Year 1 - a four day week

In Year 1, we have managed to pack lots of exciting learning into our four-day week!  

In maths, we have been using sweets to support our learning of multiplication and division. We have started to create arrays to represent our multiplication, which has helped us to start to understand that it is commutative (can be done in any order). 

For example:

2 x 4                                     is the same as                                         4 x 2

We have also started to look at division, to understand that this means to share equally between a given number. We will be continuing to develop our division skills next week, leading into fractions (halves and quarters). 

The children have worked extremely hard this week to plan and write their own version of a traditional story, including some of the features that we have been learning about. These include traditional story starters and closers, use of the past tense ‘ed’, use of comparatives (er) and superlatives (est), and similes (it was as tall as a skyscraper).  We have been amazed by the children’s imagination as well as the progress that has been made in their writing. Well done Year 1!

As part of our topic of ‘Go Bananas’, we will be learning about plants. To start off this topic, we worked independently to plant bean seeds in our classrooms which we will be observing carefully over the next few weeks. We have thought about the conditions necessary for the beans to grow and planted some beans in the dark and without water. We hope to be using these bean plants for our learning later on this half term.

In geography, we have been refreshing our knowledge of the 7 continents; we created a floor sized ‘map’ using masking tape and used hoops to represent the continents. We used this to sort out where different animals came from and why this might be. 

In RE, we have been learning about the Jewish story of the Passover, and what this means to Jewish people. We learned about the Seder plate used at the Seder meal, and what the different items on the plate represent. 

We have been building on our recorder skills in music, and as always, work on our reading and phonics skills daily.

Very many thanks to everyone who clearly labelled their child’s recorder and case – it really does make clearing away after recorder lessons so much easier!

We look forward to seeing you on Monday!

Notes:

• PE lessons are on Tuesday and Friday. Please ensure that your child has a named PE kit in school on these days. 

• Home learning is due on 7th February.

• If you are having difficulties accessing My Maths homework, please see your class teacher who will be able to print out a copy of the homework for you.