P2D- Mrs DeBonrostro

P2D Reflective Friday 8.12.23

Staff..114

Dear Parents,

We hope you had a great week.

Important information:

  • We hope you have received the lovely letter from your child inviting you to our Carol signing on Wednesday 13th December at 9.00 and 2.30. We are looking forward to seeing you all. Please don’t worry if can’t make it as we have recorded our performance to P7 for you to enjoy. This will be sent via email.
  • Please return as soon as possible all the reading books. We are missing a few books already.
  • Change of clothes: Please ensure that your child has a spare change of clothes at school (including pants and socks); these don’t have to be school uniform. It is really helpful for them all to have them (especially when they get wet). Some children took them home after needing them in but haven’t returned them back to school. Please label all the items.

This is a summary of our learning this week:

Literacy

This week we have learned the final blends: nt, ft, sp, lk.

This video is good for revision:

We have practiced our reading skills: prediction, inference, summarising, etc. This will be the last week that reading books will be sent home. We will be reading at school but not sending books home.

We have revised from block 4. It would be very helpful if your children practice reading and writing these words and previous blocks.

In writing we wrote a letter to invite you to our Carol singing. The children were very proud of their letters and worked hard on them as they knew they were for you.

At cursive handwriting. This week we have practice g and q. See the link below of the formation we are practicing at school.

Continuous Cursive letter choice 3 beginners (teachhandwriting.co.uk)

Ideas for learning at home

  • Please ask your child to read the school reading book at home.
  • Ask your child to write and read these words: loft, lift, soft, daft, raft, left, gift, sift, lent, hunt, mint, went, shunt, rent, bent, hint, dent, belt, milk, kilt, crisp, wasp, gasp, wisp, etc. You can write the words and ask your child to look for the final blends and circle them.  
  • Please continue to read stories to your child at home.
  • Please continue to encourage your child to read at home. It is important that children practice reading every day.

Maths 

We have done a final review about time. We have been learning about sharing equally, arrays (columns and rows).

Ideas for learning at home: 

Ask your child to explain to you:

  • Please continue to talk about time. Ask what time it is and related to day-to-day events.
  • Sharing equally:
  • Playing games which include sharing out cards, items etc. Ask your child to share the cards/items equally between the number of players (can be 2 or more) and initially explain that ‘sharing equally’ means everyone will have the same amount/number of items at the end. Then when playing the same game again or a different one, ask your child how s/he will know the items have been shared equally.

Possible games: card games, Snap, Dominoes.

  • Using everyday objects and sharing items between 2 or more people, e.g. sweets, biscuits, segments of an orange. Ask your child to share these items equally between the number of people who are going to have them, e.g. sharing 10 sweets between 2 people:

How many sweets do you have?

Can you share them equally between your sister and you? What does ‘share equally’ mean? How are you going to share them?

If your child does not know, then prompt by saying, “I wonder what will happen if you shared them out one at a time?”

Your child might have his/her own idea, so let them have a go (even if it is not right). If they share the items and they are not equal amounts, ask your child if s/he have shared the items equally. If your child says, “No,” then ask them why they are not shred equally and how s/he are going to solve the problem. Talking through a problem and coming to a solution is a great way to learn, so let your child make mistakes.

Your child might immediately say 5 and 5. Ask him/her how they know and s/he might say “5 and 5 altogether makes 10” or “Double 5 makes 10.”

Once the items have been shared equally, count/say how many items each person has or ask your child how s/he know the sweets have been shared equally. Promote the language, “We both have the same amount.”

Then use language, such as, “10 shared between 2 is 5, each person has 5.”

Share items up to 10 initially and then up to 20.

Share between more than 2 people, but make sure the amount can be shared equally between the number of people.

  • Sharing board: place different numbers of items (up to 10/20) in the first box for the children to share equally between the 2 boxes below.

Items can be things found around the house, e.g. pasta shapes, buttons, raisins etc.

Encourage your child to use the appropriate language in their explanations.

  • Videos about sharing equally:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m0006xcw/numberblocks-series-4-the-lair-of-shares

Other areas

EXA

We have been practicing our Christmas Carols.

ART

We have created Christmas decorations.

