Autumn Term

Click here to see what Year 1 are learning in Term 1

Click here to see what Year 1 are learning in Term 2

W.C. 3.12.18

We have had a fantastic week in Year 1! We performed our nativity twice this week and both times we showed how hard we have been working over the past few weeks to practice it. Our dancing and singing was brilliant and we blew the people who came to watch our performances away. We delivered our lines clearly and loudly which we have been practicing hard to do. Well done Year 1!

In our Maths this week we have been continuing to learn all about subtraction. We compared number sentences using the less than, greater than and equals symbols that we learnt about previously. On Thursday and Friday we worked really hard to learn that we can write eight different number sentences using just 3 different numbers and the add and subtraction sign. Next week we are going to learn about the different types of 2D and 3D shapes and the patterns we can make with them.

We finished our recounts of our trip to Lincoln Castle this week in English, remembering to include time phrases and write in the past tense. We also wrote thank you letters to Jen and Sarah who showed us around Lincoln Castle. We introduced ourselves and said thank you. Then we wrote about what our favourite part of the trip was and what we learnt about the castle. We are going to make a poster to invite people to a banquet at our castles next week.

In our History lesson this week we have been making our own castles! Using the designs that we drew last week, we started to build our castles out of bits of cardboard. We used toilet roll tubes for the towers of our castles. They are starting to look great and we are going to continue to build on them next week.

We also had a Science lesson this week. We predicted what we thought might happen when we put a water bottle with a straw stuck in it in the water. Lots of us thought that it would float but some of us thought that it might sink. The bottle floated and when we put vinegar and bicarbonate of soda in the bottle, it fizzed up and bubbles came out of the end of the bottle. The bottle moved and we learnt that these bubbles were carbon dioxide which was making the bottle move. Next week we are going to test slime to see which is the best one.

Dates for your diary

Friday 14th December - KS1 disco 6-7pm, £1 entry.

Tuesday 18th December - Christmas jumper day, please bring chocolate donations.

Wednesday 19th December - Christmas Fayre at 1:30pm.

Friday 21st December - Last day of term - Panto in Boston and Carols around the tree - starting at 2pm. Doors will open at 1:30pm and close at 1:55pm, children can be collected from their classrooms and taken home once it has finished.

Monday 7th January 2019 - first day of Spring term.

W.C 26.11.18

Lots of learning taking place inside and outside of our classroom this week! We've been working hard in our Maths lessons learning all about subtraction. We know that when we take away the numbers get smaller and have been using objects to demonstrate this. We've also been using a number line to count backwards. Next week we will continue to learn about subtraction, finding the difference between two numbers as well as comparing numbers in a number sentence.

In English we've focused our attention on recounts, writing about our trip using lots of the language of time, first, next, after that etc. We've also been learning about writing in the past tense, about things that have already happened. Next week we will be writing a thank you letter to our guides Jen and Sarah as well as writing a full recount about our time at Lincoln Castle.

Speaking of which, what a fantastic time we had on our trip! We all behaved impeccably and had so much fun at Lincoln Castle. We listened carefully, were polite and kind to the adults and all of the other children and learned a tremendous amount. When we arrived we walked the castle walls, learning about how the castle would have looked 950 years ago and how it would have been used. We went inside one of the towers, saw the portcullis, and spent some time in the Keep. Then we moved on to shield making, designing our very own coat of arms. Next it was time for a medieval banquet! A king and queen, lord and lady were chosen as well as serving people, dancers and a couple of jesters for entertainment. We really did dine like the upper classes!

After lunch we went to knight school, learning how to dress a knight for battle, shoot a bow with arrows and our champions even had a go at jousting. Then we had the chance to handle some armour, trying on helmets and gauntlets, looking at chainmail and seeing the padded clothing knights had to wear underneath the armour. It would have weighed up to 17 kg! Thank you to all of the grown-ups who came with us who made our trip so enjoyable and thank you to all of the grown-ups at home for your support, we can't wait to see how our experiences influence our writing.

