Topic – Pointillism
In topic this half term, we’re artists/artist historians.
We’ve been exploring the work of Georges Seurat, a French painter known for pointillism – painting lots of tiny dots and dashes to make up a larger image. When you look closely, it looks like a group of coloured dots, but as you move further away, the bigger picture becomes clearer.
One of Georges Seurat’s most famous works is A Sunday on La Grande Jatte. It’s 3 metres wide and took him 2 years to finish! We’ve really enjoyed discussing the painting, thinking about the visual and tactile elements of art. We’ve thought carefully about:
colour
space – distances or areas in a piece of art; usually used to describe areas or parts of an artwork where there are large blocks of colour or ‘gaps’
composition – the way that something has been deliberately ‘put together’
After some extensive discussion, we doffed our art-historian hats and settled in as artists…
The children used earbuds and paint to create their own pointillism art. I was impressed by the patience and perseverance on display.
Help at home by exploring the Art Bites YouTube channel with your child. Make sure to stay safe online.
Why not try some pointillism at home? All you’ll need is some paint and a few earbuds… and patience!
Exploring 3D Shapes!
This week, Year One has been learning about 3D shapes. A 3D shape is solid and has depth, width, and height.
We’ve identified spheres, cubes, cuboids, cones, cylinders, and pyramids, then explored our classroom to find them in real life!
Help at home
At home, you can support your child by spotting 3D shapes in everyday objects like cans, boxes, or balls. Ask: “What shape is this?” and explore together.
School history trip
What a fantastic day we had today visiting Leeds Discovery Centre and The Royal Armouries.
We began the day with an Ancient Egyptian workshop, consolidating our prior learning and showcasing all the amazing things we have learnt during the Autumn 1 half term. We were then lucky enough to visit the historical store at Leeds Discovery Centre. Inside, we saw many ancient artefacts from animals to meteorites.
In the afternoon, we had a self -led tour of The Royal Armouries. Here we enjoyed viewing many historical artefacts. The children were extremely enthusiastic about some of the artefacts and could tell me so much without even reading the notes around each display.
Here are some of the things children had to share about the day:
- I enjoyed seeing the different types of animals at the Leeds Discovery Centre. They were so interesting to look at. Valerie.
- Holding the Egyptian artefacts was fun, particularly the lucky charm. It was like holding hands with the past. Willow.
- It was amazing and a dream to see the animals up close. The Armouries was great because I saw things that I had never seen before. It wowed me. Evie.
- It was fun because the Armouries has weapons which interested me. The bow and arrow target activity was great. Freddie.
- I liked it because I have never seen real-life guns from the war before. It was amazing and cool to see them up close. Umar.
- I was cool to see the armour they used on horses and even elephants and the armour they used to protect themselves. Christian.
- At the Royal Armouries there were loads of facts about the past. I also enjoyed the Egyptian workshops. Lily W.
Nativity
The children have been thoroughly enjoying rehearsing their nativity play and are excited to share it with you next week. As part of the performance, we’ll be singing Away in a Manger. The lyrics have been sent home today, so we kindly ask you to practice them with your child. We’ll also be singing this carol at the Church service on Thursday afternoon this week.
Here are the lyrics:
Away in a manger
No crib for a bed
The little Lord Jesus
Laid down His sweet head
The stars in the bright sky
Looked down where He lay
The little Lord Jesus
Asleep on the hay.
Be near me, Lord Jesus,
I ask Thee to stay
Close by me forever
And love me I pray
Bless all the dear children
In Thy tender care
And fit us to heaven
To live with Thee there
Thank you so much to those who have already sent in costumes! If you haven’t yet, please ensure all costumes are brought in by Friday, 13th December.
Thank you for your support!
Living and Learning: I can describe and use self-care techniques.
Last week, our living and learning statement was all about looking after ourselves. It’s extremely important to care about our own well-being, as we can often put the happiness and healthiness of others before ourselves. As our school is a happy and healthy place to achieve and believe, our circle time in Year 3 this week helped us understand why looking after ourselves is so vital.