FRENCH

We have learned to tell our age.

We hope you have a lovely weekend!

Mrs de Bonrostro

Buckstone Primary School, P1 Koalas

P1 Koalas Reflective Friday 8.12.23

Staff..469

Hello everyone,

This is what we have been learning this week:

LITERACY

We were revising sounds and practising the correct formation of some letters using whiteboards and pens.

We were writing about our Nativity,  the role we played in it and how we felt about it.

LEARNING THROUGH PLAY, LITERACY FOCUS

NUMERACY AND MATHS

We started learning about shape. We used a feely bag containing different 2D shapes and described what we could feel. We talked about the number of sides the shape had and whether they were straight or curved.

MATHS FOCUS

PE

We explored the story of the Nutcracker through dance and music.

HWB

We looked at examples of different kinds of families and discussed our own families.

ASSEMBLY

We attended a Christmas assembly along with P2-4, lead by the minister from Fairmilehead church.

NATIVITY

Well done to all our P1s for two fantastic performances. Thanks to all families and friends who came along to support them.

LOOSE PARTS

We had a chilly but enjoyable loose parts play.

No more loose parts until the new term.

ART

We have begun to make santas which will hang from the ceiling. We will bring these home at the end of term.

Some other examples of learning taking place this week:

PARTY TIME!

Primary one will be having their party on the afternoon of  Wednesday 13 December. Please can you provide your child with a box containing 3 items of party food and a drink, thank you.

Have a lovely weekend.

P2D- Mrs DeBonrostro

P2D Reflective Friday 1.12.23

Staff..114

Dear Parents/Carers,

We hope that you had a good week.

Important Information

Learning Stories have been sent home today. Please look through the evidence of your child’s learning this term (worksheets) and read the teacher comment sheet. There is space at the bottom of this page for you to write a short comment and sign to acknowledge that you have received this. Please return the Learning Stories with the report inside as soon as possible.

Next week P2 are organising a collection for the Edinburgh Foodbank. If you are able to, please send in a packet of instant noodles before Friday 8th December.

We have loose parts on Friday 8th December.  As the weather turns colder, please ensure that your child brings enough layers that day and wears suitable footwear.

Our P2 Carol Singing will take place on Wednesday 13th December at 9.00am and 2.30pm. It would be great to see you there!

Here is a summary of our learning:

Literacy

We wrote letters to each year group asking them to donate a particular item for the foodbank collection.

In handwriting we have been learning to form a and d in cursive script.

In phonics our focus has been on final consonant blends: rk, nd, st, mp, lt, sk. Examples of words with these sounds are lark, hand, must, lamp, felt and mask.

In spelling we have been recapping the Block 4 words as a whole class. We then worked on the particular block we are focussing on (block 1, 2, 3 or 4).

We have introduced our ‘jotters of joy’, ask your child about them.

Ideas for learning at home:

Please continue to practise the spelling block your child is working on. Some of us did a ‘Scribble Spelling’ activity this week which we enjoyed. This photo explains how you could do it at home too.

Here is a link with the lists of tricky words.

Block 1 – 8 Tricky Words single sheet (wordpress.com)

To practise phonics it is a good idea to ask your child to read nonsense words containing the sounds covered so far. This means that they cannot guess the word, they must instead use their knowledge of letter sounds. Try to write down some nonsense words and hide them around the living room or lay them on the stairs. Can your child read them accurately using their decoding skills?

Examples of words to write:   gark, pand, fust, somp, lolt, nisk.

Please go over your child’s reading book with them at home. This will help to build their fluency. You could ask these questions to check for understanding.

  • Can you retell the story in your own words?
  • Could the story have a different ending? What could it be?
  • What makes this story different to other books you have read?
  • What kind of person do you think the main character is?

Here is the link to the website we use for handwriting. You can watch the animations at home and ask your child to practise the formation.

Continuous Cursive letter choice 3 beginners (teachhandwriting.co.uk)

Numeracy and Maths

We are continuing to work on reading both digital and analogue clocks focussing on o’clock and half past. Some of us are extending our learning to quarter to / past.

In our number work we have been working on counting in 2s and 5s.

