Mrs H's blog
Blog 8/ Monday 6th January
So how much are we loving the snow right now? I love looking at it, but I must admit dealing with all those freezing hands, wet socks and puddles on the carpet is not my favourite thing in the classroom! Let's hope they get to enjoy it today and roll on spring!
Spring term is always the one where I expect- and push for- a lot of academic progress. They are comfortable in class and know the routines, expectations and each other so we can focus on the learning. We have a lot to do. You won't believe the high standards Little Wandle produces; they will be learning so much code and it will have a great impact on their reading if we can keep practising every day at school and at home. I will send home a Grow the Code chart later this half term so you can study it with your child (with some helpful hints). I will talk about this and other learning 'stuff' in the Parent Partnership meeting next Thursday 2:45.
Maths is all about tens and ones (units) over the next 6 weeks. It is massively important that they understand that tens digit is not a '1' but one 10. We will be working within numbers to 20 to make this abundantly clear so that numbers to 100 will seem effortless to understand in the future. This is also the basis for + - x ÷ so we will be doing important work! At home replicate this by using real objects as much as possible; they need to 'see' the amount before they have to deal with it in any form of equation. This could look like bundles of twigs, frozen peas, pasta, pens, socks...
Teachers have been busy discussing and trying to organise our spring trip. We are looking to be ambitious, arty and different; we will be thanking the PTA heartedly for the money for coaches to keep the cost down for you. So watch this space!
The basic curriculum is - as always- on our class page for your perusal. Check out the new rabbit picture as well! It looks very much like me right this moment.
Thank you in advance for your support this term; I appreciate it.
Mrs H
Tuesday 10th December
Look at the little cherubs! This was our dress rehearsal photo last Friday and we were SO excited. I love how they get so much joy out of looking at each other's costumes and telling them they look great. #ChooseKindness. The team were relieved and happy to have such lovely feedback from the show last night. I think we all enjoyed it a great deal - after the event when we could relive it, whereas sitting there in the church is a nerve-racking time for staff! I had to take a breath during a longer Y2 narration bit and just be in the moment and feel so immensely proud of their confidence and abilities. This morning in register it was 'question'- "Not including yourself, which actor/s did you really enjoy watching last night?" Every single child had a character and a reason. Gosh is it really only December and not June for these wonderful Rigorous Rabbits?!
On the subject of register...we do something different every day. Have they told you? So far our favourites are: singing, French, Spanish, Italian, German, Japanese, Toy Story, Mr & Mrs, Prince/Princess, backwards, question and my personal favourite- whisper ;) It is an important part of our day when we make eye contact and they feel welcomed and noticed by me; that and our 8:40 elbow bumps! Something to ask them about!
As much as we love this time of year, it is busy. We will be maintaining the learning timetable pretty much until next Thursday. Apart from the curriculum demands, I find that maintaining routine helps keep them making good choices with friends and behaviour. Ok so we may fit in a bit of 'choosing' here and there and we did an impromptu show n tell this afternoon, but we are also doing our daily phonics, reading, maths, maths mastery, plus geography, RE, science. I will not be putting on a film- they can do that at home, snuggling with you; and to be honest watching a 5min Numberblocks is a test of (my) patience and endurance, so instead we'll play and sing and dance and make and laugh and have stories.
I am trying to do phonics assessments at the moment. These check their rapid recognition of our new Y1 GPCs (oy, a-e, ew etc), their ability to read 15 words containing the GPCs (and can they do it with automaticity- without sounding out but reading in their head and then saying it), 5 tricky words (could, want, people, their, your) plus a sentence. So far they are super confident with the GPCs and the thing to work on is them understanding what they are reading so it makes sense (eg The mouse hided instead of hides/ the tiger trees instead of tries). But they have already come a long way in a term and some are absolutely flying. It fills my heart!
Maths is all about shape, focussing more on 3D shapes- what they are called and describing their properties (ie this is a cone because it has a curved surface and a circular face on one end). They love the 3D shape song if you are bored of the Jonas Brothers - Like it's Christmas... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=guNdJ5MtX1A I warn you- we embrace the US accent! I challenged them to make a list of common 3D objects around home (making sure they label them with the mathematical language eg tissue box- cuboid). Housepoints and maybe a red sticker if I'm feeling very generous!
