Friday 25th September 2020

Friday 25th September 2020.

Maths

This week we have been looking at doubling and halving in our maths lessons using multilink and pictorial representations to calculate and write our number sentences. 

We discovered that doubling means using the same number twice and then adding them together to find a new total. On our tables we talked about the ways we could help ourselves double such as using our fingers, counters and multilink to show the two groups and then adding them.

During our second lesson we used the knowledge we had gained about doubling to create picture sentences in our books to show the doubling of a number we had rolled on a dice and then write a number sentence.

Later in the week we started halving numbers using the concept of sharing objects between two groups equally. We role played being on a picnic and sharing out food between the people there to make sure that everyone got the same amount saying "one for me, one for you". After that we went outside and used hoops as sharing circles to find half of a range of numbers.

Ask your child what they discovered about odd and even numbers in that lesson. 

In our last lesson we used all the information that we had learnt over the week to complete maths challenges in our books that cover doubling and halving.

English

We have been practising our cursive hand writing and letter formations then applying our technique to list and caption writing based on the traditional tale of Jack and the Beanstalk. We watched a video of the story and made a list of the characters in the order they appear. We started by practising cursive using chalk on the playground to write our names. 

  We discussed the features of a list and how to organise it clearly so that the reader can discover the information about which characters were in the tale. 

During our caption lesson we explored the meaning and purpose of a caption and practised matching words to pictures of Jack and the Beanstalk before writing our own caption for each picture. 

Computing.

This week in computing we looked at the features of a laptop and then labelled each part and its function on our picture of a laptop. We discussed the key buttons on the key board such as the space bar and backspace buttons and practised using our mouse control. 

We explored some of the programs on the laptop including word and the calculator and discussed how to log on and off our laptops safely.

Geography

This week we had our first Year 1 Geography lesson where identified the geographical and man made features of our school grounds. We were shown close up and far away photos of our school. We then used positional language to describe the location of different areas e.g. the play equipment, our classroom door etc. We discussed seasonal changes and how different areas of the school look during different seasons. 

Phonics 

This week we have been looking at our phase 2 and three sounds and using our phoneme fingers to sound out and blend a range of words effectively. We discussed CVC words and identified where in each word the vowel was positioned. We re-capped the digraph flash cards and had some practice writing some words which use digraphs. 

Friday the 18th September 2020.

On Monday we became secret spies attempting to decode a message using our super spy reading skills.

Each letter of the alphabet had a number given to it between 1 and 26. The children matched the number code to each letter in order to the read the message. Children were then encouraged to use the letters to try and write their own messages and decode each others.

Have a go at writing codes for each other at home using this key:

We have started our phonics this week with a re-cap of the phonic flash cards and key sounds, including our common digraphs. 

We had our first handwriting session using the letter-join program that we use at Crabtree  The children practised using their pincer pencil grip, hand and wrist mobility for letter forming and muscle memory to form each letter.

Our last lesson of the day saw us discussing a video all about being unique but still being a part of a team. The video "only one you" shares ideas about how different and colourful we all are and ways that we can celebrate being an individual. After the video we shared ideas about what makes each of us unique before decorating our stones in colours and patterns of our choice.

On Tuesday we explored our observation and memory tray game. The children sat in a circle and talked about the objects they could see on the tray in front of them. After a few minutes of studying the tray the children were asked to close their eyes while the teacher removed one of the objects from the tray. 

Once eyes were re-opened children took turn to try and guess the missing object. After the game we discussed different strategies that children had used to help them remember and what skills we had used as we played.

After break we enjoyed a postcard writing activity where we wrote to our favourite book character, a friend or family member to tell them all about some of the activities we had been doing. 

We talked about the need for capital letters, letters on the line, finger spaces and full stops. The children were then given their own postcard template and encouraged to write their own postcard.

In the afternoon we explored two CHIL sessions and made the most of the outside space and the lovely sunshine. We had an English writing activity session and then a construction CHIL exploring building with a wide range of building resources. 

Wednesday started with a maths CHIL session exploring number counting and matching numbers. 

After lunch we enjoyed an art lesson about the artist Kandinsky and looked at some examples of his paintings. We talked about the colours and techniques that he used to create his artwork and then used our own colour mixing to make marks on our paper in his style. 

We enjoyed our first RE lesson and learnt all about creation and what that means to different people. Christians believe that God created the world, so we made our own creations out of building materials. We talked about how they were special to us and why it is important to look after our creations. 

We all visited the Library in our class groups at the start of the afternoon and had an opportunity to change our reading books if we wanted to. We listened to our teachers reading and then shared ideas on what makes an exciting story. our last lesson of the day was our Creative art CHIL where we explored a range of materials and used our colour knowledge from last week to mix up some colours to use to create our pictures. 

Friday gave us some time to practise our letter-join handwriting patterns and to improve our letter formation muscle memory.  

After lunch we took part in another of our Jigsaw sessions all about being unique but also being a part of a class we discussed our rights and responsibilities to ensure everyone has a safe and happy learning experience at school. 

Have a lovely weekend,

The Year 1 team.