireworks just as Hindus do at Diwali.

Welcome back to school! Returning to school this September has certianly been filled with much excitement as the children have enjoyed seeing each other for the first time in 6 months. All of the necessary measures are in place to ensure that the 'Year 1 Bubble' can learn and play together safely during this uncertain time.

Splendid Skies

This week we have launched our topic 'Splendid Skies'. We have discussed what the children already know about the weather and the seasons. We have talked about how weather across the world is different and that we have seasons at different times to other countries. We have 'flown' in a hot air balloon across the world and guessed what the weather might be like by what we can see and the clothes people are wearing.

We are looking forward to investigating the signs of seasons and weather change oin a local area, when we go on a 'Nature's Treasures Walk' later this week.

During the topic we will be reading books about weather and seasons. We will also be completing simple experiments to collect rain fall. An exciting part of the topic is when we research extreme weathers and the impact that it has on communities and areas.

Check back regularly to see what we have been learning.

Today we have been on our 'Nature's Treasure' walk in our local area. We are very lucky to have such amazing cuntryside on our door step. The children went out in search of signs of seasonal change and collect examples of nature at work adapting to the time of year. As the weather has been unseasonably warm, many of the trees were only just beginning to turn their leaves brown, however it was exciting to see the changes at an early stage. The children had a wonderful time taking digital photographs of dew on the grass, jumping in muddy puddles and collecting “natural treasures” to label at school. The children were all so inquisitive and it was wonderful to see the learning happening outside of the classroom

Big cats, small rats, tiny fleas and buzzing bees! This half term, we’re going to discover that animals come in all shapes and sizes! Meeting the Animal Man will allow us to ask and answer questions, share information about the pets we have at home and write animal information booklets. We’ll study animal artwork, draw detailed animal pictures to capture their special features and make collages, sculptures and prints. Famous animal fables will make us laugh, and we will have fun reading them aloud. We’ll spot similarities and differences between animals, look at different habitats around the world and investigate camouflage. Designing a zoo is even on the agenda!

Spring Term

Paws, Claws and Whiskers

We launched our own rocket to great excitement!

Enrichment Opportunities in Moon Zoom

During our Discovery topic of Moon Zoom, we will be linking all our learning to this theme. As well as the wealth of knowledge and skills they will gain from the topic, we also aim to provide a range of enrichment opportunties across the half term.

These include:

Visiting a mobile planetarium

Celebrating St Wulstan's Feast Day

Multi cultural week with a focus on Sikhism

Taking part in Safer Internet Day

Year 1 have been busy in the Autumn Term

We have finished our Discovery work on "Splendid Skies" by becoming weather presenters! We have talked about why weather reports are important and watched some presenters in action. The children were brilliant at using geographical vocabulary like "north" and "south", as well as using weather words to describe the weather in these areas. I'm sure there are a few budding weather presenters of the future within the class!

The children were thrilled to see a hot air balloon in the "Splendid Skies" above our school. The timing was perfect as it was playtime!

The children have really enjoyed learning how to log on to the lap tops and access the Purple Mash software. The children all have their individual log ins, which can be found in their reading records. The children can access this at home by logging on using the link below. There are many activities to try in all subjects.

The children enjoyed paitinting pictures of the "Splendid Skies" that we have seen both on our walk and out of the window.

Nature's Treasure Walk

This week the Year 1 children went out to investigate “Nature’s Treasures” in our local area. To launch our new topic, “Splendid Skies”, the children went out in search of signs of seasonal change. The weather behaved perfectly for the time of year with sunshine breaking through clouds before turning grey and eventually starting to rain when they returned back at school. The children had a wonderful time taking digital photographs of dew on the grass, jumping in muddy puddles and collecting “natural treasures” to label at school. The adults that accompanied the children said how inquisitive they were and how wonderful it was to see the learning happening outside of the classroom. Thank you to the parents and friends who were able to join them.

Splendid Skies!

Let’s put on our coats, pop up our brollies and investigate the weather. This half term, we’ll take a walk outdoors to find out about different types of weather and to look for signs of the seasons. We’ll study TV weather reports, make weather symbols and learn about the life and work of Sir Francis Beaufort. Creative opportunities will allow us to explore weather in works of art, make season trees and create seasonal music! We’ll compose weather poems and write postcards describing the weather in different places. Our thinking skills will come in handy when we experiment with thermometers, investigate the effects of the Sun and compare weather around the world. When we are weather experts, we will share our knowledge with you. We will record and broadcast weather reports, perform weather songs and music and describe our ideal holiday destinations.

Enrichment Opportunities in Splendid Skies!

