Welcome to the exciting world of the Wonderful Ones!
We are full of fun, laughter, enthusiasm and love.
There are 32 of us including Mrs Morland and Miss Corrigan.
'For the spirit God gave us does not make us timid, but just gives us power, love and self-discipline.'
(2 Timothy 1:7)
What is a Tomb?
This week we have been learning more about the Good Friday story. After we had retold the story, we wanted to know what happened to Jesus. We learnt that He was taken down from the cross, wrapped in cloth and placed in a tomb. We think that this shows just how much Jesus’s friends loved him because they cared for Him so deeply.
We looked at images of Jesus’s tomb and talked together about what it was like and why the stone was important. Then we decided to build our own tombs.
Th is for Thinking of Others
This week we organised a mystery lollipop game as our fundraising event during Lent. It was very popular across school and we were delighted when we heard that we had raised £49!
Then we took part in the Wheelathon. We brought our bike or scooter or anything with wheels and rode round the playground. Each group was timed and we counted how many laps they could do in that time. It was lots of fun and we are enjoying collecting all our sponsors too.
Finally, we took part in the school Jubilee Lenten Walk around the park. We enjoyed walking with our reading buddies and we stopped to reflect on how grateful we are for all we have. Before we walked back to school, we prayed for ourselves and others.
From 20 to 50 and back again
This half term we have been learning about numbers to 50. We started by practicing counting from 20 to 50 and back again starting from different numbers. Then we we learnt about multiples of 10. After we had counted in multiples of 10, we made different numbers by making lots of 10 and counting them and the bits that were left. We extended our understanding by using the part whole model to partition these numbers. Finally we used what we had learnt about all these numbers to place them on number lines.
Happy World Book Day!
Today was an exciting day in Year One because we came to school dressed as our favourite book character. We shared who we were and then we went to the hall for a parade where we saw everyone else’s amazing costumes!
Back in the classroom, we discovered what our class book was the day-That Rabbit Belongs to Emily Brown by Cressida Cowell. We started by being detectives and looking for clues in the illustrations to tell us what was going to happen. After we shared our ideas, we read the story together. Finally we decided to create our own magic door adventure.
In our outside area, we discovered lots of books! We all brought in a book from home that we have finished reading and we think a friend would enjoy. We found out that we could swap a book so everyone had a new book to take home! We were very excited and we enjoyed looking at all the different titles before we made our choice.
Finally, we ended a very busy day, with story time. However, we had two special visitors-Miss Nicholson and Miss Carroll....
We ended our World Book Day week with a visit to The Little Bookshop in Chapel Allerton where we met Alison and Abigail. Whilst we were enjoying a drink and a biscuit, Alison told us a very strange story about an elephant with a broken trunk! Then we used our special vouchers to buy our own book. We couldn’t wait to get back to school to start reading them so we had a quick look on the bus!
Playful Making
In art, this half term, we have been learning about sculpture. We started by looking at different sculptures and drew what we had seen in our sketch books. We also added words to help us describe the sculptures.
Then we experimented with making our own sculptures. We gathered different materials and explored ways to fix and join them together
As we have also been learning about animals, we decided to create our own animal sculptures. We started by using our fingers to trace around the outline of animals we found. Then we looked closely at the pictures again and drew what we saw. Finally we used different materials to create our sculptures.
Amazing Animals
In science, this half term, we have been learning about animals. We now know that there are different groups of animals called mammals, fish, bird, amphibians and reptiles. We started by working creatively to make these animals and used what we had drawn, made or built to describe what they are like.
So that we could use what we have learnt, we went to visit Yorkshire Wildlife Park. We were very excited about which animals we would see and we felt very lucky to see them in an environment similar to their own natural habitat. We explored the park and we found wallabies, lions, a tiger, meerkats, lemurs, carp, giraffes, polar bears, otters, rhinos and camels. We got as close as we were allowed so we could describe them and name the group of animals they belonged too. Some of them were eating when we saw them and it got us thinking about what different animals eat so we are going to learn more about this next.
In English, we have started learning about exclamation marks. Today we learnt that we use exclamation marks when it is a command not a sentence and when we want to show emotion. After we sorted into full stops and exclamation marks, we created a rhyme to help us remember when to use exclamation marks.
How do you feel?
This Mental Week we have been learning about our emotions. Each class was given a different emotion and ours was anger.
We know that everyone feels angry sometimes. We looked at different pictures to work out how to tell if someone is feeling angry. Then we thought about what makes us feel angry. We also talked about what we can do if we feel angry. We know that some people shout and some people hit or push when they are angry. We decided that we are going to go somewhere quiet, take some deep breaths or squeeze a cushion.
Finally we decided that we need to use our words to tell someone why we are feeling angry and then they can help us.
’I am angry when my dad wins the game’. ‘ I am cross when someone tells me off’. ‘I am angry when I don’t get what I want’. ‘I am angry when someone tells me no’. ‘I am angry when I can’t go on my tablet’. ‘ I feel angry when someone takes something from me’.
