Macaws Class

Class News Autumn Term 2023

15.9.2023

Dear Parents and Carers,

Welcome to the first Macaws Class email of the academic year! I hope you all had a lovely summer holiday…I can’t believe we are already at the end of our second week. We have been very busy indeed!

It has been so lovely to get to know all of the children and I have been very impressed with how well they have settled into their new class. The children have enjoyed completing a whole host of activities that have enabled us to get to know each other and begin our learning journey together for the year.

During our first week, we enjoyed assemblies with Mrs Lang, where she talked to us about returning to school and we were also reminded of the school rules and the array of rewards we can earn in school. Children have enjoyed collecting their stickers and house points already this fortnight; what a fantastic start to the year!  

We have also been agreeing our class rules, completing creative tasks and reflecting on our summer reading task.

I was very impressed with all of the fantastic summer reading work completed. Thank you for your support with this. It has been wonderful to hear about the range of tasks you completed together. I am so pleased that the children enjoyed the book and the related tasks. I was especially impressed with all of the homemade ice cream created as part of the task. Thank you for supporting your child to complete this reading challenge.

This week has seen children begin their English and Maths lessons and complete some introductory tasks and assessments that they have thoroughly enjoyed. In English we have also begun to read our new book, ‘The Firework Maker’s Daughter’ by Phillip Pullman. Children have enjoyed using their prediction skills in considering what the book may be about.  

We have also started our new learning in our foundation subjects. This includes mapping, living things and their habitats and the Tudors. Children are so excited to find out more about these topics and they loved piecing together the Tudor family tree that was discovered and sent to us to decipher. We cannot wait to find out more about King Henry VIII and the Tudor way of life. Through this learning, they will answer the key enquiry question, “Who were the Tudors and what was their impact?”  

I am sure that you will have all seen the exciting new planners that are being used in Lower Key Stage Two this year. Children have been really responsible for taking care of these, bringing them to school each day and using them to record important information to support their learning, such as login details. When children are awarded with house points, these are also recorded within their planners.

Our Macaws of the week for the last two weeks are Elizabeth and Arlo. Well done!

Our handwriting hero and heroine are Izzi and Pelle; well done on some beautiful handwriting children!

Here are a few other reminders for you:

• Everyone in LKS2 has swimming on a Tuesday and should come into school in their PE kits

• Miss Spokes’s Maths group also have their second PE slot on a Tuesday

•  Mrs Waterman’s Maths group have their second PE slot on a Wednesday

• Mrs Shilvock’s Maths group have their second PE slot on a Thursday

·         Please remember to send your child into school wearing their PE kit on these days

·         A reminder that Year 4 children that would like to be considered for an ambassador role should complete their speeches ready to share in assembly on Monday

·         Maths homework has been set for your child on MyMaths for this week. All children will come home with their login information in their planners this weekend.  

I hope that you all have a wonderful weekend,

Miss Spokes and Mrs Paruit :-) 

 29.9.2023

Dear Parents and Carers,

Wow; what a busy couple of weeks we have had in Lower Key Stage 2!  There have been so many wonderful learning opportunities that have taken place and we continue to be so proud of the children and how well they have settled into life in our key stage.

In our Maths learning, we have been building our understanding of the value of each digit within a given number. There have been many practical activities and games that have been completed where the children have had the opportunity to demonstrate their understanding. We have also been logging on to TTRockstars each day. Times table knowledge and recall are key in Year 3 and 4 and daily access helps to support fluency.  We know that lots of children are also logging on at home which is fantastic.  We recommend that your child logs on for 5 minutes each day at home as part of their homework; thank you for your support with this.

Our adventure has continued as we have read further into our class book, ‘The Firework Maker's Daughter’ by Phillip Pullman in our English lessons.  The story has really gripped the children and we look forward to reading each day to find out what is going to happen next as Lila heads off on her exciting adventures.  The learning we have completed so far has led to us completing our first piece of assessment writing, a character description of the main character, Lila. We are so impressed with how hard the children worked to prepare for this writing and the care that they took to ensure their final piece met the success criteria and was presented beautifully.  Well done children!

For our Science learning we have been looking at ‘Living things and their habitats’.  We considered what classification was and the different ways that we could group animals, for example if they were a vertebrate or invertebrate.  We then moved on to study the habitat of the rainforest and considered how the animals that live there have adapted to survive in their environment. The children worked in groups to use the Chromebooks to carry out research and record their results; I am sure if you ask them they would happily share the interesting facts that they discovered.

In our Geography learning we have been using maps to explore the world.  So far we have identified the location of the Equator and how it is used to divide the Northern and Southern Hemisphere.  We have also looked at lines of longitude and latitude and how these can be used to easily identify different locations on a map.  We look forward to finding out more about the world in the coming weeks.

