Week 2- 2nd May '25

What a busy week the children have had! We have thoroughly enjoyed our outdoor learning in the sunshine!

In literacy the children have been planning their own stories based on the story "Jack And The Beanstalk". The children have been changing the characters and the beanstalk. We have had giant candy canes, Easter egg trees, giant sunflowers. We are really looking forward to reading these stories once they have been written. 

In maths, we have finished our unit on multiplication and division. This week saw us linking the 5 times table with the 10 times table and seeing what patterns we could find. The children also linked facts for example 4 x 5 is the same as 2 x 10. We have now started thinking about fractions. Today we were thinking about the "whole" and how a whole item is made up of different parts. For example, the classroom has lots of parts, for example a chair.

In P.E. the children have been developing their skills of moving a ball around. The children rolled balls with their hands and kicked balls. They then had to make numbers with cones which the ball could be carefully kicked around, following the shape of the number. We discovered that rolling or kicking the ball hard makes it more difficult to control. We also looked at stopping a rolling ball by placing the palm of our hand on the ball as it rolled towards us.

In computing the children were investigating a musical programme. They were learning how to compose a simple piece of music using different instrument sounds. They were then finding out how they could control the speed of the music they had composed by speeding it up or slowing it down.

In design and technology we are thinking about structures. This week the children learnt about what a structure is. We then went outside to see if we could find some. The children had a go at drawing the structures that they found. We found quite a few and they were all made from different materials.

In science we looked at our sunflowers that we planted last week. The children have been looking after them, making sure that they have been watered each day. In this warm weather they have sometimes needed more than one watering each day! We were very excited to discover that some little shoots were starting to appear. We then went outside and looked at the structure of trees, comparing them with plants. We looked at the trunks, the branches, the leaves and the blossom. The children discovered that for all trees their roots are under the ground so the children couldn't see these. However, we did see some trees with parts of their roots sticking out of the ground at the bottom of the tree.

We had reached the end of our first full week and the sun had certainly been shining for us! As we can racing through the gates excited to take on the day we weren't fazed at all when we were told the exciting news that from next week Mrs Langford would be taking Year 2 for Phonics everyday so this meant that on a Friday our morning was going to be switched around with Phonics and our English lesson happening first, but don't worry Kingfishers we still had time for our Danny Go!

This week in Phonics Year 1 continued to practice for their upcoming screening test, working in pairs to turn over a card and then use dots and dashes to mark the sounds within the word, if they could read the word they then got to keep it!

To help us we've even taken the words home to keep practicing them so why not hold up a card for you child at home and get them to read it to you? 

This week we entered Maths with a little caution as it would be fair to say that last week we had all found Maths a little bit tricky but as 'Welcome to the Ice cream parlour' appeared on the board our mood lifted and our reservations turned to curiosity, what Ice creams would we be able to buy? It was certainly the weather for an ice cream, but unfortunately these were not real but that didn't stop Kingfishers from getting immersed in the fun of the Ice cream parlour!

They worked extremely hard to count how much money they had in they jars to see what they could buy and even had a go at drawing which coins they would have in their jar when they were given the total! 

Next week will be comparing amounts of money so why not have a go over the next few days at home at recognising coins and notes and practice adding up to 3 together to find the total. 

Why not then have a go at playing 'Who's got more?'

Put coins in a pile in the middle and take it in turns to pick 3 coins each. Add up the coins. Who has more?

This will really support our Kingfishers in developing their confidence with money!

Our Friday had flown by and it was time for MNR, so out we went onto the hot and sunny field, well equipt with our water bottles which were most certainly needed! This week we engaged in team games where we had to learn to work together if we wanted to win, moving in a variety of different ways and learning some new games that we could even play ourselves on the playground!

The first game was a bit like the good old fashioned 'stuck in the mud' but this one had a medical take on it with some us in the blue bibs taking on the role of doctors and those in the red bibs taking on the role of the germs, if we didn't have a bib we had to escape away from the germs but if we were caught we had to stand on a spot and ask the doctors to come and save us! If we weren't hot before we certainly were afterwards!

After a little break in the shade and some water it was time for our next team game and this one brought a board game to life.......Hungry Hippos! We couldn't believe it, Hungry Hippos! "I've got that game at home!" With the coloured bibs acting as the balls and us acting as the Hippos, we worked as a team to take it in turns and go and collect 'eat' a bib!

This makes it sound a bit too easy though so the coach soon had us moving in many different ways, from running to bunny hopping and even hopping on one leg!

We then had to make sure we collected a different colour to the person who had run before us, wow we really did need to concentrate!

What an amazing week we've had, not only have we seen such perseverance from Kingfishers with their learning but we've been able to enjoy moments of calm together in this wonderful sunshine, sharing stories outside which has certainly been a firm favourite this week!

Next week is another short week with Bank holiday Monday, have a lovely extended weekend and we will see you all on Tuesday!