Our blogs

Year 5 - Friday 20th January 2022

Date: 21st Jan 2022 @ 1:14pm

Welcome to this week’s Year 5 class blog

This week in year 5

In Maths we been studying area. The children really impressed me with their grasp of the area of a rectangle but also estimating the area of an irregular shape. We also have been practising telling the time. This is a really tricky concept, they have done really well and many seem to understand it.  However, it is a skill that needs to be practised over and over.  If you type ‘topmarks clock’ into google you can access an interactive clock that you can set to various times and help your child tell the time. If you concentrate on analogue clock first this practise will really help your child.

In English poor Jim Jarvis has had a bad time in the workhouse but managed to escape. The children wrote a persuasive piece of writing, trying to persuade Jim to either stay at the workhouse or run away. They did a really good job. We also did a lot of work on mapping feelings and thinking about the level of feeling someone is having and words that are appropriate e.g. Is the character really terrified at the moment or is he just anxious? Finally we have started to plan a missing chapter of the book and we will concentrate on this extended piece next week.

In Science, the children had a great lesson with Mrs Quillam. She took them on a material hunt around the school, investigating the different materials objects were made from. She was extremely impressed with the level of work produced in a paragraph to explain their findings. This writing was really excellent, using lots of great science vocabulary. Well done - super scientists!

In RE, the children attended their final church session. This week we concentrated on the importance of the bread and wine and how it helps us remember the last supper.  The children have been so respectful when visiting the church and have often asked insightful questions. I look forward to seeing everyone at the class mass on Sunday and the Communion practise session on Monday evening. You will learn more about what to expect on their Communion day and ask Father any questions you may have.  We have also celebrated Wold Religion Day this week. The children learnt all about Hinduism, listened to the story of Rama and Sita, taking notes and made Rangoli patterns.

In French, the children read and understood some sentences in French about the planets. They will use these next week to help write their own sentences in French. 

In PE, the children practised their hockey skills.  They started in small groups of 8 - 4 attacking and 4 defending. They had to control the ball, pass to their partner, and try and aim effectively. They swapped over so they all had a chance to attack, score goals and defend. Then they made a team of 8 players and played matches against one another. They are concentrating on improving their technique. I am also proud that everyone can control the hockey sticks properly during the drills and games.

In history this week, we looked at the lives of children in the Victorian era. The children looked at photos of poor children and of Queen Victoria’s children and made decisions about the era based on them.  We had some ideas that all children were poor, but realised that some were also wealthy. We then concentrated on the poor children and their lives.  We looked at other sources, such as newspaper cuttings, interviews with mining children and more photographs.  They made enquiries into these, then learnt some facts that help back up their enquiries. Finally they wrote paragraphs about the sources they used and what historical claims it can help us make about the era. Again, I was impressed with their level of ability.

In computing we had a coding lesson. The children had a go at developing code to create a shape and then further developing the code to repeat the shapes at different locations on the screen. Remember if the children want to revisit any of the code lessons, they can access this at home with their passwords (please remind them not to go further than we have in class).

We have also ‘Planted a tree for the Jubilee.’ The children have helped to plant a row of hedges in the school grounds that we hope will be a legacy in years to come.

DON’T FORGET

Class Mass 10.30am on Sunday

Communion Practice on Monday evening at 6.30pm.

Topmarks clock online to practise telling the time.

Additional warm clothes for PE sessions.

Please can the children bring in a carrier bag for science next week.  We are looking for a range of types of bag e.g. bag for life, thin chip shop bag, bakery bag, paper bag etc.

Home Practice all relates to this week's learning - These are the tasks to be completed.

Reading - You all have a Home Reading book for year 5 so reading every night for 15-20 mins is essential. You also have a Reading Journal/Diary that must be completed and signed. Some children had a break from reading over the holidays but please ensure this is made a priority now that we are back at school.  Practise is vital to improve in all areas of English.

You can change your reading book on any school day (book bags to be left on Mrs Mulgrew's desk)

Maths – please ask your child what their times tables target is and help them practise this in order for them to progress.

I’d also encourage you to do a daily count with your child.  This week we are counting up in 8s. Give the children a number to start from and they must continue to count from that number in 8s, either forwards or backwards.  A strategy we use is bridging e.g. if the number is 46 and we are adding 10 we would use 4 to bridge it to the next 10 first – 50 and then add the remaining 4.  If subtracting we would again subtract to the nearest 10 – this time subtracting 6 to get to 40 and then subtracting the leftover 2.

Spellings words containing ‘ent’ and ‘ence’. We will look at these in more detail in school next week, they should be practised at home, ready for the test on Friday. 

accident, announcement, centre, confident, different, equipment, independent, conscience, difference, excellence, intelligence, science, violence, silence, magnificence

Don’t forget the children have a big list of Common Exception words to learn, these can be practised each week to push your child further.  You should all have received a sheet with these words on by now, I have highlighted the words that your child wrote correct in a spelling test before Christmas. This will give you an indication of how well they are remembering these spellings. Don’t worry if they don’t know many, they can practise them this term and will be assessed again near Easter.

Sumdog challenges

PLEASE ENCOURAGE YOUR CHILDREN TO COMPLETE THE SUMDOG CHALLENGES, MANY CHILDREN ARE STILL NOT ACCESSING SUMDOG.

Please encourage your child to complete the Maths and Spelling Training.  As you know, we set weekly challenges that are linked to the learning that takes place in school.  As an extra feature, the maths and spelling training sections will provide a tailored challenge for your child to practise skills, facts and words they find difficult.  Once the diagnostic challenges have been completed Sumdog will set challenges to aid improvement and development in the appropriate areas for your child.  Once you have completed the class challenges, please use this feature for extra challenge in both maths and spelling.  Many children have still not completed the diagnostic section.

Times tables have been set to reflect class targets

Maths the children have been set activities relating to area and time

Spellings words containing ‘ent’ and ‘ence’.

The children have worked hard this week and produced some great quality work.

Reception Friday 21st January 2022

Date: 21st Jan 2022 @ 10:35am

This week we have been learning about Pirates. 

We have been learning facts about Pirates, making treasure maps and dressing up as them. 

In Maths, we have been making teen numbers practically using 10 and some more. 

Year 3 Blog 21st January 2022

Date: 21st Jan 2022 @ 8:34am

We have had a wonderful week in Year 3, we have enjoyed spending some time outside in the sunshine and we have done lots of exciting learning. 

In English, we have continued reading Toro Toro. There are some really fantastic words in the novel which we are all trying to use in our own writing. We are currently writing a story based on the novel, we are adding new bits to the story every day. 

In maths we have learnt some new methods to multiply a teen number (like 16) by a 1-digit number (like 4). We have also been doing some problem solving - we love a challenge and never ever give up! 

We enjoyed some time outside on Thursday as we put on our wellies and headed out onto the field to plant a row of saplings. Each class has done this along the edge of the school field, we can't wait to see the hedge start to grow. 

In PE we have been learning new hockey skills, with a focus on how to hold the hockey stick correctly. We have also been learning different ways to travel and balance and using these to create gymnastics sequences. 

We learnt about the African countries that speak French this week. The African Cup of Nations football tournament is taking place in Cameroon at the moment so we looked at the map and found all the countries who are taking part. We spotted some footballers we knew too! We loved the official song! 

Home Practice

Reading

Read out loud to somebody every night for 20 minutes. Talk about the author's choice of words - can you find some good words to use in your writing?

Counting

Count out loud in 3s from 0 to 36 and back again.

Count out loud in 4s from 0 to 48 and back again.

Count out loud in 20s to 240. 