‘Divorced, beheaded, died, divorced, beheaded, survived’, this is a rhyme that I am sure you have heard as we have been studying all about the Tudor king, Henry VIII.  The children quickly learnt the rhyme and found out about the fate of his 6 wives.  The children were fascinated to know that King Henry VIII’s rule still has an impact on our lives today, over 500 years later! The way he reformed the church and formed the Church of England meant people had a choice about which religion they wanted to follow for the first time; this has helped to lead to the diverse world that we now live in where many different faiths are celebrated.

Our week ended with an ‘Orienteering Day’ that was organised and run by Miss Klausner.  This was an excellent opportunity for the children to work on their communication skills and to have the opportunity to work together as a team to reach a goal.  Great fun was had by everyone and we look forward to the skills that we have learnt being used to support us in the classroom.

As you can see it has been a very busy couple of weeks and we have had so many exciting learning opportunities that have taken place.  A huge ‘Well done’ to all the children for their positive attitude to our learning and fantastic contributions during lessons.

Our Macaw of the week for the last two weeks have been Hanna and Henry. Well done!  

Our handwriting hero and heroine are Cailen, Alicja, Flynn and Demi; well done on some beautiful handwriting children!  

Here are a few other reminders for you:

• Everyone in LKS2 has swimming on a Tuesday and should come into school in their PE kits

• Miss Spokes’s Maths group also have their second PE slot on a Tuesday

•  Mrs Waterman’s Maths group have their second PE slot on a Wednesday

• Mrs Shilvock’s Maths group have their second PE slot on a Thursday

·         Please remember to send your child into school wearing their PE kit on these days

·      Maths homework has been set for your child on MyMaths for this week. All children have their login     information written in their planners.  

Next week, we are looking forward to having a SCARF PSHE workshop in school, delivered by Coram Life Education. This fun, interactive and age-appropriate workshop will help children to understand the importance of physical and emotional health; they will learn vital life-skills that are also known to help their overall achievement. A parent letter about these workshops is attached to this email for your information.

I hope that you all have a wonderful weekend and we look forward to seeing the children back in school on Monday for another exciting week of learning.

Miss Spokes and Mrs Paruit 

 13.10.2023

Dear Parents and Carers,

We cannot believe we are quickly approaching the end of the first half term of the academic year! It has been a fantastic term full of achievements, magic moments and exciting learning opportunities. We really enjoyed meeting you and sharing these achievements at the Learning Review Meetings. We hope you found these useful, alongside the targets that have been sent home. Here are some highlights that we would love to share with you. 

Over the last couple of weeks, the children have been extremely busy in their English lessons! We have continued to explore our key text: The Firework Maker’s Daughter. This book has inspired us and opened up a world of writing opportunities! The children have created character descriptions, persuasive letters and are designing their very own set of instructions on how to wash an elephant: an essential guide we all need to know! The children are also working really hard within their spelling lessons; they are completing a range of spelling investigations and becoming spelling detectives to find new rules to help them with tricky spellings. Focus spellings are added to Literacy Planet each fortnight. Children can log in and play a range of spelling games that focus on these words. 

Every morning, the children have an opportunity to read their reading accelerator books, complete a quiz and change their books. Please remember, it is important the children are arriving promptly at 8:45am to benefit from this reading slot which will support their reading progress. 

In Science, the children have loved exploring the topic of rainforests; they have learnt about classification,  researched rainforest animals and plants and investigated the impact of deforestation. To truly immerse themselves within their learning, the children listened to our Now Press Play audio rainforest experience. This audio story enabled them to follow the life of a girl from an Amazonian tribe and discover the significance of rainforest plants and animals and why people cut trees down. We can’t wait to summarise and present all of our learning next week! 

The children have loved discovering more about Tudors in History, and we too have found out lots of facts from the children that they have learnt at home! In class, we explored a Tudor Kitchen virtually which led us to the question of what did the Tudors eat? The children were surprised to find out that Peacock was often a meat eaten in those days. We also found out that many Tudors ate with their hands!! Only the King was allowed a fork. We are all very excited for our Tudor Day on Thursday 19th October next week where we will truly learn what it was like to be a Tudor. 

Last week, we also had a visitor from SCARF who delivered a PSHE workshop to the children. This is yet another ‘magic moment’ which brought our learning to life! The children learned all about their wellbeing and how to look after themselves. We discovered the importance of eating healthily, limiting our time on devices and ensuring we get a good night’s sleep. All of which will help our brain and body function. 

A huge well done to the children for such a fantastic week of learning! 

Our Macaw of the week for the last two weeks have been Eloise and Hudson. Well done!  

Our handwriting hero and heroine are Daniel, Annabel, Eddie and Ellie; well done on some beautiful handwriting children!  

