Wrens 2020-21
Friday 9th July 2021
This week, our hard work in the vegetable patch paid off. We have been weeding and watering for months now and watching carefully as our plants grew and ripened. We talked about only eating what a grown-up says that you can as not all plants should be eaten and we learned how to wash our vegetables so that they were safe to eat.
We harvested our broad beans, carrots, radishes and lettuces, washed them all carefully and then prepared our yummy picnic, which we shared this Friday.
It was great to share what we had grown.
“Our plants have got bigger and bigger and BIGGER!” Oisin.
“You have to wash vegetables so you don’t get a poorly tummy.” Ella
“We gave our plants lots of water and they grew really tall.” Jamie
“I like trying new vegetables.” Izzabella
Our Star of the week this week was Tyler who has been working amazingly hard in maths.
Friday 2nd July 2021
We have had some great fun with our key text this week by adding instruments and exploring rhythm in the story. It helped us in our maths learning as well as we have been exploring pattern this week.
We had our first class trip to the church this week. Reverend Lulu was kind enough to give us a tour and answer some of our questions- we had lots!
Questions from Wrens Class
Why do people sing at church?
Why do people go to church to pray?
What other things do people do in church?
How do you feel looking after the church?
What is it like helping the church?
How do you feel when you are in the church?
When was the church built?
How do you ring the bells?
How do you know what the time is at church?
How do you clean the church?
How many answers can the Wrens remember?
Friday 25th June 2021
Our very first sports day was a great success with smiling faces, racing heartbeats and fabulous teamwork. Wrens were split into their colour teams for the carousel of activities, which was followed by the exciting races! Here is a flavour of this afternoon's exciting events. Full results will be announced on Monday during an assembly.
Friday 18th June 2021
Wrens have thrown themselves in to creating a new version of ‘The Very Hungry Caterpillar’ this week. The new characters (a ladybird and a unicorn) are quite amazing and the children came up with some fab ways that they might use to transform from one thing into another. Wrens have also explored the real science behind the changes from an egg, to a caterpillar, to a butterfly and have written about each stage. This got us to thinking about other animal babies when we shared ‘Monkey Puzzle’ and we have decided to find out about the life cycles of other animals and mini beast that we might find in our school grounds.
In maths there have been odd socks, plates of food and teddy bear’s toys alongside the usual array of numicon and tens frames as Wrens explored odd and even numbers. We talked about the differences that can be seen in odd and even numbered numicon pieces and the children have been sorting numbers based on this.
Our garden has finally had some very welcome rain and everything is growing well. Wrens have been measuring and talking about the growth and thinking about what scrumptious food we might make from the plants we are growing.
Friday 11th June 2021
The big news this week has been the opening of our new outdoor learning space. Over half term, a new all-purpose surface was laid, meaning that Wrens now have a lot more space where they can learn. Much of the week has been organising the resources that the children can use when they are learning outside and this was led by the children. As it was the children who organised this, they are experts at tidying away now and it has made them far more independent as there are so many more resources available for self selection.
Our new story this week is, ‘The Very Hungry Caterpillar’. Wrens have learned the story and thought about the main character. It has been great to hear from so many who have raised butterflies at home themselves. New phonics groups began this week and Wrens continue to learn new sounds and spelling choices each day.
This week saw the welcome return of our reading buddies scheme. Key stage 1 and Reception classes will spend time each Thursday sharing and enjoying stories with each other. Wrens thoroughly enjoyed sharing what they have been reading, talking about stories they know and hearing new .
In maths, we have been sharing and exploring the concept of sharing being equal and fair. Children have been practising this in their independent learning as well and have become very good at explaining if they think something has been shared equally or not.
A Reminder: change of books
This will now happen on a Thursday. Please make sure that the Read Write Inc. and colour coded book come back to school on this day. Library visits are planned in for a Wednesday.
Our Star of the week is Oisin. His amazing questions make us all think- thank you Oisin.
Friday 28th May 2021
Hello half term!
This final week of the half term has been a busy one with children helping to organise the resources so that they can be used more independently. This is working well, especially outside where children are challenged to think about how they are developing their own learning.
This has been the final week exploring Noah’s Ark. We have thought about how we make the best of each day; making us, our school and God proud of the people we are. We even had some fun wondering what it would have been like for Noah if he had made a hot air balloon rather than an ark. The children were very creative when taking this learning outside where they used the play tools and workbench to repair Noah’s ark/hot air balloon and keep it ship shape with the cleaning equipment.