Lots and lots for me to do before the weekend, let alone the end of term so I'll love you and leave you until January. Thank you for all your support this term. I do appreciate it.
Mrs H
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Friday 15th November/blog 6
Nativity practices are underway, full timetable continues, Coughing Central is our new classroom name and we are loving life!
I shouted out at the end of Friday, 'If they don't come home wanting to dance, make them!' Did they tell you why? Because we are all learning our grande finale nativity dance and we have grasped the first minute's choreography. I love how quickly there are learning to pick up all new things; it's as if they are ready to be open to all that year 1 life and learning now involves. I will be working hard to maintain and maximise this motivation!
Our text is The Owl Who Is Afraid of the Dark and we have read the first few pages (the slow reveal is crucial so please don't read ahead!) and we are rapidly becoming owl experts. This will continue over the next couple of weeks as we head towards our 'writeaway'. This is the piece of writing that is independent and will form our next piece for our Let Your Writing Shine board. We will be writing a non-chronological report about owl facts based on their appearance, food and habits. The whole month's English learning is geared up to this series of lessons and I will be looking for the following criteria to see how much progress has been made:
finger spaces- are letters snuggled but not touching? Are the finger spaces clear so that the reader can easily read your work?
making sense- do your sentences make sense to the reader or have you missed out a word?
capital letters at the start of sentences
full stop at the end of each idea
presentation- have you started at the edge of your page (for each line)? Have you written kinetic 'right'? Are your lower case letters smaller than your capitals?
spelling- have you copied the work bank words accurately?
There's a lot right? But this is the most of the Y1 English curriculum in a nutshell and each half term will get better and better. What can you do at home to help?
- copy writing is really beneficial at the moment. Their Little Wandle book is perfect for this. Focus on presentation and the right size lined paper (not too big). Our current presentation goals as a class are: 'proper' finger spaces (ie not having finger spaces within words, or finger spaces that are smaller than the spaces within letter in words), lower case letters being a uniform size that is clearly different to capital kinetic. Feel free to let them bring it in to show me.
- write them little notes - but make a couple of presentation errors so that is harder for them to read and they can tell you that!
- could they make their own fact file about an interest? (defo golden book and red sticker opps here!)
- provide 'real' writing experiences - they write out the shopping list; they sign and write Christmas cards (our tricky words last week were: Mr & Mrs so I'll be giving housepoints to those who spell my name correctly :) Missis
- Use their reading books to count the ideas (be selective as story books will have several within a sentence if they have used a conjunction!) and then count the corresonding full stops.
I could go on about split vowel digraphs, number bonds to 10, maps, Shabbat, animal babies, Purple Mash, No Outsiders (anti-bullying week)...but let's leave that for another blog. Until then keeeeeeeeeeeeep them reading like a writer and writing like a reader. And singing and dancing of course!
Mrs H
p.s. Here is a trailer of what looks like a great family (owl!) film to watch on these drizzly afternoons... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x8RKCmkOyB4
20th October
It's a time of joy at school at the moment, and I don't mean because we are successfully almost completing the first half term (#Crawling!), but that there have been so many times we have enjoyed the Rabbits being rigorous. They coped well with the flu jab. I think the downpour completely distracted them from the 'nose tickle', the former lasting a great deal longer than the seconds of the latter. We've done a lot of art for our curriculum but also incorporating our 175th anniversary- hope you liked the trees in the windows and the ones on display during the open day. On Friday we had a short master class with a real life professioonal artist who is creating a tiled collage for our 175th anniversary with every child and member of staff. I think we need more clay in our lives so watch this space. Music has been a daily source of pleasure (wonder if Mrs Line would say the same about her Thursday afternoons??!) as we learnt some new songs (I'm looking ahead to our class assembly already!) and how to use a glockenspiel. #Such fun. Hope you saw the 3 videos on Twitter. Certainly made me laugh and proud in equal measure!
Maths is all about part and wholes and fact families. Fact families (number bonds, number friends) are basically a crucial element of the foundation of all maths. We have started to record our fact families as: Part Whole diagrams and number sentences. This week and into the next half term will be learning our number bonds to 10 off by heart. One of my 'go to' games is Wipeout. It can be used for number bonds, doubles, +1 -1 etc etc. Here's how to play it:
- each player draws a 9 square tic tac toe/0 and X board.
