Class News

Remember, remember the fifth of November

This week in nursery the children were very excited to talk about bonfire night and the fireworks they saw. We created our own fireworks pictures using wax crayons and black paint, we then scraped marks into the paint to reveal the bright colours underneath.

We also remembered those who served in the war. The children explored our remembrance themed tuff tray, through the poppy fields – we even tried on some war helmets, they were really heavy!

As part of our phonics learning, we’ve introduced the letter ‘s’ this week.  At this point in Nursery, children are learning to HEAR the sounds in words.  We took turns to pull some objects out of a bag that all started with the letter ‘s’. There was… a snake, sock, spoon, and even a sausage! We talked about the ‘s’ sound that we could hear at the start of each word. In Nursery, we focus on our listening skills. We’re not learning about letter formation just yet, that will come later in your child’s phonics journey.

Here is a link to a video to show you how we pronounce the letter sounds that we will be learning over the next half term. (The video is to help show how to pronounce each letter clearly, using the pure sound. Children don’t need to be able to recognise the grapheme (letter) yet, although they might begin to.)

Help at home: What can you find at home that begins with the letter ‘s’?  Go on a sound hunt together and look for some…. ssssssocks, ssssssslippers, sssssssoap. We often exaggerate the sound at the beginning of the word when we’re first learning to listen for initial sounds and then we repeat the word afterwards, saying it as it should be. Sssssocks, socks.

What’s happening next week?

• It’s ‘Odd Socks Day‘ on Monday so your child might like to wear odd socks for the day to celebrate what makes us all unique and spread kindness!
• Friday is a non-uniform day as we’ll be taking part in some spotty Children in Need fun!
• It’s been much colder outside this week and some children have been a bit chilly whilst playing outside. As we spend lots of time in our outdoor area, please make sure that your child has a warm coat, a hat and some gloves to wear. Don’t forget to add names!

Nursery rhyme of the week – We’ll be singing lots of popular rhymes as it’s World Nursery Rhyme week! If you’d like to send us an email with your child’s favourite rhyme and we’ll try to sing it at Nursery next week.

Sound of the week – T for tiger and teapot!

Have a happy and healthy weekend!

Miss Ward and Miss Harvey

Forest School

At Forest School today, the children have created pieces of art using the natural materials in the woodland area. We have had a great time working together and being creative, all whilst respecting the environment around us.

Me and My Money

What a busy week we have had in the Year 3/4 classroom. We have learnt so many useful skills when dealing with money. We have learnt: the best ways when looking after our money, the many ways of spending money, the advantages and disadvantages of borrowing money (eg. mortgages) and why people use and donate to charities.

On Tuesday, we were very lucky to welcome members of staff from Yorkshire Building Society. With their help, we used a budget to plan a party and made spending choices based on our priorities, needs and
wants.

Help at home – Speak to your child about the importance of spending money wisely and seeking value for money. Help them to set up a way of saving (piggy bank or money jar).

Me and My Money Themed Week

As part of our Me and My Money themed week we have been doing lots of different activities around money.

In English, we looked at how money is am important part of most people’s lives and the difference between using money to buy something we need and something we want. We also discussed where money comes from e.g. earning or being given and how people make different choices about how to save and spend their money. We also talked about where we can keep our money e.g. a bank or a money box and how some places are safer than others.

In Maths, we’ve been looking at the different coins and their value. We have been comparing the value of coins and making different values in a variety of ways.

We’ve also been comparing the value of some everyday products by ordering them from the least to the most valuable. We used our new oracy target which is building on the views of others, to have a respectful discussion.

Thank you for the coin donations for our penny trail. We enjoyed adding them to the trail this morning.

Help at home: Watch the Money Matters video clip and have a discussion at home about how we get and use money, where money comes from, the difference between needs and wants, budgeting and saving. Take the quiz at the end to see how much you can remember about using money.

Helping out our environment

To end the last half-term, Years 5 and 6 decided to write a letter to Miss Beatson in hope to  transform our school gardening area into a fresh, healthy space. This came about from our Geography topic – we had been working hard in learning the importance of plants, trees and green spaces around us.

