Happy Half Term!

We have had a great Spring term 1 in Class 1 together. We just wanted to say a big thank you for all of your support whether it be reading with your child at home, attending 'Family Friday' or the class assembly, we how know valuable this is, so thank you. 

This week we had a focus around Chinese New Year in some of our learning activities. In art, we made our own paper lanterns and Chinese dragons. Some of the children also used tissue paper to create their own lantern and some made a dragon head collage where they had to cut and stick different shapes. 

In Maths we were continuing our learning about 6, 7 and 8. We started the week off by finding and making pairs and developing our understanding of odd and even. We then progressed to finding and making doubles to 8. 

During our outdoor learning session we were spotting signs of winter/spring and anything that we thought was different/ interesting. We worked in pairs to use the iPad to take photos of things we had spotted, we then took a selfie so we knew who had taken which photos!  

Have a great half term and we look forward to seeing you all on Monday 19th February.

Class 1 Team

Hello Everyone!

This week began with our outdoor learning day on Monday.
The children had a great time building dens for their animals, making maps, measuring distances between features in the forest school area and  using compasses. We even managed to fit in a campfire with toasted marshmallows. 

During one of our maths lessons this week, we went on a shape hunt, which was organised by class 4. We followed a set of clues about shapes, which helped us to solve a puzzle. Thank you class 4 for all your hard work with this. We really enjoyed it.

In English this week, we have been reading instructions about den making. We have found features of instructions, and will use this knowledge, to write instructions next week.

We look forward to seeing you next Thursday afternoon, for our class assembly, where we can show you what we have been learning this term.

Have a lovely weekend!

From the class 2 team

Hello everyone!
What an incredible day we had on Thursday for our Wild Tribe outdoor survival day. Some of our favourite learning activities were first aid, shelter building, knot securing, whittling and fire making.

This week, the children also particularly enjoyed their RE lesson, which was on Seesaw, where they learnt more about Hinduism and mandirs.

We also took our geography learning onto Seesaw this week. We improved our understanding of human and physical features. We reminded ourselves of the terminology and looked at various examples which might cause us difficulty when classifying.  Later in the lesson, we located various examples in the UK and North and South America. In addition, we took a closer look at the countries Wales and Brazil which we will be comparing in more depth this coming week.

In our PE learning, we had a mini tournament during our table tennis lesson where we played competitive games against other members of the class. In our Pro20 session, we learnt how to find space and protect the ball.

During our English lessons this week, the children have been learning to plan and develop their initial ideas. They’ve learnt about the active and passive voice along with developing their understanding of sentence structure including relative clauses.  

In our science learning this week, the children carried out the investigation which they planned last week. They were surprised by their results. Some children extended their learning by thinking what else they could investigate with similar resources. We hope to carry out a selection of these investigations this coming week.

Points to remember:
- PE on Monday (1pm-2pm)

-Class 4 assembly Monday 2.30pm

-Year 6 trip to Looe Secondary School Tuesday

- INSET day Friday 

Hello everyone 
We just wanted to start off by saying how proud we are of every child in Class 1 for their hard work this half term and the effort they have been putting into their learning. We loved sharing our class assembly with the rest of the school and our parents/ carers. 

This week in Maths our theme was ‘Growing 6, 7 and 8’. We were finding and representing 6, 7 and 8, finding one more/less than 6, 7 and 8 and looking at the numbers we could see within them. 

In English our learning has been about the story 'Aliens Love Underpants'. The children particularly enjoyed this story and found it very funny! We've enjoyed sequencing the story and telling the story in our own words. We had lots of fun using our imaginations when designing and drawing our own aliens and writing a description of our alien.

In music we listened to ‘Conga’ by Miami Sound Machine and identified the instruments we could hear. We also discussed the genre of music and made comparisons to songs we have listened to previously. We then got the instruments out and had fun playing them to see the different things we could do with them. Everybody took it in turns to play a rhythm on their instrument and the rest of us had to copy it on our own instrument. 

We had a bit of a shock when we came in from playtime to find a mess on our carpet! There was a letter and when we opened it, it was from the aliens who told us they had been flying over Earth and had dropped lots of objects from their spaceship. They told us they wanted us to give them back the magnetic objects and left us some magnets. We used the magnets to test the objects to see which were magnetic and which were not magnetic. We then sorted them into two different hoops and discussed what materials they were made out of. After we had fun exploring with lots of different types of magnets.