We've had a Geography lesson this week, learning about the geography of Lincoln Castle, it's position on the hill and what the people who lived there would have needed from the surrounding area. It's been a busy time preparing for our Nativity play but we are getting there. Everyone is working hard to practise their lines and their dances ready for the performance next week.

Dates for your diary:

KS1 Nativity 'Lights, Camel, Action!' Performance Tuesday 4th December at 1:30pm

KS1 Disco - Friday 14th December - Time to be confirmed

Christmas jumper day and Christmas dinner - Tuesday 18th December

Christmas Fayre - Wednesday 19th December

Panto and Carols around the tree - Friday 21st December (Last day of term)

Return to school Monday 7th January 2019

W.C 19.11.18

W.C 12.11.18

What a week we have had in year 1!

In Maths this week we have been comparing number bonds using the less than, greater than and equal to symbols that we learnt about a few weeks ago. We have been practicing reading our comparison symbols and are becoming experts at using them to compare two numbers now.

This week in English we have been continuing our work on the features of non-fiction books and wrote our own captions and labels. We wrote captions for some castle themed pictures, describing what was in the pictures in full sentences. Then we learnt about labels and we labelled a knight on a horse and then wrote our own labels for a picture of Lincoln Castle. We remembered our learning in history about the parts of a castle to help us label the portcullis, battlements and arrow loops on the picture of Lincoln Castle. We are all looking forward to seeing them for real when we visit Lincoln Castle next week.

We were visited by a Science Dome on Tuesday. Inside it was really dark and we learnt all about pirates. We looked at the clothes that they wear and the weapons that they use and we got to see inside one of their sailing ships. We pretended to be pirates and spoke just like pirates! We also learnt about the animals that live in the ocean too.

In our Science lesson we had to help an adventurer to escape from an ice block! We worked in groups to decide which method we were going to use to get the adventurer out. We knew that we needed to find the best way to melt the ice into water. We tried lots of different methods in our groups, working together to find the quickest way. We found that the quickest way to melt the ice was to put warm water on it. We learnt that wrapping up the ice actually kept it colder for longer!

In our PE lessons this term, we are lucky enough to have Miss Hudson visit us from Carres Grammar. We have been learning how to roll, bounce and catch balls of different sizes. We will continue to have PE lessons with Mrs Smith and Miss Hudson over the coming weeks.

W.C 05.11.18

Welcome back, we hope you had a lovely half-term. This week we have been working super hard in all our lessons, keep it up Year 1!

In English this week we have been learning about what fiction and non-fiction books are. As a class we looked at different types of books and talked about whether we thought they were fiction or non-fiction. We learnt that fiction books are made up and non-fiction books are real. We spent some time looking inside non-fiction books at the features and what makes them different to fiction books and then worked in small groups to find these features ourselves.

We have been learning all about number bonds this week in Maths. This is a different way of saying number sentences. We looked at the patterns that can be found in number bonds at the start of the week and then we learnt about our number bonds to 10. We used our learning of number bonds to help us with 6 different activities. We visited a shop with 10p and bought 2 items of food and we coloured a rainbow to find the number bonds at the end of the rainbow. We also helped to put 10 spots back on a ladybird after they'd all fallen off! Then we learnt a number bonds to 10 rhyme with our own actions which we will keep practicing to help us remember.

This week in Science we became wizards and made our own potions using vinegar, washing-up liquid, food colouring and bicarbonate of soda. We looked at the ingredients, their colours and even got to smell them too. Some of us liked the smell of the vinegar but some of us didn't! As a class we spoke about what could happen as we added each ingredient to the potion, making predictions about how they might change the potion. We talked about what had happened after we added the ingredients and noticed that the potions changed colour. When we added the last ingredient to our potion (the bicarbonate of soda), our potion grew bigger and bubbled up! Then we worked in small groups to make our own potions, making different colours and adding glitter and sequins. Next week, we have a Science dome vising the school which is very exciting. We will also be helping an adventurer to escape from some ice in our Science lesson.

