Week Ending 10/05/24
Date: 14th Apr 2024 @ 11:50am
Happy Friday! This week we have started our new story ‘Gigantosaurus’. The children were very excited to find some dinosaur eggs in the classroom and had lots of fun discussing the new arrivals. We have only read the first couple of pages of the story but talked a lot about the habitats and features of dinosaurs. The adults had great fun when the children suggested that dinosaur fossils were first found in 1964!
As the weather (hopefully) is getting and staying warmer, can I please ask that all pupils have a water bottle with them in school every day as well as a sunhat that can be left in their tray. Please do ensure suncream is applied before school. If your child does require a top up at lunch time, we recommend keeping a roll on one to be kept in their book bag should they require it. Thank you.
Dates for the diary this term:
Tuesday 21st May - Class Photos - Children to come in their smartest uniform please including a jumper/cardigan.
Wednesday 22nd May - Instinct Wellness Challenge (Children to come into school in normal PE kit).
Friday 24th May – EYFS Sports Day 9am (weather permitting). We ask that your child come to school in either a yellow, red, blue or green top, this is dependent on which coloured house your child is in.
Beeston – RED
Cholmondeley – BLUE
Peckforton – GREEN
Chester – YELLOW
Normal PE shorts/leggings/jogging bottoms and trainers to be worn with your coloured top.
Wednesday 5th June - Trip to Park Hall Farm (please can you ensure you have completed the electronic permission slip for your child to attend).
Talking Point
Next week is Mental Health Awareness Week. We will be talking with the children about ways to look after their mental health as well as their physical health. You could create a ‘wellbeing box’ at home by placing things that make them happy in a decorated box. Talk to your child about what makes them happy and how they look after their wellbeing.
Little Wandle (Phonics)
This term we move onto Phase 4 in our phonics journey! The children do not learn any new phonemes or graphemes. Instead, they are taught to further manipulate the phonemes and graphemes they have already learnt. They will begin to explore more polysyllabic words (words containing more than one syllable) and read and spell words containing adjacent consonants. E.g. string, milk, brush, scoop etc. Phase 4 requires the children to blend an increasing number of sounds together. These words are often referred to in relation to how many vowels and consonants they contain.
E.g. CVC words (consonant / vowel / consonant) such as sad, net, him.
This week we have been focusing on longer words such as handstand, script, blossom, blanket and children. We have also learnt the tricky words there, when, what and one.
As always, please see the downloadable attachment below to practise the phase 4 words and tricky words we have been learning this week.
In Maths, we have been continuing to consolidate our understanding of number bonds to 10. This week we have been learning about the related subtraction facts meaning that if I only had the 'whole' and only knew one part, what would the other part be to make 10? We've used our fingers to 'take away' to find the missing part. Remember we always take away from our 'whole' which is 10. A good game to play is to have a bag or a cup and hide 10 of something inside. Pull out a number of them and ask your child to tell you how many is inside. For example, there are 10 pasta shells inside my bag but I have pulled out six. How many are left? We can show this in a part-whole model or number sentence. 10 - 6 = 4.
On Tuesday, we found a big surprise when we came into the classroom after the weekend… a nest of eggs! We found out that they were dinosaur eggs and that our new story is ‘Gigantosaurus’.
On Wednesday, we tried our hand at some javelin throwing on the field. We then spent some time outside. Our garden (new outdoor area name) is a little sun trap in the afternoon so we kept hydrated to keep us cool.
On Thursday, we pretended to be the dinosaur’s mummies and wrote them warnings about Gingantosaurus. In the afternoon we created a simple timeline until the present day to look at when dinosaurs roamed the earth. We also put key historical events on including our own birthdays! We dedicated the afternoon to learning about Mary Anning and Elizabeth Philpott as female paleontologists. The children loved exploring photos and artefacts including some fossils and dinosaur bones.
On Friday, we practised some of the races the children will be taking part on Sports Day (May 24th). The children have really cracked the relay race now!
Congratulations to our stars of the week Niko and Henry!
Our mystery reader this week was Lara's Mum. Thank you for coming to share your story with us!
Have a lovely weekend!
Miss Selwyn and Miss Woodward