Times Tables

Practise the 3 and 4 x tables. 

Sumdog

Login to Sumdog and complete the challenges. Do a little bit every night. 

Spellings

Your spellings this week all have the /i/ sound spelled with a y.

gym          myth          Egypt          pyramid          mystery          symbol          synonym

        lyrics          systems        gymnastics

Have a wonderful weekend :) 

Year 1 Blog- 21st January 2022

Date: 20th Jan 2022 @ 10:20am

Welcome to your Friday blog.

We have really enjoyed our learning again this week.  We all planted a sapling for the Queen's Jubilee. Thank you for sending wellies in.

English

In English, we have been reading the story of The Elves and the Shoemaker. Many of us hadn't read it before and we really enjoyed it! We started off by finding the features within the story, then we wrote a thank you letter to the elves and even made up our own stories by changing the elves to another traditional tale animal/character. We couldn't believe how good the new stories were!

Phonics- We looked at 'ee' as in tree and 'ea' as in beach. We also looked at 'oy' as in toy and 'oi' as in coin.

Maths

This week we have been learning about parts of shapes. We can call these 'fractions'. We looked at halves and quarters. We have also been looking at the 'friends of 10'.These are all the ways to make 10 by adding 2 numbers together,0+10, 1 + 9, 9+1,2+8 and so on. Please encourage your child learn these number facts so that they can recall them quickly.

French

 We continued to learn the words for pets in French and we really enjoyed the song about the animals who had escaped from the zoo! We also listened to the official song for AFCON - the African Cup of Nations football tournament which is taking place in Cameroon at the moment. Lots of African countries speak French!

Music

We played 'You are my Sunshine' on the boomwhackers. We are getting really good!

Science

We started a new topic looking at everyday materials. We discussed what materials are and what objects are made from different materials. We picked one material and drew all the objects we could see in class made from that material. We also discussed why certain materials are used for different objects. We investigated what we coud do with different materials. Could we stretch,twist,bend or squash them?

Art

We focused on mixing in art this week and how primary colours can mix together to make secondary colours. We conducted two experiments - one with skittles (which worked!) and one with food colouring (which took a long time to work!!) We then used the paint to have a go at mixing the colours. We will continue with this next week as not everyone got a chance to have a go today.

P.E

In our gymnastics lesson, we learnt how to bear walk and crab walk. It was tricky but fun! We then learnt a new roll - the rock and roll. We put all three into a sequence and took it in turns on the apparatus.

R.E.

On Monday, it was World Religion Day and we learnt about the Hindu festival of Holi. We used water, paints and straws to make our own Holi picture. Then we continued with our Special People topic and learnt about who can help us in church. We made our own churches out of Lego and worked as a team.

Geography

In Geography, we recapped the four countries that make up the UK and labelled them on the map. We then took our learning one step further and learnt the capital cities for each country. We will continue to recap this as it was new learning for a lot of us.

P.S.H.E

This week we have been discussing how to keep our teeth healthy. We drew pictures about how to brush our teeth correctly. We also investigated how much sugar is in different foods.

Home Practice

Read for at least 10 minutes every night. This is so important. please sign the diary so we can change the books. Keep practicing reading the Tricky Words on sight. Please just write a note in the diary if you need the next set.

We have also been doing lots of counting. We have mainly been focusing on counting in 10s up to 100 (0, 5, 10, 15...) Please practise these at home. If you want a challenge, start from a different number that is not in the 5x table (e.g. 2, 6, 8...) We use a number square in class to help us with this, feel free to search '100 square' in Google to find one online.

Sumdog challenges

Phonics - ea and ee words

Maths - recognise half of an object

Year 4 HOME PRACTICE Friday 14th January 2022

Date: 14th Jan 2022 @ 5:12pm

Year 4

Home Practice 14^th January 2022

Welcome to this week’s blog. Here’s what we have been learning in school this week ….

In English, we dramatised an interview between a family and a reporter following the family’s encounter with the Iron Man during a picnic.  In addition, we wrote a menu fit for the Iron Man which used alliteration and ambitious vocabulary – the descriptions really made our mouths water!

In Maths, we learnt more about multiplication this week. Initially we used arrays to help with our understanding. Then, we learnt how to use a multiplication square to find the product when 2 numbers are multiplied together, and how to find factors.  Following this, we developed our understanding of the effect of multiplying a 1 and 2 digit number by 10 and 100, and used this to help with multiplication. Additionally, we have been practising our tables, and counting in 11’s and 25’s.

In RE, we hot seated different ‘apostles’ and asked them how they felt when Jesus chose them to help spread the Good News. 

In History, we discussed some of the legacies the Romans left, such as roads, the sewage system and Roman Numerals.  We then started to make a PowerPoint presentation to showcase our learning.

This week in French we revised colours in the masculine and feminine forms. Then we listened to the French alphabet and tried to spell out words using the French letters. 

In Science, we discussed the 6 types of scientific enquiry and wrote questions for each one. Super scientific thinking - it wasn't easy but the children did really well.

We began our PE lesson running 4 times around both playgrounds without stopping – we are aiming to build up our running technique and our stamina.  We then split into 2 groups.  Inside, the children learnt how to perform the dish and arch shapes and explored how to use these in a sequence.  Outside, the children continued learning how to control a ball using a hockey stick and played a mini game.

This week’s Home Practice ….

Reading

Please read for 20 minutes each evening to an adult at home.  Make sure you discuss the story and the characters.  Find the meaning of any new words too.  Reading every night will help you read more fluently and with understanding. 

Times tables

You have been given your own individual times table target.  Please make sure you continue to practise your times tables in preparation for your test next week, on Thursday (20^th January 2022). Ask someone at home to test you on your tables – can you recall them quickly and accurately?  

Remember - you can also practise your tables playing ‘Hit the button’.   

Counting

This week, please practise counting in 11’s and 25’s – draw a line and some marks on it like I do in class. You could write the numbers down as you count up.  When you count down, cover the numbers up, say the number, then reveal what you have got written down to check you’ve said the correct number.

Count in 11’s

For example, start at 0 and count up to 132 and back again (this will help with your 11 times tables)

0   11   22   33  etc                     132   121    110  etc

Then try counting from 40 to 139 and back again

40  51   62 etc                       139   128    117

Count in 25’s

Start at 0 and count up to 250 and back again

0   25   50    75     etc                    250   225   220   etc

Spellings

The spellings this week all have the prefix ‘super’.  A prefix is a group of letters that change the meaning of a word when they are added to the start.  Super means ‘above’ or ‘over’.  Please practise your spellings each evening at home as many of you are still not doing this.  You will be tested on them next Thursday (20^th January 2022). We have discussed different strategies you could use to help you learn them and you could also use ‘Look say cover write check’.

superstar    supermarket          supernova              supermodel  superhuman

superpower  superhero              supernatural          superglue     Superman

supersonic   superintendent      supersaturated      superstore   superheroes

Sumdog challenges

You have been set 3 challenges on Sumdog:

• A spelling challenge based on the spellings above
• A times table challenge based on the 11 times tables
• An ‘array’ challenge – lots of arrays and different questions to help with your understanding of times tables

Please make sure you log on and have a go! Many of you are still not accessing Sumdog on a daily basis. Little and often is the key to success!

Number bonds

Number bonds are very important and help with many aspects of maths. The more confident you are with these, the easier you will find addition, subtraction, mental calculations etc.  Therefore, please continue practising your number bonds / addition skills playing Hit the Button

The game you will play will help with your number bonds and quick addition skills. For example:

8 + 6               you could partition this into         8 + 2 + 4 = 14

This is because 8 + 2 is a pair to 10, then add the 4 to 10

Click on the link above, then on Play Game.

