We began our unit of work on Poems to Perform by listening to the Rhythm of Life by Michael Rosen.  We discussed the repeated phrases and rhythm of the poem. We then had a try at learning the poem. We created actions to accompany the words. We were really impressed with the performance after learning the poem in a short space of time. 

In Science, we completed our investigation to find the material that would be best suited to repair a hole in the bucket. We used the 'Hole in my bucket' song to think more about the problem, planned what we were going to do as a class and then worked in teams to do the investigation. After the practical testing, we wrote a letter to Henry to explain our results.

In Jigsaw sharing assembly, we showed the rest of the school our gingerbread people which we had created during the 'Celebrating Difference' unit of work. We made a part of the person each week and had a focus for the ideas for each part such as identifying similarities and differences between ourselves and others.

We thoroughly enjoyed all of the Christmas fun in Year 1 this week including Christmas jumper day and the Christmas crafts provided by the Friends of Appleton School. Thank you to everyone who helped to make these activities so special. 

We very much enjoyed taking part in some Christmas activities this week including completing our filming for the Year 1 and 2 production of A Bundle of Joy. We watched the recording in class and the link to watch this is now available via Google Classroom. We hope that you enjoy watching it too. 

On Friday afternoon, we watched the Cinderella Pantomime. We very much enjoyed joining in with the traditional shouts and boos along with eating some delicious popcorn too! Thank you to The Friends of Appleton School for organising this for us. 

In PE this week we were very excited to have a try at some Tri-Golf. The equipment had very kindly been donated to the school by Fynn's family and it was most certainly a favourite! We learnt about how to hold and use the golf clubs and played a variety of aiming games in our teams. We are looking forward to some more Tri-Golf later in the year for one of our Interhouse Competitions. 

It was a very exciting start to the week when we arrived at school on Tuesday to find that our class had been decorated for Christmas! Take a look and see if you can spot the super long paper chain which we worked as a team to make. We have also started our Active Advent calendar where we are going to do an active blast each day in the build up to Christmas.

In Phonics this week our focus sounds were ew, ire, ear, ure and ea. These lists have been added to Spelling Shed. 

Next week, we are hoping to complete the filming for our Christmas production A Bundle of Joy. 

We have continued to learn our songs for the KS1 Christmas Play. We have recorded a further three songs this week and now have three more to do next week. We are so looking forward to sharing this with you. 

In Science this week we have continued learning about materials and their properties. We focused on sorting materials according to their properties such as rough/ smooth, rigid/ flexible and hard/soft. We used objects from around the classroom which had these properties. We discussed how we would sort objects which had both of those properties. 

In Phonics, we have been the learning the ur, er, ow (brown cow), ai and oa digraphs. These lists have been added to Spelling Shed. 

There has been some excellent teamwork taking place this week and we were particularly impressed with this amazing model of the Titanic!

We have had a very exciting week in Year 1! The Christmas excitement is already upon as we have started to film our songs for the KS1 Christmas Play A Bundle of Joy. We have been working hard on learning the lyrics and creating actions for the songs. The children have been so confident with this that I have been asked to be 'the audience' multiple times! You are most certainly in for a treat when you all get the chance to be our virtual audience too! There are no photos from our rehearsals and filming...it's going to be a Christmas surprise! 

In Jigsaw PSHE this week we have focused on what bullying is and what we can do to prevent bullying. This has linked in really well with our whole school focus during anti-bullying week. It has been great to hear so many thoughtful and caring ideas from the children who have most certainly been Mindful Magpies. 

To continue the focus on the United Kingdom in Geography this week, we learnt all about Wales. A HUGE thank you to Mr Evans for teaching the class all about this country and all things Welsh. The videos were absolutely fantastic and really helped to bring the learning to life through the personal connection.  

In Maths we have continued to focus on addition and subtraction to 10. We are nearing the end of this unit of work and are moving onto 2D and 3D shapes next week. 

This week we focused on the importance of Remembrance. We visited St Laurence Church to look at the Remembrance Display that each class had contributed towards. We were really pleased with our suncatcher poppies in the window. 

On 11th November, we continued to discuss Remembrance Day and we talked about members of our family who had experienced living through wars and fought for peace. I brought my Gramp's medals from his National Service time in the 1950's when he was posted out to the Suez Canal in Egypt. The children enjoyed being able to hold real life medals and looking back at photos from the past. ​

In Phonics this week, we started to learn the Set 3 Read Write Inc sounds ea, or, a-e and i-e. These lists have been added to Spelling Shed. 

In Science with Mrs Edwards, we focused on the difference between the name of an object and the material from which it is made. We went on a materials hunt around the classroom to find objects made from specific materials such as wood, plastic, metal and glass. Take a look at what we found: 

We have had a great start back after the half term break and the children have been working really hard. 

We began our week by creating poppies for Remembrance day which are on display at St Laurence Church. We used tissue paper and PVA glue to create sun catcher poppies. We think that they look really effective! 

 In English, we have started a new sentence stacking unit focusing on the story of Pinocchio. We used role play and hot seating to become the police officer in the story who see's Gepetto running after Pinocchio. We thought of questions that the police officer might ask after seeing this such as 'Where are you going?' 'What's going on here?' 'Why are you chasing a puppet?'

A highlight this week was in reading where we were able to send home physical books. It has been great to have been able to send home reading books with the children this week and I hope that this had helped to give an exciting focus to reading at home. 

In phonics this week we have continued to practise the Set 2 sounds ar, or, air and read real/ nonsense words featuring these sounds. 

In Computing, we have continued our work on E-Safety and how to stay safe when using technology. We focused particularly on personal information and who we should share this information with. For further resources on staying safe online take a look at the Thinkuknow website: www.thinkuknow.co.uk/ 

In Maths we have continued our work on addition and focused on number bonds to 10, comparing number bonds and adding together two groups/ numbers.  

 I am extremely proud of the class and how they have returned to school in such a positive manner after the lockdown period. It has been a great first term together in Year 1. The children have worked so hard and I hope that you all have a lovely half term break. 

 In Phonics this week we have been recapping some of the Set 2 sounds that we have learnt so far. We also practised reading real/ nonsense words using these sounds. We really enjoyed playing the games on the Phonics Play website. Take a look if you would like to have a go at home too: www.phonicsplay.co.uk/ 

In English this week, we have been doing our first independent piece of writing. We planned and wrote our own Train Ride story. Everyone was a Steadfast Squirrel for showing good perseverance with writing down their ideas and using their phonics to write their words.