We apologise for the lack of presence over the past few weeks but the children in Year One have not stopped!
A trip to Birmingham on a coach is where we will begin with an informative and fun visit to the Sea Life centre. Following our learning in science about animals including humans and our English unit of Informational Texts (Non-Chronological Reports) we spent the day visiting the Centre. From Seahorses to turtles, sharks to stingrays we got to see it all and spent hours in awe and wonder of such beautiful creatures. Despite a lack of facilities to sit and eat lunch the children adapted and we ate alfresco as we tucked into our lunches before spending the rest of the afternoon exploring even more with visits to the penguins, shark 360 tunnel and a cinema viewing. The children, as always, behaved beautifully and were a real asset to All Souls’.
We have continued to put our all into our gymnastic skills moving on from balance to look at movement, jumps and rolls! The children have been creating sequences showing different types of these four elements and are in the process of planning and creating an imaginative performance with these elements involved.
We have had many prayer services with the children, as always, taking a lead in the planning of these and have been coming up with more creative and varied ways of praying within the classroom. We had a particularly beautiful service all about being peacemakers and how we are going to do our best to spread peace and encourage others to do the same.
We have enjoyed learning lots more about animals including humans as part of our science unit. We worked hard to sort animals into their correct habitats and had to find the 5 things that animals need to have to help them to survive in their homes. We then went outside and had to find different things that were from specific animals habitat and spoke about camouflage.
In RE we looked at the story of The Good Samaritan as part of our unit ‘Jesus the Healer’. We had a go at acting out the story and looked at the different roles of the characters in the story. We thought about why the characters may have made those decisions and discussed whether we had ever chosen to walk away instead of stay and help. The children were very reflective and responded with answers well beyond their years.
In music we have been exploring using different instruments to make different noises and to then develop a beat alongside a track. The children had the chance to use all the instruments and we definitely have some budding musicians in our midst! We have been exploring a new scheme called Charanaga and are still working up to a performance piece but we can’t wait to share it with you once we get there.
In maths we moved on to look at intervals of time. As we began our topic we started by sequencing days of the week and months of the year. We were surprised by the amount of children who did not know all the months of the year so will continue to look at this over the next few weeks. We then estimated how long different activities would take and sorted them into seconds, minutes or hours and moved to look at real life situations. In partner pairs they estimated which activity would take the longest amount of time and which would take the shortest, they then worked in two teams to complete the activity and timed themselves to see whether their estimate was right or wrong.
After receiving some bulbs that had been kindly donated from one of our grandparents the children had a great time planting them. Measuring how deep the holes needed to be and reading the instructions of how to plant them. We can’t wait to watch them grow over the next few weeks.
In history we have been looking at the jobs of Coventry’s past and looking at all of the industries that made Coventry so famous. The children became bakers, car constructors, builders, watchmakers and many more as they made decisions as to what job they would have liked to do if they were alive in Coventry’s past. We thank all of those parents who have sent information about their own jobs now as this is really going to help with our history lessons after half term to compare these to jobs of the past.
To celebrate Valentine’s Day we had some disco divas and dancing dudes as they took to the dancefloor to show their best moves. Great fun was had by all and along with some classics we had some of the children’s favourite modern songs too. We can only apologise for how excited they were upon leaving – the sweet cups were a big hit! The children were all brilliantly behaved and really let loose which was lovely to see and experience with them
In maths, after looking at arrays, the children have moved on to focus on division and sharing into equal parts. Miss Salter had planned some great practical activities for the children to understand that when we share it must be done equally and by splitting into a certain amount of groups. The children even took part in a treasure hunt using their knowledge to answer division questions and the number matched a letter of the alphabet which they then had to use to piece together a word or sequence of words for their blue. Great work Year One!
The Birdman brought a mass of awe and so much excitement to school this week. The children thoroughly enjoyed his workshop and for most it was a completely new experience. They loved meeting Alan, Cybil, Billy, Alaska and Sparky and as they learnt more information about the birds we also hope that they take note of some of the things that they were told about ways to take care of our planet for these birds and all other animals.
As we came to the end of our week we took some time out of our busy timetable to celebrate the amazing homework projects that this time was ‘All about Animals’. The children had tried really hard and we loved finding out what their favourite animals were as well as what we might have to do to look after it. The children talked openly and very excitedly about their work, a true show of how proud they were of their work. Well done Year One!
