Class 3 have been working with their talk partners to prepare for our Student Led Conferences next week. We are really looking forward to welcoming our grownups into school and sharing our learning so far in Year 1.
Musician of the Week
Our next musician of the week is … Bob Marley!
Enjoy x
Funky Fruit Tasting
Last week Class Six had a blast kicking off our spring expedition “Ready, Steady, Grow! How will I be the healthiest version of me?” trying a rang of different fruits. From oranges and bananas to passionfruit and avacado, we tried it all. The children showed courage, trying fruits they weren’t sure about or didn’t think they would like.
Hook Week!
This week has been a very exciting start to our spring term expedition “How do things grow and change?” The whole of EYFS have been exploring the story “How do you grow a Dinosaur?” By Caryl Hart. In the text a little boy named Albie is asked to help his mother with the gardening. Little did Albie realise, that the seeds were in fact dinosaur seeds!!! Nursery have had a lovely time painting their own imaginative creations of what they would grow, if they could grow anything from a packet of seeds.
We have also had an exciting visit from an expert visitor “Albie” the Ranger, from Animal Club, who brought with him some of his reptiles, insects and furrier animals to share with us. The children learned lots of interesting and exciting facts from Albie and were able to touch and experience most of the creatures close up, such as; a hissing cockroach called Bob, a black beauty stick insect named Del, a giant African snail, a horned frog, a tarantula, a monitor lizard (closest to a dinosaur) and a tiny furry mouse. Albie shared with the children how the animals change as they grow and how they are specially adapted to survive in the wild.
Our final hook was a lovely visit from our Kindness Elves, who kindly brought us some Jelly Beans to try, which they had harvested from their Jelly Bean Tree – just like in our story! Nursery played a game, where we covered the bowl of Jelly beans with a paper towel and had to slide our hand underneath to get a surprise flavoured Jelly Bean. We then talked about what kind of flavour they thought the coloured jelly bean would be? Some of the ideas were “Lime”, “Apple”, “Milk”, “Snow”, “Orange”, “Carrot”, “Raspberry”, “Strawberry”, “Blood”, “Lemonade”, Banana”, “Custard” and “Yellow Pepper”. They were very yummy and we all had quite a few chances to try the different flavours, for some of us this was our first time eating jelly beans.
Christmas Catch Up
Nursery were very busy over the festive period and created some beautiful work to close our Autumn Expedition; “Be Kind, How do we show we care?” Our final two texts we stories that were centred around love and kindness.
Our first festive text “Little Robin Red Vest” by Jan Fearnley told us of a main character, a little robin who wore knitted vests each day of winter to keep him warm. However, whenever he encountered a friend along his journey, suffering from the cold or snow, he gave them his vest to keep them warm. Nursery designed their own vests for Little Robin Red Vest as he eventually ran out of vests for himself. We decorated them with repeating patterns as the children had been learning all about these in maths. Here is some of our beautiful work.
Our second festive text was the traditional Christian nativity story, titled “The First Christmas” by Rod Campbell. The children explored the journey of Mary and Joseph, who fell upon the kindness of an Inn Keeper, who allowed them to shelter in his warm stable. The children enjoyed learning about the birth of baby Jesus and the important role which the Angels played in delivering God’s messages to the world. They also learned the difference between a fairy (something which lives in woodlands or at the bottom of your garden) and an angel (someone who lives in heaven with God), as many of the children at first sight called the angels, fairies, associating them from their experience, with what some people use to decorate their Christmas tree. As a celebration of the peace and joy the story brings, Nursery crafted their own angels, using a photo of their faces and their own handprints for the wings. These beautiful Christmas decorations will be enjoyed for years to come and serve as a legacy of the first time that the majority of the Nursery children heard the story and God’s message from Reverend Andy (our expert visitor who came into school to share and teach the children about the celebration also). Just look how beautiful our little angels are!
In our message centre the children retold the story using a cut and stick stable. They thought hard about the characters from the story and worked hard to colour and place them in the stable. Most of the children were able to recount the story and name key characters with confidence.
Our final week reflected how many of us celebrate Christmas now with a modern text “Dear Santa” from the same author Rod Campbell. This text explored the perfect Christmas present wished for by boys and girls. We were lucky enough to have a visit from Santa during our Christmas parties! He brought us all gifts…. How kind of him.
Finally we partied and celebrated with a lovely Christmas buffet and traditional party games. We were all kind and compassionate about winning and losing and played nicely with our friends, like the Crew we are. Such a beautiful Christmas time!
Hook Week in Year 1
What a lovely week we have had. We learnt about our body parts and senses. We used adjectives to describe fruits that Handa had in her basket and loved tasting some exotic fruits. We made shrinky dinks and investigated the shapes around us.
Animal Club
We had some very unusual visitors to class 2 this week. As part of Hook Week to our new expedition, a ranger from the Animal Club brought a selection of his animals to see us. We were allowed to touch a giant cockroach that hissed very loudly, a giant African snail and a very wriggly white mouse. We also got to see a stick insect, tarantula, spiky tailed lizard and a huge lazy frog that likes to sleep lots!!
Hook Week Special Visitors…
This week in class 1, we had a special visit from the Animal Club. The children enjoyed learning some fascinating facts from the ranger. We got up close with a hissing cockroach, a giant African snail, a horned frog, a spiny tailed lizard, a black beauty stick insect, a tarantula and a cute little mouse!
We are looking forward to starting our first case study next week where we will be finding out more about animals and insects and we will be answering the question ‘what happens to creatures as they grow?’ Our special visitors hooked us into our new expedition perfectly!
Sharing our Stories: 10/01/2025
Beautiful Work This Week
Here’s a selection of beautiful work from across the XP Trust this week! To read about other stories from across the XP Trust, visit xptrust.org.