Our PE lesson on Thursday was filled with excitement as we got the large climbing equipment out in the hall! The children all demonstrated consideration for themselves and others in order to keep everyone safe. They used their gross motor skills to navigate the equipment showing good co ordination and control. 

Please note there will be no Family Friday next week as it is INSET Day. School finishes on Thursday 8th February and we look forward to welcoming you back on Monday 19th February after the half term break. 

The Class 1 Team 

One of our highlights this week has been the visit from The Ocean Conservation Trust. They put on an amazing workshop teaching us all about the science of climate change which followed on brilliantly from our recent climate change topic. We learnt about climate heroes including seagrass and how we too can be climate heroes ourselves. Our favourite parts of the workshop included learning about combustion, investigating pH levels, the affect of pH on calcium carbonate and exploring Plymouth Sound via VR headsets.

This week has also been our maths enrichment week. We have had great fun with various maths challenges including discussing different methods to solve 'The Deca Tree' problem. We combined art with maths and learnt about circle vocabulary with Kandinsky's, 'Concentric Circles'. We even created a shape hunt for the rest of the school!

During our English lessons this week, the children have been learning about descriptive devices and using these in their own writing to describe the Amazon Rainforest.

During our science lesson this week, the children planned an investigation which we will carryout this coming week.

In our music lesson, we continued our learning with Mrs Butlin.

During our art lesson, we continued to learn about drawing in one point perspective. The children made great editions to their sketch books.

During PE this week, we enjoyed being competitive in both our football and table tennis sessions.

Points to remember:
- PE on Monday and Friday

- Our outdoor learning day is on Thursday 1^st February.

Hello everyone!

This week was Maths Enrichment week throughout the school. We took part in a range of activities including a whole school piece of artwork based on Kandinsky's concentric circles. We explored a range of texts, including 'One is a Snail, Ten is a Crab' and 'The Greedy Triangle'. We also had a number based PE lesson, where we made number cards, human number lines, and jumped along our own number lines.

On Monday, we have our outdoor learning day. Children will need to come to school in waterproof clothes and footwear that is suitable to wear outside for most of the day. If the children would like to, please can they also bring a cuddly toy with them, that they don’t mind potentially getting muddy. If it’s a woodland animal, then this would be perfect, but all animals will be welcomed! We are looking forward to a day of map making, den building and stories, as well as a few surprises. 

Have a lovely weekend!

From the class 2 team 

This week saw Class 3 focus on maths.  We investigated a tricky maths problem all abut how many legs a groups a of aliens have.  Sum of started with a 'blunt force' approach of trial and error to find the answer.  eventually we realised that the problem actually involved multiples of 3 & 7 and once we had listed all the multiples, we soon spotted a pattern and found an answer.

Class 4 created a Treasure Hunt of Maths shapes around the school and we also helped create a school display of Kadinsky style circle in the school colours.

Maths Enrichment Week
For many adults, if they think of what they disliked most at school, maths is often at the top of the list. Maths lessons may have even led to a lifelong fear of getting the wrong answer, or not getting it fast enough. One of the biggest barriers to a child developing in maths is for them to hear adults say that they were not good at maths at school, or they are not a ‘maths person’. There is a widespread belief in society that maths is hard, uninteresting, and accessible only to ‘clever’ people.  Often males and even particular racial groups are seen to be naturally better at maths. Scientific research has shown, however, the incredible potential of the brain to grow and adapt.

We feel passionately about showing how exciting maths is, and want to dispel the myth of the maths brain. In our school we teach that everyone can learn maths, with variation in strategies and equipment used being accepted and encouraged, such as drawing, or using objects. Linked with our Bridge values, we teach that maths is a very creative subject and model/encourage curiosity. Mistakes are all part of the learning process. We add ‘yet’ to sentences when a child says that they can’t do something and teach that the feeling of something being hard is when changes are happening in our brains. This week we have been celebrating maths in an enrichment week of creative thinking linked to maths across the curriculum. This has included investigation work, maths art, stories with maths themes, a maths treasure hunt and an exploration of the beauty and power of maths all around us in our assemblies. We look forward to telling you all about our special week in our class assemblies.

