Materials and Forces

We will be continuing to learn about the different types of materials, both man made and natural. We will be carrying out and experiment to test how well different materials absorb water. We will then move onto learning about forces.

Longitudinal Environment Study

Observing and predicting changes in our school environment and identifying animals and flowering plants in different seasons.

Computing

We will be learning to join simple instructions to create algorithms to first make jam sandwiches. We will then use this understanding to successively program Bee-bots to move from different instructions.

PSHE

Get Heartsmart! We will be learning about what it means to let love into our hearts. 

Art

We will be learning about the artist Picasso before creating portraits using different mediums. We will use Picasso to inspire our colour choices to successfully express our emotions.

DT

We will be investigating where fruits and vegetables come from before planning and creating 'Socktails' (fruit skewers) for Claude and Mr Bobblysock.

History

We will be learning about the Great Fire of London before creating a timeline of important events. We will be meeting with the Fire Brigade and using Samuel Pepys to inspire a diary entry. 

Music

Our music unit is called the 'Great Fire of London'. We will be learning how to keep a steady beat and how different instruments can tell the story of the Great Fire of London.

P.E

In indoor P.E we will be learning about movement in Gymnastics and Invasion games in outdoor P.E

Your child will be read with once a week by a member of staff and they will also join in with small weekly guided reading groups with their teachers whereby they will explore texts which link to our book led topic.  . Children will be able to change their spot books daily or when needed. Members of staff will move them onto new spot book bands as they make progress throughout the year. The book bands will link to their phonetic knowledge, the sight reading of tricky words and their ability to understand and answer questions about what they have read. If you would like to discuss ways in which you can support your child's reading further, please speak to your child's class teacher. We will visit the library weekly on a Wednesday Mornings, where children will be able to return and pick a new library book. 

Reading with your child at home is a fantastic way to support their learning and progress. We suggest that a 'little and often' approach is best, i.e five minutes, five times a week. As well as decoding the words, ask them questions to check their understanding. In addition to listening to your child read, please read to your child as this will support them to behave like a reader, copying what they see and hear. We recommend that you share favourite stories, allowing them to join in with predictable phrases. Also, visiting your local library is a great way to discover new and exciting books. 

Reading Challenge

Each time children read at home and their grown-up records this in their reading record, they get to move their rabbit up the burrow or their squirrel up the tree. Once they have reached the top of the burrow or tree, they get a sticker for their bookmark. When their bookmark has 5 stickers they will receive a reading challenge certificate to take home.

After October half term, we are hoping to welcome back volunteers into school. If you are interested in volunteering to read with the children in school weekly, then please let your child's class teacher know. 

Throughout year 1, the children will be revisiting and learning phonics phases 2, 3, 4 and 5. They will have daily phonics sessions, including games and on a Friday children will use the sounds which they have learnt that week to write in their phonics books. They will also learn to read and spell the 'tricky words', high frequency words and Year 1 common exception words. We will be sending out handouts at the beginning of they year to remind you of the phonics phases and tricky words. It would be beneficial to practise reading words containing the sound patterns which we are learning each week, identifying them in books and spelling words containing them.

We will send out weekly phonics sounds and spellings each week to practise at home with your child. The children will use the sounds which they have learnt to carefully segment and blend words. For example:

'chair' ch-air
'shelf' sh-e-l-f 
'home' (children will recognise the split vowel digraph o_e)

We follow the Letters and Sounds phonics programme. Find out more below.

Letters and Sounds 

Here are some useful websites for phonics games and resources:

We will be following a handwriting scheme of work called 'Letterjoin'.

Children will be learning the leads in, the formation of and the leads out of letters. We call this handwriting 'pre-cursive'. This will prepare them to begin joining up their handwriting when they are in Year 2. Here are the log in details for children to practice pre-cursive handwriting at home:

The home learning tasks for this half term will be attached below and can be completed any time before October half term. These are by no means compulsory and we do not expect the children to complete every task, unless they would like to. We set these tasks to create and encourage dialogue between home and school. Children can bring in their homework or they can share it on SeeSaw. 

We will send home paper copies of our weekly phonics sounds and spellings fortnightly for children to practise reading and writing at home. 

Please see your class teacher if you any questions or queries regarding these tasks.

Topic homework:

Claude Home Learning

Please view our online learning page in the event of school closure, bubble closure or individual self isolation from school time.

Year 1 Online Learning Page

In year one, we encourage children to be kind, respectful and tolerant towards others. We use a wide variety of positive reinforcements and rewards in order to create a nurturing and engaging learning environment, where all children are motivated and ready to achieve their very best. 

Our main behaviour for learning system is our space rocket. Children have their names on astronauts and all begin on the rocket. They then have their names moved to the star for doing something brilliant. At the end of the day, all the children who are on the star receive a star sticker. The teachers also picks two stars of the week, for children have consistently completed pieces of work brilliantly, who follows the class rules or for being resilient/kind to others. These children get a special acorn badge to wear for the week (squirrels) and five minutes extra 'golden time'.

If children do not follow the class's rules, which are agreed by the children at the beginning of the school year, then their name moves down to the Moon. If they begin to show much more positive behaviour then their name can move back up. However, if their negative behaviour continues then their name will move to the Earth which means they will receive a sanction. This may be a time out or a missed playtime, depending on the severity of the behaviour. Everyday is a new start and all the names return to the sun. 

During our Friday assemblies, Ms Fripp awards one child with a Head teacher certificate each week, for a very special rabbit or squirrel. Children also receive a reading certificate for completing the reading challenges (please find out about this above in the reading section of the website). 

Children receive dojo points when a teacher or member of staff notices something brilliant which they have done. They can get points for lots of reasons, but it may be following one of our class rules, completing a learning task well or for being a kind friend to others. Once children reach 100 they can change their dojo monster and get to pick from a variety of fun characters. The two children with the top dojo points at the end of the half term receive a prize. 

We also have a class teddy in each class that goes home with one child each Friday and returns to school on a Monday. The children are encouraged to write about, draw pictures of or take pictures of what they get up to with the teddy over the weekend. They will then share this with their class on the Monday.

We have a class chatter bag that also goes home weekly. Children take it in turns to bring in one item from home to share with their class during the weekly show and tell. This can be a special item or toy. We ask that children wait for their turn to use the chatter bag and we discourage children bringing in toys from home at any other time.