During our topic of Splendid Skies we will be linking all our learning to the topic. This helps the children to make valuable connections and apply what they have learnt in a variety of ways. In addition to their usual subjects we aim to provide the children with additional enrichment opportuntes through our wider curriculum.

During this half term the children will:

Take part in a "Natures Treasure" walk which allows them to explore our local area.

Have the opportunity to present the weather like they are on television!

Take part in a Nativity performance with their Key Stage friends

Take part in a "Skipping Day" where they will learn new moves and have physical fun!

Have the opportuntiy to represent the school in the community Three Kings Parade.

Visit the Book Fair with their class friends and families.

Particiapte in our Year 1 Class Mass

Have an evening of fun with our families during our Christmas Fair

Celebrate Christmas with our whole school community during our school party day

 

Today the Year 1 children were invited by Year 3 to find out about their exciting topic called Tremors. The Year 3 children had worked really hard to set up 5 interactive stations for the younger children to visit and find out more about rocks, earth quakes and volcanoes. The whole afternoon was a fantastic experience for all. The confidence in which the older children showcased their depth of learning was fantastic to see. The Year 1 children had so much fun visiting each station and listening to the children, and it was wonderful to hear them saying what they had learnt. Thank you to Year 3 for an informative and exciting afternoon!

The children in Year 1 have been very busy super heroes lately! We have been exploring our own super powers in the form of our 5 senses. We had an intercative lesson where we had opportuntiy to explore what an amazing job our senses do! We wore ear defenders and our partner read captions and we had to try and lip read what was said. We felt various textures while blindfolded and used exciting words to describe what we had felt. Another group had a range of pots covered in foil with holes in for them to smell - the favourite was chocolate! The children then tried guiding their blindfolded partner around an obstacle course. Finally we tried a range of super foods and described them and found out why they were good for us. At the end of the lesson we talked abut what it would be like if we didn't have one of our senses. Linking in with our virtue and value focus of grateful and generous, we all agreed how lucky we are to have our 5 senses and we should always use them wisely.

Super heroes latest news!

Our Super hero topic is well under way! So far the children have been out hunting for super heroes hiding in the local environment by listening to the instructions we gave to each other. We have also used the musical instruments to create super hero sound effects - we are waiting for Marvel to contact us to create the next soundtrack! We have been developing our English skills through the Supertato books. We have looked at the characters of Supertato and Evil Pea and created fact files. We have also developed our design skills by creating our own Supertatoes using a range of materials. In addition to all these activities we have been exploring how we can keep ourselves in top condition like a super hero. We have tasted a range of super foods and looked at what they do to keep us well. We still have lots more to explore in this topic, keep checking back for our latest superhero adventures in Year 1!

Super heroes!

Kerpow! Intergalactic greetings, young

heroes, it’s time to rescue the planet from the evil villain!

Who is your favourite superhero? Maybe your favourite is an ordinary person who has achieved great things! Or maybe its those people that save lives in our emergency

services that you admire most?

Superheroes have super scenes, use your to identify mystery items by their smell, taste, sound and touch. What do true superheroes eat to keep their senses and special powers sharp?

Can we stop the dastardly plans of Evil Pea? He is rounding up all of the vegetables to put in the freezer! We must catch him in time!!

Help your child prepare for their project

Superheroes are fantastic! Why don’t you visit the ‘Featured characters’ page on the Marvel website and read about

famous superheroes together? You could also work collaboratively to invent a superhero. Draw a picture, make a costume

or write a story together featuring the new superhero. Alternatively, read a children’s comic together. Talk about the

characters and how they behave. Are any of them superheroes?

Drumming Workshop

Year 1 2018 - 2019

Year 1 had a visit from a local up and coming musician this week to give us a helping hand with learning the song for our showcase assembly. The children really enjoyed themselves and we had great fun.

Bright Lights, Big City

Hop on board a big, red bus and head for England’s capital. Yes, that’s right, we’re on our way to London! This half term, we’ll take tea with the Queen and visit Buckingham Palace online. Using maps and research, we’ll locate Buckingham Palace, understand compass directions, plan routes around London and learn about the countries of the United Kingdom. Our research will take us back in time to the Great Fire of London and to famous London landmarks, as well as giving us an understanding of what it’s like to live in a big city. We’ll  write adventure stories, take a virtual trip to London Zoo and make souvenirs for tourists.

Memory Box

Are you ready to travel back in time? This half term, we’re taking a trip to the past to discover what life was like at the time when we were born. Thinking about our childhoods, we’ll use photos and objects from the past to help us remember special times and will study how toys and transport have changed over time. We’ll talk about our families and share happy memories of people or pets who are no longer alive. Learning about the days, weeks and months of the year will help us to work out how long we will have to wait for our birthdays to arrive! We’ll decide how objects from the past were used and have fun learning games, songs and dances from bygone days. We will end the topic with a trip to Hartlebury Castle.