In maths, Wrens have explored doubles. We used different representations of numbers to explore this in more depth and are getting better and better at recognising and recalling doubles up to 20.
The garden is coming on really well. The seeds we planted have germinated and Mrs Mandell has taught us about weeding so that the new plants have plenty of space. We have talked about what we think they will look like when we come back after half term. With all being well, we will have some delicious things ready for our picnic.
Our hard work has been noticed by the cleaners this week as we have been awarded the Cleaner's Cup. Well done Wrens for taking good care of our learning space. Let's keep up the good work next half term!
Our Star of the Week for this week is Daniel. A hard working Wren, who is always ready, respectful and safe.
We hope you all have a wonderful and restful half term break!
Friday 21st May 2021
The animals came in 2 by 2...
This week, we began learning about Noah’s ark and have begun to retell this bible story using pictures, story maps and actions. In our outside area, we created an ark for all the animals to share. Wrens carefully collected all the things the animals might need for their long journey, including comfy beds, which would be very important when the seas are rough! In the story, Noah and his family pray to God and we have been thinking about what praying means. We talked about how people of different faiths pray and that for Christians, this means talking to God. This helped us to write our own prayer about saying thank you and asking God to keep us safe.
In maths, Wrens have continued counting on and subitising in different contexts. Outside, the animals in the ark gave lots of opportunities for counting and finding totals. We have been thinking how we could show these number stories using ten frames, numicon and mark-making.
We have explored painting techniques this week as we created another display piece for our classroom. Mrs Musson taught Wrens how to create brush strokes to create different effects, which Wrens used to make wonderful animals to go inside Noah's ark. .
Our Star of the Week is Max, who is a great role model for our school rules as he is always ready, respectful and safe.
Friday 14th May 2021
Nice weather for ducks!
Our second week exploring ‘I Want A Pet’ by Lauren Child saw Wrens creating incredible, never seen before pets. There seemed to be no limit to the number of legs, eyes or colours of these strange creatures and when it came to taking care of them, there seemed to be an incredible amount of strange foods and bedding needed! It has been wonderful to see the spelling choices learned in phonics used so well.
In their exploration of numbers beyond ten, Wrens have started counting backwards. At home, why not have a go at singing some of our favourites such as green bottles, fat sausages and currant buns. Simply start at 20 and work your way back. It’s a good, fun way of exploring this tricky concept. One of our favourite games this week is where you start with between 10 and 20 objects. You have to take 1, 2 or 3 objects away each time. The loser is the one who is left with only one object left to take away.
In our outdoor area, children have continued leading the learning by using natural materials to create animals, creating new narratives, such as escaped animals, in the safari park and chalking to practise letter and number formation. It’s great to have a covered area during weeks like this one- we can still learn outside no matter what the weather throws at us.
Our star of the week this week is Keira, who has works so hard in her phonics and is using the new spellings she is learning in her spellings.
Friday 7th May 2021
A week of all weathers!
Although it’s been a shorter than usual week, we have certainly squeezed in a lot of learning in Wrens.
It was time to start a new story in our talk for writing. Our new story is based on, ‘I want a Pet’ by Lauren Child. Wrens have created actions and maps to help them learn the story and have been practising it each day. The character in the story thought that a lion might make a good pet, so Wrens had to spend a good while persuading her otherwise!
In maths, the children have been exploring number stories and practising the important skill of counting on in the context of addition. This tricky skill means counting on from a known amount, rather than starting from zero. To help the children with this, we are using the sentence stem, ‘First, then and now’ and is something that can be used at home to help mathematical learning. First, build a tower and count how many blocks there are, then add a few more blocks and now count on and find the total number of blocks in the tower. Remember- don’t start from zero; count on from the number of blocks in the first tower.
Thank you to everyone who has been supporting Wrens to learn to read the red words. A second presentation has been added to the Teams site to help you keep practising. Please do ask for support if you are having trouble accessing the learning platform and we will do our best to support you.
Thankfully, our plants continue to flourish, even through the wind, rain and hail! We found an unusual creature in the soil. Does anyone know what it might be? There was further excitement on Wednesday when an air ambulance landed on the school field. We were thankful to paramedics on board who let us have a look from a safe distance.
