Reception and Year 1 have had a fantastic first two days back at school! We are thrilled with how well all of the children have settled and they are already beginning to establish our new classroom routines. Reception have enjoyed exploring their new environment, particularly the bikes and climbing wall, as well as sharing lots of lovely information about themselves with their new classmates. Year 1 have been busy impressing us with just how much they have remembered from last year and have been wonderful role models for our new Reception children. We have an action-packed half term ahead of us, with lots of exciting learning about Creation and Covenant, the UK, Guy Fawkes, making our mark in Art and materials in Science. We are also really looking forward to starting Forest School and PE, and of course sharing plenty of stories, songs and fun along the way. What a brilliant start to the new school year!

Year 2/3

Year 2 and 3 have been excited to start designing a class scarecrow to take part in Churchfield's Scarecrow Fest competition. The children have created their own designs, using the design brief to shape their ideas. They labelled their designs with any materials needed, drawing upon their science work on materials last year. The children considered sustainability as they tried to plan to use as many recycled products as possible. The children have been told what the final design was, using their designs to choose the most popular ideas. The class can't wait to start making their scarecrow soon! As part of their learning, the class text this week has been 'The Scarecrow's Wedding' by Julia Donaldson. The class have been recapping key skills this week, such as handwriting and writing in the correct tense. It has been lovely to see how keen the children are to step up to their next level of challenge now they are a year older! Well done! In maths, the class have been learning about place value, with the Year 2 children working on tens and ones numbers whilst Year 3 move onto 3-digit numbers. In history, the class have started working on life in the Stone Age and had many interesting thoughts. We talked about modern conveniences and what people did not have back then. The children decided they would miss their comfy beds the most if they went back in time to live in the Stone Age! Well done on a super start of term everyone!

Year 4/5

Year 4 and Year 5 have had an excellent first full week back and have picked up where they left off at the end of last year. They are back into the Times Table Rockstars zone and have been working hard to build up their confidence and speed this week. They have also used their knowledge and skills to show the Year 2 and Year 3 children how to use the platform. They were very supportive and patient, impressing the adults in the room. The children have really impressed in their writing lessons this week. Using the text 'The Emperor's New Clothes' as a focus, the children have written excellent speech sentences and have used fronted adverbials effectively for description. In maths this week, the children have been applying their knowledge of place value to record numbers using different representations. The children were very excited to move on to bigger numbers this week and showed confidence to apply their understanding to complete problems. Finally, the children completed their first science investigation of the year, looking at objects and the materials they were made from. The children had to check what properties each material had and why they thought that material was used for that particular object. It was lovely to see how enthusiastic they were to complete the investigation and they had lots of questions they would like to try and answer over the next few weeks. Well done everyone!

Year 6 

Year 6 have had a fantastic start to the year and have really impressed Miss McGowan with their hard work and positive attitude. They are already getting used to the Year 6 routines and expectations, and are beginning to set a high standard for the other children in school. The children have been working hard across all lessons, and it has been wonderful to see so many put themselves forward to be a house or sports captain. Miss McGowan says that the children have told her they are working hard on their speeches at home and will be ready to stand in front of their houses next week for the final vote. 
Well done, Year 6, and good luck!