We are Family
As part of our our RE work this half term, we went to see Father Polland in church. He showed us what happens when a child is baptised and is welcomed into the church family.
We finished our baptism with a special blessing because we are all part of God’s Family.
Back in the classroom, we created our own stoles like we have seen Father Polland wear. We drew the signs and symbols of baptism and then we used what we had drawn to describe why they are important to a friend.
Pleased to Meet You…..
Today we met our new reading buddy. We were partnered with someone in Year 5 and we went to the library. We chose a book together read together. We took it in turns to read and we talked about what was happening. We can’t wait to read with our buddies again!
Happy Epiphany!
Today we led the whole school worship all about the wise men. We reminded everyone of their part of the story. Then we explained that our lives are like a journey and we make choices all the time. We don’t have a star to follow like the wise men but we do have Jesus .We asked everyone to close their eyes and reflect on how they are going to follow Jesus. We know that there are times when people try to lead us to make the wrong choices like Herod but we have to let the light of Jesus show us the way.
Perfect Puppets
In our DT unit this half term we having been learning about puppets. After experimenting with different kinds, we designed our own glove puppet. We decided to make it look like a monarch as a link to our English and History topics as well.
We started by experimenting with different ways to join two pieces of fabric together. We tried using glue, staples and safety pins and we decided which we thought would work best for our puppet. After we had created our design, we used a template to cut out two pieces of fabric and we used our preferred method to join them together. We put our hand inside to check for any gaps or holes and went back to fix them. Finally we used our designs and different materials to decorate our puppets.
We really enjoyed making our puppets. It was very tricky at times but we persevered and we are very proud of them and ourselves!
We are Shape Experts
In Maths, we have been learning about 2D and 3D shapes. We now know that 3D shapes are those you can pick up and hold and 2D shapes you can’t. We also discovered 2D shapes hiding in 3D shapes!
We started by learning their names and using words like straight, curved, corners and sides to describe them. We used what we knew to sort the shapes and make patterns with them.
The Nativity 2024
Key Stage One have a really special job to do this week and that is to share the Christmas story. We have learnt some songs, practiced our acting and words to say. We have worked really to put all these elements together to tell this important story. Mrs Morland, Miss Corrigan and Mrs Watt were really proud of us . We made sure everyone had a smile and they were filled with Christmas joy.
Watch the video clip below and you will see and hear which was our favourite song that we performed…….!
Christmas is Coming!
Today we set ourselves a challenge to spread Christmas joy around school. We decided to choose an adult and make them a card to show them how much we appreciate everything they do for us. In the picture on the front, we thought carefully about what to draw to show everything we have learnt so far about the Christmas story.
All these teachers were delighted with their cards!
Then we started our celebrations early! After Mass, we changed into our party clothes. Then we shared some food together before playing some party games with our friends in Year Two. MERRY CHRISTMAS everyone!
On our last day before the Christmas holidays, we played some games. We worked in teams to play dominoes, snakes and ladders and connect 4. Some of us even worked together to make a jigsaw. Playing games might not look like work but it helps us to work on our social skills such as turn taking and following rules as well as developing our maths skills. We had lots of fun!
Today is Christmas Jumper Day and we are all feeling very festive! We are wearing our jumpers to raise money for children who are not as lucky as us.
We love phonics so we decided to use the graphemes that we have learnt to make different words. When we coloured the words they made our own Christmas jumpers!
Ho Ho Ho Guess who came to see us……
We're going on a tree hunt! 04.12.24
Today we were detectives as we explored the woods in Middleton Park. As we were walking, we identified the trunk, bark, branches, roots and leaves on the trees we saw. We also noticed that in some parts of the woods there were more deciduous than evergreen trees. We know that not all trees are the same so we looked really carefully to describe how they were the same and different to each other. Then we split into teams and used a checklist to name different trees using the leaves. We looked carefully at the leaves and compared them as we noticed that even leaves from the same tree look different to each other. By the end of our tree hunt, we had found beech, elder, oak, horse chestnut, silver birch, hazel, plane, holly and pine trees. No wonder we were tired when we got back to school!
P is for Preparation
Advent is here! We started getting ready for Christmas by changing the cloths on our class and library prayer tables to purple.
Then we made an Advent wreath for our class. We counted five candles, three purple, one pink and one white. We learnt that we light the purple and pink ones each week in Advent and the white one on Christmas Day. We noticed that the Advent wreath is a circle to remind us that God's love has no beginning or end. Then we worked together to use evergreen leaves around the candles. We know that evergreen leaves won't change colour, just like God's love for us will not change no matter what we do. We did such a good job creating our wreath that Mrs Everett asked us to make another for the prayer table in the library. We were excited to see Father Polland when he came to bless all our Advent wreaths.
Finally we used playdough and Lego to show our understanding of the different parts of an Advent wreath.