Click on Number bonds

On the left-hand side you will see the words ‘Up to 20’

Click on Addition within 20

See how many you can get correct in 1 minute. Then have another go and try and beat your score.

Maths and spelling training

Please continue to use the maths and spellings training sections as these are tailored for your child to practise skills, facts and words that they find difficult.

Year 6 Friday 14th January 2022

Date: 14th Jan 2022 @ 3:07pm

Welcome to our second blog of 2022. Year 6 have been working incredibly hard this week, continuing their leadership roles throughout the school. The school council have been preparing the new Learning Times, which should be ready by the end of this month. Do not forget that next Friday 21^st January, we are at All Hallows’ for a taster day. Please go straight to the high school where you can leave your child at the entrance gate between 8:40am and 8:50am. The children will have a fantastic day with school finishing at 2:30pm.

Our learning in Year 6 this week:

• In Maths, we have been improving our mental and written addition strategies to become more efficient. We then looked in detail at what makes a fraction, finding fractions of shapes and amounts.
• In English, we have continued our novel, ‘Tom’s Midnight Garden’, where Tom discovered a new garden at the back of his Aunt’s flat. We wrote as Tom about this discovery and improved our descriptive setting writing through our adjectives and verb choices.
• In RE, we learnt how the Bible is made up of 73 books (46 in the Old Testament and 27 in the New Testament) which took over a thousand years or more for all the books to be completed. We then learnt how to use the numbered code to find out what the piece of writing was in the Bible.
• In PE, we learnt how to apply the skill of hockey to attacking situations, and how to create a gymnastics sequence with travels, turns, jumps and a partner balance.
• In History, we placed the history of the world (from 0AD to present day) in chronological order, whilst working in groups.
• In Music, we have creating our own rhythms and copying them in groups using the djembe drums.
• In French, we started to learn the verb ‘avoir’ = to have. We practised with songs and a game.
• In Science, we interpreted bar charts of the class pulse rates and observed some lamb’s hearts to try to identify the structures we could see. Next week, we will be conducting a pulse rate investigation and it would be very helpful if those children with phones could download a free app that will measure their pulse, such as ‘Heart Rate Monitor’ or another app that is similar and bring them into school next Thursday 20^th January (where their phone will be kept locked away until the lesson begins). This is not a requirement as we can share the devices we already have in school; your child will not miss out on any part of the lesson because of this (heart rate apps just provide us with more accurate results).

Home Practice all relates to this week’s learning. These are the tasks needed to be completed:

• Reading – Continue to read every night for 30 minutes. You also have a Reading Journal/Diary that must be used for the title of the book and any reading challenge chosen.
  • The days when you can change your book:
    • Monday – Roller Coasters
    • Tuesday – Big Dippers
    • Wednesday – The Waltzers

• Spellings (challenge words)
  • Sumdog (-cial / -tial Sp1 wk 3)

Social, special, torrential, official, especially, artificial, potential, essential, substantial, financial, confidential, partial, impartial, initial, unofficial

• Maths challenges:
  • Counting:
    • This week we have been counting in fraction steps. Try to do the same out loud or with paper.
    • Draw a line with some marks on it like I do in class. You could write the numbers as you count up or down, then double check it to make sure you have said the correct numbers.
    • Start with these numbers: 4/5, 4 1/5, 3 ½ , 8 ½ and count up 10 times then back again in one fifth and then two fifths:

4/5, 1 1/5, 1 3/5, 2, 2 1/5 , 2 3/5, etc

and in 2 ½ :

3 ½, 6, 8 ½, 11, 13 ½, 16, etc

• Number facts:
  • To help your maths even more, please continue to learn your numbers facts, 6 + 8 = 14, 8 + 7 = 15.
  • The best way to do this is to simply have someone in your home quiz you with questions like (8 + 6, 6 + 5, 3 + 8, 5 + 9, etc)
  • Then get them to change the place value of these digits (0.8 + 0.6, 0.06 + 0.05, 0.3 + 0.8, etc)
  • Play 'Hit the Button via this link, Hit the Button 

• Sumdog (Times tables x4, x5, x6, x11, x12)
  • Each child has their own tables target which they should know. The Sumdog challenge may relate to their target but if not, you can always use the ‘trainer’ section of Sumdog for extra Tables Practice. Every Tuesday there is a tables test.

• Sumdog (Fractions of shapes and on a number line)
  • For this challenge, there will be questions relating to fractions of shapes – make sure you count what the shape is divided into and then count how many are coloured in. There are also questions relating to fractions on a number line – check the gap between two numbers then divide that by how many jumps it is from one number to the next (we have practiced this in class).

Keep working through the Maths and Spelling Training. As you know, we set weekly challenges that are linked to the learning that takes place in school. As an extra feature, the maths and spelling training sections will provide a tailored challenge for your child to practise skills, facts and words that they find difficult. Once your challenges have been completed, use this feature for challenge in both spelling and maths.

Spend some time training so the program can learn the skills your child needs to work on and practise. 

Year 3 Blog 14th January 2022

Date: 14th Jan 2022 @ 2:10pm

We have had another great week in Year 3! 

In English, we have been reading Toro Toro. We are really enjoying this book and are learning lots of new exciting words, for example mesmerizing and entranced. We have been using these words in our writing. Our focus this week has been conjunctions and how to use them accurately. Conjunctions join two or more parts of a sentence together. They can go at the beginning or in the middle of a sentence. 

Here are some examples of conjunctions:
      after          although          as long as           because          before          even though       when       whenever       since                  unless               so                 while

We have linked our English learning to our new topic in geography which is Andalucia in Spain. Toro Toro is set in Andalucia which is a region in Spain. We have been using atlases and maps to locate and learn about Andalucia and Spain.  

Our new PSHE topic is 'What are families like?' We have been talking about our own families and have realised that there are lots of different types of families. Everybody has found it fascinating to learn about different types of families that exist in our class and around the world. 

This week we also had a session on online safety, looking at online gaming platforms and online chat.  We talked about how we shouldn't talk to people we don't know in real life and to speak to an adult if anything worries or upsets us. We know a lot of your children are accessing the chat features of Fortnite, Minecraft and Roblox. Below we have attached 3 guides for  the three mentioned platforms.

Home Practice 

Read out loud to somebody for 20 minutes, tell them all about the different characters. 

Spellings

Practise your spellings every night. This week, your spellings have the /u/ sound spelled ou. 

Here are your spellings:

touch          double          country          trouble          young          cousin          enough              encourage      flourish         couple 

Counting

Count out loud in 10s from 81 to 181.

Count out loud in 4s from 0 to 48.

Count out loud in 2s from 40 to 20. 

Times Tables 

Practise your 3 and 4 times tables this week. Go on Hit the button, Sumdog and times tables videos we have added in past blogs.

Sumdog

Access the Sumdog challenges and training. These are essential to practise what we have been learning in school. 

You will be tested on your spelling and times tables on Tuesday 18th January. 

Have a lovely weekend.

Year 2 Blog Friday 14th January 2022

Date: 14th Jan 2022 @ 1:04pm

Year 2 have had a fantastic week and we continue to work hard to follow all of our golden rules every day. In English, we have continued with Leaf and Non-Fiction writing. The children wrote a brilliant diary in first person (as Leaf) all about how he was feeling. In Maths, we have learnt about statistics – we have learnt about bar charts and interpreting them. In PE this week the children have performed a sequence of travelling and balances. The children enjoyed using low levelled equipment to perform different ways of travelling. In French, the children have learnt how to say types of pets.