- use a dice, roll and record the practising fact family.
- take it in turns until each player has filled their board.
- repeat the process of rolling the dice but now wipe out if you have the answer on your board. If you don't, you don't do anything. Next player's turn.
- first player to wipe out completely wins.
- repeat.
This week we will play this with fact families of 5 and a bit. So each child will roll the dice and add that amount to 5 and record it. They already know 5 +1, 5+2, 5+3, 5+4, 5+5 well and it needs to be engrained to the point of off by heart. Wipeout can be played by themselves or with lots of players.
One key 'mastery' element is to ask your child what number they need to roll on their dice to wipe out '8' (etc) although I can't promise that this will encourage a competitive element of 'manipulating' the dice to get it!
In English this week we are turning to poetry in anticipation of our new book next half term. As one of the curriculum expectations is to recite poetry off by heart, I am hoping to put on a low-key performance on Wednesday afternoon (if weather is on our side). We will be ready for hometime at 3:15 and will stand outside/at our outside door and will perform our brief poem to you. We'll start just before 3.20 as we can so you are not held up to get other siblings. Get the message out so you don't miss it!
After that it will mark the start of parents' evenings. Wednesday - I'll see you in the hall. Thursday: I'll see you online. I'll phone you if the connection is bad or we get cut off before the 10min time limit.
I love my Rigorous Rabbits and we are in a great learning place going forward to Christmas. Now let's enjoy the last week and then a chance to recuperate!
Mrs H
Thursday 3rd October
It's been a great week. We are really absorbing our timetable, behaviour and learning expectations and generally becoming Year 1. I'm proud of them. At lunch today (and we had such a giggle about the 'posh dogs' in register!) Mrs Bennink-Meyer and myself were only saying how quickly they are now taking on new things- getting their own drink and pudding independently. It's quite a manoevre balancing that tray of food to get a cup of water! We have also been pushing manners as well at lunchtime. They are always given choices (beans or peas/sweetcorn or salad etc, gravy? garlic bread?) and it is becoming much more automatic to add the 'please' onto their answer. I am also encouraging it in the classroom - if you are being given something by an adult, say thank you and if you want something from me, make me want to say yes by using your manners. Like I said, they are definitely getting into the habit.
In maths we are moving away from < > = and starting to look at number lines and Part Whole method. This is basically an alternative way of writing a number sentence. It helps to make the concept of the addition and subtraction make sense. There are some things that we need the children to know off by heart- all number bonds to 10, counting on and back in 1s, 2s, 5s and 10s- over the course of this year but we always work on what it means and how to work it out, rather than just rote learning. (If only I'd learnt maths the way it is taught in primary now!) We spent a whole lesson (#NoPunIntended!) getting our 'whole' and dividing it up into parts, then putting it back again (in our hands). The main misconception to deal with is- tear that paper into 2 parts and they tear off 2 bits but that leaves 3 parts! We had great fun tearing paper and peeling satsumas. Try it at home with dinner: you have a whole fishfinger/chip/sandwich, cut it into 2 parts. How many parts have you got? Are they equal? (not important that they are/n't at this stage). I hope they'll be saying: I know this is the whole because it is all here with no parts taken out. If eating is a bit of a battleground, you could adapt it to: here is your whole .... You know it is the whole because it is all there with nothing taken out; now eat a part. Is it still the whole? (no) Now eat 2 parts... Love maths!
In English we have finished Meesha Makes Friends and did our final assessment/writeaway piece over the last 3 days. Finger spaces are coming out as the first thing to deal with but I love their resilient attitude towards putting pen to paper. Have they told you about the Green Pens yet? We are authors who edit and publish!
Harvest festival practices have taken over today a little as we aim to peak on Monday. We had our first run through of the whole event and even got the microphones working for the y2 narrators! I sincerely hope you see the joy in their singing (and dancing!) even when they are faced with all you grown ups- it will be quite daunting for them but I have faith in them and it is such a joyful occasion. At the end of the performance we will be taking them straight back to class. This is partly because it will be a nightmare trying to organise them if they run to you and partly because it could create a detachment issue and I'd really rather not have to peel them off you if we can avoid it! I'll be telling them to smile before the performance and wave and blow a kiss at the end after Rev Jim/Mrs Forrester have finished. Try not to engage with them too much during the performance, just sit back and enjoy and feel immensely proud. (I will do the same about 8pm with some birthday 'juice'!!)