W.C 08.10.18

Thank you to the grown-ups who attended Parents Evening this week, it was lovely to share the progress of your children with you and to talk about how we can work together to support them as the school year continues. If you have not seen Miss Cragg yet, please make an appointment at your earliest convenience.

Thats week 6, over and done with! Impressive work produced too, everyone should be really proud this week, especially with our writing. We have been learning about the personal pronouns 'I' and 'me' so we have been pretending to be Paddington Bear. We have thought really carefully about Paddington's 'Adventure at the Beach' story from last week and worked hard to write Aunt Lucy a wonderful letter all about the fun we (Paddington!) had there. We remembered to start our sentences with big capital letters, making sure we had finger spaces between each word and ending our sentences with a full stop. We are trying to remember to use our phonics to help us spell and all of this hard work is really paying off.

In Maths we finished off the last part of our place value learning before we did an assessment to find out how much we have learnt. In just 6 weeks we have learnt a tremendous amount, both about place value and also how we learn Maths in Year One. We have now moved on to addition and subtraction, starting with Number Blocks and looking at the part whole model. We are beginning to understand how numbers can be broken down into parts to make a whole. Next week we will begin to look at the addition symbol +.

No Science this week, instead we will have two lessons next week on identifying animals and their habitats as well as naming common animals and looking at their structure. We turned our focus to art this week, going back to the work of Vincent Van Gogh. This time we looked at his landscape work, learning about how he painted when he lived in Holland. He used dark, boring colours there to show how hard the work was of the farmers and how poor they were. When he moved to France the colours became bright and bold, showing the change in weather and circumstances for him. Grown-ups - ask your child about Van Gogh's favourite colour! We painted a landscape in the style of Van Gogh, using cotton wool buds to create lines, swirls and texture. We definitely have some budding artists in Year One!

We also had the opportunity to learn some First Aid with a special helper. We learnt how to call for the emergency services and how to roll someone onto their side when they are poorly. Please can you ensure your child knows their address, just in case, so they can feel more confident should they need to dial 999.

A new face to welcome in our classroom, Miss Rose is a teaching student from Bishop Grosseteste University in Lincoln and will be sharing some of the responsibility for teaching and learning over the coming weeks. Please say hello if you see her!

Dates for your diary:

Superhero Day - Friday 19th October

Last day of term - Friday 19th October

Back to school - Monday 5th November

Trip to Lincoln Castle - Tuesday 27th November 2018 - Plenty of notice for this one! It's going to be lots of fun, we will have a castle tour, learn how to be knights, handle real armour and have a medieval banquet, how exciting! We hope you can make it. The trip will link to our topic of Castles next half term. We find that if children experience something first hand they will find it easier to write and talk about it. By visiting the castle, learning about the people who lived there, handling real armour and having historical guides tell us about the place it helps to spark imagination and produces great work!

W.C 01.10.18

The end of another week and what a week it has been. We have been working hard in all of our lessons and this attitude is paying off, we are becoming much more mature and like big Year Ones all the time.

In English this week we've been looking at a story about Paddington the Bear. Paddington goes to the beach with the Brown family and has a wonderful time there. We have worked hard to sequence the story in order using sequencing language like first, next, then, after and finally. We have also written some amazing sentences to go with the pictures using big capital letters, finger spaces and full stops. Next week we're going to write letters to Paddington's Aunt Lucy in Peru to update her on Paddington's adventures.

In Maths we have continued with our work on comparing, this time comparing groups of numbers and objects. We can use the language of greatest and smallest and can explain why numbers need to go where they do. We have been working hard on our reasoning and problem solving and are using stems to support our answers. We have enjoyed using the inequality symbols and are getting the hang of reading them too. The end of the week brought a new challenge in trying to understand ordinal numbers, we all coped really well! Next week we will look at the number line before moving on to addition and subtraction.

In Science we have been exploring the wonderful word of animals, this time looking at simple food chains. We can identify carnivores, omnivores and herbivores and know what they eat. Next week we will look at how animals adapt to suit their habitats.

Dates for your diary:

Parents Evening is on Wednesday 10th October. Please make an appointment if you have not already.

