Swagbagging!

Hi there!

Welcome back after a lovely half term break – we hope you are relaxed and ready to return to some hard work on the run up to Easter.

Ash Wednesday

This week sees the start of Lent. We will be holding a short service in the hall to mark Ash Wednesday and the children will receive their ashes in the classrooms afterwards. Should you wish to receive ashes in school, please join us at 9am in the hall.

To read about the traditions and customs of Ash Wednesday, go to http://www.woodlands-junior.kent.sch.uk/customs/easter/ashwednesday.htm

Of course this also means that we will be indulging in pancakes on Tuesday! Maybe the children could have a go at helping you make some on Tuesday evening and use their knowledge of how to write instructions to write the recipe down? http://www.woodlands-junior.kent.sch.uk/customs/shrove.html has a great recipe on there for pancakes and also written instructions – how many of mine will stick to the pan I wonder?

So, now that I am back with my lovelies full time, we have a packed week in store...

What on earth is the title of this week's blog?! You might well ask...Why not try this out at home.

All you need is your child's home reader or any magazine or newspaper that you are reading.

They will also need a 'SWAGBAG', which could just be a sandwich bag with the word SWAG written on it! Read it out loud to your child and get them to 'steal' any WOW words that they think are interesting - particularly adjectives or adverbs. Then, get them to write it down on a piece of paper and put it in their swagbag.

At the end of the week, empty out the swagbag and they will find that they have lots of words that they now can try to incorporate into their writing. This also works if you use 'POSH' words during conversations, which they can also try to swagbag!You will laugh, furrow your brow and amaze at the number of times that your child pretends to grab the air during conversations...they are swagbagging your vocabulary!!

We would love to hear of any successes you have at home with this.

Literacy

A great opportunity to use some swagbag skills this week, as we move onto looking at Information Texts.

Using the children's own interests as a starting point, they will pose their own questions about what they want to know about what interests them. In shared reading, we will be using information books (or ICT sources) to find answers, exploring how to use an index and alphabetical order. We will also be reviewing dictionaries and glossaries to find definitions of words from reading.

The children will also be expected to know some of the differences between fiction and non-fiction texts. The children will also learn how to use the Smartboard as a presentation tool for them to display their information text and photographs or drawings. Maybe some children could even write an information book using Photostory from a couple of weeks ago? If so, please do send them into school on a pen drive, or e-mail them to school.

http://www.kidsgowild.com/animalfacts information about animals which will help the children who chose this as their area to write about

http://www.settle.co.uk/local.htm an example of how an information text can be set out

http://www.bbc.co.uk/cbbc/wild/pets/ a great site from CBBC

http://www.abc.net.au/oceans/alive.htm information about animals of the sea – good for interaction

http://www.topicbox.org.uk/browse.php?item_ID=5426&subject=English&topic=Text%20-%20Non-chron%20report a non-chronological report on elephants. This link takes you to a powerpoint that can be downloaded to view at home.

Numeracy

A very practical week in store – the children will be investigating weight!

There will be scales in the classroom, but I shall be avoiding them!!

The children will be investigating objects which are heavier and lighter than each other and should be able to order them from lightest to the heaviest and vice versa.

As always, we are developing the children’s knowledge of mathematical vocabulary, so this week, they will need to learn:

Ascending order – from the lowest amount to the highest

Descending order – from the highest amount to the lowest

How can you help at home?

Look at different of packets, tins, jar, bottles etc. that you have in the kitchen or bathroom cupboards. Look out for how much the packet weighs and see if it is measured in grams or kilograms. Talk about how ‘g’ is short for grams and that ‘kg’ is short for kilograms.

Try to order the objects you have chosen by the weight on the packets and then check by estimating their weight by hand. You could then check by actually weighing them on kitchen scales. Point out what each of the lines mean on the scales and explain how each division might be 10 grams, 50 grams etc.

This is always difficult, so any help you can give at home with this will really help.

By the end of the week, the children:

MUST: be able to compare weights by direct comparisons using non-standard measures, need to be able to use appropriate mathematical language.

SHOULD: be able to recognise the relationship between grams and kilograms.