Reading

In Year 2, children should read for at least 15 minutes every night and discuss the book with an adult or older sibling. This will help with understanding the text and learning new words.

Please sign and leave a small comment when you have read with your child and make it clear that you have finished a book, then we know we can change it.

Reading books are changed every Monday and sent home on Tuesday. However, if you need to change a book another time, we will change it as needed.

Spellings

race

ice

cell

city

fancy

face

space

bicycle

circle

spicy

Maths

At home, spend some time counting in 3s and 4s. Can you count on from any number and see which number you can reach.

Sumdog

Please have a go at the spelling and maths training if you haven’t already. As you know, we set weekly challenges that are linked to the learning that takes place in school. As an extra feature, the maths and spelling training sections will provide a tailored challenge for your child to practise skills, facts and words that they find difficult. Once your challenges have been completed, use this feature for challenge in both spelling and maths.

Spend some time training so the program can learn the skills your child needs to work on and practise. 

Log in at www.sumdog.com

Sumdog challenges:

Maths – Charts

X2 x5 x10 x3 tables

Spellings – ‘c’ words.

 Please could your child bring in a pair of wellies for next week – we are taking part in some exciting planting out on the field.

Thank you for all your support. Have a lovely weekend.

The Year 2 team.

Year 1 Blog 14th January

Date: 14th Jan 2022 @ 12:33pm

Welcome to your Friday blog!

We have had a super week of learning again and started to notice a bit more daylight.

English

In English we have finished our Hansel and Gretel story. We've been so busy with our learning! We have thought about how Hansel and Gretel were feeling, explored our senses whilst in the forest setting and compared the original story to a different version - Trust Me, Hansel and Gretel are Sweet!

In phonics, we are still learning phase 5 sounds. Miss Fisher's group have been recapping ou, ie and ea words. Mrs Corbett's group have recapped split digraphs u_e and e_e.

Maths

We have been counting in 2s, 5s and 10s. We have been looking at the patterns in the numbers on a 100 square.

We have also been looking at repeating patterns. We made our own repeating patterns. We are also trying really hard to write our numbers correctly.

Science

This week we carried out an investigation to answer a question. Our question was-do children always have bigger feet than their hands ?

We measured our hands and feet and then collected all our data together. We found a pattern and this gave us the conclusion that most children in Year 1 have bigger feet than their hands.

PSHE

We talked about all the different ways we can keep our body healthy with exercise. We talked about what we do at school and at home to exercise. We found out what happens to our bodies when we exercise.

P.E.

In P.E. we have continued with our gymnastics lessons. We learnt to egg roll, frog jump and how to move like a caterpillar. It was so much fun. Please see the pictures below!

Art

In Art, we finished experimenting with paint. We dabbed, splatted and mixed our paint to see what will happen. Next week, we will be looking at primary and secondary colours.

Geography

In Geography, we have started to learn about the countries that make up the UK. We seemed really confident when learning about England and learnt some new information about Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. We talked about the different places that we have been to in the UK such as the Lake District, Centre Parcs and London. We then drew pictures of our trips!

History

We learned some facts about Isambard Kingdom Brunel. We talked about and drew some of the things he designed and made.

WELLIES NEEDED NEXT WEEK

As part of our outdoor learning every child in the school will be planting a sapling in our school grounds next week. Please send in a pair of wellies with your child in a named carrier bag on Monday.Your child will bring them home next Friday.

Home Practice

Read for at least 10 minutes every night. This is so important. please sign the diary so we can change the books. Keep practicing reading the Tricky Words on sight. Please just write a note in the diary if you need the next set.

We have also been doing lots of counting. We have mainly been focusing on counting in 10s up to 100 (0, 5, 10, 15...) Please practise these at home. If you want a challenge, start from a different number that is not in the 5x table (e.g. 2, 6, 8...) We use a number square in class to help us with this, feel free to search '100 square' in Google to find one online.

Sumdog challenges

Phonics - oi and oy words

Maths - counting in 10s to 100

Reception 14th January 2022

Date: 14th Jan 2022 @ 10:37am

We have continued our learning all about Zog this week, writing instructions to teach people how to fly. 

In Maths, we have been partitioning numbers in different ways and looking at the number sentences. 

During our understanding of the world, we have been looking at pictures of our families and school uniforms from the past. We have loved discussing all the similarities and differences. 

This week in French we learnt the words for some pets. We practised with them games, a story and a song.

Year 5 - 14th January 2022

Date: 13th Jan 2022 @ 5:17pm

Welcome to this week’s Year 5 class blog

The children have had a busy week working hard.

This week in year 5

In Maths we have learnt some new strategies to use when multiplying – the compensation strategy and grid method.  The children enjoyed both and have been using them in their work.  We have also done lots of mental arithmetic this week, deciding whether to work it out in our head, use jottings or a written method.  We have also practised multiplication and division reasoning problems.  These were really tricky and needed lots of concentration. The children have worked really hard.

In English we have continued to read the plight of Jim Jarvis in Street Child; poor Jim has ended up in the workhouse.  The children have written notes (in character), they have written descriptive pieces of Jim’s time in the workhouse and they had to write a persuasive piece, whether Jim should run away from the workhouse or not.

In Science, the children looked at the different sorts of enquiry that we use in Science and came up with potential questions that related to each enquiry.  This was particularly tricky but the children listened well and thought about each enquiry carefully.

In RE, the children attended church and learnt all about the preparations that have to be made for Mass by both the priest and community members that help him.  The children were able to ask questions to Father Michael and Catechists and find out more about being a member of the Parish.

In French, we started a topic on Les planetes. Over the next couple of weeks, the children will build up their space vocabulary in French and learn to construct sentences about the planets. We will finish with a piece of writing about the planets and it will be amazing! Good start, year 5!

In PE, we split into 2 groups. One for learning how to hold the hockey stick safely and then learnt passing and stopping the ball. The other group were inside learning gymnastics.  The children were fantastic.  We were using mirroring and matching poses. They had to pair up and show poses that were first mirroring one another, then matching.  They then paired with another pair and had to teach their pose to one another.  These were then turned into a routine with moves in between the poses.  I really was impressed with their teamwork and skills.

In Art, the children practised sketching cityscapes, using YouTube videos.  They were able to carefully follow the lead of the artist on the screen.  Then they looked back at their inspiration art, from Jo Quigley, and sketched out a plan for their final piece.  They have all focused well and have great ideas to create a cityscape of London. I look forward to sharing their final pieces in a couple of weeks.

In PSHE we focused on money matters.  We looked at the cost of various items a child needs throughout their life and the cost of this.  We discussed budgets and why sometimes grown-ups have to be careful with their money.  We discussed things that are essential that need to be budgeted for first and things that we would like that maybe we have to save up for.

DON’T FORGET

Sacramental folders need returning for church on Monday.

Additional warm clothes for PE sessions.

On Tuesday the children will be using the outside area and helping to plant saplings that will grow into a hedge.  Please send in wellies, in a named plastic bag, to save their school shoes getting muddy.  If you don’t have wellies, please send old pumps or trainers that you don’t mind getting muddy.  Please send in a bag so the muddy wellies can be put in a bag and not on the carpet in class.

Home Practice all relates to this week's learning - These are the tasks to be completed.

Reading - You all have a Home Reading book for year 5 so reading every night for 15-20 mins is essential. You also have a Reading Journal/Diary that must be completed and signed. Some children had a break from reading over the holidays but please ensure this is made a priority now that we are back at school.  Practise is vital to improve in all areas of English.

