Corona Virus Closure - Week 30th March
IF YOU ARE READING THIS PLEASE DROP ME AN EMAIL SO THAT I KNOW YOU ARE ABLE TO ACCESS THIS LEARNING FOR YOUR CHILD.
Hello there and welcome to week 2 of our Virtual Plum Class!
I intend to post quite a bit more content this week as I'm working from home so will have plenty more time. I enjoyed being in school last week, supporting our key workers and their children, we had lots of fun and made the most of the great weather by getting outside and enjoying lots of fresh air. The children certainly enjoyed having the big school field all to themselves!
Thank you to those of you who sent through pictures and details of how your children got on throughout the week. I hope the children enjoy seeing their work on our virtual class board. I won't ever use a name and a photo together and will use initials where necessary to safeguard everyone. It will be fun working out who's who! Please do let me know if you're not comfortable with your child's work being added to the gallery.
Reading and Writing
So, I'll set some RWI work on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday of this week and then there will be a creative writing challenge for Thursday and Friday - more about that later in the week. I've added the RWI work as a PDF for each day. Do let me know if this format doesn't work for you or if there's a more convenient way for you to access this learning. Happy to help in any way I can! Just for your information, 'hold a sentence' is an activity we do on a weekly basis in our phonics sessions. The adult says the sentence several time and the child repeats it. Then once it's in the child's head, they have to write it down. You can use your yellow books to write the sentences and draw your pictures in.
I've added in the speed sounds video that I made last week but couldn't get uploaded and throughout the week I'll add some red and green words too.
Mathematical Development:
Keep counting in 2s and 10s and also count forwards and backwards with numbers up to 50.
A good game to play could be giving your child two numbers, for example 13 and 33. They then have to count forwards and backwards between these numbers remembering where to start and stop. You can challenge your child before they start counting with some place value questions such as... "Will you count the number 21?" "Why won't you count the number 10?" Encourage your child to use their comparative language of more than, less than and greater than as they give you an answer.
Then, I'd like you to focus upon measuring this week. Here are a few activities that you can do over the course of the week:
Activity 1:
The children have done some measuring with non standard units in school (we used little cubes). Please have a go at using small lego bricks, paper clips or anything that you've got a lot of to measure objects such as pencils, books, games etc. Ensure that the children begin right at one end of the item and measure right to the other end. Then record your measurements in a little table showing the things that you measure and how long they are. Which item was the longest, which was the shortest? What is the difference between the length of the longest thing and the length of the shortest thing?
| What I measured | How many blocks long |
| My pencil | 10 blocks |
| My Gruffalo book | 19 blocks |
| My note book | 8 blocks |
The difference between my pencil and my note book is 2 blocks
Activity 2:
Measuring with our feet! Look at your feet. You are going to use these as your measuring tool today. Can you estimate how long your living room is in feet? Once you've made your estimate, measure! Don't forget to start right at the wall on one end and go right to the wall at the other end. Count carefully as you go! Remember that we learned the 1/2 sign if we need it when we measure.
Then, get your mummy or daddy to measure the living room with their feet.
Is the measurement the same? If not, why not, can you explain?
Then, measure your bedroom with your feet and compare this measurement with your living room. Which room is longer? What is the difference between the measurements?
I look forward to hearing how you get on.
Activity 3:
Today, you will need a ruler! If you haven't got one, get your mum or dad to make you a paper or cardboard ruler (mums and dads - I'm sure you can just about do this by estimating a centimetre!).
Now, go and get 5 different books or 5 different lego bricks or 5 different length pencils and measure them. Can you record your measurements in a table like we did the other day. Which was the longest and which was the shortest? Don't forget that after the number we have to write cm (this is short for centimetres and that's the unit we are using to measure with - just like we measure in degrees centigrade when we take the temperature outside)
Activity 4:
This is a fun one!
Draw around everyone in your family's feet. Cut them out and then order them from the longest to the shortest. Can you decorate them and make them look a bit like the person that they belong to. I'd like to see your photos of this!
Our Topic Work:
We had lots of sunshine last week (and I'm ignoring the snow flurries that have been going on outside my window today) so let's think about spring!
As you go out on your walk each day, I'd like you to look for signs that spring is coming. What do you notice on the trees? Can you see any flowers. Important words you might like to introduce are buds, blossom, daffodils, tulips and crocus. It's really good fun being a 'bud hunter'. They are everywhere these days! Maybe pick a few, take them home and explore what's inside them. What will they turn into?
Activity 1:
If you have daffodils or other spring flowers in your garden or if you find one that has been blown down while out on a walk, bring it home so that you can press it under some heavy books or boxes. We'll use these for our Easter cards in two weeks time.
Activity 2:
I've attached some pictures by the famous artist Vincent Van Gogh. He lived in The Netherlands over 150 years ago. Maybe you could find the Netherlands on a map. You could also Google Van Gogh so you can see what he looked like. Anyway, I thought it would be good to make our own versions of some of these pictures. You can use paint, coloured pencils, crayons, felt pens or even just an ordinary pencil. Think about creating lines for the branches on the trees and make thick branches and thin branches just like the ones that Van Gogh painted. If you were feeling really creative, you could make a background one day and then add the trees and branches on the next day. I look forward to seeing your creations!
Activity 3:
Much new life begins to flourish in spring and this is not just in our gardens. Many animals begin to have their babies. I wonder if you could explore how birds care for their eggs and new born baby birds. Which other animals might be having babies on the farms around us in Northumberland this spring? I look forward to finding out what you discover!
Parents, please remember that you DO NOT have to complete all of this work. I just want to give you options and things to keep busy if you have time to do them. Most important of all is keeping your family happy and healthy!
Take good care and best wishes to all,
Mrs G