Thankfully, our letters were a huge success! We spent an afternoon in the lovely rain, getting our hands dirty and working as a team to improve a part of our school. The children thoroughly enjoyed this challenge and we’re really proud of our achievement. Here’s some photos below of the garden area, before and after the transformation!

Mad About Materials!

Library Visit

Today, we went on a visit to Wetherby library. Before we left school we spoke about ways we can keep safe.

We need to listen to the teachers.

We need to wear our hi-vis jackets.

We need to stay with our partners.

We need to walk in a single file line when there are people coming past us.

At the library, we were greeted by the librarian and she told us where we could find a range of fact and fiction books. We then listened to some questions and we had to decide whether they were fact or fiction.

After we had chance to explore the library and look at lots of different books. We chose 5 library ambassadors who selected 5 books to bring back to school so we can enjoy them in our reading corner.

Well done Year 2, you were fantastic listeners and represented our school very well.

RE: Who was Saint James?

Who was Saint James?

The children have had a wonderful start to the half term. It has been lovely to see so many smiling faces returning to school ready for more learning.

On Monday, the children enjoyed finding out about Saint James. We researched  his life and discovered that Jesus trusted James to become one of His disciples.

We explored our school logo and discussed what the shells could represent. 

Help at home

Ask your child to tell you what they have learnt about Saint James. Share the information below together and then ask your child the following questions.

• What do the scallop shells represent?
• Tell me about St James.
• Who was his father?
• What was his job? 

James grew up by the ‘seaside’. That sea was Lake Galilee. He had a brother called John. They were known for having rows with each other and Jesus had a nickname for them: ‘the Sons of Thunder’. James had a mother called Salome and a father called Zebedee. James was a fisherman with his brother. Jesus went to meet James and he became one of the three disciples who were very close to Jesus, along with Peter and John. Jesus was preparing James to become a leader in the early church.The scallop shell of Saint James is believed to promote courage, strength and hope.

The children really enjoyed painting their own shells and these will be on display in our classroom.

Year 3/4 St James Day

We have had a wonderful start to the half term by learning more about St James. The children enjoyed researching about his life and why Jesus trusted him to become one of His disciples.

Year 3 and 4 also explored our school logo and what the shells represent. In addition we demonstrated our understanding behind our school vision; St James’ CE Primary is a happy and healthy place to achieve and believe. 

We had a really reflective, spiritual day and we all learnt lots.

Help at home – Ask your child about what they have learnt. Why is our logo scallop shells? Tell me about St James. Who was his father? What was his occupation? When is his feast day?

What is the weather doing today?

The children have been busy thinking about all the different types of weather we may experience. We used our weather window to check what kind of clothing we needed to wear to go to the forest.

We need wellies because its been raining – Ella

It’s very foggy outside, I can’t see the rain- Charlie

I need my coat and my hat and gloves Miss Ward- Savannah

We chose a non-fiction book to look at some pictures and discuss what season why might be in based on what we could see in the forest. We looked at how we could tell when the weather was windy. The children noticed the leaves blowing, so we introduced them to a wind chime. We made our own wind chime for our outdoor area, practicing our fine motor skills by threading natural and recycled objects from around nursery.

Help at home: Could you make your own wind chime? find some natural/recycled items from around the house such as bottle tops, paper clips, pine cones- anything! This well help develop your child’s fine motor skills, strengthening those muscles which supports early writing. Send in a photo of your finished wind chime to our nursery email to share with your friends!

Email: stjamesnursery@spherefederation.org

You may of also noticed your child singing a song about a big red combine harvester!

Whilst the older children visited Church for their harvest celebration, we learnt our own harvest song. Here is the link below for you to share with your child at home.

Don’t forget the actions!

Top tip for watching YouTube with your child: Go to the settings cog (it’s along the play bar) and turn off autoplay – this avoids an inappropriate clip coming up automatically, and helps to discourage your child from passively watching clip after clip.

It has been a lovely first half term! We hope you have a happy, healthy and well rested break.

Miss Ward and Miss Harvey