Rabbits' blog 21
Date: 30th Jun 2024 @ 7:37am
Blog 21
This is probably the penultimate blog for this academic year. Time is running away with us, right? The children are getting tired and it's time to start mentioning the 't' word (year Two). I am good at this transition stuff- I nurture, I encourage questions and spend a lot of time considering what each child needs from me over the last few weeks. Some need a lot of reassurance that I am going nowhere and will still be around for them, some need to know that they will be ok- they've done this moving on before and they will do it again, some need to know where they will put their book bag and when they will have PE. Often they just need to hear what they actually already know- it will probably be me, Miss Jones or Mr Brown, they know where to line up at 8.40, they know where to go to the toilet, they know what the lessons will be, that playtimes are the same, that they will see their friends. In fact, once the intial - gosh it's change- feeling has subsided, the excitement can start and we can go and wander round their potential classroom, talk about how wonderful Year 2 will be. Your own excitement will be crucial (often it is harder for us carers to grapple with the change than it is for our children!Th). You will find out with the report in the last week and I will go full throttle with the excitement and transition for those last few days.
In the meantime, they're still mine and we are still working hard to grow our brains and remember to choose kindness. Last week we started our writeaway (English writing assessment piece for our Let Your Writing Shine board). This is to be a factfile about a sea creature. We have already practised the style with whales, seagulls and jellyfish so we have chosen turtles (because in our Stanley book, he got swallowed by a turtle). have you noticed that they are talking about why these creatures are endangered? They seem very interested! I did have to make a special point that turtles are not known to lay eggs in North Wales!
Maths is full of partitioning and place value. This is a vitally important part of the curriculum that enables such a strong foundation for the rest of their maths lives and we are expanding it from 50 to 100 this week. At home you can help by:
- noticing numbers around (on house doors, in shops)
- talking about 50-100 numbers in terms of their tens and ones (68 is 6 tens and 8 ones units . If 81 has 8 tens, how many tens does 91 have?
- encourage writing PPW of the number (they will show you. We'll be doing a lot of this over the next few days)
- Start considering strategies for adding and taking away these larger amounts (86-11 = 86-10 = 76, 76-1=75). Letting them see the tens and ones and discouraging counting on and back in ones.
- counting on and back from 50-100. 'Normal' way and also '5 tens and 1, 5 tens and 2, 5 tens and 3 etc)
- I'm thinking of a number that has 7 tens.It has more than 3 ones but less than 8. What could my number be?
We have Mrs Griffiths (y4) coming to take a look at our computing on Monday. Some of us are striding away with programming; some of us needing support to log on and know the difference between username, password and cursor control. We are using mazes to programme an object to navigate around the maze. Such fun! I have 'programmed' ;) Purple Mash so that these exercised can be done at home on their account weekly alongside some other learning games.
In short the rest of the curriculum:
geography- atlas mania! (did you see the Twitter video?)
science- growing our sunflower and understanding classification keys
RE- how to Muslims welcome babies into their faith?
art- making our 3D birds
music- keeping to a pulse
phonics- the Grow the Code y1 is almost complete!
This week will be a little different because Y2 have their residential on Wednesday and Thursday. I will have the pleasure of the Y1 cohort for these 2 days (with TA support!). We will move to the Squirrels/Otters classrooms for some of the time (transition start and practicality). I have planned a possible mini sports day (#weatherdependent) and a potential y1 carer show case on Friday 3pm (#halltimedependent). Wish me lots of luck!!
I get a bit emotional thinking of them leaving me so forgive me. I love them.I will miss them. I will be there in autumn for them (but will allow them space to bond with their new teacher first). The next few weeks ramps up for staff in terms of busy-ness but my focus will be on the transition for them, squeezing out every possible bit of learning and enjoying them to the maximum.
Mrs H