You can change your reading book on any school day (book bags to be left on Mrs Mulgrew's desk)

Maths – please ask your child what their times tables target is and help them practise this in order for them to progress.

I’d also encourage you to do a daily count with your child.  This week we are counting up in 9s, 0.9 or 0.09. Give the children a number to start from and they must continue to count from that number in 9s, 0.9 or 0.09 either forwards or backwards.  A strategy we use is adding 10 and then taking 1 away if counting up, or subtracting 10 and then adding 1 if subtracting.

Spellings words ending ‘ance’. We will look at these in more detail in school next week, they should be practised at home, ready for the test on Friday. 

acceptance, appearance, assistance, balance, distance, ignorance, importance, performance, substance, vengeance, endurance, disappearance, circumstance, extravagance, attendance

Don’t forget the children have a big list of Common Exception words to learn, these can be practised each week to push your child further.  You should all have received a sheet with these words on by now, I have highlighted the words that your child wrote correct in a spelling test before Christmas. This will give you an indication of how well they are remembering these spellings. Don’t worry if they don’t know many, they can practise them this term and will be assessed again near Easter.

Sumdog challenges

PLEASE ENCOURAGE YOUR CHILDREN TO COMPLETE THE SUMDOG CHALLENGES, MANY CHILDREN ARE STILL NOT ACCESSING SUMDOG.

Please encourage your child to complete the Maths and Spelling Training.  As you know, we set weekly challenges that are linked to the learning that takes place in school.  As an extra feature, the maths and spelling training sections will provide a tailored challenge for your child to practise skills, facts and words they find difficult.  Once the diagnostic challenges have been completed Sumdog will set challenges to aid improvement and development in the appropriate areas for your child.  Once you have completed the class challenges, please use this feature for extra challenge in both maths and spelling.  Many children have still not completed the diagnostic section.

Times tables have been set to reflect class targets

Maths the children have been set activities relating to multiplication and division strategies. 

Spellings words ending ‘ance’.

The children have had a great week, working hard.

Year 4 Home Practice Friday 7th January 2022

Date: 7th Jan 2022 @ 5:01pm

Year 4

Home Practice 7^th January 2022

Welcome back to school and to this week’s blog. Here’s what we have been learning in school this week ….

In English, we learnt more about adverbs and how to correctly use them at the beginning of a sentence. We tried to include some of these in our writing about our first day back at school after the Christmas holidays.  In addition, we have continued reading our class novel, The Iron Man, and discuss the different characters we have been introduced to.

In Maths, we revised rounding to 10, 100 and 1000.  In addition, we have continued to refine the formal written method of subtraction, especially where there were zero’s in the numbers – some of these were quite tricky but Year 4 worked hard to try and master this. Additionally, we have been practising our tables, and counting in 3’s and 6’s.

In RE, we learnt about community – we discussed the different communities we belong to and what makes it function well.  In addition, we talked about the advantages and demands of being part of a community, and what causes a community to either break down or helps to build it up. 

In History, we learnt about the types of houses the Romans lived in and looked at various different mosaic patterns.  We then looked more carefully at mosaics and started to appreciate which mosaic patterns we liked and why.

Bonne annee! In French this week, we learnt about how French people celebrate La fete des Rois - the Feast of the Epiphany. A special cake which contains a lucky charm is shared. Whoever gets the lucky charm in their slice becomes the King or Queen for the day. We then focussed on the phonic sound oi (wa) as in roi, listening to a song with lots of oi words and reading them. Tres bien!

Our PE lesson involved both gymnastics and hockey. In gymnastics, we practised a one-foot balance, explored different ways of travelling and refined the front and back support. We then started to create our own sequence and showed this to the class.

This week’s Home Practice ….

Reading

Please read for 20 minutes each evening to an adult at home.  Make sure you discuss the story and the characters.  Find the meaning of any new words too.  Reading every night will help you read more fluently and with understanding. 

Times tables

You have been given your own individual times table target.  Please make sure you continue to practise your times tables in preparation for your test next week, on Thursday (13^th January 2022). Ask someone at home to test you on your tables – can you recall them quickly and accurately?  

Remember - you can also practise your tables playing ‘Hit the button’.   

Counting

This week, please practise counting in 3’s and 6’s – draw a line and some marks on it like I do in class. You could write the numbers down as you count up.  When you count down, cover the numbers up, say the number, then reveal what you have got written down to check you’ve said the correct number.

Count in 3’s

For example, start at 0 and count up to 36 and back again (this will help with your 3 times tables)

0   3   6    9  etc                     36   33    30  etc

Then try counting from 30 to 66 and back again

30  33   36 etc                       66    63    60

Count in 6’s

Start at 0 and count up to 72 and back again (this will help with your 6 times tables)

0   6   12   18     etc                    72   66   60   etc

Do this a few times to help you learn them!

Spellings

The spellings this week all have the ending ‘sure’ or ‘ture’.  The ending sounding like ‘zhuh’ is spelt ‘sure’.  The ending sounding like ‘chuh’ is spelt ‘ture’.  Please practise your spellings each evening at home as many of you are still not doing this.  You will be tested on them next Thursday (13^th January 2022). We have discussed different strategies you could use to help you learn them and you could also use ‘Look say cover write check’.

future         nature         creature      feature        mixture

picture        adventure    fracture      vulture         closure

leisure         measure       enclosure     pleasure       treasure

Sumdog challenges

You have been set 3 challenges on Sumdog:

• A spelling challenge based on the spellings above
• A times table challenge based on the 3 and 6 times tables
• Rounding to the nearest 10, 100 and 1000 (we have practised this in class this week)

Please make sure you log on and have a go! Many of you are still not accessing Sumdog on a daily basis. Little and often is the key to success!

Number bonds

Number bonds are very important and help with many aspects of maths. The more confident you are with these, the easier you will find addition, subtraction, mental calculations etc.  Therefore, please continue practising your number bonds / addition skills playing Hit the Button

The game you will play will help with your number bonds and quick addition skills. For example:

8 + 6               you could partition this into         8 + 2 + 4 = 14

This is because 8 + 2 is a pair to 10, then add the 4 to 10

Click on the link above, then on Play Game.

Click on Number bonds

On the left-hand side you will see the words ‘Up to 20’

Click on Addition within 20

See how many you can get correct in 1 minute. Then have another go and try and beat your score.

Maths and spelling training

Please continue to use the maths and spellings training sections as these are tailored for your child to practise skills, facts and words that they find difficult.

Year 2 Home Practice Friday 7th January 2022

Date: 7th Jan 2022 @ 3:42pm

Happy New Year! We hope you had a lovely Christmas break. Year 2 have had a brilliant first week back in school, it has been great to see their smiles and happy faces again. Our novels this week in English are Leaf and non-fiction. The children have looked at features of non-fiction texts and have written some great questions to Leaf the polar bear. In Maths, we have started multiplication, finding arrays as repeated addition. We have explored shapes in the environment in Art this week. In Science, the children have really enjoyed taking part in an investigation all about which ball will bounce the highest. The children came up with brilliant questions all about different ball types including colours, materials and sizes. In French, the children have learnt about how French people celebrate La fete des Rois – the Feast of Epiphany. The children are also beginning to write some sentences in French – tres bien!

Reading

In Year 2, children should read for at least 15 minutes every night and discuss the book with an adult or older sibling. This will help with understanding the text and learning new words.

Please sign and leave a small comment when you have read with your child and make it clear that you have finished a book, then we know we can change it.

Reading books are changed every Monday and sent home on Tuesday. However, if you need to change a book another time, we will change it as needed.