Our Star of the week this week is Izzabella. It has been hard not to notice Izzabella’s hard work in phonics and writing. We are all very proud of her.
Friday 30th April 2021
This week was our final one looking at ‘We’re Going On A Bear Hunt’. Wrens created new settings, explored new characters and created their own version complete with actions. Lots of our writing this week explored the new version of the story, with groups exploring how to link sentences about it, describing the new settings and exploring what other animals they might go on a hunt for. It is wonderful to see the hard work in phonics pay off as Wrens become more confident with spelling choices while compose their own captions and sentences.
In maths, we have continued with number and understanding different representations. The children have explored number lines, tens frames, cubes, numicon and a host of other resources to explain their understanding of amounts.
The safari park has continued to develop with the addition of sky bridges for visitors to view the animals better. Wrens have also been busy creating maps to help animal lovers find their way around the enclosures. Now they know the animals well, some children even challenged themselves to create fact files for their favourite animals.
Although the weather has been a little chilly, work in the growing patch continued this week. We explored what new growth could be seen and created a map of the area. We have also tried to make it safer for all who use it by creating cane toppers for the top of the poles used to support the beans and sweet peas. The rain this week was also welcome as we have been learning about how important rain is to plant growth.
Our star of the week this week was Josh. Thank you for being such a hard-working and smiley member of Wrens class.
Friday 23rd April 2021
The sun has certainly energised Wrens this week and we have completed another wonderful week of work.
In Talk for Writing, Wrens have explored the difference between the physical aspects of a characters and the way that they feel. By the end of this session, I think everyone was feeling quite sorry for the bear! Wrens have also been thinking more deeply about the settings within the story. These change quite regularly and the children were challenged to think of some new ones. By using the senses of touch, smell and hearing Wrens explored some objects and used the to come up with new ideas. One of the ideas is to have a frozen lake that they could skate across. Great thinking Wrens!
In maths, the children have explored number in greater depth. By developing mathematical language to describe numbers, every child becomes more confident when explaining their thinking. As always, games and puzzles form a large part of the learning, so this week we have been racing, playing bingo and creating patterns to explore the numbers we have been looking at.
The safari park is in full swing, although this week one of the crocodiles had a poorly foot. That created an interesting dilemma at the vets! This child-led approach to learning has created some wonderful writing and conversations.
Mrs Mandell visited again this week. The growing area is developing nicely as the children have been busy weeding and planting out their beans. We noticed so many changes in the bean plants and wrote some great notes about the differences between a week old plant and one that was 4 weeks old.
Our Star of the Week was Thea. Well done Thea for such enthusiastic reading and writing this week.
Friday 16th April 2021
This week’s learning began with an incredibly important job. Mrs Wizard came in to find hordes of animals all over the classroom! When Wrens looked closer, they noticed that there were a real mix because some were pets, while others were wild. It took some careful organising, but the class worked together to sort the animals into smaller and smaller groups. Indoors, we have created a safe area for the pets where they can come and be looked after by vets and outside we have an entire safari park. Wrens have worked tirelessly to create different enclosures for the different animals; including the food they would need to stay healthy. We have made toys to keep the animals thinking as well as labels so that the visitors to the safari park know what they are looking at.
In our Talk for Writing sessions, we have begun looking at ‘We’re Going On A Bear Hunt’ The children have really enjoyed this so far, creating story maps and thinking about what their favourite part of the story is. It inspired the children to create some lovely art later in the week where they created some of the settings using a mix of media.
In maths, Wrens have continued to build on their important subitising skills and getting to know the numbers they are using really well. We have begun to think beyond 10 in our sessions this week. This has meant lots of practice where Wrens look for patterns and amounts that they recognise by sight and without counting.
Our growing project is coming along nicely. We were again visited by Mrs Mandell who explained how we would be caring for our planting area. Wrens have been busy weeding as well as planting. Thank you for taking such good care of the bean seedlings. There are a few more frosts forecast in the next days, so we will keep these seedlings safe and hope to plant them out next week.
Please remember to return any books on Mondays so that they can be changed. This helps us to ensure we follow the quarantine guidelines set out by the school and ensure that Wrens have new reading material to challenge them.
Our Star of the Week this week is Thurston. We have all been very impressed with the effort that he has put into his reading. In particular, we are proud of how he has been able to sight read the words in his ditty book this week.
