Saturday 22 November 2008

It's Christmas Eve...there's lots to do ....

Well, can you believe that we have the dress rehearsal for our Christmas production this Friday? The children have been working tremendously hard and we can’t believe how quickly the children have managed to fit it all together last Friday!

Because of our rehearsals this week, we shall have a reduced curriculum, but still with lots of hard work in the afternoons. The children will probably be very tired this week, so a few earlier than usual bedtimes may be in order – I’m sure Santa would appreciate some extra time in the evenings too!!

In this week’s blog, we aim to consolidate all the information that has come home over the last few weeks, so you can find it easily in one place, so here goes...

Costumes

Monday – please could you send in your child’s costumes in by today, so that any last minute adjustments may be made. If there are any problems, please DO call in to see any member of staff as soon as possible.

Dress Rehearsal

This Friday sees our dress rehearsal, where the children will perform in front of the children from Springwood Nursery.


Non uniform day
This Friday is also a non uniform day. We would be grateful if children could bring something for the Tombola stall for the Christmas Fayre. Maybe for this one, why not send in something other than a tin – the children could get some lovely ‘presents’ from this stall using pocket money...a lovely idea!


Christmas Fayre

Saturday sees the Friends of St Vincent’s hold their annual Christmas Fayre, between 11am and 1pm. Please do come along to visit Santa’s grotto and lots of other fun activities and stalls.

Operation Christmas Child

If you would like to send a shoebox into school, filled with Christmas gifts, then please do so by WEDNESDAY of this week. You will have received a leaflet explaining the types of things which are suitable to include for each age range. The boxes need to be able to be opened by customs, so securing the lid on with an elastic band is the best way to do this. Please also ensure that you remember to include the correct amount for postage costs.

Christmas Lunch

The children will be having their Christmas lunch on 8th December, so if you would like your child to take part in this, and haven’t already done so, please send in the payment by Monday. Obviously, children will not need a packed lunch for that day, but please bear in mind, that there will be no toast available at morning break on that day.

Christmas Party

Ooh, get those glittery dancing shoes out for a good old boogie! It’s our Christmas party on 15th December in the afternoon. The children will be allowed to come to school in their own clothes for the day. You should have received a letter this week, requesting £2.50 towards the costs of the food and drinks for the party, as well as a little gift from Santa. We would be grateful if this could be sent into school as soon as possible, as Santa’s elves need to make and wrap over 120 presents in time! If you think you would make a good elf, please let any of the team know as soon as possible.

Christmas productions
You will have received your tickets for the production last week and we ask that you keep them safe, as there will be no admittance without them. The productions take place on 1st and 2nd December at 9.30am and on 3rd December at 6.30pm. We ask that the children come back to school NO EARLIER than 6.00pm and that they come through to their classrooms. As I am sure you can appreciate, getting 120 children into costumes and face paints can be extremely hectic, so please send the children through and then take up your places in the hall. Many thanks for your co-operation with this.

One advance piece of information, is that on the morning after the evening performance, Mr Barker usually allows the children to come into school slightly later – by 10.30am. If this is a problem for you, then the staff will be in as usual.

Carol Service
We will finish our Christmas celebrations with our carol service, which will once again be held up at Church. It is a lovely celebration and a chance to us to reflect on the true meaning of Christmas. Please let any member of the team know if you are able to help walk the children to and from church on the morning of 19th December.

Panto

Many thanks for all your offers of help for the panto on 9th January. We are awaiting confirmation from Parr Hall on numbers of adults that we need to take. As soon as we receive confirmation, I will let you know. Many thanks.

Homework

Because of the evening performance next week, and the hard work which the children have been putting in in school, there will be NO HOMEWORK on the week of the production.

Phew! Hope I haven’t missed anything out, but please do let me know through the diaries if there is anything I have missed!

Curriculum
Numeracy

Last week, the children were really good at o'clock and half past times, but to our surprise, they found it difficult to name the months of the year. Any help you could give at home with this would be great.

This week, we begin counting in groups of 2, 5 and 10. Essentially the children will begin to learn their times tables this week!

For homework this week, the children will have a 100 square in their books and will have to colour the ‘multiples’ of each number. Do they notice any patterns? Can they work out a quicker way of colouring the grid? Can they tell you what a multiple is?

We will be using the following sites on the interactive whiteboard this week, but perhaps the number line site is the most useful, where you have to guess the missing number.

http://www.ngfl-cymru.org.uk/vtc/times_it/eng/Introduct/default.htm
http://www.e-gfl.org/e-gfl/custom/resources_ftp/client_ftp/teacher/other/Spark/Spark2005/catch_numbers/play.html
http://www.oswego.org/ocsd-web/games/Ghostblasters1/gbcd.html
http://www.ictgames.com/fishy2s.html
http://www.ictgames.com/newduckshoot10s.html
http://www.ictgames.com/fairyfog10s_v2.html
http://www.ictgames.com/fairyfog5s_v2.html
http://www.amblesideprimary.com/ambleweb/mentalmaths/numberlines.html

Here I Am
We begin our new topic of Birthdays this week, where the children will plan a birthday celebration for our new class teddy bear (mmm...might be another opportunity to eat in our class I think!!). They will recognise the different ways people have of celebrating birthdays.
Use this weekend, as a chance to look through any photographs you may have of their birthday celebrations and ask them to write down the different ways they have celebrated.

We will also be reinforcing the months of the year in our Here I Am lessons to support our numeracy curriculum. Maybe you could make a calendar with your child and ask them to draw the different birthdays that happen in each month for your family.

Art
The children will be given the challenge of changing our display board this week and changing it into our Winter Wonderland (oooh, bet you have just started humming that Christmas song like I have!)

They will be using elements from nature to make some winter collages and writing some list poems, which will all be on display by next week. If you have any twigs or conifer leaves in the garden, we would be very grateful for them in school.

Role play
The children are in for a real treat on Monday, as, by the magic of the weekend, our role play corner has been transformed in the Argos Christmas shop! A big thank you to Miss Knight for stalking the Argos store to collect our catalogues and other resources! I wonder what delights the children will order? Will they be able to calculate how much everything will cost? Will it be in stock?

Have a great week!
Year 1 team x

No comments: