April Highlights from TLAP
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Nursery
We can’t believe it’s the end of another term in Nursery! The children have really grown this term with their social skills, communication and independence and it is a joy to be a part of this every day. The children have been working hard on their number sense and phonics, and the progress we have seen, has been amazing. They are also able to transfer the skills they have learnt into their free flow. Linked to our text Cave Baby, the children have been learning about babies. We have looked at difference and similarities between ourselves and them. As some children have younger siblings at home, they enjoyed sharing what they were able to do and how they help with them.
The children enjoyed making baby food during free flow. We discussed how it needed to be ‘smooth’ as babies don’t have any teeth to chew food. We discussed what parts of the body milk is good, and how it helps us grow. Children have again been busy in the mud kitchen, enjoying water and messy play and using their imagination to make some junk modelling creations. They are also developing their problem solving skills, as the adults ask the children to think of other ways of making things work.
It was fantastic to finally be able to put on a show for the parents, and we were all so proud of how the children learnt their song, and preformed it on the stage, at our Spring Concert. We hope you all enjoyed the fantastic singing, which brought a tear to so many adults in the room! The children (and adults) enjoyed the stay and play, and it was great to finally have parents in the classroom! The children enjoyed showing their adult what they can do, and what we have available to them in Nursery. It was also nice to see the children still following the routines and showing their adults how we do the ‘stop sign’, and telling them “you now have to stop!” Thank you for all the homework which was handed in.
Reception
The children have had an amazing term! They have now secured good relationships with friends and staff and are always ready to learn new things! We also celebrated our 101st day at school where we decorated ourselves as Dalmatians and took part in some fun activities like shopping and baking!
We have been busy reading our key texts in Talk for Writing, including ‘Supertato’ and ‘Handa’s Surprise’. Reception have been very creative with making up their own signs and actions to help them remember and read the story maps which have progressed their oral story telling skills. The children have also been able to extend their vocabulary associated with these texts and are applying it to their everyday play and writing. The children really enjoyed being on the lookout for the Evil Pea from Supertato and then they came up with their own innovated super villain! Recently, the children have been reading Handa’s Surprise where they revisited African animals and fruits such as mangoes and guavas. They changed the African animals and fruits in this story into Arctic animals and warm clothing to create their own version of the story!
In Maths, we began the term learning about height, length and distance. We took part in activities where we measured ourselves in height order and built towers of different heights. We put our origami skills to the test and made paper aeroplanes to fly; we then measured the distances they landed at, it was a lot of fun! The children have learnt how to use Numicon to find number bonds to 10. They have also looked at comparing two numbers to say if one is more or less than the other. Many of the children have been having a go at writing number sentences to reflect their understanding of number bonds. We have also revisited our learning of 2D shapes and have learnt more names and features of 3D shapes and linked them to shapes in our everyday lives such as a sphere football or a cuboid cereal box! As a link to our learning of Kenya, we have looked at Kenyan art patterns and made repeated patterns with different objects around the class!
In Topic, the children have been learning all about plants and Kenya. Reception have been busy planting seeds outdoors as well as indoors and investigating which elements they need to grow a healthy plant. The children know that plants need water, soil and sunlight to grow. We investigated whether plants such as cress seeds needed soil to grow by planting the seeds in cotton wool and we found out that we can indeed grow plants without soil! This week we have further investigated whether or not we need sunlight to grow plants. We have placed plants in three different locations in terms of lighting and are eagerly awaiting the results of their growth to see if our predictions were right! We had a special talk with Mrs Abdi from Year 2. She comes from Kenya and shared her knowledge about Kenyan food, activities and general life in such an amazing country which is also home to so many different kinds of food and animals!
We have enjoyed learning about the many festivals and celebrations that are taking place this month including Ramadan, Vaisakhi and Easter. Reception wishes you all a happy, healthy break and hope you enjoy all of your celebrations if you are celebrating!
Year 1
What a wonderful term we have had in Year 1. We have really enjoyed writing our very own weather reports based on the story ‘Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs’. The children innovated the story and added their favourite foods. We had a lot of fun imagining what it would be like if it rained prickly pickles or snowed pink candy floss!
We have also listened to a story called 'Rain' and learnt lots of interesting facts about Venice.
In Maths, we have been exploring capacity, volume, weight and mass. The children had a lot of fun using the scales to weigh objects from around their classrooms and comparing them.
In Science, we have learnt all about the seasons and explored what types of weathers are usually weathers associated with then in the United Kingdom. We have discussed why we have many more daylight hours during the Summer months, compared to the Winter months. This linked nicely to our Geography learning, in which we learnt about hot and cold places around the world and where the equator is and what this means.
We hope you all have a wonderful break and please remember to do lots of reading and writing at home! We can't wait to see you in two week’s time.
Year Two
Year 2 have been very busy this last half term. We have had a fantastic Science show where we looked at the fire triangle. The children had an amazing time where they learned about what fire needs to ignite and burn, however our main learning was all about keeping ourselves safe around possible fire hazards!
Our term has been all about the ‘Take One Picture’ where we have looked at The Fighting Tem-eraire, the children have loved this topic and have really engaged in J.M.W Turner’s artwork. We have also looked into the history of tea trade, were we investigated the terrible side of the East India Trading Company and explored how Smugglers made expensive tea available for all by mix-ing it with sheep dung and sawdust! Finally, Year 2 enjoyed our Vaisakhi celebrations and the children celebrating the festival loved coming in their own traditional clothing. Have a great half term break, enjoy and keep safe from the Year 2 team.
Year Three
This term has been jammed packed with activities for Year 3.
In Science this term, we have been focusing on the Skeleton and muscles in the human body as well as classifying animals into Vertebrates and Invertebrates. The children enjoyed creating their own skeletons with salt dough and labelling the different bones. They created their own forearm with elastics that represented the biceps and triceps and the contraction and relaxation of the muscles. In the last week, the children completed an investigation where they hypothesized what would happen without bones in our bodies.
This term in Maths, the children have been looking at money and measurements. They learnt how to add and subtract with money as well as convert pence into pounds. During our measurement topic, they learnt how to measure in centimetres, millimetres and metes using a range of equipment like trundle wheels, metre sticks, tape measures and rulers. The children then went on to learn how to convert millimetres to centimetres and centimetres to metres. Finally, the children learnt about the perimeter of a 2D shape and how to calculate it.
For the first part of English this term, the children explored newspaper reports. They looked at how newspaper reports are written, structured and what should be included. They explored writing headings and subheadings as well as including relevant photos. They then had a go at writing their very own newspaper report about Archaeology Day. In the second part of English, the children looked at writing a descriptive setting. They used their senses to help them describe a setting about Stonehenge.
In History, the children explored life in the Stone, Bronze and Iron Ages. They looked at many different aspects of each period of time including their clothing, housing, diets and tools and weapons. Using this knowledge, they were then able to answer our Big Question for the term which was: Would you prefer to live in the Stone, Bronze or Iron Age? The children were also lucky enough to have an archaeologist come in for the day to teach them how to be archaeologists themselves. The day focused on broadening children's knowledge of the skills needed to be archaeologists as well as deepening their understanding of prehistory. They looked at digging in a pit, washing their finds, understanding stratigraphy, aerial photography, recording small finds and dissecting coprolites. The children also enjoyed a whole Stone Age day where they got to build their own version of Stonehenge, they learnt interesting information about the Stone, Bronze and Iron Ages and finally, ended the day with a battle between the Romans and the Iron Age Celts and a variety of warrior training games.
At the start of term in Art, the children looked at drawings of animals to help them create their very own drawings for our Art Exhibition. Later on in the term, the children used our topic of Prehistory to create their very own cave art. They explored cave art in the Lascaux Caves, first copying a section of it themselves on crinkled brown paper, then using their knowledge of cave art to make their very own prehistoric artwork on rocks
We hope that everyone has a restful holiday and we look forward to seeing you all next term.
Year Four
It is here! The end of the Spring term, and what fantastic experiences the children have had! When we started, after the Christmas holidays, the children hit the ground running learning all about the Ancient Egyptians. They wrote excellent stories in English, which they then converted into graphic novels. In Maths, they learnt many different ways to multiply numbers and how to work out the area of rectilinear shapes. The children had great fun building their own pyramids out of clay and finished them off with gold paint.
The children then went to Ufton Park to help their understanding of and role-played a court room. The children are looking forward to the residential in July!
Also, this term the children have taken part in various Discovery Days, where they have explored around a particular theme. In January, they worked around equality and diversity, in February the children spent a whole day creating mosaics in an Art day. In March, the children had World Book day and we based our work around the story ‘A boy named Wonder’. More recently, the children explored the local grounds of the school and created their own maps in a Geography discovery day.
The ancient Romans was the next theme and the children were fully immersed in fun and memorable experiences. Some children have been carrying out a project to make a Roman road; all the children have made Roman catapults and the children have been finding out about how diverse Roman society was. In Science, the children have been carrying out practical experiments to see how the water cycle works. In English, the children learnt about the fearsome Roman rebel, Boudicca and then based their own information text on the Ivory Bangle Lady.
The children have worked extremely hard over the last few months and it has been great to see all of them flourish. All year 4 staff would like to say a big thank you to all families for your support this term. We hope you all enjoy the holidays.
Year Five
Throughout the term Year 5 have enjoyed a multitude of science investigations all based around states of matter. This has allowed children to improve their enquiry skills and their understanding of fair testing. As it has been so experimenting based, Year 5 have been able to take on a hands-on approach to their learning discovering new things about the natural world, trying not to get the school too messy in process! In recent weeks, a group of children were able to watch The Langley Academy’s production of Mary Poppins. After watching this, children were able to use the lessons learnt to coach Year 3’s in drama skills. We have also been exploring Shakespeare’s plays this half term, as Year 5 have been immersed in his wider works through taking part in drama activities. In computing children have been learning how to design a blueprint for a two-floor gallery. Making sure to mark out features including doors, exhibitions, stairs and expected crowd levels. In PE, the children have been practicing gymnastics, which has been beneficial for their coordination and fitness. Finally, some students have ended the term celebrating Vaisakhi by wearing traditional clothing to celebrate the birth of the Khalsa.
This week has been a fantastic final week of the Spring term for Year 5. We have been working hard to complete our final pieces of work ready for the exhibition that took place on Thursday, which we all thoroughly enjoyed. In DT we constructed our model stages based on Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream. In writing we have finished writing our adapted playscripts based on A Midsummer Night’s Dream and in Maths we have continued to investigate decimals.
Year Six
A very busy term is coming to an end. This week we have brought our latest freeflow projects to a conclusion, celebrating our work with an exhibition. We have also concluded our work on the partition of India, by sequencing all the discussed events into a chronological timeline, of facts and images. Our maths and reading sessions have analysed the recent mock SAT tests and considered in which we might target our revision. Swimming lessons continue to be both enjoyable and productive, with all of us becoming water confident and developing our strokes. As we head into the holiday, it is important that Year 6 find a balance between rest and relaxation, activity and fresh air, and their ongoing studies, as they look ahead to the Year 6 SATs tests (week of 9th May). On behalf of the whole Year 6 team, have a wonderful break.
