Where is Barnaby Bear?

Hola

Welcome to the last week of this very short but exciting half term and yes, finally our much anticipated visit to the Science and Industry Museum has arrived. You should have received a letter with all the details last week. The children do need to be in school uniform and require a packed lunch, preferably in a back pack or a labelled carrier bag. The school day will be the same length and so there are no extra arrangements you need to make. Could I ask though that the children be in school promptly to enable us to get a quick getaway at 9am. Thanks.

The visit to the museum will be a great way to finish off ur topic on transport and journeys. The children (and I) have loved the work we have done and this will be the icing on the cake. I can't wait for Barnaby Bear to take us to the moon.

Assessment and Review Week
As always in the last week, we will be reviewing previous learning and making assessments to inform our planning for after half term. However, we will also have some new learning in Communication, Language and Literacy as some children are so close to being ready for the next level in their reading and just need to focus on the non-fiction reading targets. So for Communication, Language and Literacy this week, the children will start to learn all about information books.

By the end of the week, the children:
MUST be able to sort books according to whether they are fiction or non-fiction;
SHOULD be able to understand that information can be retrieved from books and find the contents page;
COULD know that information books have headings, photographs and captions, and be able to use the contents page to find answers to their questions.

They will develop their knowledge and understanding of the different features of an information book. For instance:
That they provide us with information about things that are real;
That photographs and diagrams are usually found in information books rather than illustrations;
That information books have a contents page that can be used to navigate their way around the book;
That an information book does not have to be read from start to finish – you can simply ask yourself a question and then seek to find the answer out in the text by using the contents page;
Pages in information books often have a heading, a photograph and a caption.

By the end of the week it is hoped that the children will have collaborated to create a class information book about transport. At the museum the children will take photographs for our information book. EVERY child will complete a part of it.

As we have a week off too, I have listed some websites you may wish to have a go at with your child.
If your child is still working on their letter recognition then please try out these websites also: http://www.ictgames.com/phonic_fighter4.html http://www.ictgames.com/letterlifter.html http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/laac/words/dgi.shtml - this is a great website for identifying the sounds at the beginning, middle and end of words.

http://www.starfall.com/ - the old favourite. In addition to this we will also be concentrating on the children’s spelling of simple three letter words such as big, man, cat, top etc as well as focusing in on the high frequency words more. The children are doing great as this is the end of year target for Foundation Stage and we are already working on it!! The following websites should prove very useful.

http://www.crick.northants.sch.uk/assets/Flash%20Studio/cfslit/CVC%20Maker/cvcmaker.html - this website asks you to see how many words you can make
http://www.ictgames.com/cvc_machine.html http://www.ictgames.com/plankgame.html - this focuses on high frequency words

http://www.ictgames.com/lcwc.html - this concentrates on the spelling of the high frequency words. You can simply type in the high frequency words that your child needs to work on for them to play the game with.

http://www.ictgames.com/machine.html - great for blending sounds together. For those children who are already able to spell and read simple three letter words then try out these websites as they will focus on the spelling of consonant clusters in words e.g bl, cl, st, sm etc. http://www.ictgames.com/blending_dragon.html http://www.ictgames.com/cluster.html


Mathematical Development
This week we will be assessing the children's previous learning from this half term. We will look at:

2D and 3D shape recognition
Use of language to describe the shapes
Number recognition
Finding one more and one less mentally
Adding two numbers together
Ordering numbers ( this is to inform planning for after half term)

You may wish to look back over previous blogs to review the websites used.

Here are some good websites you may wish to check out over the holidays as the first week back we are working on ordering numbers and number recognition:
http://www.ictgames.com/caterpillar_slider.html - this is a great website and you can select the numbers you wish your child to work with.
http://www.ictgames.com/mucky.html - to revise more and less; http://www.ictgames.com/nutty_v3.html http://www.ictgames.com/postletter.html http://www.primaryresources.co.uk/online/online_downloads.htm - click on the ordering numbers game.

So what else will be going on this week? WELL…

Kung Hey Fat Choy!

Yes, this week the children will be learning about the traditions of the Chinese culture and in particular the Chinese New Year. We look forward to this week every year as it provides us with the opportunity to cover all areas of the curriculum in a really integrated and fun way.

They will experience Chinese cuisine, even prepare and cook some for the rest of the class to share. On Thursday, we hope to invite the year 1 and 2 children into our classroom, which will have been set up like a restaurant, and serve them with some Chinese food. The children will learn a poem by Meg Jones that goes to the tune of ‘Ride a Cock Horse to Banbury Cross’.

Chinese New Year
The house must be clean,
The food all made ready
For a happy New Year.
With bangs and firecrackers
And lions that dance,
With dragons all fiery
To China we dance.

The children will use the poem as a stimulus to finding out about the Chinese dragon dances, the firecrackers and the tradition of cleaning houses and giving money. They will learn about how the years were named after the different animals.

Creative and Physical Development
The children will have the opportunity to listen to and respond to Chinese music. In dance they will learn how to keep to a beat alongside a drum in preparation for our very own dragon dance on the playground during Golden Time. They will be creating Chinese lanterns, dragon masks and many other creative artefacts linked to the Chinese New Year.

The Domestics
There will be a service in school for Ash Wednesday at 9am.

A letter regarding parents’ evening was sent out on Friday. Please can you return it as soon as possible as I hope to give you the times and dates before Friday. Allocation of times is on a first come first served basis. If you are able to make as many choices as possible that would be great. Friday 5.10pm is always the favourite with about half of you asking for that time. So…please put as many times as possible down. Thanks

The comments written in the reading diaries are great. Thanks. We are still on 93% though. Come on let’s try to get to 100% this week.

There will be no handwriting homework this week due to the holidays. Talking of holidays…HAVE A GREAT ONE!

Kind regards

Jayne Narraway and the Foundation Stage Team xxx