Hello Everyone ,  THE  PHOTOS YOU ARE SHARING ARE ABSOLUTELY AMAZING and being in a school without your wonderful children, the photos bring A HUGE smile to my face. I even had someone singing Our Pirate song down the telephone to me yesterday afternoon. It’s Fabulous news that you are remembering our class songs that always made us laugh together. A personal Thank you from me for your time. It means a lot to me. 

So today I have a few of those lovely photos to share…You are all GREAT LEARNERS.

Active Learning encourages all areas of development and is SO much FUN. I love seeing it in action. 

We have previously spoken about Baking and Cooking and identified how many skills your child is using by making their own breakfast,  lunch or snack…!! These photos show their fine motor control developing as the tools are being coordinated. Beautiful learning with such a yummy end product… mmmmm.

So today’s challenges:-  We have been looking at snails this week and I wondered if you could create your own spiral pattern. This is a complex skill. You can make it easier by just letting your child start as a spiral and then because it  is a coordination task the spiral will turn into a scribble …but that’s fine and will happen because are muscles developing.  As fine motor control develops through play the children will be able to keep controlled lines to form a spiral. All attempts are PERFECT. 

Can you draw your own coloured spirals, like you see on a snails shell?  If a spiral is easy… they can you create different sized snails with your spirals? Even harder……completing clockwise and anti-clockwise spirals. 

Meet ‘ Sonic the Snail ‘ He has a lovely snack…..look strawberries how nice. 

I wonder if you can find a snail to look at while you draw your own spirals?

Day Three of Mrs Heap’s Rhyme Time session…We need to ask her,  where did she find her long long tube! You only need a little cardboard tube! Click here for Day Three Words 

TODAY’s story is one of our familiar stories ( Our Core Stories )  I wonder if you can recall parts of the story or can you join in with phrases you remember… Enjoy,  it is a very classic imaginary story. 

Keep exploring active ways of learning, choosing things that make you happy.  Keep Smiling. I look forward to finding out what you have decide to learn next. Miss Butler, Miss Lofthouse and Mrs Breakwell.

Good morning all!

We hope that like the natural world you were able to enjoy our first wet day for a while?

How did you all get on yesterday with the challenges set? Please email your photos as we love to see them because we miss seeing you all.

How did you enjoy Mrs heaps video? Here is day 2. click the link as yesterday and enjoy making some music!

and click  the blue writing for the words: Day Two

As yesterday, it would be great for you and your family to stop for one minute either in your home or on your daily walk and listen to the sounds you can hear. Who heard the most? were the sounds different today? Please play this listening game:

Challenge: find a selection of items that make a noise from around the house: for example: keys, bells , two blocks, 2 spoons you will find much better ones

Hide from the person playing with you; so they can not see the sounds you are making and play each sound. Can they guess the sound ?

Can you guess more than them when it is your turn??

Make some instruments like Mrs heap suggests and play along to some of your favourite tunes and have a band time with your family!

I hope you found a collection of items to order and count yesterday and if you didn’t  you can find some today. Why not place them in different ways on a 10 grid and make ten in as many ways as you can. 

Enjoy the story I have chosen today. As Mrs Heap’s song is about a fish I felt that you needed a fish story so sit back and enjoy “Hooray For fish” by Lucy Cousins

We all wish you a happy Wednesday. Last day to up load your drawing or model for Captain Tom! Take care and stay safe

Mrs Penn, Mrs Coleman and Mrs Heap

Hello all!

I hope you all had a good Monday the weather was better than I expected and we managed our daily walk and Ollie, our dog, tried to pull a fallen tree from the stream again! Enjoy the photos below!

I believe that today is going to rainy but I hope you will still manage a daily walk in the rain. The world looks and sounds so different in the rain; so put on your rain coats and welly boots and enjoy this wet day!

Today I am excited to post the first of five musical activities devised and filmed by Mrs Heap and her husband! I will post one each day. It is a fabulous watch and will also inspire you to make your own instruments. Please  click the arrow  below to watch:

Please click the blue day one for the words to this song!

