This term we have been learning about the fossil hunter and collector Mary Anning and discovering why she is important in history. We were lucky enough to have a workshop led by SeaCity Museum. A member from the museum brought along some amazing artefacts for us to explore and we took part in 4 different activities during the morning. These were…
Workshop 1:
We were given a selection of equipment. We had to decide who would have used this equipment, Mary Anning or modern-day fossil hunters who are now known as archaeologists.
Workshop 2:
We studied an animal bone artefact and drew what pre-historic animal we think it belonged to. We found out at the end of the workshop that palynologists believe the bone belonged to a woolly mammoth!
Workshop 3:
We discussed and decided which animals were dinosaurs and which were not. We discovered chickens did descend from a dinosaur! We then found out the type of prehistoric animals Mary Anning found. These were sea animals and birds but she did not find any land animals. This was because Lyme Regis was under water millions of years ago.
Workshop 4:
We also studied a selection of artefacts from the past and discussed and questioned what we thought they were and why. We then discovered if we were right or not!
Finally, some of us got to dress up as Mary Anning and other important people in Mary Anning’s life. We discussed why these people were important and why Mary did not get the credit she deserved whilst she was alive.
Recently, in Science, we have been learning all about animal groups. We have categorised animals then went on a trip to Marwell Zoo to identify different mammals, amphibians, reptiles, fish and birds.
We discussed what made each animal belong to its group. We found lots of mammals and one of the zoo keepers explained to Monkey Trees class all about the different types of Zebra and how and where to spot them.
We also spotted lots of different species of birds. We especially enjoyed seeing the penguins swim!
We then visited the tropical house to see some reptiles, amphibians fish and birds. It was very hot in there! One of the zoo keepers told us all about their resident sloth and pointed to where it was hiding in the trees above.
We had a fantastic day and made our teachers proud with how sensible we were, well done year one! 😊
PE
This week in indoor PE we were learning about point balances. We first of all practised one-point balances and were challenged to try and keep our limbs as straight as possible and to point our toes! We learnt that we are trying to improve our ‘core strength’ in order to balance successfully without wobbling. Once we had practised different one-point balances, which included standing on one leg in different positions, we then choose 3 of our favourite balances to put into a routine. We then performed these, one group at a time to the rest of the class. We gave each other feedback on which was our favourite balance we watched and why.
Music
We have been listening and responding to ‘icy music’. We Listened to ‘Icy music box’ by Nakira and discussed:
We then used the picture notation flashcards to represent a range of icy sounds and explored sounds to go with each card. We used xylophones to represent snowflakes, drums for water drops, bells for icicles and wooden blocks for wind. We then enjoyed developing a piece of Ice music as a class; using a graphic notation score to help you remember when it was our turn to play. Some of us even had the important job of being the conductor! We then listened back to our icy music and discussed how we could make it even better and make it sound even more icy.
Art
Recently in art, we have been colour mixing and looking at the artist Philip Sutton!
We have discussed the 3 primary colours, red, yellow and blue and the secondary colours these make when they are mixed together.
red + blue = purple
red + yellow = orange
blue + yellow = green
We used powder paints and our fingers on top of a plastic sheet to mix the paints together to create the new secondary colours. We also sang our primary colours song as we mixed these.
After exploring with powder paints, we then used poster paints for the background of our final piece. We mixed these colours to represent the 4 different seasons. Winter, Spring, Summer and Autumn. We will then decorate our trees leaves to represent the seasons.
Maths
In Maths we have been learning all about measure. We have been learning new language to help us understand.
We are learning the following words:
Money
Measure
Centimetres
CM
Least
Most
Tallest
Shortest
Biggest
Largest
Pound
Pence
Coin
Note
We have completed a range of activities from ordering height to sorting and recognising money. Have a look at our lovely work.
History trip to Milestones Museum
We loved our trip to Milestones! We had a great time learning about the past and our Teachers told us they were so proud of us for our excellent behaviour and engagement. We were also really good on the journey in the mini buses and some of us had great fun playing the sleeping game with Mrs Byng!
When we first got to the Museum we were given some free time to explore in groups. We enjoyed looking around the pier and playing some of the games and old fashioned arcades. We were WOWED by all of the massive vehicles including a huge steam roller and fire engine and compared and discussed how they are different to todays vehicles. We also enjoyed exploring the old town and went in some shops and homes from the past, including a homes’ outside toilet! We went in the Teddy Bear Museum. it displayed more than 250 bears, some of which are over 100 years old!
In the afternoon we took part in some workshops all centred around ‘Toys’ to help us with the learning we’re doing in History at the moment. These workshops included:
Identifying the differences between ‘soft’ and ‘hard’ toys and ‘old’ and ‘new’ toys and games, using descriptive vocabulary like ‘worn’ and ‘rusty’ for old toys and ‘shiny’ and ‘colourful’ for new toys.
We took part in a building challenge and answering the question: what are the differences between using traditional wooden blocks and LEGO(R) bricks? Some of our responses included:
“we can knock the blocks over, easier to pack away”
“it is more fiddly with the lego”
“lego is more fun”
“I liked stacking the wooden blocks”
Toy Timeline – we looked at Milestones’ Toy Museum which displayed Toys through the decades. This helped us order the toys from ‘a very long time ago’ ‘a long time ago’ and ‘now’. We then discussed the ways that toys have changed and developed over time.
We enjoyed playing ‘games without resources.’ We discovered this meant no preparation, no resources and no materials and this is how children entertained themselves in the past with nothing to hand. We played hopscotch, Simon says and sang songs like ‘The Farmers in his den’
That Rabbit belongs to Emily Brown.
That Rabbit Belongs To Emily Brown By Cressida Cowell and Neal Layton.
In English, our new story is one of our all-time favourites and we hope the children will love it just as much. This story is about a naughty Queen who has a fascination and desire to have Emily’s Rabbit – Stanley or Bunnywunny as she likes to call him. However, not everything quiet goes to plan for Queen Gloriana III.
The story tells the journey of a strong-willed little girl who just loves her rabbit.
Have a watch of this story online and if you can, have a listen or read at bed time so the children become familiar with it.
As a challenge, we would love children to create their own MISSING POSTERS to help share around the school. We look forward to seeing these in school.
Autumn Term 1
What an amazing first week in Year One!
We have had a very busy first week back to school and have settled into Year One so well. We have enjoyed some great transition activities including painting ‘all about me’ rainbows, collaging some monster phonics characters and number games using chalk. We read some stories about worry monsters and created our own worry monsters from paper-mache that we can use to give our worries away anytime we have them. We also learnt our year one song – ‘hakuna matata – it means no worries’ and sang some other Warren Park songs we know and love from Reception.
Computing
We have begun our first computing unit and this term its all about bee-bots! We began our first session with designing and creating a world for the Bee-Bot on a grid. We used our English text driver as our ‘theme’ and as a class verbally discussed ideas of what we could draw, related to the ‘Cave Baby’ story. We then worked in groups to design the world.
In our second session we explored what the Bee-bots could do in small groups. We were investigating how to use the buttons on the Bee-bots and what the symbols might mean.
RE
To launch our RE unit ‘special clothes’ we had the opportunity of coming into school dressed in our own special clothes. We discussed why our clothes are special to us, how they make us feel and when and where we might wear our special clothes. We had some fantastic responses and enjoyed seeing photos of our teachers in different special clothes including Miss Bentley on a horse in her horse-riding gear and Mrs Nunn brought in her sparkly wedding dress to show us.