Finally look out for the message about parent conferences (see dates for your diary) that is coming soon. I will also be sending home Cauliflower cards (what is it with cauliflowers right now?!) on Friday. You must submit your order online before you send in the form and completed Christmas card.
Time to plan some more wholes and parts!
Mrs H
Thursday 19th September
'Settling in' period is technically almost at an end in as much as we have got to grips with the routines and sitting at tables, using books and what a context label is etc. There is still LOADS to learn about the classroom rules and expectations but I'm really happy with their progress and learning behaviour attitudes; now to work on noise level! We have spent a lot of time these last couple of days at trying to understand and manage our whisper vs indoor vs outdoor voices with a lot of modelling from me. I don't shout and they have already started to realise that I don't need to but that does not mean that I am not the boss- quite the opposite! Ray of the Day has been the person who has generally used the appropriate voice level at the right time.
I wonder if they have told you about:
- hands up for silence?
- our glue pots (far more environmentally- and budget-friendly than pritt sticks
- capital letter, subject, verb, finish the idea, full stop
- Meesha
- the Torah
- Go Noodle
- new learning partner and carpet space
Things you could ask them about over tea maybe.
It's hard to write about what we have learnt this week because even with a slimmed down curriculum (as we settle down into Y1), we have learnt LOTS.
Today we had an iPad each and learnt how to log on, edit our avatar and log off to Purple Mash (our computing programme). They have their log in details in their Reading Records so you can now access this learning facility at home. I will be putting some work in the To Do folders throughout the year which will aid their learning. In the meantime, just practising how to manipulate the cursor, find capital letters and log in would make my life easier and soles of my shoes wear out a lot less quickly!
We have learnt the adjectives: frustrated, worried and comfortable this week thanks to our English text. I am blessed with many great actors in the class who are happy to help me explain how to manage those feelings and how to help our friends. We also practised saying (in reply to:'Can I play with you?') Errr, not today; maybe tomorrow. The focus is more on the way you say it, not just the words. And also we came up with a special Rabbits code that if someone says: 'I can't find anyone to play with. Can i play with you please?', the answer will be yes. And they are a friendly bunch.
Reading is still a massive focus. We are about to move onto Phase 5 GPCs (Grapheme Phoneme Correspondents= this is the letter and here is its sound) next week. The new GPCs will come in thick and fast. I will be sending home a list of the Phase 3 GPCs that they are not recognising immediately soon so that you can work on them at home. We must fill gaps! I am fortunate this year that I often have a (brill!) TA in the classroom, but not always so your support is really, really appreciated.
Fancy a quick maths game to consolidate learning over the last 2 weeks? Choose a number (3,4,5,6,7) and play: 5 or not 5 (etc). You get objects, fingers, drawings and they subitise (recognise without counting individually) and give thumbs up - yes 5! or thumbs down - not 5! A lot of our work has been around 5+1= 6, 5+2 =7 so they learn the number bonds. (Don't bother with the written number sentence, focus on verbal language: 7 is made up of 5 and 2).
Until the next time..
Mrs H
Friday 6th September
Week 1 done! Got to say I'm feeling a little less 'perky' than I was this time last week when I was at Nantwich Food Festival but I'm just as happy. The new Rabbits are a wonderful set of children and I am impressed with several aspects of their learning beehaviour: their listening skills are good- exactly where I would expect them to be; they follow instructions respectfully; they show kindness to each other; they want to learn (ok so they want to play more but that's ok at the moment) and they are being open to new things. I'm excited to be their teacher this year.
I hope my messages got to all of you yesterday; some people replied so I assume they did. This blog will aim to give you information about our weeks and ideas for you at home. The first one is: try to ask 'Tell me something good about your day today' rather than 'How was your day?' . I guarantee each child will have had a positive experience many times during the day even if some aspect was overwhelmingly negative to them :( Not a common thing generally but even I cannot control all their feelings! Please speak to me if you are worried about any aspect of school - the smaller the problem, the quicker we can fix it.