The children began with trigger statements, offering their own thoughts on two self-care techniques:
I look after my mind when…
I look after my body when…
The children shared fantastic ideas, such as:
I look after my mind by having a two minute silence in my room when things are getting too much. This helps my brain relax. – Hattie
I look after my body by having showers and keeping my skin clean and healthy. – multiple children
I look after my mind by not having too much screen time and playing outside instead. – Freddie
We also discussed ways to relieve stress and support our mental health. In our reading lessons, we read a news article on other schools trialling some nature time each day across the UK. Responding to this, we’ve decided to implement some outside learning into our Year 3 timetable, starting with three lots of 10 minutes across the week. After one full week of this, we will reflect on the results as a class and decide whether this self-care technique is working for us. The newspaper article is below if you wish to find out more!
Help at home:
Talk to your child about their self-care techniques. Do they know how to keep happy and healthy? Perhaps come up with some new strategies together and see if your children remember some of the advice given in our circle time.
Owl Babies
This week our focus book has been Owl Babies by Martin Waddell.
We’ve really enjoyed the story reciting the repeating line ‘I want my mummy!’ Our word of the week has been swoop and we’ve enjoyed using it during the week.
“The owl swoops to catch a mouse.”
“I can swoop when I put my arms out.”
We’ve also continued exploring nocturnal animals this week.
Help at home: Ask your child if they can explain what a nocturnal animal is and if they can name any.
Phonics
Autumn 2 week has focused on words with s /s/ added at the end (hats, sits), words ending s /z/ (his) and with s /z/ added at the end (bags)
We’ve learnt the tricky words; we, me, be
Tricky words are words that should be read by sight.
Poetry Picnic
Each week we will be learning a new poem. We will recite this poem each day. By saying the poem out loud, we can focus on the sounds and rhythm of each word or line. We talk to the children about how this can help us become better readers. This week’s poem is called Wise Old Owl.
A wise old owl sat in an oak,
The more he heard, the less he spoke.
The less he spoke, the more he heard.
Why aren’t we all like that wise old bird?
Maths; counting, ordinality and cardinality
In Maths, we’ve revisited careful counting. Making sure we say our numbers in the correct sequence (ordinality) and stopping ‘at the stopping number’ (cardinality).
Help at home: The Journey of a letter
Next week, we’ll be reading The Jolly Christmas Postman and learning about the journey of a letter when it has been posted.
To help with our discussions, we’d love to share some photos of your child at their local post box.
Send your photos to: stjameseyfs@spherefederation.org
We are also asking you to send in one stamp for your child, to support our learning next week.
Have a happy and healthy weekend and thank you as always for your support.
Mrs. Kendrew, Mrs. Rippon and Miss. Feldman and Mr. Smith.
Art – collages inspired by the work of Zaha Hadid and Sir Christopher Wren
We have thoroughly enjoyed our learning this half-term about the work of architects Zaha Hadid and Sir Christopher Wren.
As well as learning about the work of these architects, we have also developed our art skills to use techniques such as tracing, using carbon paper and freehand drawing.
Having honed these skills, we created multiple pieces which we then combined to form a collage. The children have thought carefully about the use of technique, colour, space and the composition of their final pieces.
Each piece was truly unique and it was wonderful to see the happiness experienced during the creation of the collages!
Gymnastics – applying our learning to big apparatus
There was much excitement in Year 4’s PE lesson this week!
The children applied what they have learned about jumping and travelling to the big apparatus. They showed courage and resilience pushing themselves to achieve new personal goals in gymnastics.
They followed the rules to ensure that they kept themselves and each other safe. There was a great sense of pride in the room as we reflected on what we had achieved by believing in ourselves. A great opportunity to see our school vision being lived.
National Santa Dash
On Friday, all children took part in the National Santa Dash. This event was all about having some fun whilst being active.
We’ve decided to extend this event: we’ll be holding an Easter and Summer Dash, too! Our goal is to allow pupils to set some targets and improve on their personal bests through the year.
Here are some photos – enjoy!
Philosophy Friday – 06.12.24
Philosophy is thinking deeply.
Every Friday, we start our day with some time to wonder and ponder.
We’ve a different question each week – there’s no obvious right/wrong answer and no underlying moral message. All children are given the opportunity to contribute their ideas and give reasons for their thoughts.
This week’s question related to our living and learning statement:
This question sparked some interesting discussion and debate.
People might be sad if they don’t do the right thing to each other.
– Esme
Being kind to yourself is everyone’s responsibility
– Vincent
This links to respect and tolerance. You have to respect others and yourself to be kind.
– Woody
Our oracy focus this half term is:
Help at home by discussing this week’s Philosophy Friday question with your child. Does this question link to any of our Christian values?