Spellings

write

written

wrote

wrong

wrap

wrist

wreck

wrestle

wriggle

wren

Maths

At home, spend some time counting in 2s, 3s, 4s, and 5s. Practise these times tables on a game called Hit the Button. Follow this link: https://www.topmarks.co.uk/maths-games/hit-the-button

You will have a number fact challenge on Sumdog to complete by next Friday.

Sumdog

Please have a go at the spelling and maths training if you haven’t already. As you know, we set weekly challenges that are linked to the learning that takes place in school. As an extra feature, the maths and spelling training sections will provide a tailored challenge for your child to practise skills, facts and words that they find difficult. Once your challenges have been completed, use this feature for challenge in both spelling and maths.

Spend some time training so the program can learn the skills your child needs to work on and practise. 

Log in at www.sumdog.com

Sumdog challenges:

Maths – Arrays as repeated addition

X2 x5 x10 x3 tables

Spellings – ‘wr’ words.

Thank you for all your support. Have a lovely weekend.

The Year 2 team.

Year 6 Friday 7th January 2022

Date: 7th Jan 2022 @ 3:37pm

Welcome back to our first blog of the Spring term. We hope you and your family had a great Christmas and New Year and are all healthy and keeping safe.

Our learning in Year 6 this week:

• In Maths, we have been revising our knowledge of place value with numbers up to three decimal places and developing our understanding of negative numbers.
• In English, we have started our new novel, ‘Tom’s Midnight Garden’, and have begun to understand the main characters of Tom, Aunt Gwen and Uncle Alan.
• In RE, we started a new topic, ‘Sources’, where we discussed what kind of books inspire us and why. We then wrote about our favourite book and how it affected our lives.
• In PE, we managed to fit in a session that we missed (due to Bank Holiday Monday) so we could assess our learning of team games through Hockey and Dodgeball. Remember, you can bring in a hat and gloves whilst it is cold to use during our PE lessons.
• In History, we discussed how we know about the past and what chronological order means. We then created our own timeline about our lives so far.
• In Music, we have been practising B, A and G chords on the recorder.
• In French, we learnt about how French people celebrate La fete des Rois- the Feast of the Epiphany, A special cake which contains a lucky charm is shared. Whoever gets the lucky charm in their slice becomes the King or Queen for the day.
• In Science, we began our new topic, ‘Health, the Heart and the Circulatory System’. We have started to look at the function of the heart, blood vessels and blood, then we research how to have a healthy heart and why it is important.

Home Practice all relates to this week’s learning. These are the tasks needed to be completed:

• Reading – Continue to read every night for 30 minutes. You also have a Reading Journal/Diary that must be used for the title of the book and any reading challenge chosen.
  • The days when you can change your book:
    • Monday – Roller Coasters
    • Tuesday – Big Dippers
    • Wednesday – The Waltzers

• Spellings (challenge words)
  • Sumdog (Suffixes Sp1 wk 1/2)

Next week we will be investigating the effects of suffixes on root words with -ing, -ed, -er, -est, -ly, -less, -ful, -ness

Caring, friendly, physically, nicest, happiest, hopeful, beautiful, careless, discussed, equipped, bruised, consciousness, attached, continued, luckier

• Maths challenges:
  • Counting:
    • This week we have been counting in whole numbers steps. Try to do the same out loud or with paper.
    • Draw a line with some marks on it like I do in class. You could write the numbers as you count up or down, then double check it to make sure you have said the correct numbers.
    • Start with these numbers: 400, 165, 5000 and count up 10 times then back again in 25:

                           400, 425, 450, 475, 500, 525, etc

                            and in 250:

                            400, 650, 900, 1150, 1400, etc

• Number facts:
  • To help your maths even more, please continue to learn your numbers facts, 6 + 8 = 14, 8 + 7 = 15.
  • The best way to do this is to simply have someone in your home quiz you with questions like (8 + 6, 6 + 5, 3 + 8, 5 + 9, etc)
  • Then get them to change the place value of these digits (0.8 + 0.6, 0.06 + 0.05, 0.5 + 0.9, etc)

• Sumdog (Times tables x6, x7, x8)
  • Each child has their own tables target which they should know. The Sumdog challenge may relate to their target but if not, you can always use the ‘trainer’ section of Sumdog for extra Tables Practice. Every Tuesday there is a tables test.

• Sumdog (Negative numbers)
  • For this challenge, there will be questions related to positive and negative numbers. The questions will ask you to decide which number is the most or least. This will be great practice for your learning next week.

Keep working through the Maths and Spelling Training. As you know, we set weekly challenges that are linked to the learning that takes place in school. As an extra feature, the maths and spelling training sections will provide a tailored challenge for your child to practise skills, facts and words that they find difficult. Once your challenges have been completed, use this feature for challenge in both spelling and maths.

Spend some time training so the program can learn the skills your child needs to work on and practise. 

Year 3 7th January 2022

Date: 7th Jan 2022 @ 12:54pm

Happy New Year!

It has been lovely seeing everyone back at school this week. 

In our English we have started our new novel, Toro!Toro!, written by Michael Morpurgo. We have read the blurb and a letter from the author. Before starting the story, we have been finding out about some of the topics which will come up in the book including Spain, bullfighting, and The Spanish Civil War. We have written non-chronological reports including this information and are now ready and excited to start reading the story an Monday.

In Maths this week we have been learning all about multiplication and how to use our times tables to solve complex calculations. We have set some Sumdog competitions and challlenges to help improve fluency in your tables.

On Friday, we continued our Science topic on light. We explored light sources and talked about how we know something is luminous or non-luminous. Here is some of the vocabulary we will meet this half term.

luminous, reflective, transparent, translucent, opaque, source, dim, artificial, natural

Home Practice

Please read out loud to somebody every night for 20 minutes and talk about what you have read. 

Spellings

Practise your spellings every night by writing them down and saying the letters out loud. 

Your spellings this week all have the /ow/ sound spelled ou. 

     mouth           around         spout         ouch           sprout             hound             trout               outside          found             sound

Practise the following skills for maths – even if you already know them, you need to be quick.

• Number facts, click on doubles – doubles to 20.
• Times tables and counting. Click on times tables – x3 and x4

https://www.topmarks.co.uk/maths-games/hit-the-button

Well done to everyone who is accessing the Sumdog Learning platform. The training feature is still available to practise those skills your child finds tricky.

You will be tested on your spellings and times tables on Tuesday 11th January.  

Have a great weekend!

The Year 3 team

Reception 07th January 2022

Date: 7th Jan 2022 @ 10:33am

We have made a great return to school this week! 

This half term we are learning all about Julia Donaldson, our story this week is Zog. We have enjoyed playing in our dragon hut and writing what we would learn at dragon school. 

In Maths, we have been exporing numbers to 10 in different ways, using dominoes, counters, numicon and dice. We have also been using the lanuage of 'more or fewer' when comparing amounts. 

In Art this half term we will be looking at different textures. We had an experiment in Science - who could keep their ice cube frozen for the longest, exploring the season of winter. 

Year 5 Friday 7th January 2022

Date: 6th Jan 2022 @ 5:04pm

Welcome to this week’s Year 5 class blog

Happy New Year to all my Year 5 families. I hope you all had a great break and are ready to go in 2022!

This week in year 5

In Maths we have worked on equivalent fractions.  We have been converting fractions into equivalent fractions with both a higher and lower denominator and looking at finding the lowest term. This is a really tricky skill but the children will need to remember the rules with equivalent fractions – we can only use times and divide when making equivalent fractions and that whatever we do to the top we have to do to the bottom.  This week everyone has worked really hard to grasp the concept.

