Wednesday 5th July
Today, had the most WONDERFUL educational visit to Seven Stories! Seven Stories is one of the National centres for children's books and it is home to an array of stories and exhibitions. We began our morning with a superb workshop led by Lawrence called "Do Dragons Really Exist?" where the children looked at some beautifully illustrated dragon books and sources, to decide if dragons really do exist. After that, the children drew their own dragons and then we were treated to a dragon story by Lawrence, who told the story incredibly well; putting on different accents and using actions to retell the story.
After a busy morning, we were all ready for our lunch! We had our lunch in the cafe area and the children were extremely sensible and well behaved. We then began our afternoon activities; we began by going to look at the Mog the Cat exhibition. In the exhibition, they had some of Judith Kerr's original illustrations which were amazing to see and they even had one of her sketchbooks.
Then, we listened carefully to Lawrence as he explained some of the different story genres that you can find at Seven Stories. The children were very keen to share their knowledge of different story genres as well as the titles of stories that fit into that genre. We explored the story genre exhibition and the children loved exploring the role play area and the Gruffalo puppet activity.
We had such a superb day and the children were incredibly enthusiastic about the books we read and the activities we participated in.
Friday 30th June
The children in Northern Ireland class thoroughly enjoyed their Godly Play session this week organised by Lynne and Sam Cree. The children listened carefully to Lynne as she told the Christian story of “The Good Samaritan” using props and figures. After some discussion about what Christian’s believe the moral of the story is, the children were keen to participate in the lovely range of activities the ladies had organised. The children enjoyed retelling the story using Lego, reading some other Christian Bible stories from their collection of books and drawing their own “Good Samaritan” figures. We had a lovely morning with Lynne and Sam, and I know that the children are looking forward to their next session when they will be in Year 3.
Friday 22nd June
This half term, we have been studying the work of Eric Carle in Art and Design. Eric Carle is a wonderful artist, who is best known for his children’s books including The Very Hungry Caterpillar. As well as writing many stories, Carle also illustrates many of his books and uses collage to create his beautiful illustrations. In our art lessons, we have replicated the technique that Eric Carle uses to create his colourful collages. The children began by painting their papers; creating textures and layers with the paint. Once the papers had dried, the children planned their designs, created paper stencils and used their different papers to create their illustrations/ characters. As you can see, the work the children have produced is amazing and inspired by the wonderful Eric Carle.
Friday 9th June
We’ve had a brilliant afternoon singing and playing instruments at the same time in our music lesson. We began by singing the name game, where each child introduced themselves and clapped the rhythm of their name, then the whole class would sing back “hello _____” also clapping the rhythm of that child’s name. After that, we continued singing but this time we sang “row, row, row your boat” and clapped the pulse as we sang. We then sang the same song, but this time clapped the rhythm. After that, we learned a very short song called “one man fell in a well” and once the children could sing the entire song, they worked in pairs and played untuned instruments to the pulse of the song. The children were amazing and had lots of fun singing and playing the instruments.
Thursday 25th May
We were lucky enough to spend the morning with the wonderful author Adam Bushnell on Wednesday; getting our creative juices flowing and imagining that we were visiting another planet! The children absolutely loved using their imaginations to draw and write about their own weird and wonderful planets. Adam then guided the children to write a letter to friend, describing their planet. I was extremely impressed with the children's focus on the morning and Adam was blown away by the quality of the writing in Northern Ireland class and the work that they produced.
Well done to everyone in Northern Ireland class, you are all very accomplished writers!
Friday 19th May
This week, we had the opportunity to spend a sunny afternoon attending the Quadkids Festival at Thorp Academy. The children were split into groups and guided through various activities by the fantastic sports leaders from year 7 at Thorp Academy.
The activities tested a lot of their physical skills like throwing, catching, running, and balancing, often racing against each other to see who could complete a challenge quickest. Most importantly, the children were also challenged to work in teams and support each other; they had to communicate clearly and give each other advice so that the team could succeed.
A huge well done to the children of Northern Ireland class for conducting themselves so well at an event with many other schools. It was fantastic to see you cheer each other on. I was so impressed with your attitude and ability to take on so many physical challenges – let’s see if you can apply your new skills to our PE lessons!
Friday 12th May
This afternoon we had great fun starting our new topic in design technology. We began learning to sew! The children have already had some experience sewing when they were in Year 1, so today we started by practicing to thread the needle and then we had a go at threading on wooden boards. This activity required the children to use their growth mindsets and also their problem solving skills; it tested our patience at times but the children all worked extremely diligently. It was also lovely to see the children supporting and encouraging one another; helping their partner to rethread their needle and unpick any knots.
Next week, we will begin to practice doing a running stitch along a piece of fabric. Our aim for this topic is to sew pouches that will hold our reading records! After todays lesson, I am very confident that the children in Northern Ireland class will achieve this.
Well done to all of the children in Northern Ireland class, I was extremely impressed with your sewing skills and the super attitude that you all had.
Friday 5th May
Today we have had a wonderful day celebrating the upcoming coronation of King Charles III. We sang the national anthem and also loved singing “Our King”, a song that we have all been learning in school this week. The children sang along beautifully to both songs but, I was blown away by their singing of “Our King”.
As well as this, the children learned about the coronation schedule and then had a go at sketching a portrait of King Charles. I encouraged the children to look carefully at King Charles’ face and think about how they could show the different lines and textures of his skin using their sketching pencils. I was extremely impressed with the sketches they produced; they have looked carefully at the King’s features and sketched them carefully.
This afternoon, after the children enjoyed a picnic lunch in the classroom, the children took part in the school “Design a Coronation Flag Competition”. The children worked diligently to design a standout flag. Much like the sketches, the designs the children produced were all different and unique. The children in Northern Ireland had great fun designing their fabulous flags. We were lucky enough to end our afternoon with an ice cream from Mrs Whippy’s ice cream van!
We’ve had a fantastic day and are all looking forward to watching the King’s coronation tomorrow.
Friday 28th April
This week Northern Ireland impressed Mrs Priestly with their amazing geography work! Mrs Priestly teaches Northern Ireland class every Tuesday afternoon, and she was incredibly impressed with their geographical knowledge and the work they produced after their lesson on Cardiff. The children listened extremely carefully in the lesson, and learned lots of new information about the city of Cardiff. They then compared the city of Cardiff to London (a city they learned about earlier in the academic year) verbally. After that, the children were then tasked with writing a comparison of the two cities. Mrs Priestly was particularly impressed with the work produced by Maci.
Well done to everyone in Northern Ireland class, you have made me very proud!
Miss Kenyon x
Thursday 20th April
We've had a lovely first week back at school after the Easter holidays and the children have thoroughly enjoyed their English lessons based on our new model text, The Paper Bag Princess. The Paper Bag Princess is a "conquering the monster tale". It is an untraditional fairy tale, as the main character, Princess Elizabeth saves Prince Ronald and decides that she does not want to marry the rude Prince after all.
To help the children develop their understanding of the story and the characters, we spent our English lesson today doing different drama games and activities. We children were very enthusiastic and loved the detective game.
I was extremely impressed by their understanding and evaluation of Princess Elizabeth when they completed the "role on the wall". On the outside of the character, the children described the Princesses appearance and on the inside of the character outline, they described her character and personality. Their vocabulary choices really highlight their understanding of the character of Princess Elizabeth!