Friday 26th March 2021
Spring has sprung!
Here we are at the end of the Spring term. Wrens class have settled well into the routines and learning as a whole class once more and have completed the final week of this term.
This week, Wrens have explored the traditional Easter story. There have been choral readings, role-play to explore the main ideas, sequencing and writing about the most important story for Christians. Alongside this, the children have also explored some traditional activities including egg rolling, where children suggested units of measurement for how fart heir egg rolled and a reading egg hunt.
After learning about a much loved character of the snail in our key text from last week, the children decided that they wanted to learn about snails that we have in our local areas. We had a brief visit from a snail from our wooded area who was willing to put on a show under our visualiser and help us learn about how snails move and their different body parts. Wrens looked very closely and created some great pictures with captions.
In maths, we have continued to consolidate the understanding of the numbers Wrens have explored so far in different contexts. The key skill of subitising has really improved and the children are now applying this important skill when exploring different number bonds.
We had a visit from Mrs. Mandell on Friday this week and she shared her very exciting idea with us. We are going to work on a project where we grow some food to eat. All the Wrens will have brought home a bean seed that they planted today. Please pop this somewhere warm, keep it watered and look after it over the holidays. Hopefully, you Wrens can return these to school on Friday 16th April when we can begin to plant them out.
Thank you for joining both Mrs Wizard and Mrs Barnett for parents’ meetings this week. It was wonderful to share the progress that these hardworking children have made and how the important support offered at home can continue to support each and every child on their continuing learning journey. A written summary of these meetings will be e-mailed out to you during the first week of the summer term.
Our Star of the Week is Makena this week. A hard-working Wren who is always willing to share her ideas with her friends.
All the Early Years team wish you a restful Easter break and look forward to seeing Wrens class in the Summer term.
Friday 19th March 2021
Marching through March!
It has been a busy week of learning in Wrens once more.
This has been our second and final week of ‘The Snail and The Whale’ and the Wrens have cleverly recycled the characters and setting to create their own versions of this well-loved tale. In school, there is some supported writing, but the majority that the children create is now independent, using the ever-growing phonics skills that they build upon each day. The children have been introduced to the idea of a sentence and as a class and in groups, we have talked about how these begin with a capital letter and end with a full stop. We even have some funky kung-fu actions to help Wrens to remember this. This story has also inspired some rather wonderful art work. This term, Wrens are exploring pencil control in art and have created some very detailed coral and shells ready for a display.
In maths, we are revisiting the key skills of number up to 10. This encourages Wrens to subitise more quickly. In their independent learning, children explored how the different shapes of numicon fit together to create a set amount and were encouraged to explain their thinking. They have explored numeral recognition through hopscotch as well as problem solving activities about the number 6.
Our work on people who help us has continued throughout the week. This week, we have thought about refuse collectors and delivery people. Strangely, the sniffer dog in the police station went for a walk-about at the end of the week. Wrens looked for clues and had to piece together what they had found out. The silly pup had wandered to the school kitchen! Wrens decided that it must have been because of all the delicious food smells.
Friday 12th March 2021
Welcome Back!
It has been wonderful to see all the Wrens back in the classroom this week. We have worked hard together to re-establish those all-important learning routines at school, but overall the feeling has been that ‘It is just so god to be back!’ The children have been eager to learn and have jumped back in to whole-class learning straight way. We continue to place huge importance on the key skills of reading and writing, alongside maths every day, whilst ensuring that children’s interests and independent learning is supported and developed. We are lucky to have been joined by Miss Jenkins, who began supporting the learning in class this week. She will be working on Wednesdays, Thursdays and Fridays and has explained that she is already feeling very much at home even after only a week.
Our new book for the next 2 weeks is, ‘The Snail and The Whale’. Throughout the week, Wrens have been learning the text, thinking about the characters and the setting of the story. The Wrens team are very proud of how the children are beginning to apply their phonics that they have been practising both at home and school.
In maths, Wrens have continued to explore 9 and 10. We have continued to support the skill of subitising, where children recognise amounts, rather than needing to count them. Using this skill, Wrens have been able to explore the terms fewer and more to compare amounts by looking for patterns within larger amounts.
