Another great week in Owls!
Date: 21st Jan 2022 @ 9:32pm
Wow Owls! Another fantastic week of you all being super hard working and determined. What fun it has been!
In English this week, we have begun to explore lists. The children helped to map out all the different places that Granny visited in our story "Granny goes to Market." They explored a large World map and a globe and were so enthusiastic in learning about where the countries were, how big or small they were, whether they were hot or cold and any animals or other interesting facts about the countries. Our discussion ended up talking about Tonga and the recent events that have occurred over there. The children were fascinated by the fact that the volcano was underwater and that it sent a huge wave and could be seen from space. It was lovely to see so much empathy from the people of Tonga, they were genuinely concerned for the people who lived there. After we had used the maps, the children discussed lists and were taught how to write one. They then wrote their own lists of where Granny travelled to.
Within phonics we have learnt the sounds y, z, zz and qu. The children have listened super well and played a range of games to help them retain these sounds. We have begun to understand that we will be learning digraphs now, where the two letters work together (like friends/buddies) to make one sound, 'qu' was our latest one. The children were given a wide range of paired objects all spread across the floor. Each item of each pair has a 'q' and 'u' on. The children had to pick a pair of the items and pop them together to make a 'qu.' This was a great exercise to make the children see how the two letters come together to form that one sound. In addition to this activity, the children also had magic carpets with cvc words on, hidden in the sand. They used spoons to spoon out the magic carpet, read the word and then return it to the sand for someone else. They also had paper plates with sounds on, which they had to throw beanbags on, and then name the sound it landed on. In our reading room, the children were able to choose a book and search through for the different sounds that we have learnt this week and on our World map we have had various activities from magic carpet with sounds on used in a game of pairs and hooking a duck to read a sound whilst it swims around the world.
In Maths we have continued to focus on 6, 7 and 8. We have been looking at the composition of these numbers and trying to subitise them. The children have used a range of resources from, numicon, conkers, 10 frame and number cards to look at these numbers. We then focused on numicon to look at pairs in numbers. We furthered this slightly to learn about whether the number was an "Odd Bob” or an "Even Steven," by comparing whether the number had full pairs or an odd one left over. We discussed 'buddies,' as being part of a pair and this linked well to our digraphs in phonics. The children have enjoyed making 6 using numicon plate towers to create magic carpets on our World map, they also used socks to make pairs and they all loved playing with Noah's Art and all of the wooden animals, pairing up the animals.
In our 'Love to Learn, Excited to Explore,' sessions, we have created playdough magic carpets using beads, gems and wool. The children were encouraged to create a pattern on their flying carpet and to ensure that their tassels matched each side. They have loved exploring our small world magic flying carpet area and our role play. Additionally they have been sharing books in the reading room and using lego and duplo to make market stalls and flying carpets. Finally in art, we finished our large patterned flying carpets. We then sat on them and the children told me where they would fly to and what they would get. How lovely it was to hear one of them say, " I would go to the sad place...Tonga, to help people by putting them on my magic carpet."
Owls your imagination is infectious! Alongside all of this we have explored a whole range of new vocabulary from coil, camouflage, globe to Tonga, eruption and Tsunami.
Well done all of you. Have a good rest and a wonderful weekend!