Just a reminder, please continue to encourage daily use of Times Tables Rockstars at home. This will support all children in accessing all areas of Mathematics. The children are very motivated and are currently involved in a tournament which will end in one week! Please encourage your children to log on daily, in line with our homework guidance. 

Homework this week will be set on My Maths. Please remember that on alternate weeks, children should be logging on to Bedrock and Literacy Planet to complete their English homework too. All logins are in your child’s planners.

I hope you have a lovely weekend; we look forward to seeing you all again on Monday! 

Miss Spokes and Mrs Paruit :-) 

 3.11.2023

Dear Parents and Carers,

Welcome back to the second half of the Autumn term! 

We must begin this email by thanking you for your support in ensuring that your child was ready for Tudor day! We loved the effort that the children (and you!) had gone to with their costumes. They all looked brilliant and we all had such a great day. From cooking and tasting pottage to performing their Tudor dances, the children enjoyed this ‘magic moment’ and it really helped develop and enrich their understanding of the Tudor period. 

Linked to this, we are very excited to be at the beginning our next History topic, ‘The Age of Exploration’. This is primarily focussed upon the Tudor period as this is a time when great discoveries and exploration was made. We will be learning about a range of explorers and thinking about what they achieved to make this period a ‘golden era’. This week we began by learning all about Christopher Columbus and discovered that knowledge of the world was very different in the past. 

We have really enjoyed reading your child’s homework linked to Black History Month. From posters, presentations and fact files; the children have all clearly worked so hard to find out about a range of inspirational black women. Thank you for your support with this. 

Our English learning this week was a little spooky, as we completed our reading of the famous witches poem from Macbeth, a play by William Shakespeare. Children loved getting into character to read this aloud. We studied the range of language features and we have also created our own poems in this style. In addition to this, we have also read and been inspired by a range of other Halloween poems from the book ‘Fire Burn, Cauldron Bubble: Magical Poems’ by Paul Cookson. I wonder if your child would be able to tell you some of the gruesome ingredients that they selected for their own witches poem? 

You will have received the overview of our curriculum for this half term. We hope this will be useful for you and help you when talking to your child about their learning. 

Our Macaw of the week was Cailen. Well done!  

Our handwriting hero and heroine are Arlo and Jolie; well done on some beautiful handwriting children!  

Homework this week will be set on Literacy Planet and Bedrock. Literacy Planet provides spelling games linked to the focus words we are learning to spell in school. Bedrock Learning provides children with the opportunity to practise their understanding and use of  vocabulary  through completing a range of different interactive questions. Children should all be completing this homework as it compliments the learning we are completing in school. This is essential in supporting your child’s understanding and progress. 

Next Friday, Maths homework will be set on MyMaths. All logins are in your child’s planners. 

Just a reminder, please continue to encourage daily use of Times Tables Rockstars at home. This will support all children in accessing all areas of Mathematics. The children are very motivated! Please encourage your children to log on daily, in line with our homework guidance. 

Children should also be reading at home each day. This enables children to develop their reading fluency and their understanding (comprehension) of what they are reading. We would like to see more children completing their Accelerated Quizzes each morning in school; reading at home will support children in being able to read and be successful in understanding a range of texts. Arriving at school at 8.45am will also give children the time to read, change books and complete reading quizzes!

As part of our activities for Maths Week (13-20th November), we are inviting children to come in dressed as a rockstar on Monday 20th November. Costumes can be as simple as a pair of jeans and a coloured t-shirt. Children will then be performing a rocking times table song in our whole-school assembly. 

I hope you have a lovely weekend; we look forward to seeing you all again on Monday! 

Miss Spokes and Mrs Paruit :-) 

 17.11.2023

Dear Parents and Carers,

We have had such a busy and exciting week full of fun and exciting learning opportunities.

This week, we have been celebrating not one but three different events: Anti-Bullying week, Maths week and Children in Need. The children loved coming in on Monday with their odd socks, and thoroughly enjoyed our morning assembly where we reflected on why we were wearing these: to celebrate our differences and uniqueness. We thought further about the word bullying and how we can ‘make a noise’ about bullying to stop it. The children also experienced a fantastic drama workshop by Gripping Yarns last week; it was one to remember! The children identified the importance of taking action if we see others being unkind or bullied; we learnt not to be bystanders but to stand against bullying. Great work children! 

Thank you to parents for supporting these events; the children have loved coming in in their spotty clothes to celebrate Children in Need. Don’t forget, children will celebrate Maths week further on Monday when they dress up as a rockstar! 

The children have been working really hard in class. Here are some highlights: 

Is it too early to get Christmas decorations out? Never! This week, the children were introduced to their new key text in English: One Christmas Wish by Katherine Rundell. They were so excited to explore the book and to begin by making predictions about the text based upon the front cover and blurb. Over the next couple of weeks, the children will be working towards writing a story opener for this book! To inspire them, they used their senses to describe and explore a number of Christmas decorations which will be main characters within their story. We can’t wait to see what they come up with. 

