Arts Festival
We have had such a busy last week of Term 2 with end of unit assessments, wrapping up our Unit of Study ‘Telling Tales’ and our ‘Stories’ in Writing Workshop, the publishing party, not to mention the Arts Festival technical rehearsals, two dress rehearsals and an evening show! No wonder we all feel tired and are in need of a rest!
This year’s show, ‘Once Upon a Time’, was produced with as much involvement from the children as possible. This began weeks ago with a class ‘brainstorm’ of what was needed to put on a show. The children’s ideas were fantastic: an introduction, actors, costumes, posters, props, invitations, lights, music, microphones, a stage, tickets and rehearsals.
Under our guidance and supervision, and with a sharing of ideas, the children have sent home invitations, made tickets, helped to paint props, developed actions and movements, given ideas for words of songs, recorded songs, and worked together brilliantly in rehearsals. We are so proud of their efforts in learning their parts, from the movements and positioning on stage, to the acting, speaking and singing.
The culmination of all their efforts was their final performance for you on Wednesday evening. The level of excitement on the evening was unsurpassed, and we believe this was because the children were involved in so many aspects of the show and had real ownership.
Thank you for coming to watch and support the children. They really benefited from having such a lively, interactive audience. We hope you enjoyed watching as much as the children enjoyed performing for you.
Maths
We will continue developing the children's skills in addition and subtraction. In a natural way, children develop strategies that are based on counting to solve addition and subtraction problems, progressing through several stages.
Children will continue to explore which strategy works best for them and are being encouraged to talk about how they arrived at the answer.
For example: 12+4=?
One child might say “I just know it’. Another child might say ‘I put 12 in my head and counted on’. Another might say ‘I used the number line to count on’ and another child may say ‘I know 2 and 4 is 6 and then I added 10 more’. It really does not matter which strategy your child uses as long as the answers are consistently correct.
As we teach, we will have the following objectives in mind:
- I can decompose numbers less than or equal to 10 into pairs in more than one way.
- I can calculate the number that makes 10 when added to the given number.
- I can count all or count on to find out how many.
- I can fluently add within 10.
- I can fluently subtract within 10.
- I can use objects or drawings to represent addition and subtraction.
- I can solve addition and subtraction word problems.
For those children who have clearly demonstrated that they have achieved these goals, they will be challenged appropriately at their level.
Over the course of the first three weeks of term, we will also be reviewing Geometry, Measurement and Data Handling in a hands-on way.
Literacy
Phonic Work: we will be looking at ‘Married Sounds’. This is a term we use when two letters put together make one sound, e.g. ‘ee’ and ‘ea’, as in meet, beep, team and heat. Over the coming weeks we will be introducing many ‘married sounds’:
- ai/ay/a_e
- ie/i_e/igh/y
- oa/ow/o_e
- ue/u_e/oo/ew
Writing Workshop - Poetry
We will be looking at some essential questions to help the children with their writing:
1. How will I choose what to write about?
2. How can I use other poems to help me with my writing?
3. How will I 'paint a picture' for the reader with my words?
4. How will my writing look different on the page (line breaks/white space)?
5. How will I use illustrations to make my poetry clearer?
6. How can I use my senses in my writing?
7. How can I use poetry to write about nature, common objects and my feelings?
First Day of Term 3
We hope you all enjoy the break and are looking forward to seeing you bright and early on Monday 13 April, for the start of our final term in K2.