Year 1 were delighted to see Mrs Mallinsons again this week and we were lucky enough to get to meet the new baby.  We have had a very busy week, working hard on our phonics. In maths we have been making equal groups and in Art we have been looking at the work of Kandinsky.

What's your favourite animal? One that meows? Big cats, small rats, tiny fleas and buzzing bees! This half term, we're going to discover that animals come in all shapes and sizes! Meeting an animal expert will allow us to ask and answer questions, share information about the pets we have at home and write animal information booklets. We'll study animal artwork, draw detailed animal pictures to capture their special features and make collages. Famous animal fables will make us laugh, and we will have fun reading them aloud. We'll spot similarities and differences between animals, look at different habitats around the world and investigate camouflage

As always, we have been extremely busy in year 1. We have just come to the end of our paws, claws and whiskers topic where we were lucky enough to have the ducklings and a visit from a guide dog.

In maths, we have been learning all about measurements. When learning about height and width, we made suitable sized enclosures for our ‘snakes’. For weight and mass, we concluded our learning by making overnight oats where we measured the weight of the ingredients. Making our ‘mocktails’ allowed us to conclude our knowledge of capacity. We are now moving onto learning about fractions and have lots of fun, practical activities planned.

In our English lessons we have continued to work hard on our phonics and writing. We are starting to look at plurals and prefixes. I have been amazed at how hard the children have been working on their weekly spellings, this week over half the class got all 10 correct – well done!

We have been learning all about animals: how to classify them and their habitats as well as looking at patterns in art. We are now moving into our next topic ‘Memory box’. If the children could bring in photos of themselves as baby’s, this would be great.

Year 1 2019

Firstly, I would like to start by thanking Year 1 for working so hard this week, you should all be incredibly proud of yourselves. This half term our topic is ‘Moon Zoom’ where the children will learn about space and space travel. We will be finding out about astronauts and aliens!

In English this week we have been looking at the story of ‘Man on the Moon’ and the children have produced some lovely writing based on this. In Topic we have learnt about Vincent Van Gogh and have recreated our own version of his painting ‘Starry night’. In Maths, we have been securing our knowledge of numbers, our focus in spelling is common exception words. In RE, the children have been looking at Christmas and they have written some beautiful prayers giving thanks to Mary for the birth of Jesus, our class worship continued to build upon this knowledge with a reading of the Wise Men.  In PE we are learning cricket skills, please ensure children have a PE kit in school so that they can participate in this.

Well done to Year 1.  As part of a whole school homework challenge Year 1 created their own Advent Wreaths.  As you can see the hard work has been impressive!

Thank you to Year 1 for the shoe box gift for Operation Christmas Child.  So many children will be made very happy.

Dinosaur Planet.

WOW!  We have had such a busy half term discovering all about dinosaurs.

Year 1 have pretended to be ‘Palaeontologists’ and discovered dinosaur bones. We have then made bones out of clay. Our TA, Mrs Smith, fired them in her very own kiln and we have painted them to look like real bones. The results are fantastic. Mrs Smith has also made us each a fossil of a dinosaur with the bones imprinted. We have had the chance to paint these in our favourite colours.

Also, we have been studying teeth and which dinosaurs were carnivores, herbivores or omnivores. Andy, from 'Andy's Dinosaur Adventures' dropped off a present for us at school. It was a box of poo! He challenged us to work out which animals were meat eaters or not from what was found in their poo. So, we rolled up our sleeves and discovered meat eaters have bones in their poo they can't digest. Herbivores have some leaves and sticks they can't digest. Omnivores have both as they have eaten both. Year 1 are real scientists in the making!

In English we have been using the Talk4Writing strategy to write the story Owl Babies. We have created our own story map to help us. When we return after half term we are going to innovate this story and have decided to create our own “Dino Babies” story. We cannot wait.

Saint Veronica

We have chosen Saint Veronica to be our Class Saint. We enjoyed learning about the compassion she showed to Jesus during a hard time. When we show examples of compassion we write them down and keep them in our 'Compassion bag' to remind us how important this is for all of us.

Dinosaur Planet

RRRROOOOOOOAAAARRRRR! In Year 1 our very first project as part of the Creative Curriculum is Dinosaur Planet. We have painted a huge dinosaur for our display and have been busy learning lots of words about dinosaurs. We will soon be making clay fossils. How exciting!

Rio De Vida

Our project for this term is very exciting. We are learning all about Brazil, carnivals and festivals. We will also be creating our own mythical creature and will write a myth all about that creature. To get started we studied pictures of carnivals and decide to make masks. We have used these to create a mask on the wall. We have been writing some fantastic poems and have displayed some of these too. We have also been making bunting by drawing the flag of Brazil to decorate the classroom.