In Science, the children have been busy completing investigations for our new topic: Animals including humans. So far, the children have explored what might happen if an animal is removed from the food chain and how animals’ and humans’ skeletons compare. I wonder if they can tell you the difference between an exoskeleton and an endoskeleton? This week, the children discovered what happens to our food once we eat it! They were able to describe the purpose and functions of each part of our digestive system. Fantastic work children! 

In P.E, the children have made us so proud in their swimming lessons. We are delighted with how much they have progressed! They have shown determination, resilience and enthusiasm each week. The children have also thrown themselves into their football lessons at school. Come rain or shine, the children have shown eagerness to get stuck in. They have learnt how to control the ball as well as pass using the inside and outside of their feet. 

Well done to our Macaws of the week for the last two weeks: Pelle and Annabel V. 

Our handwriting heroes and heroines are Liam, Elizabeth, Kornel and Eloise; well done on some beautiful handwriting children!  

Reminders: 

• Homework is on Literacy Planet and Bedrock this week. Literacy Planet provides spelling games linked to the focus words we are learning to spell in school. Bedrock Learning provides children with the opportunity to practise their understanding and use of  vocabulary  through completing a range of different interactive questions. Children should all be completing this homework as it compliments the learning we are completing in school.

I hope you have a lovely weekend; we look forward to seeing you all again on Monday! 

Miss Spokes and Mrs Paruit :-) 

 1.12.2023

Dear Parents and Carers,

We have reached the end of another busy couple of weeks; so much wonderful learning has taken place and we are so proud of how hard all the children have been working and the wonderful work that they have produced.

In our English learning this week, we have loved reading more of our class book ‘One Christmas Wish’ by Katherine Rundell.  It really is a magical book, with the most beautiful illustrations and it has really captured the children’s imaginations. So far, we have written our own story openers, using the book for inspiration.  We have also created our own characters to go into our stories.  We are now exploring how dialogue is used in text.  We carefully studied a section of our book and created a set of important instructions that we need to follow when adding speech into our writing.  We look forward to following these instructions as we create our own stories that will include dialogue between the characters we have created.

This week in Geography, we have continued exploring our wonderful world.  So far we have looked at the 7 human Wonders of the World and this week we moved on to look at the 7 physical Wonders of the World.  The children are becoming so confident at locating places on maps of the world and then talking like Geographical experts to describe their location. There have been some really wonderful discussions taking place as the children have been sharing about which Wonder of the World they would like to visit the most and why.

In our History learning, we have continued to look at explorers and consider the impact that they have had on the world today. We have researched two famous Tudor explorers, Sir Frances Drake and Sir Walter Raleigh.  We accessed a wide range of sources of information to find out more about their lives and then assess the impact that they made on our lives today.  Did you know that Sir Walter Raleigh is credited with bringing coconuts and turkeys to England?  With Christmas fast approaching, we need to thank him for bringing back one of the vital parts of a traditional Christmas dinner!

Finally, in our Science learning, we have continued learning about the human body.  This week, we explored our teeth;  we started by identifying the different types of teeth we have in our mouths and what each type of tooth is used for.  The children were able to make fantastic links to our previous learning about the digestive system about how our teeth support our bodies to digest food.  We then set up an experiment to show the impact of coke, orange juice and water on our teeth.  We used eggshells to replicate our teeth as they have similar properties.  After several days we returned to our experiment and were amazed to see the effects that each liquid had on our teeth.  This all helped to emphasise the importance of making sure that we look after our teeth.

Well done to our Macaws of the week for the last two weeks: Demi and Kornel. 

Our handwriting heroes and heroines are Tomi, Aria, Jasper and Hanna; well done on some beautiful handwriting children!  

Reminders: 

• Homework is on Literacy Planet and Bedrock this week. Literacy Planet provides spelling games linked to the focus words we are learning to spell in school. Bedrock Learning provides children with the opportunity to practise their understanding and use of vocabulary  through completing a range of different interactive questions. Children should all be completing this homework as it complements the learning we are completing in school.

• Now the weather has turned, can you please make sure that your child has the appropriate warm clothes to wear in school.  In addition to this, can we please ask that hats, scarves and gloves are clearly labelled.

• A huge thank you to everyone who has bought items from ‘My Child’s Art’ already.  This is an opportunity for you to own a piece of your child’s artwork that they are so proud of, on a number of different items.  Here is the link that will allow you to access the website and place your order:

https://mychildsart.co.uk/find-artwork?username=LarkRise&access-code=eHlDg4a6

 

I hope you have a lovely weekend and wrap up warm – it looks like it is going to be a chilly one! We look forward to seeing you all again on Monday! 

Miss Spokes and Mrs Paruit :-)