Day One (1)

When you go out today for your daily walk or in your house get everybody to stay still and quiet for a minute and after the minute talk about the sounds you could hear.

Listening skills are so important to all areas of our learning and the more we practice listening the better we will get! Listening is vital for us to hear and distinguish sounds which aid our reading as well as helping us to dance to a beat of some favourite music or tap along in time to the beat of song as in Mrs Heap’s video. Mrs Heap would love to see photos of you making music.

Yesterday I suggested you cut circles to make different moon shapes inspired by the story “Papa get the moon for me!”~ did you manage this! Did you create a full moon(whole circle), half a moon (semi circle) and did you manage a crescent shape moon and a slither of moon. This was a challenge for your scissor skills!

Practice your cutting skills by cutting out your favourite pictures from magazines or cutting up play dough!

Kieran enjoyed finding stones which became his moon rocks which he ordered by size and counted. Can you find items around your house and arrange them or sort them in your own way and count them?

I have added a very short story for you to watch. The animals in this story get very muddy! It is called “Mrs Wishy Washy.” Enjoy!

We hope you have fab day  creating music, splashing in puddles, taking time to listen, cutting and drawing but above all having fun and staying safe!

Mrs Heap, Mrs Coleman and Mrs Penn

Good Morning Everyone … I hope you are all smiling…..

It might be inside weather today listening to the weather forecast….Lets hope we can still enjoy our gardens and our one walk a day…even in the rain!! where you can continue to discover insects and new flowers. I found a centipede in my garden yesterday. He scurried away rather quickly as I disturbed his home. I also found a new wild flower (new to me!) on my daily walk. I will have to take my wild flower book with me next time, so that I can learn its name.   

This is a picture drawn by my nephew and sent to me..  He is 2 years old next month.

I love to watch how drawings develop when we give children  plain paper,  without any outlines,  and a range of mark making tools, alongside of course our time and attention. As children explore the media, they learn the movements they can coordinate and slowly learn to describe the meaning behind these physical marks. 

I wonder what picture you can create today?  Fast circular marks, dots, lines, dashes or  imaginative imagery …maybe dragon’s, superhero’s princesses….etc 

You might even create a ‘story’  from your image or marks?  Or you might cut or ask you mum or dad to cut out your image so that you can use it within your imaginative play… Using block, bricks etc  

Yesterday your challenge was to find 10 items and explore different ways of making 10. Thank you for the photos of your 10 items and lines. I thought the items you could find at home would be much more exciting than the things in my house!

We can use the items that you found and sorted in your house yesterday in today’s challenge.  I wonder if today you can use 10 items IN  YOUR PLAYDOUGH!! creating your own stories and explorations. The animals, paw patrol, cars, buttons can be added into the playdough to develop your explorations and your story telling. ( A playdough recipe is available on a previous blog page if you need it. Just scroll down the first page under FS base 1. ) 

I know some children do not like the texture of playdough on their hands but you can create small world imaginary areas from just setting out bricks  a range of boxes, tubs and old rolls of wallpaper. Rolls of wallpaper always make great roads and allows a large drawing space. 

Story Telling is SO important, for memory development , oral language, sequencing, imagination, self confidence etc.  Being able to retell a whole story in the correct sequence involves a lot of skills. We can allow the children time to explore these skills through the use of small world items in playdough or by building  mini worlds and through drawing. We also develop sequential story telling by learning a story off by heart. Repeating the same story again and again and again and again!!!!  If I asked you to retell the story of The Three Bears you could manage this with easy because this story language is stored in your long term memory.  We have to repeat traditional and new stories so that the children also have a wide range of stories in their long term memory. Last term we looked at The Gingerbread man.

This half terms story is:- The Enormous Turnip. There is also a rhyme we will learn about the story.  It will be added onto the site soon. 

Mrs Heap has created An Amazing Rhyme Time video for you to join in with. Just click the arrow below so that you can join in with her activity. ENJOY.  We will add a new Rhyme Time clip everyday this week. 

