Year 1

Welcome to Year 1

Mrs Ndisi, Mrs Walker, Mrs Good

Thank you very much to all parents and carers for your support during school closure. You have made such a great effort to keep the children engaged and participating with the work set each week and we really appreciate this. 

A huge well done to you Year 1. You have been trying your best and working really hard over the last few months. It hasn't been easy but you haven't given up and we are so proud of you!

We hope you all have a safe, relaxed and happy Summer break,

Mrs Ndisi, Mrs Walker and Mrs Good 

Useful activities to practise key skills during school closure:

                     Representing Numbers                 Maths                        Quick Maths

                                              Phonics              Common Exception Words               SPaG

                     Daily Online Activities         Maths and English Ideas          Practical Ideas

                                   KS1 Maths Games                     Year 1 Number Games

Useful websites to practise key skills during school closure:

Maths Links:

Use the following links to practise these key Year 1 number skills:

- Counting in 2s, 5s and 10s up to 100

- Recognising odd and even numbers

- Finding 1 more and 1 less than a given number

- Partitioning 2 digit numbers into tens and ones

- Number bonds and facts to 10 and 20

- Finding doubles up to 10 and finding halves from 20

Children's individual log-ins for 'Times Table Rock Stars' were sent home in their home learning packs and they should be able to use these details for 'Numbots' too. 

English Links:

Use the following links to practise these key Year 1 reading and writing skills:

- Segmenting and blending all sounds

- Breaking longer words into syllables to read them

- Reading contracted words (I'm, don't, can't etc)

- Reading and spelling tricky words and common exception words

- Forming capital and lowercase letters correctly

- Writing sentences with capital letters, finger spaces and full stops

- Extending sentences using 'and' and other conjunctions (but, so, because, then, with)

- Developing sentences by adding adjectives and using different sentence openers

Children's individual log-ins for 'Spelling Shed' have been emailed out to you all and individual log-ins for 'Teach Your Monster to Read' were handed out at TLC meetings. For 'Phonics Play' use Username: march20 and Password: home for free access. 

Other Learning Links:

Use the following links to practise knowledge and skills from other areas of the curriculum:

Whole school log-in details for 'Discovery Education - Espresso' were written in the home learning letter from Mrs Davidson. 

Useful resources from SEND Supported:

We work with a company called SEND Supported at school and they are releasing newsletters each week offering support and guidance to parents of children who many have additional needs in school. Please find below a link to these newsletters:

There are also lots of other resources and information available on their website. The 'Things to do Issue 2 - Resources' file has some lovely activities for all children regardless of whether they have additional needs or not. There are lots of great visual puzzles and games for children to play so please have a look if you can. There are also resources available now to support with developing children's memory skills in 'Thing to do Issue 3 - Resources.'

Useful resources for explaining and discussing Covid-19:

Spring 2

Where do and did the wheels on the bus go?

 Our theme this half term is called ‘Where do and did the wheels on the bus go?’. During this theme, we will spend our Geography lessons investigating our local area. We will develop our geographical skills by using globes, atlases and maps and will practise using and creating keys. We will explore key cities from around the UK and discover famous landmarks in each of these before finding out a bit more about different modes of transport that we could use to travel between these cities. Towards the end of the half term we will spend our D&T lessons researching, designing, making and evaluating our very own vehicles with wheels.

Core Skills

In Core Skills this half term, the whole school will be developing our core skill ‘Knowing me, knowing you’.

In Year One we will be trying particularly hard to:

1) Use simple coping strategies when encountering a problem

2) Use strategies to help calm ourselves down

English

In English this half term we will be using ‘Naughty Bus’ by Jan and Jerry Oke as our stimulus text. We’ll begin by sharing the book as a class. We will make predictions, justify our opinions and try to draw upon our own experiences linking to the story. We will investigate the interesting use of fonts throughout the book and begin to think about why the authors made certain choices. We will work to develop our use of vocabulary by improving some of the language in the story, swapping boring words for more adventurous options. Writing outcomes for this half term will include setting descriptions using adjectives and similes, letter writing using the correct features and diary entries using the suffix ‘ed’ for past tense verbs. We will also be writing our very own extensions and sequels to the book in which we will have to create our own adventures for the bus to go on. Towards the end of the half term we will be exploring some poems from the book ‘Vroom vroom poems about things with wheels’, looking out for adjectives and rhyming words before writing and performing our own poems.

