Year 1: Blog items
Date: 25th Feb 2023 @ 8:43pm
Today we began our History journey by being ‘History Detectives!’ We were given 8 visual clues that revealed details and ideas as to why Columbus is famous, even though he died 500 years ago. We worked in groups to look at these historical sources, writing key words or phrases that came to mind around the outside of the photos. We then combined all our ideas on our class mind map.
Date: 25th Feb 2023 @ 8:38pm
Our first Reading into Writing journey this half term is instructions. We began this journey by reading the story 'The Disgusting Sandwich.' Today we practised following instructions to make paper plate fish and a friendship bracelet. We recapped on the features of instructions, before decoding and reading through each example and finding the features together. It was then our turn to follow the instructions to make our end product. Some of us found out what happened when we don’t read and follow instructions carefully!
Date: 19th Jan 2023 @ 6:53pm
This week in PSHE we have been learning about how to keep safe in and around our home. We learnt and discussed what medicines are, when they should be taken and how they should be kept. We also talked about other substances that can be dangerous and poisonous in and around the home,
Date: 19th Jan 2023 @ 6:47pm
This week we enjoyed our DT day! We began by tasting lots of different fruits, talking about how we knew if certain foods are fruits or vegetables. We then moved on to designing our own fruit salad. We wanted it to be colourful, have at least four fruits in and to be cut up into bite sized pieces!
After creating our design, we then practised our cutting skills using play dough. We learnt how to use the bridge grip and the claw grip and once we had mastered the skills we moved onto making our fruit salad. We used the two cuts we had learnt to safely and sensibly prepare and make our individual fruit salad. We all enjoyed tasting them! Finally we completed our evaluation to identify what we liked about our design and what we might change if we were to make another fruit salad.
Date: 12th Jan 2023 @ 7:51am
Today we learnt that animals come in all shapes and sizes and that we can describe them by looking at their body parts. We discovered that some body parts are common to all animals whereas some body parts are only found on particular animals. We began the lesson by listening to a number of clues and using our prior knowledge about animals to try and guess the animal.
‘I have six legs, I can fly, I am red with black spots…What am I?
We then looked at a number of different animals from each animal classification and identified their key features. We asked and answered questions about why certain animals need these parts, where they live, what animals we could think of that were similar and how many different types of each animal we could name. We then used this knowledge to investigate a range of animals and match the correct labels to each.
We also drew and labeled the key features of our favourite animal.
'My favourite animal is a frog - it has long hind legs so it can jump!'
'My favourite animal is a shark - it has fins and gills to help it swim and breathe under the water'
Date: 10th Jan 2023 @ 6:28pm
This week we have begun our art journey 'Flora and Fauna.'
We have looked at artists who use drawing as a way to capture the way plants and insects look, and artists who use their imagination to create their own versions of flora and fauna.
We have spent time engaging in observational drawing to build our drawing skils, alongside experimenting with new materials. We have also practised our cutting and collage skills to explore shape and colour to build images.
Finally we used these skills to create our own individual mini beast collages.
Date: 10th Jan 2023 @ 6:01pm
This week we have begun to read 'The Girl With Two Dads' by Mel Elliott. After discussing the key features of the book we then read and discussed the story.
'The two friends get to know each other and learn about each others lives'
'Pearl is surprised to find out her new friend has two dads, she doesn't know anyone else with two dads'
'Both girls learn that all families are different'
We sequenced the key events from the story and worked on retelling the story with a partner.
Date: 9th Jan 2023 @ 7:22pm
This half term in Maths we have begun by exploring numbers within 20. We have been talking about what we already know about these numbers and learning how to represent these numbers with Base 10. We have then recapped on prior learning to find one more and one less, numbers that are greater then/less than a given number and whether numbers are odd or even.