Ideas for learning at home:

Reading clocks is proving challenging so please practise as much as possible at home. Here is a fun game you can try at home.

Telling the Time – Mathsframe

Other areas of the curriculum

We started to learn some of the Christmas carols for our performance on the 13th December.

We have an advent calendar. Each day we will open a drawer and we will have an act of kindness to carry out.

Have a lovely weekend,

Mrs de Bonrostro

Buckstone Primary School, P2MD Mrs McFarlane and Miss Davidson

01.12.23 P2MD Blog

Staff..226

Dear Parents/Carers,

We hope that you had a good week.

Important Information

Learning Stories have been sent home today. Please look through the evidence of your child’s learning this term (worksheets) and read the teacher comment sheet. There is space at the bottom of this page for you to write a short comment and sign to acknowledge that you have received this. Please return the Learning Stories with the report inside as soon as possible.

Next week P2 are organising a collection for the Edinburgh Foodbank. If you are able to, please send in a packet of instant noodles before Friday 8th December.

We have loose parts on Friday 8th December.  As the weather turns colder, please ensure that your child brings enough layers that day and wears suitable footwear.

Our P2 Carol Singing will take place on Wednesday 13th December at 9.00am and 2.30pm. It would be great to see you there!

Here is a summary of our learning:

Literacy

We wrote letters to each year group asking them to donate a particular item for the foodbank collection.

In handwriting we have been learning to form a and d in cursive script.

In phonics our focus has been on final consonant blends: rk, nd, st, mp, lt, sk. Examples of words with these sounds are lark, hand, must, lamp, felt and mask.

In spelling we have been recapping the Block 4 words as a whole class. We then worked on the particular block we are focussing on (block 1, 2, 3 or 4).

Ideas for learning at home:

Please continue to practise the spelling block your child is working on. Some of us did a ‘Scribble Spelling’ activity this week which we enjoyed. This photo explains how you could do it at home too.

Here is a link with the lists of tricky words.

Block 1 – 8 Tricky Words single sheet (wordpress.com)

To practise phonics it is a good idea to ask your child to read nonsense words containing the sounds covered so far. This means that they cannot guess the word, they must instead use their knowledge of letter sounds. Try to write down some nonsense words and hide them around the living room or lay them on the stairs. Can your child read them accurately using their decoding skills?

Examples of words to write:   gark, pand, fust, somp, lolt, nisk.

Please go over your child’s reading book with them at home. This will help to build their fluency. You could ask these questions to check for understanding.

  • Can you retell the story in your own words?
  • Could the story have a different ending? What could it be?
  • What makes this story different to other books you have read?
  • What kind of person do you think the main character is?

Here is the link to the website we use for handwriting. You can watch the animations at home and ask your child to practise the formation.

Continuous Cursive letter choice 3 beginners (teachhandwriting.co.uk)

Numeracy and Maths

We are continuing to work on reading both digital and analogue clocks focussing on o’clock and half past. Some of us are extending our learning to quarter to / past.

In our number work we have been working on sharing out objects into equal groups. Some of us are linking this to counting in groups e.g. counting in 2s or 3s.

Ideas for learning at home:

Try to find real life examples where your child can work on sharing out objects. For example, can they share out items to each plate at the dinner table? You can also use toys, for example, laying out soft toys and using building bricks to be pretend food. Can they share out items equally?

Reading clocks is proving challenging so please practise as much as possible at home. Here is a fun game you can try at home.

Telling the Time – Mathsframe

Other areas of the curriculum

We started to learn some of the Christmas carols for our performance on the 13th December.

We made a kindness advent calendar. We each have a bauble and on our selected day, we will have an act of kindness to carry out.

Have a lovely weekend,

Mrs McFarlane

P1 Pandas

P1p reflective Friday 1.12.23

Staff...685

We have been very busy practising the nativity presentation ready to share with you next week. Thank you for sending in clothes, if you have not yet done so please can we have them on Monday morning for our dress rehearsal.

Here is a request from Primary 2

Our learning this week


Here are a few photographs of us developing our skills through our independent learning opportunities and experiences this week. Please take time to share these photographs with your child so they can share their learning with you.


Literacy focus


This week we have been revising the tricky words taught so far.