Day One (1) Click on the blue (1) for the words to rhyme ‘Horsey  Horsey’ . 

Enjoy your day and What ever story you decide to create, HAVE FUN. Remember to Stay Safe 

From Miss Butler, Mrs Breakwell and Miss Lofthouse. 

Hello everyone!

Did you enjoy the weekend? the sun shone so I hope you were able to spend time outside? I did some gardening: some digging and moving very big stones and I also planted some seeds. I noticed how tiny the seeds were I was sowing in the trays. At lunch time I cut up an avocado and was amazed at the size of that seed stone!

Did you notice the different sizes of seeds? Kieran has sent me some photos of his learning and he had a space theme going on at home and he found and ordered some stones which he calls his moon rocks! Thank you for sending me your photos they make me smile!

Today’s story has a space theme  and is called “Papa get the moon for me!” this is another Eric Carle book so I hope you enjoy it?

Can you take a circle piece of paper or perhaps a paper plate and cut it to create the different sizes of the moon?  If you add string you could create your own moon mobile!

I thought that the bubble foam was such great fun and it reminded me that you could have ago at making some corn flour slime either in your outside space or if dull and chilly inside(mummy’s and daddy’s this slime sweeps up easily!) you need a big bowl, some corn flour and water and food colouring if you have it?

• add the corn flour to the bowl
• add water slowly
• keep mixing and adding water until the mixture looks like you can pick it up (if too stiff add more water/if too runny add more flour)
• add food colour if you have it
• Play with the slimeIf you do not have any corn flour why not try a squirt of baby lotion on a tray and explore this with your fingers or your toys. This fun activity will develop all the muscles in your hands and arms and shoulders which you will need for writing!

Please continue to send pictures of your learning we love to see them and we always write back to you. Remember we have a 2 days left before Captain Tom is 100 years old so any happy pictures you have done please send them so we can print and add them to his card

Thank you

Mrs Penn, Mrs Heap and Mrs Coleman

Good Morning 

Thank you for sharing the amazing learning your have been engaged with at home. Your photos always make me  smile as I open my emails. THANK YOU. 

Flower collections and Snails has been a huge hit with you all.

If you have not yet pressed flowers, see which flowers you find on your walk. Remember you only need two pieces of kitchen roll and large books to press the flowers. 

FINAL IMAGE

Mixing Flower petals

I was even sent a story square that was written at home and sent in. Its lovely to think you are still writing your own stories at home. I love how story squares are totally individual. 

Snail and slime all over the place. The baby didn’t go with the daddy snail. The mummy snail stayed to look after the baby. Then daddy snail came to see baby snail that had hurt himself. The doctor snail took baby in a caravan to take him to the doctors where he had a plaster put on and was given a sticker for being such a good boy.The other snails are doing something else and slugs. Then they just are popcorn and watched TV but the TV stopped. They were cross, so they bought a new TV and then owl went Twit Twoo and was cross because they were watching a new TV….. The End. 

Story Squares are stories your child tells you which are written down … WORD for WORD. We usually act these stories out at the end of a school day but at the moment we can just share these stories until we are back together again BUT you might wish to act out your story square at home.

I was sorting out items at home and wondered how many different arrangements  of 10 you have found? 

You will have lots of exciting things to sort, Cars, Polly pockets,  pirate coins, Lego men etc 

You will all be able to join in with this song. We will have to change the words to the song depending on what you find at home in your search and sort. I wonder what your number song will be about? 

Enjoy your day searching and finding different things: flowers, snails, sticks, toys you want to sort or line up.  You could even make your own  Story Square. 

Keep Smiling and having fun as a family and remember to Keep Safe

From Miss Butler, Miss Breakwell and Miss Lofthouse.

Here are some of the lovely photos you have sent this week from your time at home enjoy!

Hello Everyone!

What a lovely sunny day Thursday was! I managed to do a little gardening and on my daily walk I think I successfully found a flower to match each colour of the rainbow. Have a look at my photos below to see if you agree? Did you try this challenge and did you find a flower for each colour?