There has been a very exciting development in the role-play area. Wrens have been finding out all about the work of police officers and have used what they have found out to create their very own police station. The new-found skills came in handy in Thursday when Mrs. Barnett’s special pen went missing! Wrens employed their detective skills and discovered that it was in fact Yoda who had borrowed it without asking. Great work Wrens!
Our Star of the Week is Lily, who can always be spotted trying her best. This young lady simply loves to learn!
After all that hard work, the Wrens are likely to be ready for a rest this weekend. Please can you ensure that books are returned on Monday so that they can be changed.
Friday 18th December
Merry Christmas!
4 days of busy work and play has seen us through to the end of a very successful term.
The maths and phonics this week has consolidated everything taught so far, which reminded us all of how far we have come on our learning journey. The children's independence has developed so much this term and they should feel amazingly proud of the giant steps they have taken.
Oisin was our Star of the Week due to his hard work and positivity.
Thank you for coming (some of you twice!) to our Christmas song. It was a wonderful way to wish us all well as we went off to enjoy a well-earned Christmas break.
We can't wait to see all the Wrens back safe and sound in 2021.
Friday 11th December
It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas!
The penultimate week of this term has been another one packed with learning.
Wrens have had their memories tested this week with not one, but 2 story map creations. This skill is very important as it helps the children to reflect on the structure of a story and cement this in their own minds. This has been alongside list writing (Father Christmas will be busy!), card writing and our general kinetic letter practice. This week we explored the fisher family and the children have been excellent at consolidating the large body movements before moving onto board and paper practise. We have seen such an improvement at school!
Maths explored one more and one less in different contexts this week. There has been lots of tower building, number-block making and games to help children to recall these facts quickly.
As Christmas approaches, we have been exploring the story of the birth of Jesus in more detail. We had a wonderful, virtual assembly with Rev. Paula all about Christingle. This is a wonderful service that normally takes place in church each year. This year, the children have brought home a candle and information about a virtual Christingle service that will take place on Sunday 13th December. The children have been busy crafting. Shape decorations (that came home today) alongside cards for home and school (these will be with you once the glue has dried!) have been created ready to bring some Christmas cheer!
Tomorrow’s character walk sounds like it will be amazing. With over 70 stops, there are bound to be some wonderful sights as well as tasty treats.
Our Star of the Week this week is Izzabella. Such a kind and helpful Wren! Thank you for being such a superstar in our class.
Friday 3rd December
When December arrived
As always, so much learning has been packed into the week. The children in Wrens have started to explore 2 Christmas stories this week; ‘Harvey Slumfenberger’s Christmas Present’ as well as the traditional Christmas story. The children concentrated really well as they learned the stories and began to role-play the Christmas story in the outdoor area. First, they built a structure for the stable and then explored what the characters might say and do about the arrival of baby Jesus.
In maths, the children have been learning about one more and one less. They have explored this concept outside as the created a bus stop game, which they were also able to explore in more detail thanks to a board game inside. By using lots of practical resources, Wrens have begun to understand the many different ways that these number stories can be created and so have become more confident when retelling their own number stories about one more and one less. The advent of Christmas was also a great opportunity to recap prepositional language as we decorated trees and talked about where we placed the baubles and tinsel.
The weather has definitely become colder as the week has gone on…but it hasn’t stopped us learning. At one point, we even explored ice in the water tray! With only a few reminders, Wrens are very good at getting themselves ready for an outdoor session- but please can you support us by making sure that all children are able to do up their own coat. This week outside we have been mark making in foam, making spells and imaginary food with lentils and rice, not to mention improving our fine motor strength by using pegs to pick up cotton wool balls and adding them to Santa’s beard. Great fun!
Our Star of the Week this week is Johhny, who uses his boundless energy in his learning every day .
Friday 27th November
Next customer please!
This week, the role-play became one of our favourite places- a toy shop! Wrens have learned about the role of customers and shopkeepers as they explored what they might want to buy or sell. Each toy has a price and the children have busily been creating price labels linked to their growing knowledge of numbers.
In maths, as well as reviewing the numbers and their representations so far, Wrens have explored the number 5. There has been some amazing number block painting, which will be used to create a display sharing this new knowledge with the rest of the school. Wrens have also been thinking about how days are divided into day and night and have created their own personal morning and night timetables. In the outdoor area, we have begun to explore how we might measure a shorter period of time using a 1 and 5 minute timer. A goal shoot-out competition was in order and we raced to see who could score the most goals in 1 minute.
