Autumn is coming!
The children have been exploring natural objects found in our garden area. We collected a selection of leaves, bark, and vegetables that had grown over the summer and added them to our Autumn themed tuff tray. All the children share a common interest in our play dough area, this week we really explored our sense of smell and added cinnamon and clove!
Next Thursday we will be going for our ‘Wellie Walk’ around our local area to see what other natural objects we can find. Please ensure your child is wearing suitable footwear, as it may get a little muddy.
You could encourage your child’s learning further at home by going for your own ‘Wellie Walk’ in your local area, your child can collect objects to bring back to nursery to share in our circle times. This is a fantastic way of developing your child’s understanding of the changing seasons and exploring new vocabulary!
Poetry Basket-
Each week the children will be learning a new poem from our poetry basket session. This week was ‘chop chop’. Ask your child to sing it with you at home!
Nursery now has its own dedicated email address to send in photos, achievements or any queries regarding your child’s development.
stjamesnursery@spherefederation.org
Happy Walking!
The Nursery Team
30 September 2022
There’s a social theme to this week’s Talk Time as we think about our speaking and listening skills.
Agree or disagree: speaking is more important than listening!
Spend a few minutes having a conversation about your day with a someone at home. After the chat, reflect on how much time you spent speaking and how much time you spent listening. Would the conversation be the same if you didn’t speak/listen as effectively?
Below are some statements about effective listening and speaking which may help you when deciding whether you agree or disagree on the above statement.
Effective listening entails simultaneously observing, understanding, and generating ideas.
Effective speaking means being able to say what you want to say in such a way that it is heard and acted upon.
In school this half-term, we’re focussing on some of the physical skills of speaking. In particular, we’re ensuring children project their voice. When discussing this at home, help by making sure your child speaks confidently, clearly and coherently (no mumbling!).
RE: What is Ramadan?
During this week’s RE lesson, we continued our learning of Islam. We recapped the five pillars of Islam and focussed our learning on one particular pillar: Sawm (fasting).
Check out this short animation about Ramadan – we followed a QR code to view it. Why not watch it again together with your child at home!
Friday 30th September 2022
This week, our spellings focus on double consonants:
appear
different
difficult
possible
trapped
happening
opposite
arrive
hopping
clapped
30.09.22 Spellings
We are learning to use an apostrophe in contracted words. The apostrophe marks the spot where the letter or letters have been removed. Use the following words to create your own sentences. Practise them ready for a test next Friday.
haven’t
couldn’t
don’t
they’ve
we’re
won’t
aren’t
you’re
Week 4
What a fantastic week we have had in Reception. On Monday we started our daily poetry work. We loved listening to the poem and learning actions to go along. Our poem this week was called ‘Chop Chop’ and all the children will bring it home with them on Friday to share with you. Check out the video below to see us in action.
We had our first visit to the school library this week. It was great fun looking at all of the books and choosing one to take home. Please can all library books be returned on Monday so we can return them and choose another exciting story.
We have been learning more about where we live and our families. We used google maps and street view to look at different places in Wetherby and then shared information about our families and things we like to do together. Thank you to everyone who has brought a family photograph in, the children love sharing them with their friends. If you would like to send a photograph into school we would love to add it to our frame wall. Photographs can also be emailed to our reception email stjamesreception@spherefederation.org.
On Thursday 6 October we will be going on a local Autumn walk. Please can all children come to school in a warm coat and sensible shoes. If you would like to send wellies in to wear that would be great!
PE
In PE, we’ve been using our throwing and catching skills. We’ve also talked about the skills we need to defend a ball that is being thrown. Today, we put all of this together and introduced a game of ‘bench ball’. We used hoops to help us understand the rule that 5 people need to be on the bench for a point to be scored. Next week, we will be using the benches!
The children had lots of fun and demonstrated some fantastic throwing, catching and defending. Who knew they could jump so high to defend a ball? We also had a great umpire, making sure everyone followed the rules of the game. Well done, Year 2!
What’s in the Box?
This week, Year 5 and 6 are writing our first piece of short, descriptive narrative. This writing is based around our class novel (Secrets of a Sun King) where Lilian, our main character, finds a mysterious package on her grandpa’s front door step.
Our aim is to engage the reader by showing them Lilian’s thoughts and feelings, instead of just telling them everything that’s happening. We can do this by leaving little clues for the reader to pick up on – this allows the reader to paint a better picture of the story in their minds.
I am so impressed with the amount of perseverance all pupils have shown with this writing – some children even started all over again because they were determined to improve!
Here are some examples of our work so far – well done, everyone!
Science
Our Science this half term includes learning all about living things and their habitats. This week, with Mrs Bald, we’ve been exploring habitats and micro-habitats. A habitat is a home to a living thing. A micro-habitat is a smaller, different environment within the larger habitat that it is in. We put on our coats and went on a ‘habitat and micro-habitat hunt’ around the school grounds. We found lots of animals living under large sticks and in bushes – snails, spiders and even a bee!
Why not have a look in your garden or the local park to see what habitats and micro-habitats you can find?
PE
We’ve been working on our ball skills in our PE sessions. We have been throwing and catching and bouncing and catching. The children have all wowed us with their ball skills.
