Autumn 2 20205

This half-term we have been busy bees - we LOVE the Gingerbread Man SO much so we have based our recount writing on this. For our Yr 1's they also drove the fact that they wanted to see if we could protect the Gingerbread Man (last year we tried to save him – but when he landed in the parachute he broke his arm!) so this half-term we decided to see what materials could protect him.  We also had a focus on Swansea Airport as part of our Cynefin topic – the children then had to complete a number of activities to get their own Swansea Airport passport!  We also have had a very special half-term singing our little hearts out for our 'Jingle all the Way' sing-song with our families – we even had a real-life donkey to plod along...in Penclawdd no less!  It was such fun, and we became proficient in singing 'Jingle Bells' in English, Welsh AND French!!  Take a peek...

 

LLC 

Our daily bread and butter always consists of phonics, handwriting and learning our tricky words.  This half-term we continued to work on our sentence structure, and we even became 'Sentence Chef's'...making sure all the correct ingredients were in so that we could have a grammatically correct sentence – we even had a French chef flown in to help us in our learning!!  In Reception, we have continued to learn in a variety of ways that our name begins with a 'big tall' capital letter.  Every week we are busy learning our spellings - always amazing Miss Smith at how well we can remember them!  

LLC - Recount

Oh, we do love the Gingerbread Man! It is a firm favourite in our class, so the perfect tale to use in our recount writing.  We, of course, made some lovely gingerbread to help us with our adjectives – they were crunchy (but don't tell Miss Smith!!).  'Nana' also made us some gingerbread playdoh and that helped to evoke some wonderful language to help us in our writing.  We worked together on a class write to re-tell the story and made not only a giant story map to help us – but also a GIANT Gingerbread Man!  During this time, we also enjoyed many traditional tales – we were able to spot lots of different types of punctuation in these books too. We explored why the author would use such punctuation, and it proved a great understanding of text. 

Welsh

We have worked hard this half-term on Welsh, and we continue to LOVE it! We love learning about where we belong and our topic of 'Cynnefin' has really helped us to understand all about special places in our area.  We have also focused on family, colours, weather and, of course, 'Nadolig!'.

Maths & Numeracy

Smiles galore in Maths! We just love every element about it - we are very hands on! This half-term we have continued to develop our understanding of numbers - our most loved lesson was our '5 Currant Buns' lesson - actually, '10 Currant Buns' - 'Nana' again came to the rescue and made us some currant buns. We could understand that through subtraction our numbers got 'less than'.  We then played 'shop' independently, and we were able to say our start and end number.  We also explored shapes – both 2D and 3D and had such fun making our shape display using different art materials.  In Yr 1 we have been busy working on whole part, addition, subtraction and shape – we really are becoming experts and can show you, tell you and explain to you different strategies and ways.  We also used our topic to help us size some aeroplanes that you might see at Swansea Airport (mind you – we are not 100% certain there is a jumbo jet there!!...yet!!).

 

Science & Technology

Have we mentioned that we love the Gingerbread Man!?! WE LOVE the GINGERBREAD MAN!!  So much so the children decided that they wanted to see if they could 'protect' him.  Last year, our Yr 1's worked on saving him (but he did break his leg on the landing of the parachute!), so we wanted to see what materials could protect him to crossing the river.  We all had our own Gingerbread Man and made a prediction to start with as to what material might work – we decided that the bag might work, but the paper would not work.  We then dropped (carefully!) our Gingy into the cup, and we observed...yells of 'he has gone!' with gasps permiating the room...because, yes, of course – the Gingerbread Man could not be protected by the kitchen roll! The children worked together – discussed what they saw and then, of course, independently carried this investigation on to see what they could design to help save AND protect him.  The language used was subject specific and used in the correct context: 'the Gingerbread Man has dissolved because the paper did not protect him'.  We also used our digital skills this half-term and we drew our Gingerbread man in JIT saving our drawing and adding our name.  We also understood that we need to be model citizens and add our name for ownership on all our work.

 

Health and Well-Being

We continue to be healthy, confident individuals daily during our outdoor provision and the emphasis on movement is key for a healthy body and mind.  The children check in each morning, and they understand the importance of telling someone how they feel – our day always starts with a chat so that we know how we are all feeling.  In PE, we have focused on Miss B's technical skills of hand-foot co-ordination and have been learning football skills – it is lovely to see that some of our learners are part of Penclawdd AFC and you can see the skills they learn at the local club transfer to ur PE lessons.  We celebrated World Mental Health Day and Mr Culpin treated us all to a hot choc, and we were able to relax with our friends.  Mrs D was carrying out a 'bread' experiment for the month of November, and we all had a tasty bit of wholemeal bread for our afternoon snack – it ensured we stayed on task and had no dips in energy – we loved it too!  We have loved being busy and hands-on and love our daily movement breaks – never a dull moment in our class! 

 

Humanities

During our topic of 'Cynefin' we focused on where we live – most recently we looked at Swansea Airport and decided that by the time we are grown-ups, the airport might have grown enough to have a 'jumbo jet!'.  During this time, we have also spent time thinking of Christmas and all the celebrations and festivities that go along with this – during our 'Jingle all the Way' rehearsals we took time to think of those in the past and how we all come together in kindness to celebrate special occasions.  

 

 

 

Expressive Arts

We have studied the artist Emma Cownie, and we started our half-term with a wonderful teams meeting with Emma.  Emma's art is inspired when she goes for a walk in her local area – she then takes pictures and returns to paint them.  During our topic we discussed how we all love to walk in our local areas, so we used Emma to help us.  In our discussion with Emma, she taught us how she selects different brushes for different strokes – she also taught us to sketch out what we wanted to paint first (a top tip that had come from our two expert artists, Sam and Finn!) so they were thrilled to concur with Emma!  The children also explored different tones and used light and dark to vary the colour.  The children then drew and painted their favourite place – either from a walk or by observing their house.  We have shared these with Emma, and she is thrilled that she inspired the next generation of artists.  We have had a wonderful music session this half-term – both with our own Miss B during our Expressive Arts carousel and also with Father Tim.  Both taught us rhythm, pitch and to listen – a really important skill when playing music.  We also recited many songs for our production of 'Jingle all the Way' and we especially loved 'Little Donkey'...seeing as there was a 'real life donkey...plodding along!'  What a terrific half-term it has been!