In English we have started reading Street Child. This book is about a child during the Victorian era who ends up becoming a runaway. The story describes his life on the streets at a difficult time. So far the children have made some predictions, discussed the thoughts and feelings of characters through freeze frame drama and showed scenes from the book and discussed each character.

In RE, the children started their Mission topic.  We have explored what it means to have a mission in life and how different people are called to their mission.  Next week we will be concentrating on our Holy Communion.  Please ensure that all sacramental programme folders are back in school for the church visit on Monday. You had a booklet to complete over the Christmas period that should also be returned.

In French, we learnt about how French people celebrate La fete des Rois - the Feast of the Epiphany. A special cake which contains a lucky charm is shared. Whoever gets the lucky charm in their slice becomes the King or Queen for the day. We then focussed on the phonic sound oi (wa) as in roi, listening to a song with lots of oi words and reading them. Tres bien! Bonne annee!

In PE, the children completed the train run warm up, we have some super runners in Year 5 and they all really trying their hardest.  Due to the cold weather we had to stay inside and had a spirited game of dodgeball and benchball.  Next week even if the weather is cold we will still be doing PE outside, so please send in plain, dark leggings or jogging pants so they can keep warm.  We are also suggesting thin gloves and hats if the children want to wear them. That way we will be able to split the class again and learn 2 different areas of PE each week.

We are studying history again this half term and our topic is the Victorian era. This fits alongside our English novel and will help with their understanding of the story.  We have had an introduction lesson where we looked at the industrial changes that happened and how this prompted migration from the countryside to the cities and the negative consequences this had on people. We discussed the lack of housing, jobs and food and the spread of infection, illness and disease.

In Art, the children returned their focus to the artist Jo Quigley and looked in more detail at the features of her work.  They have written a plan and chosen a specific piece of art for their inspiration and will sketch a rough plan ready for their final piece over the coming weeks.

In Science, the children had a wonderful lesson with Mrs Quillam.  They investigated words that can be used to decribe different materials that they may be working with scientifically. They then went on to write questions that would lead to a fair test and went back through their science books and discussed questions that could have been used for enquiries in their previous topics. Mrs Quilliam was very impressed with their enthusiasm and their ideas. I'm sure this will help the children with their experiments and enquiries in our next topic Properties and Changes of Materials.

DON’T FORGET (see above for further details)

Sacramental folders need returning for church on Monday.

Additional warm clothes for PE sessions required from next week.

Home Practice all relates to this week's learning - These are the tasks to be completed.

Reading - You all have a Home Reading book for year 5 so reading every night for 15-20 mins is essential. You also have a reading journal/diary that must be completed and signed. Some children had a break from reading over the holidays but please ensure this is made a priority now that we are back at school. Practice is vital to improve in all areas of English.

You can change your reading book on any school day (book bags to be left on Mrs Mulgrew's desk)

Maths – please ask your child what their times tables target is and help them practise this in order for them to progress.

I’d also encourage you to do a daily count with your child.  This week we are counting up in 4s, 0.4 and 0.04. Give the children a number to start from and they must continue to count from that number in 4s, 0.4 or 0.04 e.g. 3.2, 3.6, 4 or 1.13, 1.17, 1.21 etc.  This will help the children learn and remember strategies to help them in maths. 

Spellings words containing ‘ant’. We will look at these in more detail in school next week, they should be practised at home, ready for the test on Friday. 

Don’t forget the children have a big list of common exception words to learn. These can be practised each week to push your child further.  You will receive a sheet with these words on over the next few days, I have highlighted the words that your child spelled correctly in the spelling test before Christmas. This will give you an indication of how well they are remembering their spellings. Continue to practice these and will be assessed again near Easter.

antique, assistant, disadvantage, elephant, fantastic, gigantic, radiant, reluctant, want, advantage, ignorant, anticipate, defiant, important, distant

Sumdog challenges

PLEASE ENCOURAGE YOUR CHILDREN TO COMPLETE THE SUMDOG CHALLENGES, MANY CHILDREN ARE STILL NOT ACCESSING SUMDOG.

Please encourage your child to complete the Maths and Spelling Training. As you know, we set weekly challenges that are linked to the learning that takes place in school.  As an extra feature, the maths and spelling training sections will provide a tailored challenge for your child to practise skills, facts and words they find difficult.  Once the diagnostic challenges have been completed Sumdog will set challenges to aid improvement and development in the appropriate areas for your child.  Once you have completed the class challenges, please use this feature for extra challenge in both maths and spelling.  Many children have still not completed the diagnostic section.

Times tables have been set to reflect class targets

Maths the children have been set activities relating to fractions. 

Spellings words containing ‘ant’.

The children have worked hard this week and settled in well.

Year 1 Blog 7th January 2022

Date: 6th Jan 2022 @ 10:21am

Welcome to the first Year 1 Friday blog of the new year!

.

In our Phonics this week we have been recapping the phase 5 sounds. In particular, we have compared the phase 3 ow (cow) sound to the phase 5 ou (shout) sound. Keep practising these sounds at home!

In English we have started to learn about traditional tales (fairy tales). We talked about our favourite tale, explored the features that they have in them and then read the story of Hansel and Gretel. We then sang the Little Red Riding Hood songs on the BBC website, we loved them!

In Maths we have been looking at number patterns and counting in fives in particular. We spotted that the numbers end in either a 5 or a 0. We have been starting from different numbers and using our knowledge to solve challenges.

 In R.E. we finished our waiting topic and recapped why waiting is very important. We listened to 'Be still for the presence of the Lord' and took spent a few minutes thinking about making time for God.

In P.S.H.E, we started to explore healthy eating and how we can have a balanced diet - we know that we can have more of certain foods and have others for a treat.

 In French we learnt about how French people celebrate La fete des Rois - the Feast of the Epiphany. A special cake which contains a lucky charm is shared. Whoever gets the lucky charm in their slice becomes the King or Queen for the day. We chose some Kings and Queens in class by drawing cubes from a bag. Whoever got the lucky cube became le Roi or la Reine and was allowed to tell the rest of the class what to do for a short time! We also read a story and listened to a song about the feast day.

In Science we looked at our five senses and how we use them. We labelled which parts of our body are associated with each sense.

We've had a lovely first week back together, it has been great to see everyone working so hard!

Home Practice

Read for at least 10 minutes every night. This is so important. please sign the diary so we can change the books. Keep practicing reading the Tricky Words on sight. Please just write a note in the diary if you need the next set.

We have also been doing lots of counting. We have mainly been focusing on counting in 5s up to 100 (0, 5, 10, 15...) Please practise these at home. If you want a challenge, start from a different number that is not in the 5x table (e.g. 2, 6, 8...) We use a number square in class to help us with this, feel free to search '100 square' in Google to find one online.

Sumdog challenges

Phonics - ow and ou words

Maths - counting in 5s to 100

Online Safety Update

Date: 5th Jan 2022 @ 11:44am

Filters

Filters are amazing and can set healthy, age-appropriate boundaries for free on any device connected to the home WiFi. These can be set through a phone call to any internet provider and updated as children grow. Updates are incredibly important to gradually increase exposure and allow young people to build resilience as they mature. 

Make sure that you are aware that any devices with their own data sets, like phones, will need their filters set separately. And remember that you can set passwords to override the filter system so you don't miss out on any of the film releases that would be less suitable for your 10-year-old.