So these first 3 days have been about getting to know the expectations and each other. We have started some aspects of the curriculum - phonics, maths, maths mastery, English, kinetic letters and next week we will add reading, RE, PE and history - all being well and their resilience holds out! Certainly by break time Friday morning, they were pretty much done and it took a lot of energy to keep them focused and learning the rest of the day so we lightened the load a bit in the afternoon. DId they tell you that we had an impromptu fire alarm? (an over abundance of steam in the kitchens!) They dealt with it brilliantly as we quickly evacuated and lined up on the top playground waiting for the all-clear. That turned PE into an impromptu obstacle course session on the trim trail (and hopefully gave them a playtime idea for the future).
They were particularly excited to see that they have their own book for everything! I showed them how to stick in their own context label before the lesson and I cannot emphasise this enough - I don't normally expect them to do this before Christmas but they listened and by day 2 hardly any needed to be restuck. #slay
They have learning partners and carpet spaces now. This cuts down unnecessary stress/behaviour issues over where shall I sit today and with whom. I change this every half term or so.
In maths, we are learning to verbalise ways of sorting objects. I want them to confidently be saying something along the lines of: this group of objects have been sorted by colour/shape/size etc. I wonder if you could practise this at home with toys, food etc. We did it in the classroom then went outside and loved sorting twigs, stones, fallen leaves, grass. Some got really quite creative. We have the year 1 squirrels with us for maths and they enjoyed mixing up and being a bit of a larger group again.
Apologies for no library book this week. It was more important to let them play and keep cool. Reading will be a priority from next week. I will send a Little Wandle book home on Thursdays (or Fridays) and a library book and maybe a general read for pleasure book (they are not always decodable so better as a read with me book). Aim for them to read to you every day. As the year progresses they will be able to read to themselves - if you want- so you can still cook tea or do their hair or whateever while they are reading out loud to you.
Here's to a sunnny weekend and some sleep!
Mrs H
Blog 1/ 28th August 2024
Greetings and a very warm welcome to Year 1! I wonder how you're feeling? After all my years teaching in primary (and I have spent a lot now in Reception and KS1) the transition from YR to Y1 can sometimes be a challenging one. This is mainly because parents and carers were not expecting it to be; of course there would be nerves and trepidation about joining school- it is different to pre-school settings. But year 1 is another big step and some families find that nervousness creep up on them almost without warning and it makes going back to school a bit daunting. If that is you or your child, please be assured that I understand and have planned in time and space in the first week (and half term!) to allow that all-important settling in and getting to know you routines. Also know that it is quite normal for a child to have wobbles at some point in the year and together, we will deal with them.
You might notice that I am calling this year's Rabbits - Rigorous Rabbits. I was going to go with respectful but that sounds as if they aren't/weren't and I'd expect every child at school to show respect to me and the school rules so instead, I've gone with 'rigour'. And what do I mean by rigour in year 1 school setting? I mean that we will basically do our best, put in a lot of effort and build up our resilience to school life and academic and social successes.
From day 1 I will be demonstrating what rigour looks like in our classroom; I'll probably start with tidying up! We don't have individual drawers in year 1 so their book bags will be used a lot to go in and out of to get books, put away drawings etc. Each house team has a book bag box. (And please no backpacks- they won't fit!) We will explore the classroom a lot over the first few days so they know where everything is; I promise you by December they will be rigorous in their knowledge of where everything should go and I love how independent they quickly become in their classroom.
What else will we do those first few days?
I've planned to start our timetable straightaway (we have a lot to teach in our curriculum) so phonics, English, maths, reading will all happen. 'Choosing' will also be in there for a while. I love watching and being a part of their play; I really get to know them a lot quicker that way.
We will have (Golden) Ray of the Day every day. 1 child per day (sometimes 2) will bring home a teddy as a reward for something that impressed the classroom adults. I imagine I will choose some sort of evidence of rigour which might range from looking after their stuff or maybe showing determination to read or correct a mistake. Please get your child to contribute to the teddy's diary and then they bring it back the next day and share it with the rest of the class. We ask them questions that usually always include- what did you have for tea?/where did they sleep? It is a joyful time of the day. I will plan for every child to have been Ray of the day by the end of the first half term (attendance providing).
What else do you need to know?
I will promise to be rigourous in my love for my new rabbits and in my dedication to their academic and social development over this year.
Let's get cracking!'A love of reading is the biggest indicator of future academic success.' (The OECD- the organisation of economic cooperation and development)
'Children are made readers in the laps of their parents.' Emilie Buchwald