Wrens writing continues to come on in leaps and bounds. In kinetic letters, we looked at the abracadabra family once more. These all begin with the same movement from scared monkey and this week we have been developing fluency in writing these letters. Linked to our toy shop, each child was challenged to write the name of a favourite toy by breaking down the sounds and pinching each separate sound onto a finger. These essential, early spelling skills are constantly developed in the classroom to help the children make independent spelling choices as they grow. At the end of the week, we even wrote some secret messages to challenge our friends. Using invisible ink and blue light was a great way to challenge our reading and writing skills.
Our Star of the Week this week was Finley. So many adults have spotted him being so kind and hard working this week. Amazing job!
Friday 20th November
The number 4 and more!
Thank you to everyone who was able to join us for the Zoom phonics and kinetic letter talk earlier this week. It was wonderful to see so many parents in one place- albeit virtually. Clearly like us, you share a real passion to help the Wrens class succeed and develop as readers and writers. Each day this week, every child has moved forward with their understanding of the sounds in the British language and how to make spelling choices for them. They have continued to develop that core strength using the kinetic letters body positions that were spoken about and they have refined the way they write each letter family on whiteboards. Anyone who ordered the kinetic letter cards should be receiving these so that children are able to practise these at home. Thank you again for this invaluable support!
In maths, the focus number has been 4 and children have explored the many ways that it can be represented. This of course led Wrens to exploring squares and rectangles both in the classroom and outside. Transparent shapes in the water tray became quite a challenge as children were asked to explain what was the same and what was different between the different shapes they encountered.
The Wrens class have been introduced to the term ‘primary colours’ and have been challenged to explore red, blue and green and what happens when they mix these paint colours using a colour wheel. It was lots of fun and will be explored further next week.
Thank you to everyone who joined in with the Pudsey colouring competition. The wonderful entries were judged today and the winner in Wrens clas was Finley. His entry will be displayed in the school entrance hall.
The role-play of traditional tales continues. Outside, many children have risen to the challenge of creating a house belonging to one of the 3 little pigs. Honestly, the portrayals of the big, bad wolf have been quite terrifying.
Well done to Jake who was our Star of the Week. He is always works hard and tries his best and the adults thoroughly enjoy the stories he shares with us.
Good job Wrens! We hope you have a good rest over the weekend and we look forward to seeing you back at school on Monday.
Friday 13th November
A Busy Week!
Throughout the week, the children in Wrens class have continued to explore traditional stories and have been busy creating story maps to help them to retell these. Even in our outdoor classroom, it has been a common sight to see a troll and Billie Goats trip-trapping over bridges that the children have constructed. Alongside the picture prompts, the adults in school have been encouraging the Wrens to use their growing phonic knowledge to have a go at spelling the names of some of the characters. The children have again been thinking of the different ways that the numbers in these stories can be represented through lots of independent tasks throughout the week.
Key PE skills have been brushed up again this week, with children refining their throwing skills to become more accurate. It has been great to see them challenge themselves!
Towards the end of the week, the children began to think about Diwali. Wrens learnt about how a child called Dipal celebrated this festival and it was wonderful to hear them make links between this celebration and the way the children celebrate their own special days. The children created some wonderful, textured Rangoli patterns, which was a great way of recapping what they had learnt about shapes so far. Our focus shape has been the triangle and we have been thinking about counting the 3 pointy corners and 3 straight edges to check if it is a triangle or not.
Our Star of the Week for this week is Bertie. Thank you for being so enthusiastic in your learning and always sharing it with your grown-ups at home as well as everyone at school.
Today is Children in Need. Wrens have thought about why it is important to help others and linked it to stories and ideas we have discussed in our class assemblies. They came up with so many ways that they could show kindness to other people. They will now bring home a Pudsey themed colouring-in sheet. If you would like to join in the school’s fundraising efforts, please get colouring and then return the sheet with your donation.