Our preparations did not stop there! We decided to make an Advent tree. We added lights to the tree to remind us that Jesus is the light of the world. Then we wrote a promise that we hung on the tree. Each day, as we count down to Christmas, we are going to turn over a promise and we are going to try and keep it.
Hmmmm delicious!
This week is our school Christmas Fayre and to help us raise lots of money for our school, we made some tasty treats. We worked together in teams to make peppermint creams and mince pies. It was fun, messy and for some of us it was the first time we had baked.
Everyone is a Reader
Today we had some special visitors, some of our parents and carers came to read with us! We started by showing them how we read using the rule of 3. First we segment and blend trickier words. Then we reread the sentence and finally we read the same sentence one more time with expression. When we read like this, we are becoming more confident and fluent readers who understand more of what we are reading. When we were reading together, one person pointed to the words for their partner to read and then we swapped over. We really enjoyed reading with our grown ups and talking about what we were reading. We really were reading together!
Practicing reading at home is just one way to get better at reading, reading for pleasure is important too so before we went home Mrs Morland shared a story with us. It was called 'The King's Hats' and it is now one of our favourites!
We are all Talented!
Today we had a special treat…….we went to the cinema to watch Trolls:Band Together. We had lots of fun watching the film and dancing along but watching it reminded us that God made us all unique and all talented.What are your gifts from God?
We love new book day!
Every Friday is always exciting in Year One because we get a new reading book to take home. We have a first look when we read with our partner. We work as a team to read the new story together, supporting each other to segment and blend tricky words.
November is the month when we remember those who have died and gone to be with God. We know that poppies are a special flower at this time of year and so we worked creatively to make our own.
Today we had a special class worship. We stopped and said special prayers for those we wanted to remember.
We even planted our own poppies and all through November we are going to care for them. As they grow, we will take time to remember all those important to us.
The Marvellous Mr Burt!
Every Thursday, we sing with Mr Burt and it is one of our favourite parts of the week. We are starting to learn about rhythm and how to change the pitch of our voices when we sing. We have learnt lots of new songs and our favourites are ‘The Little Green Frog’ and ‘Hallelujah’. Watch the videos below for a little taste.
Some of us are even brave enough to sing on our own. Have a listen to some of our beautiful voices….
We are Thankful 18.10.24
Today we led the whole school worship and we reminded everyone how important it is to be thankful. We shared the creation story and then we asked our friends to close their eyes and reflect on what they had heard
We ended our worship by sharing one of our favourite songs called ‘If I Were a Butterfly’. Watch the video below to hear a little taste….
Marvellous Middleton
This half term in Geography we are learning about our local area. So far we know that we live in a city called Leeds and we live in a town in Leeds called Middleton. We used aerial photographs to describe Leeds and Middleton and then we found the streets where we live on a street map of our area.
Today we explored our local area around our school. We found our school, our nursery, our church, houses and shops. We used what we saw to draw our own maps. We added the names of the different types of shop such as a butchers, an optician and a pharmacy. We also added street names and other features like traffic lights and zebra crossings. Back in the classroom, we used our maps to tell our friends about Middleton.
We are now experts on our local area! After looking at a street map of the area around our school, we our knowledge and what we had seen on our walk to create our own 3D maps. When we had made them, we used directed small world people to different places. This helped us practice our geographical vocabulary and check that we had now missed our any important features that make Middleton marvellous!
We are all Readers
We have lots of books that we enjoy going back to over and over again. We recommend ones to our classmates and share others with our friends like this….
Acrostic Poems
In English, we have started learning about acrostic poems. We discovered that each line starts with a capital letter and those letters spell out the theme of the poem. We used this knowledge to reorder a poem that had been jumbled.
To get ready to write our own acrostic poem, we practiced forming capital letters correctly. We started by warming up our muscles with special exercises then we practiced each letter in each different family.
We have read several acrostic poems and one of our favourites is N is for Nature by Angie Turner. We set ourselves a challenge to learn it off by heart and we put actions to each line to help us remember the words. Watch the video below and enjoy…..
Our Prayer Garden
This week Father Polland came to bless our new and improved Prayer Garden.
Year One went to visit to see what it was like and we noticed lots of prayers and other objects that will help us when we worship.
We decided to have our class worships out there. As well as saying our prayers, we created our own prayer with each one of us saying what we would like to thank God for.
What a Wonderful Week!
We have had a very busy first week in Year One and we are already learning so much!
In RE, we went outside to look for all the beautiful things that God has created and we had a special class worship to say thank you to him.
In Maths, we sorted objects in different ways. We decided to line up the objects once we had sorted them to make them easier to count.
In Art, we experimented with spirals and we used lots of different materials to create them.
Finally, we spent some quiet time in the library choosing ourselves a new book to share with our grown ups. The library is one of our favourite places in the whole school.
Phew, we are shattered but we have had lots of fun!
Meet the Teacher Meeting 05.09.24
It was lovely to meet so many of you on Thursday, some familiar faces and some new! Please find the PowerPoint below with all the information that we discussed. If you have any questions, please ask one of the Year One team.