KS1 – Newsletter – 16.1.26

We have had a lovely week in Key Stage One, settling back nicely after our time off.

In maths, Year One have begun to work on subtraction, understanding that we start with the whole and remove a part. They have used language such as minus, take away, subtract, less than and left. They were able to solve number sentences using numberlines, part whole models and pictoral problems using things like ten frames. In Year Two, one group have been solving subtraction problems and learning how to exchange. They have been using Base 10 and drawing tens and ones onto place value charts. The other group have been solving missing number problems, thinking about how to use the inverse to find the number. They have used column addition and subtraction and been explaining what they need to do and why. 

In English, Year One continued to order pictures chronologically and Year Two have continued to use the past tense. We have used the book ‘African Savannah’ and read a diary entry from someone who had been on a safari and then ordered their pictures from which animal was seen first to last. They then used these pictures to write sentences about the animals. We also used the ‘Now Press Play’ system to follow someone on safari and acted out our own safari adventures.

This term, as we look at Africa, we will be looking closely at what Africa is like and comparing it to the UK in geography. We began today by looking at a variety of pictures and deciding whether they are pictures of Africa or not. We found some very obvious, like pictures of elephants in the savannah, but we also discovered that Africa has big cities, markets, waterfalls and a range of landscapes.

We did an experiment in Science to try and determine which material would be good for making a boat. We made some origami boats out of different foldable materials eg cardboard, paper, tissue paper, tin foil etc.. we watched what happened when we put them into water and concluded that tin foil was the best material because it floats, it is waterproof and can be moulded in different ways.

We have been learning how to pay invasion games in PE. We have been playing games such as domes and dishes and gold in my den, where the children have to work on teams to change all the cones to domes or dishes and steal gold from other groups dens whilst defending our own. We began to realise how quick we needed to be and how aware of people in other groups.

In computing, we have been learning to code. We understand the importance of algorithms and how they need to be clear and precise. We put this into practise using 2Code on Purple Mash. We followed instructions for selecting fish and telling them which way to move. We were able to run the program and see if the fish were doing what we needed them to do. If they were moving down instead of right for example, we had to go back and work out what we needed to change in the coding process to correct it.

We have begun a topic on the life of Jesus in RE. This week the children were learning about how Jesus was baptised by John the Baptist before he began teaching people about God. They also learned that he chose 12 special friends, called his disciples, who travelled around with him.

In PSHE, we began to discuss loss. We read the story of Dogger and thought about a time that we had lost something and how it made us feel. We discussed what we could do in different situations and also thought about what we could do to help us feel better.

Dates for your diary.

Friday 13^th January – Break up for half term