Friday 6th November
Our first week back
We may only have had 4 days this week, but we have managed to squeeze a lot in! The adults in school worked with each child this week and have been so pleased with the phonics progress they have made. All children have begun to read ditties this week in the phonics sessions as well as with an adult. This is to make sure that they are prepared to bring these ditties home to share with you all at home. Behind the scenes, we are preparing a guide to help Wrens children and parents to get the most out of these reading sessions and this will be with you in the next few weeks. In maths, Wrens have explored the many different ways of representing the numbers 1, 2 and 3. This is vitally important for the number work later on in the year and for encouraging children to record numbers in their own way. The children also explored prepositional language in the environment, becoming more confident when describing where someone or something is.
Our role-play area has transformed into the cottage belonging to the 3 Bears. There has been a lot of porridge mixing, bed making and chair testing with the Wrens working together to really get to grips with the story.
We finished the week with a fizz, pop and bang as we thought about how and why we celebrate bonfire night. There were some wonderful bonfire and firework creations from the very creative Wrens.
Friday 23rd October
First half term complete!
What a wonderful final week of our first half term as Wrens. Autumn has well and truly sprung, with pumpkins, colourful leaves and soggy days aplenty!
The children in Wrens have really got to grips with our key text and are happily retelling ‘The Tiger Who Came to Tea’ with great enthusiasm. There have been story maps, role play and small world play all helping to cement an understanding of this classic story. If you would like to invite a tiger into your home follow these simple instructions.
- On your phone, go to google.com or open your Googleapp .
- Search for an animal, object, or place.
- If a 3Dresult is available, tap View in 3D .
- To interact with the 3Dresult in AR, tap View in your space.
- Follow the on-screen instructions.
It would be wonderful to see some of the adventures you get up to with your new house guest on Tapestry!
In maths, we have explored 1 and zero and developed our mathematical language when we talk about these numbers and how they can be represented. This led us to explore circles as they have no corners and one curved edge. Wrens learned about the art of Kandinsky and Andy Goldsworthy and used these a s a springboard to create their own pieces both indoors and outdoors. What a creative lot!
Congratulations to Max who is our first Star of the Week. Max always tries his best and is a very active learner and great friend.
It has been a real pleasure to share the wonderful progress of your children during the parents evenings this week and we appreciate the time you gave over to this. The staff are very proud of how well the children have settled as well as how engaged they are in their learning adventure at Greens Norton. We hope they all have a fun and restful half term.
Friday 16th October
Patterns everywhere!
This week, we explored patterns inside and out. Our AB patterns could be found in the sand, the paint, between trees, in the water- in fact there were few places this week that weren't covered in patterns. We began by completing patterns, then copying them until we felt confident to make them ourselves. Some very clever Wrens were explaining how broken patterns could be fixed as well.
Our work on The Tiger Who Came To Tea continued well, with lots or retelling and role play. In our cafe, we had some very hungry tigers and customers this week!
In PE, Wrens are getting themselves ready more quickly and calmly. This week we have been lucky with the weather and have been building up our gross motor skills outside. This was extended on Friday when the class went outside to dig up the vegetables that Mrs. Marsh planted earlier in the year. There was some tasty chard, huge balls of beetroot and even some carrots. We might return to the vegetable beds next week to see what else we can discover.
Today we took part in the first Zoom celebration assembly- which was wonderful as some of the stars of the Week were siblings of Wrens class members. The adults will have the tricky task of choosing our first Star of the Week next week. We always look for someone who has tried hard and pushed themselves in their learning.
Friday 9th October
A busy, busy week!
This week's reading and writing has been a joy to see. All the adults are so proud of how Wrens are using the methods that have been taught so far. In the phonic sessions, children are asked to focus on a particular sound. It is becoming normal for children to refer back to the classroom frieze and this demonstrates that the children are using the tools around them and become more independent in their learning. Kinetic letters this week looked at the abracadabra family and the children have been linking the large movements taught throughout the week to smaller, more refined movements on whiteboards and paper. Good job Wrens! We have been sharing the story, 'The Tiger Who Came To Tea' by Judith Kerr daily this week. The children are beginning to know it well. In the coming weeks, we will dig deeper into this story and use it as inspiration across other areas of learning.
In maths we have been incredibly busy comparing a range of things- some which can be counted, some which need measuring and others that have to be measured in other ways such as using scales or pouring into containers. Towards the end of the week, we began to explore AB patterns such as red, blue, red, blue or heart, circle, heart, circle. The children are beginning to be able to talk about these with more confidence as well as being able to copy and continue them. Maybe, over the weekend, see what patterns you can create together at home and upload this to Tapestry.
