Welcome back everyone - so lovely to see you all! (and welcome back to Ms. Reynolds who is now in the final term of her training).

Well we have returned to school after the two week Easter break and to some, it might have been a shock to the system to get straight back in to starting with a full week - Monday through to Friday. If we were feeling tired by Friday we were soon wide awake when we welcomed Hogan School band into the hall - if only every Friday got off to such a lively start - we were singing, clapping, tapping and dancing (I did notice a few blank faces when some of the songs started - the blank faces were of the staff, we had no idea what some of the words were but thankfully the children were there to help us out!). Hogan School Band were fantastic and they commented on how fantastic our children were, how they were able to keep the timing and rhythm of the clapping going throughout the songs and how well behaved the children were too. Lovely feedback!

“It was so cool - especially the drums” Archie

“I think now when I am older I will be in a band, I will be the singer and my sister can play the instruments” Oscar

“I could feel the music in my body and in my head” Sophie

Week 1

What a fantastic first week we have had back after the Easter break! The children have come back and are already taking on their new learning power of being curious! We hope that you all had a lovely two weeks. The children have been excited to tell us all about the Easter hunts that they took part in and the places that they went.

In Maths Year One had a flying start to the week, moving onto exploring Place Value from 50 to 100 and enjoying playing ‘Fill your 100 Square’ where they were asked to roll a dice and move along the 100 squares, filling in any of the missing numbers that they came across. Whilst doing this they continued to show their growing understanding of place value and were all able to work out the next three numbers in a sequence by counting on and have begun to develop their confidence when counting backwards. Why not continue to practice this at home using the number splat game on the link below to work out the hidden number?

https://www.topmarks.co.uk/learning-to-count/paint-the-squares

Reception continued to wow us with their counting skills to find out ‘how many’ objects there are. They enjoyed counting how many claps they heard and had to listen carefully as the number of claps increased. We then moved on to using a counting wand to help us to count accurately and develop methods that support us with doing this such as lining the objects up and counting from the start to ensure we don’t miss any out!

In Art this week we started to explore a new artist, Michelle Reader who using recycled items to create sculptures. We enjoyed watching a video of how they she created a London taxi using coffee pods and filters and were all amazed by the different objects she was able to make from our recycling! The children loved selecting their favourite sculpture to discuss and have a go at drawing from ‘The wave’ to ‘A girl at the beach’.

“I like the wave the best, she used a ball and bottles to make the wave crash. Great!”

“I like the girl the best, she used tin cans to make the body, we get tin cans at home so I could do it.”

On Tuesday we continued to write the story of the Three Little pigs, using our story map to support us with writing the ending of the story. Year One are all working extremely hard to develop their writing skills, thinking carefully about capital letters, finger spaces and full stops as well as ensuring they reread their writing to check it makes sense.

In the afternoon Reception started their new art topic and had lots of fun flicking paint onto pieces of paper using paint brushes to create different effects. “This is crazy” said one of them as they let go of the idea that they need to paint something specific and simply began to embrace expressionist art!

Whilst Reception was busy create masterpieces, Year One dived into exploring the world of maps and learnt about the different types of maps that you might come across and when we might use them.

“My mum and dad use them in the car when they get lost”.

“My sister has a globe in her room that lights up!”

They had lots of fun placing photos of different areas of the classroom onto a plan and found that it was a lot trickier than they first imagined! We then used these plans to create our own birds-eye plan of the classroom, whilst trying to resist the urge to add too much detail! Next week we can’t wait to begin exploring maps of our local area!

On Friday, as well as the School Band in the morning, Robins had Forest school all afternoon and we loved it! It was raining but we did not mind at all. We had great fun. Mhairi told us that there were some (toy) woodland creatures hiding in the Forest School area, we had to use our eyes and look high and low to find them all. We also had a go at climbing trees, digging, making mud pies, rolling tyres, exploring the Forest School,team building, chatting, laughing and learning….all at the same time! Click on the gallery below to see just a few of the pictures.

Just a reminder that we will send PE kits home on a Thursday and Forest School kits will need to be brought in on a Friday. Getting dressed independently is part of our curriculum in Robins and therfore we encorporate getting dressed from school uniform into PE / Forest School kits as part of our learning time.