Phonics and Spelling

In Phonics and Spelling sessions this half term we will continue to consolidate our learning of all of the sounds we have learnt so far. We will be practising the alternate pronunciations and alternate spellings of the sounds that we know. Children will continue to practise how to spell using the correct representation of sounds and will apply this in their independent writing. We will also continue to investigate the number of syllables in words and practise breaking longer words into syllables to read and write them. We will continually revise our Phase 2-5 tricky words and try to spell them correctly in our independent writing.

Maths

In Maths this half term we will be practising skills across three main areas. We will start off by looking at ‘Numbers to 50’. We will sequence numbers and explore tens and ones. We will also think about place value whilst representing, comparing and ordering these numbers. We will continue to practise counting in twos, fives and tens also. We will then move on to ‘Addition and Subtraction within 20’. We will be exploring concepts of comparison and difference, identifying numbers on a number line and applying the ‘make ten’ strategy. We will continue to practise reading, writing and solving equations to consolidate our learning on number bonds. Finally, we will focus on ‘Fractions’; recognising, finding and naming a half as one of two equal parts and a quarter as one of four equal parts. We will be describing position and direction using whole, half and quarter turns.

Science

In Science this half term we will be asking “can you see me?” whilst investigating light and dark. We will be exploring what we need to be able to see and thinking about what we could do to make things easier to see at night. We will be sorting light sources into those which are natural and those which are man-made before looking at the difference between a source of light and a reflector of light. We will be investigating how mirrors use reflection and will learn the difference between transparent, translucent and opaque objects. We will also be creating shadows and then discovering how we can change the shape and size of them.

P.E. and Forest School

PE this half term will continue to be on Mondays. PE kit required includes plain black shorts or joggers, a plain white tshirt and black pumps. These all need to be named and in a named PE bag please. This kit will stay at school all week.

Forest School will continue to be on Thursdays. Forest School kit required includes wellies, spare socks, joggers, a tshirt or long sleeved top, a hooded jacket or jumper, a hat, scarf and a pair of gloves. These all need to be named and in a named Forest School bag please. This kit only needs to come to school on Thursdays.

Show and Tell

Show and Tell this half term will continue to be on a Friday afternoon and the children will take it in turns each week. I will continue to write which group’s turn it is on the weekly letter every week. Please could I remind everyone that Show and Tell is a speaking and listening exercise and if children choose to bring something in then it needs to be linked to our learning and they should be ready to talk about their item and answer one or two questions about it too. Achievements from outside of school, such as dancing, football, gymnastics awards are always welcome!

Reading

Reading books will continue to be changed on Fridays and children will bring 2 books home at a time. Our expectation is that children read at least 3 times a week with an adult and use the reading questions and activity grid to extend their reading experiences.

Reading records will be checked every Friday and those children who have read 3 times that week will receive a star sticker on their bookmark (stays at school). As the number of star stickers on their bookmarks builds up to 3, children will receive a round sticker and a reading award to come home with. Once they've obtained 3 round stickers and reading awards, they will be rewarded with a special certificate.

Please do jot down any reading that children are doing at home into their reading records so that we can reward their wonderful efforts. We do also ask that children have their reading books and reading record in their book bags at school every day to make the most of all reading opportunities at school.

Home Learning

Weekly homework will continue to be sent home on a Friday and collected back in for marking on a Wednesday.

Maths – Assigned pages of the Schofield and Sims book will be on the weekly letter sent home every Friday

Reading – At least 3 times a week with an adult along with discussion using question bookmarks and completion of activities from the grid

Spellings – Daily practice using the look, say, cover, write, check method on the practice sheet sent home every Friday

Thank you for your support

If you have any questions about any of the information above or about your child’s learning and progress then I am always happy to chat at the end of the day. Unfortunately, I cannot discuss matters at the beginning of the day as I cannot leave children unsupervised as they enter the classroom. However, messages can be left with the adult on the door and they will then be passed on to me. You are also welcome to make an appointment with the office and I’d be glad to speak with you another time.