Hello and Welcome to Maple Class page,

Your teachers this year are: Mrs Yeandle and Miss Reed. Your teaching assistants are: Mrs Pearce, Mrs Muchmore and Mrs Dyer. For one afternoon per week Mrs Kelly will teach History/Geography and a Premier Sports coach will teach PE to Maple on two afternoons.  This half term we are very much looking forward to our class trip to the theatre to watch The Jolly Postman in December.

As mathematicians, Year 1 have started this half term learning about subtraction within 10. The second unit will be 2D and 3D shapes. Year 2 have started this half term continuing to look at addition and subtraction. The second unit will be looking at properties of shape. They have also been practising skip counting in 2s, 5s and 10s. Maths lessons are delivered using the Power Maths WRM scheme. We have recently started a new maths scheme to improve fluency from NCTEM. We also practice our arithmetic skills daily through 'Fluent in Five'. 

This half-term, Year 2 will focus their English learning around the book "The Owl Who was Afraid of the Dark" where they will practise gathering information and writing a factfile on owls.  The mastery keys will be punctuating sentences correctly, adding “ly” to adjectives to make adverbs and using commas in a list. Their writing will focus on including co-ordination (and, but, or). 

They will use our new spelling programme 'Pathways to Spell'. They also have weekly Guided Reading sessions.

The Year 1s will continue to learn phonics with Fred Frog and practise writing skills through different story books as part of Read, Write Inc.   

For more information about Read Write Inc please follow this link where it explains all the language and how it works - https://home.oxfordowl.co.uk/reading/reading-schemes-oxford-levels/read-write-inc-phonics-guide/

This half-term we are being Historians and our topic is The History of Transport.  Children will learn about important individuals within this topic including: 

Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, Michael Collins and their mission to walk on the moon,  Bessie Coleman who was the first black woman to train to fly an aeroplane, 

Henry Ford’s assembly line made cars which were made more cheaply and easily, 

The Wright brothers who built the first plane, 

And finally Robert and George Stephenson and their locomotive successes. 

As scientists we will be exploring Season Changes in Year 1. We will observe changes across the four seasons, observe and describe weather associated with seasons and how day length varies. Pupils have already encountered some seasons, seasonal changes and types of weather in EYFS, so in this unit we formalise this. We also build on pupils’ knowledge by including more examples of changes – such as a wider range of wildlife changes across the seasons – as well as instances of extreme weather. 

As scientists we will be exploring the Needs of Animals in Year 2. We will notice that animals, including humans, have offspring that grow into adults, find out about and describe the basic needs of animals, including humans, for survival (water, food and air), describe the importance for humans of exercising, eating the right amounts of different types of foods and practising good hygiene. For the final point, we will focus on the fact that our diets should provide us with all the nutrients we need.

In RE Year 1 will be looking at the story of the annunciation of Mary and the preparation for the birth of Jesus. In Year 2 they will look at the prophet Isaiah and how he foretold the coming of the son of God like many other prophets also did.  They will look at the annunciation of Zechariah and of Mary and the circumstances Jesus was born under.  Some of RE will also be spent in preparation for our Nativity performance and we hope you can join us to watch in December,    

In ICT Year 1 will be continuing to practise successfully logging on to the laptops using their login cards and how to access simple ICT games as well as understand what each button on the keyboard represents and how to log off and shut down successfully.  Year 2 will be practising logging on to become competent at completing their online reading quizzes on AR as well as Quest Quizzes. All children will be using our recently launched Numbots and TT Rockstars to become more competent mathematicians and ICT users.

In Art Maple will start a new unit on three dimensional shape and sculpture.  They will experiment with paper by folding, scrunching, making zig zags, making spirals, rolling and overlapping.  They will practise folding paper in different ways to create effect and as a year group will design and make a sculpture for younger children to enjoy at toddler group. Children will look at work by the artists: Samantha Stephenson and Louise Bourgeois before creating their own individual sculptures using paper and the techniques they have learned.  They will talk to their peers about what their sculpture represents and name their art.

In PSHE and RHE we will look at ''Celebrating Difference". Within this Puzzle (unit) Maple will talk about the similarities and differences between people and that these make us unique and special. The children learn what bullying is and what it isn’t. They talk about how it might feel to be bullied and when and who to ask for help. The children talk about friendship, how to make friends and that it is OK to have differences from their friends. The children also talk about being nice to and looking after other children you might be being bullied. 

In Music this term, Year 1s and Year 2s learning is focused around The Christmas topic which contains repertoire linked to popular primary themes. The Topics will be used as an exciting song bank to support and enhance learning right across the curriculum. Alongside our Music lessons this half term, we will be learning and practising all our Nativity songs and dances! 

Below you will find the key vocabulary for science and History. Please talk to your child about these key words to find out more about what they have been learning! 

Please come back soon to see what we’ve been up to!