Week ending 31st January 2020

Following an assembly about birds visiting the school garden, we have been interested in finding out more about birds.  We started our research by asking, ‘Where do birds live?’  We went outside and listened for birdsong and tried to spot them in the trees.  We watched a film about an explorer in the jungle spotting birds of paradise and discussed the differences between these and birds we might see in our gardens or in the countryside.  The children were fascinated by the bright colours of these birds, which sparked an interesting conversation as to how these birds came to exist?  The children used different materials to make birds and bird houses.  We read Harold Finds a Voice and thought about the different noises Harold the parrot might make.  Next we used our knowledge of phonics to write down our ideas.

In preparation for sharing assembly, we wrote a class prayer to read out.  The children wanted to say thank you for the people who help us when we fall or hurt ourselves, and asked for help to learn together.  The Hedgehogs are able to pay close attention to speakers during assembly and really enjoy the opportunity to take part in whole school events. 

Week ending 17th January 2020

This week we took a closer look at a real car; we identified all the different parts and looked at all the different letters and numbers around the vehicle, making a note of them on our clipboards.  We took our findings back to the class and made our own private number plates, using letters from our names and significant numbers.  We had some great collaborative work as the children built a car with junk modelling resources.  We looked at driving licenses, again investigating what all the writing and numbers might mean.  Some of the children wanted to make their own licenses, so we used a ride-on car to take a driving test (luckily they all passed, with only a few minors!) and then made licenses.

We have been enjoying our new core books, and have been using them to introduce digraphs, where two letters are used to represent one sound.  We have started recording these on our Sound Board next to the door.  When you are reading books at home look out for these vowel sound digraphs ai, ee, ie, oa, oo.

Week ending 10th January 2020

It was great to welcome the hedgehogs back to school after the holidays, and to find out what they have been up to. We talked about the new year and looked at what 2020 means.

After playing on the trikes in the outdoor classroom, the children got interested in driving and cars, so we have decided to research cars over the next few weeks. If you have a photo of your car (or a friend or relatives car) please bring it in to share.

We have been looking at some new core books that have been introduced to the classroom:

Shark in the Dark by Nick Sharratt

A Little Stuck by Oliver Jeffers

Polar Bear, Polar Bear, What do you hear? by Bill Martin Jnr/Eric Carle

Shake the Tree! by Vignocchi

Week ending 13th December

A festive week, starting with working as a team to assemble a Christmas tree with no instructions.  The children worked together to sort branches by size, and then piece together each section of the tree.  Next they had to string the baubles to decorate the finished tree.  Some excellent collaboration and lots of opportunity to practice listening and taking account of others’ ideas.  The children have been making Christmas cards and writing messages to go inside, practising their creative and writing skills.  We experimented with mixing powder paints to produce different shades of green to paint trees – very messy but lots of fun!  All of this alongside practising songs and rehearsing for our imminent performance.

Coming up:

Monday 16th Please drop off at the church for our dress rehearsal.

Tuesday 17th Please drop off at the church for our performance to the rest of school.

Wednesday 18th Please join us at church for our final performance to parents.  The children will have Christmas lunch back at school

Friday 20th Christmas jumper day and end of term.  In the afternoon we will attend the annual Christmas service at the church.

 

 

Week ending 29th November

A short, but busy week for the Hedgehogs…

As we have been thinking about the Nativity, the children decided to construct a stable with manger so that we can act out the story.  We have worked together to change the room around, opening up our role-play area to make this area more accessible and to emphasise the importance of imaginative play in our learning. We found all-sorts underneath the units, which prompted us to have a good clean up and to talk about taking care of all the wonderful resources we have in our room. It was really nice to welcome Janet the caretaker into the room to show her how we can all help to tidy.

Some of the children wanted to make stars to hang above the stable so we used a method developed by them, involving circles and triangles, and will be painting them next week. We also made red playdough, which turned out to be pink in the end (“Not enough of the red stuff!”). The children collaborated really well, taking turns and listening to each other, to measure out the ingredients and mix them together; without covering everything in flour this week!

We continue to enjoy our core books and have been looking out for digraphs, where we need two letters to spell one sound.  See if you can find ai, ee, oo in your books at home.

Our maths challenge was to investigate number bonds to 10, and then say or write a number sentence to record our thinking.  We used the mathematical words plus and equals in our sentences.