COULD: be able to read simple scales to the nearest division.

http://www.wmnet.org.uk/wmnet/custom/files_uploaded/uploaded_resources/853/numberlinev2.swf the children will use this in school to help find out how much each of the divisions on a number line are worth. This will also help them when they come to read numbers on a scale.

http://www.ictgames.com/mostlyPostie.html drag the parcel onto the scales and then read the scale to see how heavy it is. Enter the amount on the till and click check. If you are correct, then the postvan will drive off.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/starship/maths/aliencookbook.shtml this is quite challenging, as it ask you to measure not only weight, but capacity as well, but the children will get experience of reading a variety of scales, not least to make an upside down cake!

http://www.crickweb.co.uk/assets/resources/flash.php?&file=simplescales2 a simple way of introducing how to read scales, by weighing how much each toy weighs.

http://www.ictgames.com/weight.html

http://www.crickweb.co.uk/assets/resources/flash.php?&file=fruitbalance3 this is good for developing the vocabulary of which is heavier or lighter. See if you can find out which is the heaviest fruit?

http://www.crickweb.co.uk/assets/resources/flash.php?&file=scales3 a very similar site, but this time, the children have to try and guess which is the heaviest alien! Very funny!

Science

We begin our new topic of Light and Dark with the children this week. The children will learn that that the sense of sight can only be used when it is light. They will also be able to name a variety of light sources and make comparisons between them. Finally, they will find out that the Sun is the source of light for the Earth.

We will also be reading a lovely story called ‘The owl who was afraid of dark’. The children will have to come up with as many different ways of making sure that Plop feels safe at night!
In preparation for this, it would be great if you could try this activity out at home, before the children come back to school:

Stand in your living room, or your child’s bedroom and ask them to look around and describe what they can see.

Then turn the light off to make the room as dark as possible.

Try asking these questions and remind your child that we will be asking them these questions in school this week:

· In the darkness what are you able to see?
· In the darkness are you able to see clearly?
· In the darkness are you able to see the outlines of objects clearly?
· In the darkness are you able to see different colours clearly?

By the end of the topic the children:

MUST be able to name a number of light sources, including the Sun; recognise that they cannot see in the dark and know that it is dangerous to look at the Sun.
SHOULD be able to name a number of light sources, including the Sun; recognise that they cannot see in the dark; describe and compare some light sources and explain why it is dangerous to look at the Sun.
COULD be able to explain that they cannot see shiny objects in the dark because they are not light sources.

Challenge: Can the children investigate whether the moon is a light source or not?

http://www.mystery-productions.info/hyper/Hypermedia_2003/Roby/index.html this site is aimed at Key Stage 2, but I think if you sit with your child for this one, they should be able to work through it
http://www.ngfl-cymru.org.uk/vtc/Phase2delivery/Wales/Science/Keystage1/Physicalprocess/Light/Introduction/default.htm work through this activity to identify which objects are sources of light and which are not
http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/scienceclips/ages/5_6/light_dark.shtml good old scienceclips! Drag the objects into the centre of the room, to see if they are light sources or not.
http://www.poissonrouge.com/opticalillusions/index.htm just for fun this one! I am normally not very good with these optical illusions, but have a go with your children to see the kind of tricks light can play on your eyes!

Barnaby Bear

I love this topic! We have a very well travelled bear in Year 1, having been taken to Chicago and New York by Mr Worrall last year, but he hasn’t been anywhere lately and is getting restless. Oh dear...we can’t have that can we? This year, he wants to see what his local area is like and have some photographs he can take on his travels over the summer.

So...can we help him? Of course we can! Barnaby will be coming home with each every one of the children over the next few weeks and we would like you to fill in a page each night with his adventures. Don’t worry – it only means writing one or two sentences about what Barnaby has done that night whilst he was at your house. You may even want to take a photo of him wherever he has been and stick that into the book too.

This type of activity already happens in Year 2, so we are preparing for the transition early, with the children getting used to taking Barnaby home. All that we ask, is that you send him back to school the NEXT MORNING, even if you haven’t had the chance to write anything in his book. Thanks for your support with this.

I think that’s all for this week. Have a good one!

Year 1 team x