Dear Parents/Carers,

IMPORTANT INFORMATION

• Next week is Health Week so pupils are invited to wear PE kit all week.
• Sports Day will be held on Wednesday at the Waterboard Field from 10:30-12:00.
• We have a session of Loose Parts on Thursday afternoon. Please come dressed for the weather!
• No reading books were sent home yesterday, and no books will be sent home at the end of Health week. In class we are reading poetry books but there are not enough copies to send home.
• Learning Stories were sent home today. Once you have read the newsletter and term 3 targets please send them back in.

We are also looking for donations of picture frames for an art activity. If you have an old picture frame that you no longer need, we would be very grateful if you were able to donate it. Thank you in advance!

We have had a quick but very busy week! Here is a summary of our learning. I have also added photos from our Generation Science workshop last week to the very end of this blog.

Literacy

We have continued to read and spell words using the suffix -ing. For example: feel – feeling, wait – waiting.

We have been learning to read these tricky words:

• through
• always
• country
• young
• example

We have continued to work on our own list of common words for spelling.

We have started a unit of work on poetry. Pupils are learning to read, listen to, join in with and respond to poetry that captures sensory experiences. We have been outside to experience the weather then made a list of words and phrases to describe what we could see, hear, feel, taste and smell. We enjoyed Wind Ways by Judith Nicholls and When The Wind Blows by John Foster.

Ideas for learning at home:

Keep working on the individual list of tricky words for spelling.

Write the five tricky words for reading (above) on small pieces of paper. Hide them behind an object then slowly reveal the words one letter at a time. How quickly can your child read the word?

Here is a link to an online lesson with videos and activities which will explain more about poems and to try to learn and perform one.

Remembering and performing a poem – BBC Bitesize

Maths

We have been learning to estimate the area of a shape by counting squares. We have also been learning that different shapes can have the same area (conservation of area).

We have been rounding off our work on reading clocks. We have been reading digital o’clock and half past times. We have also been using quarter past / to on analogue clocks.

Ideas for learning at home:
• Please continue to practise number formation and make sure that numbers are not reversed.
• Talk about the different times of day. For example – what time does the alarm go off in the morning? Can your child write this as a digital time?
• There is a Sum Dog challenge to revise some of the concepts covered this week. It goes live tonight!

Other areas of the curriculum

• We enjoyed an outdoor learning session which linked to our unit of work on poetry.
• We have been preparing for Sports Day as part of our PE lessons.
• As part of RSHP and Health and Wellbeing we are learning about where living things come from and about how they grow, develop and are nurtured. As part of this we are going to see first-hand how the butterfly life cycle works. We have some class caterpillars which we will look after until they turn into butterflies. We will then set them free outdoors!

Have a great weekend.

Mrs McFarlane

Dear Parents/Carers

We hope you had a lovely week.

Important Information

• We are looking for empty, cleaned yogurt pots. Please send these in when you can.
• There will be no reading books sent home next week or the week after. In class we will be reading poetry books in our groups but there are not enough copies to send home.

Here is a summary of our learning this week.

Literacy

– This week we have been learning to add the suffix -ing to long vowel sounds. For examples: feel – feeling, wait – waiting.

– We have been learning to read and write the following common words: different, picture, letter, better, earth.

– We have continued to work on our individual blocks of common words for spelling. It is great to see how motivated the children are and making good progress. Thank you for your support at home!

– In writing we wrote the story of ‘The clocktower’. We watched a clip and thought carefully about the story. We had a special focus on adding adjectives. Each week we are getting better at writing a beginning, middle and end.

– We have been reading our reading books.

– We have worked on adding punctuation to sentences: full stops, exclamation marks and question marks.

– In handwriting we are learning how to write capital letters.

Ideas for learning at home

· Please work on spelling the tricky words sent home at parent consultations. If your child has moved block practice the new ones.

· Reading books were sent home yesterday. Please continue to practise reading at home.

· Begin to prepare the talk on a subject of your choice.

Numeracy

– We have been recognising and naming 2 digit numbers (and for some pupils 3 digit numbers).

– We have been sequencing numbers.

– We have been learning to read o’clock, half past, quarter past and quarter to times on analogue clocks. We also have looked at o’clock and half past on a digital clock.

Ideas for learning at home

· Practise number formation and make sure that numbers are not reversed.

· Draw attention to clocks at home. Reinforce the fact that the minute hand is the long hand and when it is pointing to the 12 it is an o’clock time, and when it is pointing to the 6 it is a half past time. Point out that the small hour hand lies exactly on the number for o’clock but moves past the number for half past. The minute hand (long hand) is pointing to the 3 when is quarter past and the small hand has moved a little from the hour number. When it is quarter to the long hand is pointing at the 9 and the small hand ( hour hand ) is near to the next number.

You may wish to use this teaching clock if you only have digital clocks at home.

https://www.topmarks.co.uk/time/teaching-clock

This is another game that you can use: https://mathsframe.co.uk/en/resources/resource/116/telling-the-time

· Talk about the different moments of the day when you do things: what time do your child wakes up, what time does your child have breakfast, what time do you leave the house to go to school, etc.

· Ordering numbers: https://ictgames.com/mobilePage/playYourCardsRight/index.html

Other areas

Loose parts: We had a great time outside. As it was raining when we went outside there was good teamwork and engineering while building tents to protect ourselves from the drizzle.

PE; We have continued to practice for Sports Day that will take place on Wednesday 10th May. We are practicing skipping, relays, throwing to a target and dribbling a football. We are finding skipping very tricky so it would be great to practice at home.

RHSP We have been learning about the lifecycle of a butterfly and a frog. We have continued to look after our window beans. We can see the roots and shoots developing now!

Science We have been learning about the skeleton (names of bones) and germs.

We had a visit from Generation Science. We learned about day and night. “I learned that the moon goes around the Earth and it takes a month” “ I learned that a year is 365 days” “ I learned basically everything: the moon and the Earth orbit around the sun”.

Remember:

P2 Listening and Talking Term 3

In June, the pupils in P2 will be asked to give a short talk on a subject of their choice. We are making you aware of this now so that you can support your child over the next few weeks to prepare for this.

Pupils can choose to talk about a hobby/interest, how they look after their pet, a favourite wild animal, favourite film etc.

The focus is on selecting ideas and relevant information, organising these into a logical sequence and using words which will interest the audience.

Please see guidance below on how best to prepare for this.

1. Choose a topic.

2. Think about the ‘W’ questions: Who (who is this about?) What (What do they do?) Why (Why is it interesting?) Where? When?

3. You may wish to make cards for each heading with a picture and/or key words. Don’t write whole sentences to read out loud.

4. Once the information is organised, practise delivering the talk to family at home.

Thank you in advance for your support with this.

I have added photos from the last few weeks to the end of the blog this week. I hope you enjoy seeing the variety of activities the pupils have been engaging with.

Have a lovely long weekend!

Mrs McFarlane