Week 6. 27th - 31st March
Well another fun-packed week in Willow class. The children got together with Oak class for our traditional annual Easter egg hunt. I f you live locally you might have heard the sounds of many farm animal noises as the children alerted their team leaders whenever they found an egg. All the children were great sportspeople and took part with much enthusiasm. It was so lovely that Mrs Garner was able to join us in the fun.
The children enjoyed their treat day when they brought in a doll, teddy or book to join them for the day. They enjoyed an extra long PE apparatus lesson, made their own jumping bunnies and tucked into the chocolate Easter nests made earlier in the week. It was great fun to see whose bunny could jump the highest as they sprung into action all at the same time!
In the afternoon we had a rather emotional farewell assembly for Mrs Garner with rousing singing in true Charminster style and the presentation of not one but all of the Cracking Caterpillar certificates, one from each class as well as some gifts from the School Association and staff. Mrs Garner will be missed by all and we wish her all the best as she moves onto pastures new.
We can't quite believe another term has finished. We wish you all a restful Easter holiday and look forward to seeing you in the summer term.
Fun in PE
1/5
The extra members of Willow Class on Friday
3/5
Whose jumping bunny went the highest?
4/5
Enjoying the chocolate Easter nests
5/5
Week 5. 20th - 25th March
It was wonderful to see so many parents, friends and relatives at our Easter service on Thursday. We were so proud of how well Willow class sang their chick song and also of their impeccable behaviour sitting for so long, not once but twice! We hope you enjoyed how the different classes told their part of the Easter story through acting and singing which is such a strength at St Mary's.
In class, we have a bee display to encourage good behaviour with key areas including sharing, working together, good listening, following instructions, and using kind hands. Exciting news - the children have managed to fly all the bees into the hive which means they will have a reward. After much discussion amongst the class, they have decided what they would like to do on the last day of term as a special treat. Look out for these details on Tapestry.
We went for another lovely Spring walk around the school grounds on Monday to see how Spring was progressing, the children used excellent observational skills to spot some signs of Spring , they were very excited to see our daffodils growing well and the cherry blossom on the trees. We then went back to the classroom and drew a 'Spring walk' map, the children put a lot of thought into their maps.
Next week we are looking forward to some Easter cooking, art and craft and of course, finishing off the term with our special treat day!
Week 4 13th - 17th March
Willow class had a great time at T@St Mary's on Tuesday. We enjoyed role playing the coronation of a King. and all the children had a chance to wear a crown. Mrs Garner was a very good Archbishop of Canterbury. A big thank you to Reverend Leila and all the T@ St Marys volunteers for a wonderful welcome. We are so lucky to belong to such a wonderful community in Charminster. The children had a biscuit and squash before heading up to school. They were beautifully behaved and represented our school in an excellent way . Well done Willow class.
We were learning all about time this week and were introduced to the relationship between minutes, hours, days, weeks and months. The children enjoyed seeing what they could do in 1 minute such as star jumps, how many times they could write their name, draw a face or build a tower. They are getting really confident in reciting the days of the week and talking about what they do on certain days. You could ask your child to sing the days of the week song which has helped them remember all the days in order.
The children have been busy practising their song in preparation for the Easter service next week. We hope that many of you will be able to join us to see them in action on Thursday!
Week 3 6th to 10th March
A slightly quieter week in Willow class this week which gave us all a chance to recharge our batteries. It was lovely to be able to discuss the amazing progress made by your children so far this year at our parents evenings.
This week in Willow we have been investigating combining two amounts and have even had a go at recording our calculations. We have also continued practising our one to one counting and any practise at home would be very useful, such as counting the stairs or laying the table.
The children enjoyed making rainy day umbrella pictures using the well know technique of paint splatting, some of which ended up on the paper and a lot of which on Mrs Simpson and the table. They took great care colouring in the umbrellas and look very effective on display in the classroom!
In English we have enjoyed listening to the story of 'The Rain on Kapiti Plain' and enjoyed meeting and writing a sentence about Tommy the parrot . The children are becoming very skilled at using their phonic knowledge to write and enjoy using the grapheme charts we have to help them.
In our PE lesson the children used the large apparatus to improve their gross motor skills by climbing on the wall bars , building up their core strength by holding themselves up on the ropes and balancing on the beam. We can already see improvement in their balancing with more children successful in walking all the way along the beam with no help. Fantastic! The main focus this week was how to land when jumping onto the mat, making sure they were landing on two feet, bending their knees and standing up straight afterwards.
Willow class are looking forward to attending T@St Marys on Tuesday with Reverend Leila, we will tell you all about it in our next blog. Have a good weekend.
Week 2. 27th February - 3rd March
We enjoyed our whole school RE day on Monday with a focus on 'heroes'. Willow class based their day around the Bible stories of Deborah and Gideon, thinking about the qualities that made them good leaders.
Pancake racing on Shrove Tuesday was a hit and the children demonstrated some great co-ordination as they raced each other, even managing a few flips on the way!
Our maths focus this week has been all about practising counting one to one when adding up amounts practically and thinking about different ways of representing the numbers using Numicon, dominoes and numerals.
On Thursday, it was World Book Day and the children came to school in a fabulous selection of costumes dressed as a book character or a word. We all enjoyed our whole school assembly where each class took it in turn to parade around the hall.
In music the children thought of different ways to make percussion using only their hands and surprised us with how many different ideas they came up with. They then enjoyed playing percussion instruments and were able to follow hand signals to tell them when to play and when to be silent. Great watching and concentration Willow. We finished by learning a body percussion sequence that took a lot of concentration from everyone involved, including the grown-ups!
The children did very well experimenting with colour mixing the primary colours and were very excited to see the range of colours they could make just out of blue, red and yellow. We enjoyed watching Skittle sweets colour mixing too after adding warm water to them and seeing the colours flow.
In handwriting after a warm up to music with scarves to practise gross motor movements, the children focused on forming 'c' with a clear curl at the top. We call it the 'magic c' as it can turn into so many other letters such as a, g, o, d, q! Writing in shaving foam is a great multi-sensory way of feeling how the letter is formed and was very popular with the children as well as making the classroom smell lovely. They are all making fabulous progress with their handwriting so well done Willow class!
Week 1 20-24th February
We hope you all had a lovely half term it was lovely to welcome the children back to Willow class on Monday.
We started the week off with a clip from the film ' Cloudy with a chance of meatballs' the children enjoyed watching pizzas and eggs (amongst other strange items) raining from clouds and this really sparked their imaginations off, we followed this up with writing about the things we would like to see coming from clouds. There were all sorts of wonderful ideas including a bacon sandwich and some unicorns!
On Tuesday Willow class celebrated 'Shrove Tuesday' with the obligatory pancake race, which they all took part in with great enthusiasm and proved themselves to be great sportspeople. We even managed a flip or two with our improvised 'whiteboard frying pans' !
We have also been busy looking for signs of Spring around our school environment and are very excited to see our plants starting to open.
Linked to our maths this week, pairing up socks and pegging them on the washing line proved to be very popular. If you are looking for helpers to sort the washing at home, look no further!
In music this week the children had to listen carefully to instructions with a focus on singing and playing loudly and softly. It was lovely to see good teamwork when finding partners and groups to work with and they all enjoyed playing the egg shakers, maracas, multi-guiros and rain sticks in time to the music.
There was great excitement in our Friday P.E lesson when they were able to use the large apparatus for the first time! Well done to everyone for being very sensible and careful especially when climbing on the wall bars. The children focused on balancing on the narrow side of the bench by holding their arms out and looking up, holding and swinging on the ropes with a solid landing, and landing on both feet after jumping off the horse.