W.C 24.09.18

Another week, gone! They say time flies when you're having fun and we've certainly had plenty of that this week! We started off on Monday with our Harvest Festival. Thank you to all of the adults who came to see us perform our poem and show us their support. We spotted you! I think you'll all agree we read our poem and held our props/vegetables magnificently, what a wonderful celebration it was.

On Thursday we had the pleasure of a visit from the Mighty Zulu Nation theatre company, all the way from Durban, South Africa. We sang and danced our way through the day, enjoying an amazing performance in morning assembly and getting the opportunity to show off our skills and shake it in a dance workshop. We then rounded off the day with a performance of all of the singing and dancing we'd done throughout the day to the grown-ups in the hall. We hope you enjoyed it, we certainly did. Get them booked in for next year soon please Mr Clay! We had so much fun.

In English this week we've continued to focus on capital letters, full stops and finger spaces and do you know what? We're making huge progress! Our handwriting is improving all the time and we're being really careful when thinking of our sentence, saying it out loud, writing it (using all of our amazing phonic knowledge) and then reading and checking it. We're trying hard to recognise and use more capital letters and the hard work is really paying off. Next week we are going to continue to practise more fine motor skills as well as sequencing pictures and writing sentences.

In Maths we have been fine-tuning our knowledge of greater than and less than, we were introduced to the inequality symbols and have taken to using them like little ducks to water! We have watched the Numberblocks episode entitled 'Blockzilla' to begin to understand how to use them as well as being introduced to Mr Snappy...ask us all about him and his antics! (Miss Cragg cannot promise that he hasn't attempted to eat a child this week but tickle him under his chin and he *usually* spits them out...!) We are getting so good at being able to explain which is the greater or smallest number and how we know. Next week we will move on to putting numbers into order, ordinal numbers and using a number line.

In our Art lesson this week we use the vegetables from the Harvest Festival to do some printing. We made repeating patterns using different colours and explored the shapes which they created. We also had the opportunity to use the iPads and the laptops to go on a variety of apps as well as play on Maths Whizz. In our PSHE lesson we talked about oral health and how to have a healthy smile. We were all given a toothbrush and toothpaste in a campaign by Colgate. I just don't know how we squeeze it all in!

Dates for your diary:

Parents Evening - Wednesday 10th October 2018 - Please make an appointment with Miss Cragg if you have not already done so, thank you.

W.C 17.09.18

We've been working hard this week preparing for Harvest Festival which is on Monday. Year 1 will be performing a poem called 'It's Harvest Time'.

In English this week we've continued to concentrate all of our efforts on practising capital letters, we are improving at using them all the time and know that they go at the beginning of a sentence and we use them for names. We have been working on letter formation and learning their names. Next week we will be writing sentences for pictures, matching capital and lowercase letters, and adding capital letters and full stops to sentences.

In Maths we have been focusing on one more and one less, counting and matching objects and beginning to compare objects using the language of greater than, less than and equal to. We are getting better at sequencing numbers and recognising number words and we are trying to explain our answers both verbally and in a written format. Next week we will be carrying on with comparing numbers and will be introduced to the inequality symbols < > and =.

In our Art lesson this week we learnt about a different form of art, weaving. We learnt about people weaving for hundreds of years around the world making things like baskets, chairs and rugs. We talked about the art of Gunta Stolzl who created textile art. She was born in Germany and worked as a nurse during WWI, later becoming a master at the Bauhaus art school. Gunta made exciting, colourful designs and introduced new materials for her students to try.

Some of us have been able to access Maths Whizz again this week, logging on by ourselves and having a go at some of the games. Others have been able to play with various apps on the iPads. We were also lucky enough to have Richard Fish come in on Thursday to teach us some Makaton. We learnt greetings such as hello, goodbye, good morning and good afternoon as well as the chorus to 'I Just Can't Wait to be King' from the 'Lion King'. Next week we have Zulu Nation to visit on Thursday.

Dates for your diary:

Monday 24th September - Harvest Festival from 2pm in the hall, everyone welcome.

