Year 1 2023 - 2024

The Summer term has crept up on us and we are planning lots of opportunities to work outside more often. Our Summer timetable is in the 'Files to Download' section below, (scroll down) and there is also a link to our Year 1 Long Term Plan. School library visits are now timetabled for Friday with Mrs Gray and Mrs Doig will continue to teach us Maths on a Wednesday afternoon. PE is on Fridays and Mrs O'Neill is with us Monday through to Thursday.

Our Summer term Big Question is...

Is there a place for everything?

We have two lovely texts this term to inspire our writing and thinking; "Wild" by Emily Hughes and "One Day on our Blue Planet: The Savannah" by Ella Bailey.

We will continue reading some 'seasonal' poetry, guided reading texts and exploring some well known fairy tales through a class read "Jeremiah in the Dark Woods".

Science:- Each table team has planted different seeds and we have observed how they have grown and changed. We will be planting them outside, observing and naming wild flowers and also completing a summer check on our chosen tree in the school grounds. We have been collecting rainfall in each season to answer our question - Which is the wettest season? Our last science unit will be to classify living creatures.

Humanities:- We are comparing homes from today with homes in the past and next half term we will be looking at different homes around the world in our Geography unit. In RE we will be considering sacred places for pople of Christian, Muslim and Jewish faiths.

Creative:- In Art we will be creating paper spider sculptures and then weaving with different materials. We are writing simple programs in Scratch during our computing sessions and designing and making fruit salads next half term in design technology. Music sessions will have us singing in the round and playing the glockenspiel!

Reading continues to be the most important homework to support your child's learning. The children are developing their fluency and some have now 'taken off', showing good discussion of what they are reading. It is lovely that those children are showing their love of books by talking about chapter books they are reading at home. If this has not happened for your child yet - don't worry but keep practising school books and sharing those bedtime stories. Please, please find time to read together or organise family members or friends to read with your child. Any problems, contact us and we will sort out a plan to make reading happen.

The following links give some hints and tips about reading at home.

Reading with your child

Phonics remains a target for our children - using and applying phonic knowledge to read and now to spell also. To find out about how we teach Phonics and early writing you can click here. There are some useful links which will take you to videos which show you how we pronounce different sounds correctly and how we form lower case letters. As we use Bug Club to support phonics and reading in school, there is a link in the 'Files to Download' section below that may help you to navigate the website. With the national phonics screening check approaching in June, we will send home words to practise blending real and alien (nonsense) words.  

We hope you are enjoying the My Maths homework to help your child's learning and understanding. Try encouraging your child to count in 2's, 5's and 10's forwards and backwards. Any real life opportunities to weigh, measure or tell the time will also be of benefit to support mathematical development.

As always, speak to Mrs O'Neill, Mrs Doig or myself if you have any questions or concerns and we will be happy to try and support or help.