'Fourteen is 1 ten and 4 ones'
'Twenty is two tens'
'I know 11 is odd because it ends in a number 1. 1 cannot be shared equally between 2'
'15 is less than 16, 17, 18, 19 and 20'
Date: 9th Jan 2023 @ 7:19pm
Today we began to learn about Hinduism by thinking about our roles and the roles of others. We talked about people in the community – nurses, doctors, teachers, police, fire service, care workers, rubbish collectors, postmen/women etc, discussing how they are special and what would happen if we did not have these people. We learnt these people make a difference! They each play an important roe and do extraordinary things for people around them. We then looked more in-depth at police officers, discussing why this role includes special clothing and visual ways of showing people what this person’s role is.
‘Police officers wear a uniform so that people respect them’
‘’Their uniform helps people to know who they are and that they can trust them’
‘’Police people wear a uniform so that people can recognise them in a busy place’
Date: 13th Dec 2022 @ 7:09pm
Year 1 have been enjoying all the Christmas activities around school over the past few weeks! We had lots of fun on Christmas jumper day where we also enjoyed a delicious Christmas lunch!
Date: 13th Dec 2022 @ 7:03pm
Today we took part in the Now Press Play Christmas story. We played lots of different central figures including: the Angel Gabriel, Mary, Joseph, Baby Jesus, the innkeepers, shepherds and wise men. The experience took us through the main events of the story and the main places to understand that Jesus’ birth was – and is – important to many people.
‘The Angel Gabriel delivered very important news to Mary’
‘The wise men brought presents to Jesus to show respect and love’
‘Mary and Joseph travelled to Bethlehem. It was a very long journey and they were tired. The donkey was tired too!’
Date: 13th Dec 2022 @ 6:59pm
Today we completed some RE art to show an important event in the story – when the three wise men travelled to see baby Jesus. We created silhouettes of the three wise men on their journey and used collage to create a colourful design for the wise men’s clothing. We ripped, scrunched, cut and twisted crepe paper to create our design. Some of us also created and used patterns within our design.
Date: 8th Dec 2022 @ 7:13pm
This week Year 1 have been very interested in the seasonal changes taking place. As the weather has got much colder we have enjoyed spending some time outside observing what is happening to the trees, making patterns in the frost and exploring ice!
Date: 8th Dec 2022 @ 6:34pm
Today we worked collaboratively to build and assemble a range of 3D shapes. We firstly looked for examples of 3D shapes within the classroom and identified the number of faces, edges and vertices of each shape. We then used this knowledge to create a range of 3D shapes out of different materials.
‘A cube has 6 faces’ ‘It has 12 edges and 8 vertices’
‘A cuboid has 6 faces – four rectangles and 2 squares’ ‘It has 8 vertices and 12 edges’
‘A pyramid has 5 faces – 4 triangles and 1 square’ ‘It has 5 vertices and 8 edges’
Reading into Writing so far this half-term...
Date: 8th Dec 2022 @ 12:14pm
Date: 5th Dec 2022 @ 7:04pm
This week we were lucky enough to visit St Mark’s Church. We met Reverend Matthew and told him everything that we have leant about Christianity so far. Reverend Matthew then read the nativity story to us and we all joined in with different parts. He taught us about the key messages in the story and the roles of different characters. We then learnt about the advent wreath and the symbolism of the different candles. Finally we looked around the church and asked and answered lots of questions about features of the church.
‘The pink candle on the wreath is for Mary’
‘The white candle is for Jesus and it is lit on Christmas Day’
‘The font is where Christians baptise a baby to welcome them into the Church family’
‘Matthew, Mark, Luke and Josh are the four gospels’
‘Christmas is about Jesus being born, not just presents!’
Year 1 Musical Listening and Composing
Date: 30th Nov 2022 @ 4:06pm
In Year 1 we have been doing lots of listening to different types of music. We used our new Musical Listening Mats to think about the tempo, pitch and how the music made us feel. We also started composing using Chrome Music Lab and understood that different patterns and marks represent different notes and sounds. We made our own ostinato patterns which repeat. We have been playing percussion instruments in time to the music and learning the names of other common instruments.