These are words which cannot be sounded out using phonics and should be learned by memory as sight vocabulary. please practise both reading and writing these words

Use the sounds you know to read and build words. If you want a challenge you could try to write the word if an adult reads it to you.

Building a word. Using plastic letters or letters written on small pieces of card or paper an adult says a three letter CVC word ( consonant, vowel, consonant) and the child chooses the correct sounds to make the word.

Blending a word . Adult writes or uses letters to make a CVC word and the child should say the pure sounds of each letter then blend them together to read the word.

Our writing programme starts with telling stories through detailed drawing. We are now beginning to write some of the words and sounds we know as part of our sentence. This week our focus was I am me

Maths and numeracy focus

We continue to practise our number bonds of ten. These are the pairs of numbers which, when added together, total ten. The children should learn these as instant recall facts. We also talk about ‘switchers’ e.g. if we know that 8 + 2 =10, we can tall that 2 +8 = 10.

Please support your child at home to learn these facts. If they already know them, the challenge is to apply that understanding to tens numbers to 100 ( e.g. 8+ ? = 10, 18 + ? = 20 , 8 +? = 40 etc)

We continue to work on SEAL ( Stages of Early Arithmetical Learning) Pupils are working and challenged at a level appropriate to their individual development. These are examples of some of the skills we have been practising :

Making arrays and counting in groups to find the total. Key vocabulary included the words rows, columns and groups

Adding 1

Adding 2

Counting random printed arrays accurately ( when you can’t move the item being counted)

Counting in tens

Counting in tens off the decade

Recognising and ordering numerals to 20

Counting forward and back within 30 ( to 100 for some)

Establishing a collection.

Counting a collection with accurate 1-1 correspondence

Identifying number families ( teens, twenties, 30s etc)

Subitising ( recognising an amount without counting )

Other areas of the curriculum



We had a visit from the school dental service – it was fun lying on a table !

In PE we have been playing games which give us opportunities to practise the skills we have learned.

We had a visit from the school dental service – it was fun lying on a table ! nurse.

We continue to practise our nativity presentation. Please support us by having on elast push with helping your child to learn their line and be able to speak it slowly and loudly – the hall is a very big space to fill with our voices.

Looking ahead to next week

Please keep practising those lines !

‘Homework’ ( things to practice at home)

Count back from 20 -10

Write your name. Try to use correct letter formation for all the letters. Remember, only the first letter should be a capital. As a challenge, try writing your surname too.


Buckstone Primary School, P1 Koalas

P1 Koalas Reflective Friday 1.12.23

Staff..469

Hello everyone,

This week’s blog will be a very short one. P1K have had a really busy week rehearsing for their Nativity. We are looking forward to sharing our beautiful singing and loud speaking voices with our special audience next week.

PE

We were playing running games to improve our fitness and have fun. We participated in various fitness activities at different stations around the gym hall. We practised some yoga in our classroom.

ART

Some of us have been drawing parts of the Christmas story for our window display.

LOOSE PARTS

Next date for loose parts is Wednesday 6 December.

Here are some examples of learning taking place this week, please ask your child about their learning. Many children have been very interested in making our home corner and small loose parts areas into a café. They have been making signs, creating menus, drawing plates of food, and taking on the roles of customers and waiting staff.

Have a lovely weekend.

P1 Pandas

P1p reflective Friday 24.11.23

Staff...685

Miss Nicol , our PGDE student finishes her 5 week placement with us today. We will really miss her and wish her well in her career – we have no doubt she will be an excellent teacher.

Apologies if last week’s blog did not appear for some people as usual – there were some technical issues, but hopefully it is there now along with this weeks. Any issues with seeing it please let me know.

Our learning this week


It has been such a busy week we have hardly had time to take any photos, but here are a few photographs of us developing our skills through our independent learning opportunities and experiences this week. Please take time to share these photographs with your child so they can share their learning with you.


Literacy focus


This week we introduced the letters

j and v

and we introduced the tricky words

saw, was

These are words which cannot be sounded out using phonics and should be learned by memory as sight vocabulary. please practise both reading and writing these words

Use the sounds you know to read and build words. If you want a challenge you could try to write the word if an adult reads it to you.