 

Week ending 22nd November

This week Hedgehogs have been to visit Paddy the Vicar of All Saints Church for a guided tour of this magnificent building; soon to play host to our upcoming nativity performance.  We have also joined forces with Foxes at the church for our first rehearsal.  The children had to use their senses to safely walk in a group through the village, and we looked out for any signs with print and numbers.

Inspired by our visit we made churches and other buildings using 3D shapes, thinking about which blocks would be best for different aspects of our constructions.  Our role play areas inside and outdoors were adapted into ‘Christmas Churches’ complete with pews and pulpits.  The children have also been role playing restaurants, creating menus and taking orders.  It was great to see lots of independent mark-making from our ‘waiters’.

We have read the story of the first Christmas and have been practising the songs for our performance.  You will have a received a letter regarding costumes, as well as lyrics for the songs the children are learning; I have been really impressed by everyone’s courage and enthusiasm to take part in the performance.

 

Week ending 15th November

Inspired by some animal bones brought in by one of the children, we have been finding out about skeletons.  We looked at the human skeleton and learned the names of some of the bones in our bodies.  We read Funnybones by Allan Ahlberg which led us to change our role play area into a Dark Dark House, full of bones and skeleton costumes.  We experimented with ways to make the classroom as dark as possible and used torches and lights to see.  The children wanted to throw a skeleton party, so they made tickets and invitations and set out party food.  We made play dough and used it to make skeletons, and skeleton food.  We finished the week performing a skeleton dance to the rest of the school.  The children showed great courage standing in front of an audience, well done Hedgehogs!

 

Week ending 19th October – 25th October

In preparation for our end of term Harvest Festival the children collected leaves and we used these with paints to mix autumn colours and create beautiful prints. They then used these in different ways to decorate their donation boxes.
The children also wrote a Harvest song which we taught to the rest of the school to sing in the assembly. We spoke about prayers and how these are used  as a way of saying thanks, either to God if you are Christian or simply as a way of vocalising your gratitude for what they have. The children wanted to make a prayer box – so we have a space in the classroom for them to write a prayer if they wish. We decided that we would place an acorn into a basket if we wanted to do this and during our weekly candle time we have shared these.

We discovered that there are lots of ‘bonkers’ words that cannot be sounded out phonetically. We are making a collection of these and we are calling these our ‘Bonkers conkers’ words. For those of you with older children they are the ‘tricky’ words. We have now finished all the single letter sounds and have begun to look at the digraphs. (2 letters that make 1 sound) More information will be sent home on this in the near future.

They made and decorated Gingerbread and have all seemingly enjoyed the Foxes company. We will continue to work alongside the Foxes next term too during the afternoons. When we are outside we will be wearing your wellies and our blue suits.

I was so pleased you all found your way to the hall using the wonderful signs your children made! What a great Party!! I hope they liked their gift and weren’t to full of sugar?!! (I think they were…but I didn’t even serve it all up!) We will be sharing the remainder of the party food brought in over the final few days!

For the remainder of the week we will be preparing for Alec’s arrival and I have spoken to them all about my departure. They are excited to meet him and we will send him a video and book we have made over the holidays so he can get to see them before he starts on the 4th November. I will also be there on this day.

Have a wonderful half term holiday.

Week ending 11th October

This week we have continued to prepare for the party and the children have decided to hold this in the hall for you now which has involved measuring up for banners and decorations! We have discussed the food they would like to share at the party and we talked about how some foods are treats and others vital to keep us healthy. I will display their list later this week and if you can contribute something for your child to bring on the day of the party, they’d be very grateful!

Our discussions about different beliefs has focused on how important everyone is to take care of and look after our world so we can enjoy all the precious things in it. All the children discussed who they thought were important within their family but also within the school family. We are creating a wall in the classroom to display all these important people. This of course included themselves and they discussed why they think they are important and painted a picture of themselves. We looked closely at the shapes within the face and they mixed colours to use in their paintings. We looked at the similarities and differences between hair and eye colours and recorded our findings as a class.

In PE all the children are getting so good at putting their shoes on and off independently I would now like to get them to begin to change into their PE kits. Please bring these in next week in a named draw string bag. These can stay at school on their peg.
Please remember they DO NOT need plimsolls as we do this bare footed.