Thursday 27th September - we will be welcoming Zulu Nation to Church Lane again, which we are incredibly excited about. On their visit last year we sang and danced all day long, their enthusiasm is truly infectious. We will be going down to the hall for their final performance and to share the work the children will have been doing in the workshops from 2:45pm, everyone is welcome to come and watch us in the hall. As a result we might be late back to the classrooms at hometime.

Wednesday 10th October - Parents Evening. Please make an appointment if you have not already done so.

W.C 10.09.18

Another very busy week in Year One, including Roald Dahl day on Thursday. Thank you to everyone who dressed up as their favourite character, we had lots of fun. We watched The Enormous Crocodile and discussed the story, then we put pictures into the correct sequence and some of us wrote some pretty amazing sentences with capital letters, finger spaces and full stops! The grown ups in the classroom were impressed at how hard everyone is working now that we are big Year Ones. It is a big jump from Reception but we are coping well and settling in nicely.

In Maths we've begun working in our groups with grown-ups. This week we've been counting on and back to find a missing number in a sequence. We've also been learning about how to find one more using a number line and using objects to represent numbers. We've practised number formation, counted objects and pictures, put numbers into the right order, played number and picture matching games and sequenced numbers. Next week we'll be looking at one less, one to one correspondence and beginning to compare numbers using the language of greater than, less than and equal to.

In English we've had another week of sentence focus looking at what a sentence needs. We know that sentences start with capital letters, have finger spaces between each word and end with a full stop. We are beginning to recognise and be able to write and use more capital letters but will continue to work on this next week.

In Art this week we have begun exploring the life of Vincent Van Gogh. We looked in particular at his techniques, practising with oil pastels and learning how to blend and change the shading of lines. We had a go at blending swirls and looked at his seascape paintings for inspiration for our techniques.

Some of us had the opportunity to begin learning how to log in and use Maths Whizz this week. Maths Whizz is an online resource available to all children at Church Lane which helps them develop their ability through games. Log ins will be sent home soon. We practised logging into Maths Whizz on the laptops with our usernames and passwords and some of us completed our initial assessment. Some of us got to use the iPads and explore the range of educational games and activities that are installed.

Dates for your diary:

Parents evening is on Wednesday 10th October. If you have not already, please book an appointment to see Miss Cragg by returning the slip sent home. Thank you for your support.

W.C 03.09.18

Welcome back to the start of a brand new school year!

We're very excited to welcome all of the new children into Year One, we can't wait to get to know you and find out all about you.

We've started off this week in style, jumping straight in. In Maths we've been exploring numbers to 10, building them in a variety of ways and practising our number formation. We have used dienes, cubes, objects, straws, bead strings and tens frames and have demonstrated our understanding well. We have also sorted objects into groups based on their features. Next week we will move on to counting forwards and thinking about missing number sequences.

In our English lessons we have discussed our hopes and wishes for our time together in Year One. We would all like to make a new friend, keep our school tidy and win the Maths Whizz trophy this year!

We've also spent time this week exploring the resources in our classroom and making the most of the last of the summer weather by using our outdoor area. We have been suprised by the weather twice already, please ensure your child is prepared by bringing a coat or a rain jacket to keep them dry and warm. We're hoping to get a few more weeks out of the area yet!

Things to note:

PE is on Mondays and Tuesdays. Please return any missing PE kits to school.

Reading books will be changed on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. Please read with your child and write a note in their reading log. Children will then need to place their books and reading logs in the yellow box to be changed again. We will remind children each morning to check their bags and place any books in the box but we will be unable to check every child's bag.

Homework will be sent out each Thursday, to be completed and returned by the following Tuesday.

Labels in clothes make them much easier to return! Please label everything your child brings to school, if it does happen to sprout legs then a label will ensure it makes it's way back to us.

Statutory nationwide Phonics Screening occurs in Year One, in early June. We will be practising Phonics every day but would require support at home after Christmas to ensure a continuing high success rate.

Thank you for your support and we look forward to getting to know all of the class's grown-ups over the coming year.