Happy New Year! I hope everyone had a fantastic Christmas break, the children certainly seem to have enjoyed our first week of the new term, it has flown by!

We began the week by talking about new year celebrations. We discussed new year resolutions and thought of some of our own. We use the calendar daily to embed maths within every day life and this term we have also started to use ten frames to illustrate the number of children in school, providing a visual representation of the base ten number system. In our maths lessons we have been continuing to practise both counting and subitising skills through both adult led carpet sessions and play.

In phonics we have learnt 4 new sounds, j, v, w and x. The children have taken home today a book mark showing these new sounds and some focus words from this week. Every child now has a reading book, please continue to read with your child at home, it really does make such a difference to their progress.

It’s been a very chilly week and the children have had lots of fun exploring the ice outside, we painted the snow, investigating colour mixing and changing states of matter. Inside the classroom we used fruit and vegetables to print with paint, after having studied some of the beautiful artwork by Dennis Wojtkiewicz.

Our p.e. lessons this term are in dance. This week we explored moving our bodies to a piece of music, using counts of 8 and learnt why this is important in dance. We all had lots of fun. If your child wears tights to school, please could you send in socks to wear with their plimsolls for p.e.

Next week, on Thursday, we have our school trip to Pizza Express to look forward to. You will not need to order a school meal for your child on that day, we will be bringing the pizzas we make back to school and eating them in the classroom along with a selection of salad vegetables.

I hope everyone has a wonderful weekend, thank you for your support,

Jo Bentley

Please do not hesitate to email me with any questions or queries: jbentley@stjohnsprimary.org