A busy first week back in pre-school after the half term break.  The children were excited to be back and shared some lovely stories of fun things they had enjoyed with their families.

We delved straight into our Autumn Term 2 question 'What makes Julia Donaldson stories so fun and exciting?' Room on the Broom was our first text to enjoy this week, with our own potion making tuff tray and some sparkly wand making to wish for our own truly magnificent broom!

Another special date this week was Bonfire Night, the children looked at pictures of fireworks, and we made our own explosive colourful artwork.  We also enjoyed making chocolate breadstick sparklers!

Our other activities included the start of a new Phonics topic.  This half term our phonics sessions are 'Traditional Tales' themed.  With Goldilocks and the Three Bears starting us off.  We listened to the story and enjoyed different daily sessions - Lumpy Bumpy Porridge being a favourite where we explored rhyming words and mixed them in to the pot!

Our music assemblies and lessons with Mrs Butlin have been exciting with the introduction of the music for the whole school performance of Lights, Camel, Action 2!

Lastly, we have enjoyed some afternoon art lessons 'Drawing Marvelous Marks' alongside our Reception friends - exploring mark making using different drawing materials.

This Friday is 'Children in Need', we will have some Pudsey activities for the children.  The school has a non-uniform day for £1 donation, if Pre-school children would like to dress up or wear something Pudsey themed for a donation they are most welcome.

The Pre-School Team. 

What a fantastic week of learning we've had in Year 2/3! The children have shown such enthusiasm and curiosity across all of our subjects - it's been lovely to see them so engaged and eager to share what they've discovered.

Maths:
In Maths, we have continued our work on addition and subtraction, building on our understanding of place value to help us add and subtract larger numbers confidently. The children have been using their knowledge of tens and ones to partition numbers and find efficient strategies for solving problems. It's been wonderful to see how they are becoming more independent in explaining how and why they chose a particular method.

English:
This week we began our new whole-school genre focus - traditional tales - with the much-loved story of Jack and the Beanstalk! The children have enjoyed retelling the story in their own words, identifying key features of a traditional tale, and practising their comprehension skills by retrieving and summarising important information. There's been lots of great discussion about characters, settings, and what lessons we can learn from Jack's adventure!

RE:
In Religious Education, we started our new topic: How do festivals and family life show what matters to Jewish people? We began by learning about Shabbat, exploring how Jewish families prepare for and celebrate this special day of rest. The children were fascinated by the traditions and rituals, and they reflected thoughtfully on what makes family time special in their own homes too.

PSHE:
Our new PSHE unit, Celebrating Difference, got off to a great start. We talked about how every family is unique, and how these differences make us all special. The children spoke beautifully about the love and care that families share, no matter what they look like or how they are made up.

Topic - 'Who lives in Antarctica?'
Thursday was a particularly exciting day as we launched our brand-new Geography and Art topic: Who lives in Antarctica? The children revisited the seven continents and discussed their relative sizes before using maps to explore the lines of latitude and locate the icy continent itself. In Art, we looked at cold colours to begin our Antarctic-inspired paintings and created our own adorable penguin families using oil pastels - they look fantastic! The children are already brimming with questions about life in such an extreme environment.

Science:
In Science, we began our new unit on Forces and Magnets. The children explored different types of pushes and pulls and thought about where we can see forces in action in our everyday lives. They are very excited to start experimenting with magnets next week!

It's been a busy and inspiring week of learning - well done, Year 2/3!

Please see the attached document for more about what we will be learning this half term in Mousehole class.

What a fantastic final week before the half term break it has been for Mousehole Class! The children have worked incredibly hard and shown such enthusiasm across all areas of their learning.

In History, the class has been busy creating double-page knowledge spreads to answer the question: "How important was Ancient Egypt?" The children explored fascinating themes including the River Nile and how it supported daily life, the afterlife and mummification, hieroglyphics, and a range of artefacts and inventions that tell us so much about this remarkable civilisation. Their work beautifully showcased both their historical understanding and creativity.

