Hello!
This week we have been making potions! We have had a cauldron full of snakes and bats and other such bugs and grubs to help make our potion. Our main story was Room on the Broom by Julia Donaldson and Axel Scheffler. The children knew the story well and could join in the refrain. We looked at the changing weather in the story and talked about how we could make a new broomstick for all the characters.
The children new the story so well and have spent the week using the toys to recreate and re-tell the story.
We made sure we had our safety goggles on before we started to design and make our potions. We talked about witche’s spells and scientists making potions and medicines … the Corona Virus Vaccine might well have been developed in our classroom!
Our fine motor activity saw the children using pipe cleaners and wool to make mini broomsticks…
Our sounds were: e, l h , sh and r. We have done plenty of writing, reading, blending and segmenting using all the sounds we have learnt. The children are becoming really confident now and I hope the first ‘ reading’ book home went okay. We have started to learn our tricky words or red words as they are sometimes known: words which cannot be sounded out. Unfortunately they just need to be learned. So far we have learnt I and the. When you are reading to your child at home it would be beneficial to ask them to spot any the’s or I’s in the text. They love to do this and it helps embed the tricky word firmly in their memory.
We are using this song to help us learn our tricky words too: watch it along with your child, you will soon get the idea!!
We have had lots of sound activities out this week to reinforce our learning…
Our writing table saw the children writing ingredients for potions and spells. The children enjoyed choosing slimy or disgusting ingredients to write about. Eye of a newt, legs of a frog and skin of a snake was a great example of some ingredients chosen.
Our number work concentrated on ordering numbers and comparing groups of non-identical objects. We got into groups – white t-shirts and green cardigans, teachers and children, dark hair and light hair – we looked at which group had more or less people – we used the language of more and less and greater and lesser. We continued our learning grouping various resources around the classroom and comparing the size of the groups.
We read the Winnie the Witch series of books this week too. The children love Winnie’s antics, especially Wilbur the cat. These books have fabulous illustrations that can be poured over and always a new part of the picture to spot.
The nasal flu spray was successful for those who received it and we also had our first fire drill which went smoothly too.
Have a great rest of the weekend!
Erin