Safe search engines

For under 10s, setting the homepage to a safe search engine is an excellent way to overcome mishaps. We have all had a seemingly innocent image search go awry, and by using child-friendly sites like Smiggle, YouTube Kids and KidRex, we can reduce that risk substantially. Some large web search providers do have safe search options but, be aware, these are very easy to switch off.

As for older children (year 6), it's all about reinforcing the importance of responsibility. Leaning over a child's shoulder at all times or attempting to monitor their screens using apps is less likely to create a healthy relationship and more likely to teach them how to creatively sneak past you. 

Algorithms

Have you ever bought a pair of jeans and then been bombarded with ads for jeans for the next three months? That's an algorithm. They collect information and send us materials that will make us tick. While this may be great for our wardrobe, it can create problems regarding echo chambers and fake news.

Reinforce the importance of learning about the world from mainstream media channels rather than stories from social media or news suggestions from their phones. This can build a more balanced knowledge of the world within the home and help you recognise when you or your children are straying into conspiracy theories and bias debates, and instead form healthy informational environments.

Social media

Social media is often the centre of a young person's world and while many parents may have a Facebook account, they may be less au fait with the newer, young models.

For younger children, play around on social media sites alongside your child, learn together how to block and apply appropriate privacy settings to form a positive online space.

For older children, reinforce the message of accountability. What happens on the internet can be difficult to erase. Many young people have no interest in "friending" their parents, and respect of space can build trust, but if you have any concerns, ensure that the parents feel they can have an open a supportive dialogue to air out any worries. 

National Online Safety Training Hub

Continue to access all information on the National Online Safety website. You will get access to all videos and guides by clicking the link below and joining free to our school online safety hub.

http://nationalonlinesafety.com/enrol/st-oswald-s-catholic-primary-school-pr45eb

We have set up a watchlist which includes some videos and training we think you will find beneficial.

Year 4 Christmas Blog

Date: 17th Dec 2021 @ 1:59pm

Year 4

Christmas Blog Friday 17^th December 2021

Welcome to this week’s blog. What a busy week and a fantastic term we’ve had! 

Even though it has been the last week of term, we have still been working hard. We have written letters following our trip to Lancaster City Museum last week and learnt how to subtract 4-digit numbers using the formal written method.  In addition, we made Christmas cards and calendars, and learnt what the Romans built after they settled in Britain.

We hope you enjoyed listening to our Christmas carols on Tuesday afternoon and that this helped to put you in a festive mood. 

Mrs Tipping and Mrs Dexter would like to wish you all a happy, healthy and safe Christmas and New Year. Enjoy spending some quality time with your families. We look forward to seeing Year 4’s bright, smiley faces again on Tuesday 4^th January 2022.

Reception 17th December 2021

Date: 17th Dec 2021 @ 12:38pm

Reception have had an amazing first term in school. We would like to say a big 'Well Done' to them all.

This week we have been learning all about the Jolly Postman at Christmas and seeing where a letter goes after we have put it in the postbox. 

In Maths, we have been finding missing numbers and ordering them. 

In Science, we were using our balloons to make static eletricity. 

In the afternoon, we have been making our Christmas cards, calenders and tree decorations.  

Year 5 Christmas Blog

Date: 17th Dec 2021 @ 11:57am

What an amazing term Year 5 have had!

I have been blown away by the amazing work produced this term bit also with the enthusiasm the children have shown.

This week the children have enjoyed learning in a fun way.

We have carried on with fractions earlier in the week and then completed some fun maths mysteries later in the week. The children love completing them even though they have to complete a number of difficult challenges to solve the mystery.

We have finished our Christmas Carol topic in English, the children showed great skills whilst reading this book and were able to understand some really tricky words and link certain themes within the book. I was impressed with their comprehension of the book, let's hope they remember it when they move onto high school and study it again!

We have had an arty week, the children have used layered printing, over a number of sessions, to produce some lovely Christmas cards and also used sketching and printing to make seasonal calendars.

The children have done some fabulous research of the planets in science. They were really engaged and couldn't stop informing me of all the different facts they were finding out.

The children completed an outbreak challenge in computing where they have to try and stop a terrible outbreak with the use of face masks, vaccinations etc. They used various coding skills to complete the challenge. They then discussed how real scientists may use these types of skills to help with things like the pandemic. Some children were very keen to work in this field in the future.

We have continued to think about the preparations we are making for the coming of Jesus at Christmas. The children are trying to make a difference to others each day, with kind acts and kind words.

The children had a very spirited dodgeball competition this week. They were so enthusiastic and showed great promise for the dodgeball team next year.

The children have had a lot of festive fun as well this week including the Santa Dash, Carolling in the yard for the parents (thank you so much for such an amazing turnout) and attending the Christmas shop. We have also completed a number of Christmas activities on our last morning such as poetry writing, Santa beetle drive, Christmas cartoon strips and the fantastic Pirate maths game - they would have played it all morning!

Thank you so much for all your support this term.

No challenges have been set for the break but Sumdog will have the tailored challenges available for the children to access at any time. Also feel free to practise any times tables, number facts or mixed fraction to improper fraction games ( 3 ½  = 7/2 seven halves).

We would like to wish you all a very Happy and Holy Christmas, I hope you all get a good rest and have some peaceful times. I look forward to seeing you all back in January and send you all the best wishes for the New Year.

Tiny Tim said it best, "God bless us, everyone."

Year 6 Christmas Blog

Date: 16th Dec 2021 @ 7:18pm

Our last week in December has been very exciting filled with the Christmas pop-up shop, Christmas carols sang to the parents and the Christingle, which was led very well by the Year 6s! Mrs Hall and Mrs Washington, from All Hallows’, visited us this week to say hello and answered many questions about the life of the high school. They also informed us that there will be a taster day visit in the New Year.

Our learning in Year 6 this week:

• In our Design and Technology topic of sewing, we have planned, prepped, sewn, made mistakes, corrected those mistakes, persevered and finally completed our project. Please see the pictures on our website for their brilliant work.
• In PE, we have been working on creating a range of team strategies to outwit the opposing team. We then practiced them in a dodgeball match.
• In Maths, we used various problem solving skills to solve Math questions as a group.
• In English, to complete our World War One topic, we learnt about the Christmas Day truce of 1914 between the British and the Germans, through the Sainsbury’s advert.
• In Art, we learnt a new skill of printing, with paint and polystyrene to create our Christmas cards. Please check out the Year 6 gallery for pictures of the super artwork.
• In French, following last week’s ‘Who killed Santa?’ cluedo game, we recorded ourselves to practice our brilliant pronunciation. Joyeux Noel et bonne annee tout le monde!
• In Science, we conducted an experiment which focused on the inner workings of the digestion system in animals.

You will have also noticed that there is no Sumdog being set for the Christmas break so you can have a rest and come back fresh and ready for the exciting learning in January!

BUT please keep reading as much as possible – like I always say, ‘It is the number one thing that will unlock all your learning!’

Year 2 Christmas Blog

Date: 16th Dec 2021 @ 4:28pm

Welcome to our final blog of 2021!

We have had a fantastic term in Year 2 - well done for all your hard work!

Merry Christmas! 

We hope you all have a wonderful and peaceful Christmas with your family and friends.

We will look forward to seeing you in the New Year.

Thank you for all your support.

Miss Gravili, Miss Bennison and Mrs Whitworth.

Year 3 Christmas Blog

Date: 16th Dec 2021 @ 3:40pm

Merry Christmas everbody!

We have had an amazing first term in Year 3 - well done! 

Now enjoy spending time with your family and friends, relaxing, and having lots of fun. 

We look forward to seeing you in 2022. 

Miss Smith, Mr Campbell and Mrs Woof.