Our work on keeping ourselves and each other safe in these strange times continues. We have talked a lot about the importance of hand washing this week and everyone was able to explain to a partner why they thought it was important. We talked about how we are part of the bigger community of Greens Norton School because we all behave well and try to earn marbles for our team. The teams are named after colours and at the end of the week, the team with the most marbles wins. The team with the most weekly wins gets to choose a treat, such as a non-school uniform day for their team at the end of a term. As well as marbles, children earn stickers for working hard in their learning, especially when they have to really persevere at something tricky! This week, Holly, Thurston, Max and Lily received their bronze certificates for earning 25 merits for hard work and excellent learning in the classroom. Well done!
Friday 2nd October
A final disgusting sandwich for all!
This week has been our final one based on ‘The Disgusting Sandwich’. Thank you all the parents who have shared their experiences of their children’s retelling at home. What a good job Wrens have done at internalising such a long and involved text! Please do feel free to share this learning on Tapestry with the staff as it’s wonderful to read. We created our own disgusting sandwiches and characters and thoroughly embraced the ‘yuck factor’ as we covered them in sand, feathers, pretend and other unmentionables!
In phonics, we continue to learn and practise daily. Wrens are becoming much more confident when hearing and using ‘Fred talk’ and using ‘Fred fingers’ for spelling.
Our kinetic letter family this week has been the Abracadabra family. By learning the large movements first, Wrens are learning to internalise the movements that create the shape of a letter. Strong body positions help Wrens to create these movements and prepare for longer writing sessions later. Pencil control continues to be very important and all the children have had time with an adult this week to work on this.
Sorting has been the name of the game in maths and children have been sorting a variety of different objects- giving reasons for why they placed an object within a group. This was applied later in the week in forest skills as we sorted the natural treasures we found on our outside adventures.
Friday 25th September
Autumn has arrived!
Any learning outside has needed us to wrap up in layers towards the end of the week as the temperature dropped off dramatically! It hasn't Wrens though. Outside, we have explored colour mixing, matching, counting, balancing and writing to name just a few things. Our weekly trip to the woods helped Wrens to test our memory skills with a game of 'what's missing?' and some very energetic games of 'seek and go find'.
The return of hot dinners has been very welcome with lots of Wrens tucking in to some tasty choices. Dining room behaviour has been really good and all the staff have been so proud of how the children have settled in to enjoy these times.
In phonics we have t, i, n and p. The children are practising these continually throughout the day and really making progress. Pencil hold has also been a focus this week and will continue throughout the next weeks and months as Wrens continue their writing journey.
In maths, Wrens have explored matching and counting and have been asked to explain how or why things match (or don't!). These early mathematical skills are developing well and the class have been using colour, size, amount and shape to explain matches before counting.
Friday 18th September
Now we are full time!
This week we have all been working so hard- do not be surprised if there are some very tired children this weekend!
In phonics we have learnt about m, a, s and d and begun to have a go at writing the letters to represent the sounds. Lots of the week has been spent building up the strength in our bodies. Please refer to the information we sent home earlier this week. This essential strength is the cornerstone of writing and we practise it daily at school. Please continue to support us at home as we support Wrens on their journey to be excellent writers.
In maths we have incorporated a little counting into our cafe when we started ordering different numbers of cakes. There was lots of great ideas about how and why it is important to count.
The learning outside the classroom has been wonderful. Wrens explored the track on bikes and scooters and challenged themselves with many different assault courses of their own creation. We noticed lots of different differences in our school grounds as the trees begin to change colour and produce nuts and seeds. It's a great time to get out and explore these as we found sycamore keys, hazel nuts, cherry stones, acorns and conkers just on our short walk.
Next week will bring lots more exciting learning- so we hope the wonderful Wrens get lots of rest ready for another week.
Friday 11th September
Our first 5 days
What a wonderful start we have had to our time in school. All the staff have been very impressed with the way the new Wrens class has started their journey at Greens Norton Primary School.
These 5 days have all been about getting to know each other, making new friends and learning the routines and the Wrens have been brilliant! With the support offered at home, the children are confident to make new relationships with both adults and children and are SO ready to learn. Throughout the half days, the children have been learning indoors and outdoors and showing the adults at school what they know already. It has been a pleasure to get to know these new, eager faces and all the staff are excited about the full days next week.