I noticed a lot of dandelions on my walk and I remember blowing the seeds and saying a time for each blow. This was called a dandelion clock and it is helping the dandelion disperse it’s seeds to make a new plant. Why not have a close look at a dandelion seed head, look at how small the seeds are. I know that  some of you have been planting seeds to grow at home. Have noticed that seeds come in different sizes? Collect seeds this weekend from the fruits you eat or what you find in the woods on your walks  and look at their shapes and sizes. Inside each seed a new plant is waiting to grow~ this is amazing! 

Our world is full of wonder and it has been good to see how many of you and your families have been exploring your gardens, local woods and fields on your daily walks. I  read an article this morning and in the article they suggested a poem. I have found a you tube video of this poem for you to watch and listen to. This poem is called “Who Has seen the Wind?” by Christina Rossetti when you have listened to it talk with your family about it!!

Over the weekend you might like to create a little den for the bugs in your outdoor spaces. You need  sticks and twigs and leaves that you could collect on your daily walks. Make a small den and wait for the creatures to move in. Please send me photos of your den creations.

To end this post I have chosen 2 stories for you to listen to this weekend. They are both by Eric Carle. The first one is a favourite and you will know it well. in this video Eric Carle himself reads “The Very Hungry Caterpillar” and then this is followed by a short film of the story  “The very Quiet Cricket” which is beautiful and has so many creatures for you to spot. Enjoy!

May we wish you a lovely weekend carrying on doing the things that make you feel safe, fit and above all happy!

Please send us any photos of your learning

Mrs Penn, Mrs Heap and Mrs Coleman

Hello Everyone 

I can’t believe how beautiful the weather has been this week…Super Sunshine. I went for a walk at 8am yesterday morning,  the bird songs are clear and now sound so loud because we don’t have many cars on the road, It’s such an stunning sound. Have you heard the bird sing on your walks?  What is also amazing is how the flowers and new leaves just shimmer in the morning light.

I wonder if the sun is shining on Friday you might wish to explore learning outside again but this time looking at water. I am sure some of you will have already been exploring water outside and inside!! Water is always a HUGE interest  because of its sensory properties and calming  effect.  

I have pick 2 of the 100’s of water activities you might wish to explore. I’m sure you will have fun with water what every activity you choose. Even just washing your mum & dads car or washing the dishes,  is fun learning.  

•  Have you tried painting with water outside on you path or on your patio.  Maybe you, your mum, dad or older sibling could even paint around your hand with water to make a shape.  You might even be able to paint, lines, a picture or even letters in your name.

  

  Wait and watch how they explore the water.

  

  What will they create?

  

  Where will they paint?

  
  
• I wonder if you could make your own garden soup or perfume with tree blossom  or flower petals. Collect petals that have blown off trees in you garden or you find on your daily walk.  Bring back your treasures and mix them together in a bowl of water in the garden or on your balcony. Mixing garden potions are always fun.

I wonder if any of you feed the birds in your garden? What do you feed your birds? Or maybe you feed the ducks on your walk?

https://www.woodlandtrust.org.uk/blog/2019/04/identify-bird-song/ 

The website is GREAT because you can click on each bird image and hear their individual bird songs and calls.  Enjoying listening to the sounds. I wonder if you will be able to name any birds?

Leo Leonni is one of the authors we would have been looking at this half term. You might know his stories they always have many layers of personal and social learning. Click on the arrow and the story will play. 

If you are having difficulty accessing or using bug club,  Please do let me know. I will help however I can. Next week we will start to look at this terms told story ‘ The Enormous Turnip’ …Mrs Breakwell has set  all  of the FS staff a challenge of growing our own vegetables. I have NEVER grown vegetables before and  I am not sure my lettuce, carrots and radishes will grow ENORMOUS or grow at all!!! I will let you know. 

How are your Pea plants growing? 

Enjoy the Amazing Weather together as  a family.

Keep Safe and Keep Smiling Miss Butler, Mrs Breakwell and Miss Lofthouse