In English, the focus has been on writing non-chronological reports. The children have used their research and planning skills brilliantly to produce well-structured and informative pieces of writing. It's been wonderful to see their confidence as writers continue to grow.

On Thursday, we celebrated Black History Day. The children learnt about Rosa Parks and discussed her courage, determination, and the lasting impact she had on the civil rights movement. They also thoroughly enjoyed taking part in an African dance workshop, moving to the rhythms of traditional music and exploring another vibrant aspect of African culture.

Mousehole Class have truly been marvellous this week-their positive attitudes, teamwork, and effort have shone through in everything they've done.

Have a restful and enjoyable half term break, and I look forward to another exciting half term of learning when we return!

This last week of Autumn Term 1 we have looked at Diwali, the Hindu celebration of light.  We have had stories to understand more about the celebration and what Hindu families do to celebrate.  We have also made our own Diva paper plate lamps.

We also enjoyed some early Halloween activities this week, with spooky silhouette painting, looking at Pumpkins and why we carve them, Halloween yoga and dancing, then finishing the week with some Halloween dressing up!

I think we are all ready for a little half term rest before we come back in the very exciting second part of autumn term.

We return to Pre-School on Monday 3^rd November and our new enquiry question will be 'Why is Julia Donaldson so fun?'  An exciting topic with so many lovely stories by Julia to enjoy.

We hope everyone has a lovely half term break.

The Pre-School Team.

Duckpool update...

So it's been another very busy week with so many exciting events, including an African Dance workshop and research to commemorate Black History Month.

Also, Duckpool have been producing some super factfiles to show off their knowledge from this half term's learning on Rivers. They have been speaking like Geographers and writing like Geographers; using key (tier3) vocabulary such as 'evaporation, precipitation and condensation' ...




Excitingly, we teamed up with Lantic class to read them our fantastic Beastie Stories, we think you can see from their faces how much they enjoyed our stories.

Well, that's just about it for this half term, thank you for reading our blog and have a great holiday!

This week we have finished our learning around our autumn term 1 enquiry question, Who Am I?

We talked about our families, looked at all the pictures on our family wall and then drew our own families inside a lolly-pop stick house.  These look very cute alongside our portrait display wall.

The children have all been busy making some beautiful autumn leaf sun catchers for our windows, do look out for them as you walk by!

We had a lovely surprise invitation from Lantic class on Thursday, to join them in meeting PC Brailey-Evans and a police vehicle.  The children all had fun exploring the police van and then receiving a sticker.  

Next week we will be looking at the celebrations of Halloween and Diwalli, with some fun activities planned.

As a reminder, please do make sure your child has spare clothes each day in pre-school.  If your child has been sent home in spare pre-school clothes, then please do return them.  We are very low on spare trousers for both girls and boys.

Since we have started joining the main school for lunch time, there is the option of ordering your child a hot school lunch if they would prefer this over a packed lunch.  The cost of a school lunch is £2.70, this would need to be paid for in advance on parent pay.  If this is something you would like to arrange then please do go and speak to Mrs Thompson in the main school office.

A reminder that this Friday 24^th October is an Inset Day for the whole school, we return to pre-school after half term on Monday 3^rd November.

 
The Pre-School Team.

October

This October has been a busy month. Eddie enjoyed a day out at the Wild Wood where he visited the Saxon Village. Here he found out how they lived. We explored the different types of huts they lived in and tried out the wooden bed. It was not very comfy but the animal skins kept the Saxon's warm. The Saxon's had metal helmets and long tunics, using spears, axes and swords. The Spears were good for hunting, axes for wood and swords for fighting. 

We were lucky to have a go at making flat bread and woodwork. The flat bread was delicious. 

Wild Wood, also had a very tricky maze...we eventually found our way out. We had time at the end to visit the different animals including the bears. One was asleep in the tree. 

Freddie enjoyed a special day at school, when the fire engine arrived for the children to take a look at and listen to fire people explain what they had to do in their job.

We have also been busy in class. Leo is showing one less from 5 as he joins in with the '5 Little Monkey's rhyme' (one of his favourites).

Duckpool authors...

and mathematicians...