News
Newsletter for the week ending Friday 25th April
Welcome back everyone and we hope you had a good Easter break. A shorter week, but no less busy. A new term brings the start of new projects and topics and this has included visits to the beach looking for seaweed types and creating a mini coastal habitat in a tank in our main corridor. Please click here for an overview of what your children will be learning this term this year. And as to what the children have been up to this week in all classes, please read on to find out…
Dates for the Diary
- Saturday 17th May, 10am-4pm, family friendly Festival of Nature, St Mary’s Hall, Appledore see here
- Sports Day Tuesday 17th June and reserve date is Tuesday 24th June
Wishing you all a super weekend
From Jeremy Cooper and all the children and staff
AROUND THE CLASSES
This week in Turtles and Dolphins we have started our new topic, ‘Fairy Tales.’ We have read the story ‘The Ugly Duckling’. We have acted it out and thought about how the duckling changed through the story and how his feelings changed. We have made ducks using handprints and paper plates. We have also labelled parts of duck and found out about their habitats.
Year 1 have had a great first week back to school! We have started our new Oceans book and the class have loved finding out different facts about lots of animals. We also thought of all the animals we knew that live in the ocean and grouped them ourselves. We thought of great groups such as animals that are dangerous or not dangerous and animals that can camouflage or not. Our book fits in brilliantly with our new topic ‘What do we find in the oceans?’. We have started by learning the names of the 5 oceans and labelling them on a map. In Maths we have been learning to count in 2’s and 10’s and have enjoyed listening to songs to help us.
Welcome back to year 2 after the Easter break! It was lovely to see everyone back and enthusiastic to start learning for the new term. The highlight of the week was our morning at the beach in the beautiful sunshine looking for different types of seaweed for The Royal Society Project. They also managed to collect a variety of sea creatures to put in the tank for observation back at school. In Maths, they are continuing to learn about fractions and have been finding a quarter and a third of different shapes and numbers. In English, they have continued to read ‘The Dragon Machine’ and have been looking at the different emotions of the main character in the book. Our Geography topic for this half term is all about the weather, so the children might be asking you if they can watch the weather forecast! We welcome Mrs Stephens back to the classroom after her maternity leave. She will be teaching on Thursdays and Fridays.
Years 4 and 5 began some whole class ensemble teaching on the recorder this week building on the skills they had learnt in the previous year. There was far less squeaking than usual so well done everyone. Year 3 extended their work on digital music production by importing an audio recording of their live instrumentation piece into their spooky house sound track. Year 6 began a unit of work on dance as part of their music provision. They are creating a contemporary piece based on a poem about an open hand and a closed fist. In RE all year groups began new units all on the theme of Christianity. Year 3 looked at how Jesus called his first disciples. Year 4 looked at how the Holy Spirit came at Pentecost. Year 5 looked at the parable of the foolish and wise builders and year 6 researched how Nobel peace prize winners have sought to solve some of the world’s problems.
Year 3 have had a wonderful first week back! In Maths, we learnt how to add and subtract fractions with the same denominators. In English, we read the first part of Small in the City, and looked at images of cities and listened to city noises. We then wrote noun phrases to describe all the things you would see and hear in the city. To finish our geography topic from last half term, a visitor came in from the local community to talk to us about how Appledore has changed over time. We looked at images of Appledore from the past and compared them with the present day and then took part in an Appledore quiz! In Computing, we discussed the differences between beliefs, opinions and facts and how and where these might be shared online. In Science, we dissected daffodils to explore the different parts of flowering plants. We identified the different parts, including the roots, leaves, stems and petals and then researched the function of each part.
Welcome back year 4 for the Summer term! I hope you all had a lovely Easter break. It’s been a busy first week back! The children have been doing wet felting in Art and they revised some decimal work from before Easter ready to continue learning about decimals in Maths. In English, we read the story Leon and the Place Between which is our new text we are focusing on this half term. In Geography, we started our new topic about water and the children learnt about how serious cholera was in the UK during the Victorian times. The children also have started swimming lessons; this is happening every Wednesday until the last day of school in July. Please make sure your child brings goggles and a hat. In Guided Reading, we started reading The Wind in the Willows. If you haven’t already done so, it would be really beneficial for your child to have a copy of the book to help them in lessons.
Year 5 returned to school full of enthusiasm. We have started our new writing unit based on the adventures of Ernest Shackleton. Our geography this half term will focus on plastic pollution in the ocean and science will be looking at living things and their habitats. We are finishing our unit of work on fractions and will start the new unit which will be looking at shape. This week we started our tennis sessions with ARC coach, Lottie, and next week we will start having cricket coaching. There are lots of exciting things happening this term so please look at all the events on class dojo.
Year 6 have worked really hard this week and have been getting back up to speed with linking together all areas of maths with some challenging problems. They have looked at figurative language in literacy and used songs to revise areas of grammar. They have also enjoyed Geography: starting the Lundy work and using map skills in Outdoor Learning. Don’t forget, if they need help with any areas of their work, they can sign up on the sheet, inside the classroom door, for support.