Climate Change Roadshow
On Friday we were visited by the National Marine Aquarium Ocean Conservation Trust. Class 4 explored climate change through Virtual Reality headsets and exciting science investigations! The trust also led a very thought provoking assembly.

KS2 Cross Country Stars
Congratulations to Harrison, Elsa, George and Joseph, who attended a cross country event at Looe Community Academy secondary school. They all came in the top 8!

Bush Skills Outdoor Learning Days
Class 2 Monday 29th January; Class 3 Tuesday 30th January; Class 4 Thursday 1st February. Please make sure that your child has layers of warm clothing, including a waterproof coat, gloves and hat for these sessions.

We hope that you have a lovely weekend,
Abigail Oliver (Head of School)

We have had a great week in Class 1, especially with it being Maths Enrichment week too! 

Let's tell you just some of what we've been up to! 

As we have already mentioned, it was Maths Enrichment week where we took part in and completed lots of different activities including a whole school piece of artwork based on Kandinsky's concentric circles. We explored a range of texts, including 'One is a Snail, Ten is a Crab' and 'The Greedy Triangle'. We used playdough and straws to create animals with different amounts of legs and then wrote a number sentence to represent them. We also made a triangle out of four smaller triangles and learnt about how many sides different shapes have. We would also like to thank Class 4 for putting on a brilliant shape themed treasure hunt, we had a great time working with the children in Class 4 and solving the clues together.

We also continued our White Rose maths learning where we were focusing on mass and capacity. We used balance scales to compare mass and find a balance. First of all we held two items and then made a prediction about which item we thought would be the heaviest. We then checked using the balance scales. We started to develop our understanding of comparative terms such as heavy, heavier than, heaviest, light, lighter than and lightest. Towards the end of the week we moved on to learning about capacity. We used rice, sand and water to explore the capacity of different containers. We then made direct comparisons by pouring from one container to another.

This week we have been learning all about the planets in our solar system. We learnt all their names and learnt about some of their properties including, which planet is the largest and smallest and which are the hottest and coldest. We then learnt the order of the planets, starting with which one is the closest to the sun and going all the way to the planet furthest from the sun. We each had our own planet and had to work together to stand in the correct order. We then practised our cutting skills when cutting out all the planets and sticking them in the correct order. 

In Art we had fun with shaving foam and food colouring! We used a pipette to drop food colouring onto some shaving foam before mixing it with a skewer. We then laid our piece of card on top and then scraped off the excess foam to create some beautiful patterns. We hope to turn them in to planets! We also experimented with food colouring and oil. We used a pipette to drop the food colouring/ oil mix into some water and then laid our card on top. When we picked the card up we had some interesting patterns. We look forward to seeing our artwork once they are completely dry. 

Next week there will be no Family Friday as we hope to see you for our Class assembly.

The Class 1 Team

Reminders
*Class 1 assembly - Friday 2nd February at 2:30pm. 
*Please ensure reading books and reading records come to school on Mondays so we can change books.

SION

We took advantage of the frost this week and used it to practice our spellings.  We got physical and stamped out our spellings on the grass.  Our ideas we'll explore as the weather allows will be water writing and stick spelling.

Hello everyone!

This week, we delved deeper into this half term’s big question, ‘The amazing Americas: how does the UK compare?’ The children researched geographical information about North and South America so they can compare these to the UK at a later date. They also revisited the meaning of key geographical language including continent, country, county, state, region, city, town, village, hamlet.

During our English lessons this week, the children got creative and planned and wrote their own stories based on a selection of pictures from our new class read, The Explorer’. This was a great opportunity for them to continue to build writing stamina and to see what they had retained from our last narrative unit of work. This week, we also had a grammar focus on word classes.

In maths this week, yellow group learnt how to use a written method to divide whilst purple/red group continued to learn about ratio. Green group learnt to multiply using a formal written method.

During our science lesson this week, the children continued to explore scientific electrical symbols. They made circuits from symbol diagrams and then drew their own diagrams (using the scientific symbols) from circuits they had made themselves.

In PSHE this week, the children started to learn about jobs. They discussed the importance of various jobs in society and tried to determine the various salaries. We discussed what might impact salary and also looked at job satisfaction.