The Great Fire of London

What an exciting afternoon! Year 1 have recreated the London at the time of the Great Fire. They have built their own Tudor houses and we have placed them together as they would have been years ago. We have talked about how the fire spread so quickly and the damage that was caused. We coloured in our own flames and recreated our own fire. I am sure you will agree the houses created were fantastic with so much hard work put in. Well done to all of the children.

Royal Wedding Fever!

What a wonderful day we had on Friday 18th May. To celebrate the upcoming Royal Wedding we dressed in red, white and blue colours. Some of the children dressed as real Princes and Princesses. We had a lovely afternoon and even got to eat a choc ice in the sun.

Our project this term is Bright Lights, Big City.

To begin our project we have enjoyed a tea party in our classroom. We were wondering what it would be like to have a tea party with the Queen and thought about the things we would need to practise. The children had to curtsey and bow to one another. We practised using our manners saying please and thank you. We then had tea (water) and cake and used our napkins to make sure we did not drop any crumbs and to wipe our mouths. Watch this space for more information.

The ducklings have arrived.

Year 1 have five ducklings that have hatched in our classroom. The eggs arrived in an incubator on Monday 16th April and they had all hatched by Wednesday. The ducklings are living in a large cage and are very active. Year One have named them Fluffy, Lily, Daniel, Mittens and Eleanor. We are really enjoying having them in the classroom.

Well Done Year 1! Attendance winners AGAIN for the Spring term.

Year 1 have won the Attendance Cup for the second term running. This is shared with another Year group, however, what a fantastic achievement and demonstrates how committed to learning children in Year 1 are.

Our class trip to Harvington Hall.

Year 1 recently visited Harvington Hall with the children in Year 2. This was a very exciting day. The children were able to go into the secret priest hides and experience what it would really have been like. The hides were designed by Saint Nicholas Owen who is the Saint of our Academy. We have been learning all about his work. We learned a great deal about this era and what it would have been like to live then.The children behaved exceptionally on the day and this was commented on. Well done.

How to make biscuits.

We have been learning to write instructions in English. We have concentrated on "How to make biscuits". The children have written some fantastic instructions. To finish this off we made biscuits for Mothers Day. Yum! Don't tell anyone it will be a surprise.

World Book Day 2018

Thursday 15th March was the day that Gangster Granny, Little Miss Sunshine, Fantastic Mr Fox and many other characters from our favourite books turned up to school. We had a fantastic day and got to read our favourite books. Some children took part in a book swap and took a new book home. Our work was based on writing a new ending to the story Little Red Riding Hood. We got to share our endings with each other too.

Catherine McNabb won the prize in Year One dressed as the Ice Queen from The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.

DINOSAURS - our Spring term project

Year 1 have been very busy working on our Dinosaur Project. We have looked at dinosaur timelines, studied reptiles and discussed how we think the dinosaurs became extinct. Very interesting! We have also been learning a dinosaur stomp in PE and dinosaur songs in Music.

During all of the recent snow we actually found frozen dinosaur eggs and so put these around the school to study which ones would melt first. We had to keep a careful eye on them as we did not want any of them to escape. Luckily we managed to catch them when they melted.

Merry Christmas

We have performed the most wonderful Nativity. We have been so proud of the children and how hard they worked to make this so fantastic. We are also especially proud of their beautiful singing.As we near the end of term we have enjoyed Christmas Jumper Day, had so much fun at Party Day and got to meet Father Christmas. We have had Toy Day where the children shared all of their toys with each other so well.

Year One now deserve a well earned rest, Well Done. Merry Christmas.

Year 1 Attendance winners for the Autumn Term.

Attendance winners - Well done to Year 1 who have won the attendance cup for the Autumn term. Year 1 has the highest number of children with 100% attendance in the school. This is fantastic. Hopefully we can hold onto our title.

PAWS, CLAWS AND WHISKERS - our Autumn Term project

Paws, Claws and Whiskers. This has been our first topic. We have covered so many exciting things.

We have looked at a day in the life of a Zoo Keeper.

Created leaflets showing how to care for animals.

We have been learning to identify Herbivores, Carnivores and Omnivores.

We have had a visit from "Hari" a tortoise before he hibernates for the winter.

We have had another very special visitor called 'Crumble'. Crumble is a Guide Dog and we listened to her owner tell us all about her work.

To bring the topic to a close we had 'Vet Day'. We got to bring our toy pets into school and make them better at the vets surgery. What an exciting day! Please see our gallery of exciting pictures.

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