Building a word. Using plastic letters or letters written on small pieces of card or paper an adult says a three letter CVC word ( consonant, vowel, consonant) and the child chooses the correct sounds to make the word.

Blending a word . Adult writes or uses letters to make a CVC word and the child should say the pure sounds of each letter then blend them together to read the word.

Our writing programme starts with telling stories through detailed drawing. We are now beginning to write some of the words and sounds we know as part of our sentence. This week our focus was I am me

Maths and numeracy focus


We also continue to practise our number bonds of ten. These are the pairs of numbers which, when added together, total ten. The children should learn these as instant recall facts. We also talk about ‘switchers’ e.g. if we know that 8 + 2 =10, we can tall that 2 +8 = 10.

Please support your child at home to learn these facts. If they already know them, the challenge is to apply that understanding to tens numbers to 100 ( e.g. 8+ ? = 10, 18 + ? = 20 , 8 +? = 40 etc)

We continue to work on SEAL ( Stages of Early Arithmetical Learning) Pupils are working and challenged at a level appropriate to their individual development. These are examples of some of the skills we have been practising :

Making arrays and counting in groups to find the total. Key vocabulary included the words rows, columns and groups

Adding 1

Adding 2

Counting random printed arrays accurately ( when you can’t move the item being counted)

Counting in tens

Counting in tens off the decade

Recognising and ordering numerals to 20

Counting forward and back within 30 ( to 100 for some)

Establishing a collection.

Counting a collection with accurate 1-1 correspondence

Identifying number families ( teens, twenties, 30s etc)

Subitising ( recognising an amount without counting )

Other areas of the curriculum



In PE we have been playing games which give us opportunities to practise the skills we have learned.

We had a visit from the school nurse.

We continue to practise our nativity presentation. Please support us by helping your child to learn their line and be able to speak it slowly and loudly – the hall is a very big space to fill with our voices.

We were very excited about the school fair coming up on Friday afternoon.

Looking ahead to next week

Please keep practising those lines !

‘Homework’ ( things to practice at home)

Count back from 20 -10

Write your name. Try to use correct letter formation for all the letters. Remember, only the first letter should be a capital. As a challenge, try writing your surname too.


Buckstone Primary School, P1 Koalas

P1 Koalas Reflective Friday 24.11.23

Staff..469

Hello everyone,

This is what we have been learning this week:

LITERACY

We introduced the new sounds v and j.

 In small groups we were thinking about words beginning with these sounds, playing games, and identifying the letters which make these sounds. Some of us were learning how to ‘build’ and ‘blend’ three letter words with the sounds we know.

We also introduced two ‘tricky words’ was and saw. Tricky words cannot be sounded out but have to be learned. We will be introducing new tricky words on a weekly basis.

THINGS TO DO AT HOME

Hold up the letters and ask your child to tell you the sound they make. Ask them if they can think of a word beginning with that sound. Play ‘I spy’ using the sounds your child has learnt.

Use letters written on a piece of paper or card to ‘build’ a word. The adult says a three letter word and the child choses the correct sounds to make that word.

An adult makes a three letter word, and the child says the pure sounds of each letter to blend together to read the word.

Write down was and saw on a piece of paper or card, hold the cards behind your back then show them to your child and ask them to read the word you have shown them. Your child could practise writing these words, forming the letters the way they have been shown in class.

(If you are unsure about correct letter formation, please speak to one of us at the end of the day).

NUMERACY AND MATHS

On Friday 1 December the children will bring home their learning stories with comments on their progress in literacy and numeracy along with evidence of their learning. This week we have been assessing the children in numeracy.

PE

We were playing running games to improve our fitness and have fun. We participated in various fitness activities at different stations around the gym hall. We practised some yoga in our classroom.

NATIVITY

Together with the Pandas we have been practising the songs we will be singing and trying to say our words loudly and clearly in the big hall. Please help your child to learn their words and home, encouraging them to speak as loudly as possible!

LOOSE PARTS

Next date for loose parts is Wednesday 6 December.

ART

We decorated a giant Christmas tree for the hall and everyone drew their own Christmas bauble.

Some examples of learning taking place this week:

Have a lovely weekend.