In our music lesson, we continued our learning with Mrs Butlin.

During our art lesson, we learnt about one-point perspective. The children were impressed with how they could make their own drawings look 3d. I was impressed with their efforts. 

In our French lesson, we started to learn about French speaking countries around the world.

During PE, on Monday the children enjoyed their session with Pro20. On Friday, some children left us to take part in their cross-country race. An amazing well done. What a great effort especially in the cold weather. The children that remained at school, continued their table tennis focus. They continued to develop their serve and their understanding of the rules of table tennis.

Points to remember:
- PE on Monday and Friday

- Our outdoor learning day is on Thursday 1^st February.

- Please note the change in residential dates due to the new INSET day on Friday May 24^th

Hello everyone!

 I’m so proud of the children’s effort and enthusiasm in their English lessons this week. They have written some lovey stories, and I have really enjoyed reading their creative and original ideas.

In maths this week, Year 2 have finished their topic of 2D and 3D shape. They have been sorting shapes according to their properties. 
Year 1 have been finding near doubles by adding or subtracting 1.

During our science lesson this week, we have been testing materials to find out how flexible they are. 

We had a thought provoking RE lesson this week, when we explored the topic of forgiveness. The children were given scenarios, where they had to decide if they would or would not forgive someone. We had some interesting discussions around why we would/would not forgive someone.

Next week:
PE on Monday and Wednesday

Our outdoor learning day will be on Monday 29th January.

Have a lovely weekend!

From the class 2 team

. 

We've had another fun week here at Pre-School

We have been enjoying the dry, although very cold weather outside and exploring our new play equipment which has been super fun and popular with all of our friends.

Our book this weeks was Mr Gumpy's Motor Car - Mr Gumpy has decided to go for a ride in his motor car. It's a nice day and the sun is shining, so off he goes. But he only gets as far as the lane before the children, the rabbit, the cat, the dog, the pig, the sheep, the chickens, the calf and the goat ask if they can come along too.

We have had lots of discussions about where we have been or could go in our cars, also looking at different cars and how many people they can carry. 

We have talked about where different transport travels, the children shared if they have ever travelled in a bus, boat, train or aeroplane!
We have also been listening to clues to see if we could identify different types of transport - the children were all amazing at this and using their super listening skills got them all correct.

We have also being playing I Spy in the car park as we can see lots of vehicles' come and go from our windows, plus we have also spotted a couple of aeroplanes and a helicopter in the sky above.

For Show and Share this week we would love to see any photos of your child when they may have enjoyed a trip in any form of transport – bus, car, boat, train or plane!
It’s always lovely for the children to share their own experiences with us at Pre-School. 

Please either send in a photo with your child or email them to us at preschool@pelyntprimary.co.uk and we will be happy to print them for you.

We hope you have a super weekend, and look forward to seeing you all next week.

Mrs G, Mrs Rickard, Mrs Rowe and Miss Carr.

Reading Champions wanted!
“The most valuable gift you can give children is a love of reading. Reading makes learning anything possible and imagination grow with no boundaries.” Julia Jett Reedy
Can you spare an hour or two a week to listen to children read, or to read stories and non-fiction books to small groups of children? If so, please speak to Mrs Thompson in the school office about completing a DBS check.

INSET Day and Class 4 residential
All Bridge Schools will now have an extra INSET day for staff training this year, which will be on Friday 24th May. As this was one of the original dates booked for the Class 4 residential, this has now been rescheduled for 12th, 13th and 14th June.

End of Spring Term change of end of day From now on, the last day of term before the Christmas, Easter and summer holidays for all Bridge schools will finish at 1pm. School will end at the usual time for all half term holidays. This will mean some adjustments to planned church services when these fall in the afternoon. We are rearranging these with Reverend Allen and will let you know when we have new dates or times.

Outdoor Learning Days
Just a reminder that we have our bush skills outdoor learning days coming up the week after next:
Class 2 Monday 29th January
Class 3 Tuesday 30th January
Class 4 Thursday 1st February

Given the current very cold weather we are having, please make sure that your child has layers of warm clothing, including a waterproof coat, gloves and hat for these sessions.

Cross Country at Cothele today
Good luck to our KS2 cross country team this afternoon!

