Year 1

Welcome back everybody! We hope everyone had a lovely Easter holiday and is feeling rested and ready for the start of the summer term. We have had a wonderful week back, starting it off by sharing all about their holidays, then jumping straight into new learning. 

Our new book in English is called Meerkat Mail by Emily Gravett, where a meerkat travels to different places each day of the week. Everyday, Sunny sends a postcard back to his family describing what each place is like. We have pretended to be meerkats, focused on chronological order and the days of the week and created a bank of vocabulary for each of the places he visits. We will then be adding all this into our travel journals, where we will sequence our writing using days of the week, and using first person to write as Sunny the meerkat. 

In maths, we have been learning to count in 2s, 5s and 10s, and we practise all the time - when we’re lining up, walking to the playground and during any transitions. It would be very helpful if we could extend this practice at home to make sure children are fluent in counting in 2s, 5s and 10s. We have been using lots of different manipulatives to make equal groups of 2s, 5s and 10s, adding equal groups and sharing. 

Andy Goldsworthy is our artist we will be focussing on this half term. With the lovely weather, we have had a wonderful time exploring natural materials often found in Andy Goldsworthy’s work, and using malleable materials such as clay to create imprints of nature. We are exploring seasonal changes and plants in science, where we look at data and observe how day length varies with the seasons, and look at different parts of a tree by sketching a tree and labeling the parts. In geography, we have looked at continents, oceans, and the North and South pole.

    

                       

                            

w/b 28.04.25

Keywords: oceans, natural materials, day length, seasons, data, 

Sounds: ur, er, ow, ai, oa, ew, ire, ear

 

w/b 06.05.25

Keywords: North Pole and South Pole, malleable, clay, imprint, parts of a tree 

Sounds: ure, tion, c/tious, au, ck, e-e, ie

 

Messages: 

Please drop children off to their classrooms by 8.45am. If you are running late, do not go to the classrooms after 8.45 and instead go through the office as this can be disruptive to the learning. 

Bring reading folders (reading records and spelling books) on Monday. 

The reading record should be signed by an adult five times.

Your child will receive their reading folders back on Tuesday. 

 

Dates: 

Every Monday - homework club

07.05.25 - open classrooms (8.45 - 9.15)

07.05.25 - celebrating diversity workshop for all families (9.15-9.45)

23.05.25 - The Vineyard Walk

 

Year 2

We hope you all had a restful and enjoyable Easter break. It's been wonderful to return to school and enjoy the lovely weather as we begin our summer term. The children have settled back in brilliantly, and there's a real buzz of excitement in the classrooms.

We're especially looking forward to our trip this week to see The Carnival of the Animals - a fantastic opportunity to explore music and storytelling in a fun and creative way!

In English, we’ve started a new story – The Gigantic Turnip. The children have really enjoyed exploring this traditional tale and are now working on writing their own imaginative versions, adding their own twists and ideas. In maths, we've been focusing on measuring length and height, using centimetres and metres, and comparing different objects. We’ve also been developing our understanding of the four operations – multiplication, division, addition and subtraction – and discussing which operation is best to use when solving word problems. Please continue to practise this at home to deepen your child's understanding. For example: A rope is 5m long. If I cut it in half, how long is each piece? We have begun to learn about mass, including how to compare mass using grams and kilograms. Our science topic this term is Plants, and the children thoroughly enjoyed heading outside to explore and identify plants around the school grounds. It was a lovely way to kick off our learning with some hands-on discovery. In Art, we are learning about the artist Wassily Kandinsky. The children have loved exploring the colours and shapes inspired by his work. In Geography, we’ve started looking at São Paulo, Brazil. The children were fascinated to learn how different the weather can be in other parts of the world – and that rain doesn’t always mean it’s cold!

We’re looking forward to a busy and exciting term ahead.

    

                           

w/b 28.04.25

Keywords: verbs, past tense, suffix ‘est’ and ‘ly’, characters, setting, description, mass, grams, operation, kilograms, lighter, heavier, scales, weighing, Sao Paulo, seasons, wet, dry, Kandinsky, colours, shapes, plants, grow, sunshine, water, air, nutrients.

Spellings:The suffixes –less and –ly

badly, hopeless, penniless, happily, lovely, joyless, slowly, quickly.

 

w/b 06.05.25

Keywords: retell, litre, millilitre, volume, capacity, seed coat, embryo, food store, physical, human features, brush stroke, 

Spellings: Words ending in -tion

Station, fiction, motion, national, section, addition, subtraction, potion.

 

Messages: 

Bring reading folders (reading records and spelling books) on Monday. 

The reading record should be signed by an adult five times.

Your child will receive their reading folders back on Tuesday. 

Once it starts to get warmer, please send your child to school with a sun hat and apply sunscreen before the school day.

Please ensure your child is wearing appropriate footwear - e.g. school shoes with their uniform and only trainers with their PE kit.

Please ensure your child has a book bag and not a rucksack.

 

Dates: 

Friday 2nd May - Classical concert, Southbank

Tuesday 6th May - National Archives, Kew (Amethyst Class)

Wednesday 7th May - Open classrooms 8.45-9.15

Wednesday 7th May - Celebrating Diversity workshop for all families 9.15

Tuesday 13th May - National Archives, Kew (Pearl Class)

Tuesday 20th May - National Archives, Kew (Turquoise Class)

Friday 6th June - Pearl and Turquoise Scooter Training (please bring your child’s scooter. If they don’t have one, they can share with a friend)