Year 1 Waterproof or Absorbent
Date: 25th Nov 2022 @ 7:27pm
Today we helped Ted solve an emergency! Firstly, we learnt two new key words, waterproof and absorbent.
‘Waterproof means it keeps out water’
‘Absorbent means it can soak up liquid’
We also discussed and found out about Charles Macintosh, who was best known for his invention of a method for making waterproof clothing.
‘He put the rubber and chemicals on fabric to make it waterproof’
We then used what we know about materials, their properties and our new vocabulary to solve Ted’s emergency. We discussed how we were going to make it a fair test, by using the same amount of water and the same amount of time. We then worked in small groups to complete our experiment. In these groups we made our predictions, before following our method.
Year 1 The Jolly Christmas Postman!
Date: 25th Nov 2022 @ 7:18pm
After reading our new text we received a letter from ‘The Jolly Postman!’
We used our phonics knowledge to decode the letter and to find out what he had to say! We also identified the address, the date, who the letter is to and who the letter is from. Over the next few days we will be reading a range of different letters, highlighting the key features and further developing our understanding of the purpose of letters.
Date: 20th Nov 2022 @ 6:52pm
During Anti-Bullying week, Year 1 explored different types of bullying. We read the story 'Carrot Club,' which reminded us not to judge others by their appearance and to think positively about healthy eating! We discussed what we thought bullying is and learnt the thorough definition. We then learnt about different types of bullying, including physical, verbal, cyber and indirect.
'Indirect bullying could be leaving people out of games'
'Cyber bullying is when people use messages to upset someone'
We discussed lots of examples together and then moved on to talking about what we could do in certain situations.
'You can tell your trusted adult'
'You can be kind to the person being bullied and help them not to feel alone'
Date: 16th Nov 2022 @ 7:40pm
Today we began to read, discuss and understand the Christmas story and the message behind the story. We read the story together, identifying the characters and key events witihin the story. We then independently ordered the story, using pictures/captions to support our learning.
Date: 16th Nov 2022 @ 7:10pm
We began our history topic with reading the story ‘Too Many Toys.’ We read and discussed the story, talking about other children’s favourite toys, before moving onto identifying our own favourite toys. We found out what Miss Kay’s and Mrs Websters favourite toy were and listened to the reasons why, before contributing our own thoughts and ideas. We became confident using the phrase ‘My favourite toy is ___ because ___’
'My favourite toy is Lightning McQueen because it has flames and can go fast'
'My favourite toy is a ukalele because it can make music'
'My favourite toy is Elsa because she has long blonde hair and ice powers'
Date: 3rd Nov 2022 @ 7:36pm
This week we began to explore the term part and whole. We worked practically to investigate how to identify a whole number and split it into different parts. We realised that we could split the whole number into two (or more) different parts and that these can be shown either way around, e.g. 3 and 4 make the same whole as 4 and 3. We have also continued to complete place value and number activities in our provision to support our knowledge of numbers!
Date: 3rd Nov 2022 @ 6:44pm
Today we enjoyed our first forest school session in Year 1! This week our learning was based around birds. We made birds nests, pretended to be birds to play a game collecting seeds and looked at pictures of birds eggs. Throughout the session, we also made two different types of bird feaders, created mud masterpieces in the mud kitchen and enjoyed having some time outdoors in the sunshine!
Date: 31st Oct 2022 @ 6:22pm
Today, we began the start of our new half term by enjoying a DT day!
Firstly, we looked at existing products to explore the different mechanisms and moving parts in a range of picture books. We talked about how the moving part moves, how it works and what effect it has.
We then began to make two prototypes, a lever and a slider. We linked each mechanism to a story to create a moving picture for each. We all talked through the safety points and watched our teachers make an example, reading through the instructions together and spotting where they went wrong! We then each had a turn to follow the instructions, read them carefully and make our two prototypes.
We verbally evaluated our desgins, talking about what had gone well and what we could improve next time.