We hope that you have a lovely weekend,
Abigail Oliver (Head of School)

Welcome back everyone!

This week began with a visit from the squash box theatre. Everyone of all ages were thoroughly entertained. The children also enjoyed their follow up workshop, which involved plenty of learning which linked to science and English.

Our English topic this week has resulted in some amazing writing of the story of Peter Rabbit. We will be finishing these stories next week.

In maths, Year 1 have been learning about numbers bonds to 10 and 20 and doubles, while Year 2 have been naming and describing 3D shapes. 

Our science lessons this week looked at different materials and their properties. We matched materials to their names and sorted objects in the classroom by the materials that they were made from.

Next Week:
PE will be on Monday
After school football club on Tuesday.

Welcome back!

We thoroughly enjoyed watching the Squashbox theatre production and taking part in the session afterwards as you can see by the photos.  

During our English lessons, we had a poetry focus. We immersed ourselves in various poems and discussed our preferences. We learnt about word classes and punctuation marks and how these are included in certain poems for various effects.

In our maths learning, the children have been getting used to their new groupings and learning environments.  

In science this week, we finished our learning journey based on light and started our new one on electricity. We worked scientifically to investigate the effect of changing the voltage in a circuit on a bulb, buzzer and/or motor. Importantly, we also learnt about safety around electricity.  

During our PSHE lesson, we focused on our own hopes and dreams for the future. We learnt about various jobs and the steps needed to get there. We wrote a kenning to highlight a dream of ours in the future.

In our music lesson this week, we enjoyed our session with Mrs Butlin.

During our art lesson, we were intrigued at our new art learning journey on architectural drawings. The children drew a picture of the houses of parliament as a piece of artwork to reflect back at, at the end of the journey to see how far they have come.

This week, the children had their first Pro20 PE session and improved on Friday, they learnt the rules of table tennis and started to improve their service. 

Homework has been set on Mathletics and Spelling Shed. Class 4 are starting 'The 99 Club' so don't forget, you also have 'log on' details to TT Rockstars to help practise. 

Key details to remember 
-PE for Class 4 Monday and Fridays
-SATs club on Thursdays
-Residential replies in by the beginning of the week please 

Happy weekend to you all! Here's a little overview of what we have been up to in Class 1 this week!

Ted the 'travelling bear' has chosen somebody from Class 1 this week who has been a brilliant role model, tried hard with their learning and has been a kind friend to others. Ted will spend the weekend with this person and return to school on Monday. On Tuesday, when Mrs Horn is in, we will ask this person to share what Ted has been up to with the rest of the class and they will then have the opportunity to answer questions from their friends. Ted has a book that travels with him which details further information for grown ups. 

In Maths we were consolidating our Alive in 5! module of learning where we recapped and continued our previous learning about subitising to 5, representing 0 to 5 and finding one more/less. We then looked at composition to 5 where we were exploring the different ways we could make 5. 

Our focus text this week has been 'Zoom, Rocket, Zoom' which is a story all about different space vehicles. We discussed and wrote different sounds that rockets make - our ideas included 'woosh, zoom and bang'. We also wrote a list of the items we thought an astronaut would need to take to the moon for a space mission.

We enjoyed learning about different space technology and vehicles including space shuttles, satellites, the Mars Rover and the International Space Station. We had lots of fun taking part in a balloon rocket science investigation. We used balloons for our rockets and they had a race; we discussed what was different about the rockets that travelled further. You can watch a video of one of our balloon rocket races on Seesaw. 

An image of a spacewalk was the focus during our "I see, I think, I wonder" session this week. The children enjoyed telling me what they could see and coming up with some questions. We used the iPads to research some of our questions and shared the answers with the rest of the class. 

Our outdoor learning focus over the past couple of weeks has been about habitats and birds. On Tuesday, we made some bird feeders. We used a pine cone and rubbed pieces of lard into the gaps before rolling the pine cone in bird seed. We also halved oranges, scooped out the flesh and then filled it with a mixture of lard and bird seed. We decided we would like to hang them in our outdoor area so that we could monitor them closely and notice any birds that decide to visit. 

Next week is our whole school Maths Enrichment Week. We 're looking forward to taking part in lots of fun maths activities.

Class 1 Team