Welcome to Sunshine Class Year One September 2020

Welcome to Sunshine Class! Year One September 2020

Start of the day • The children enter the classroom. They hang up their coats and wash their hands. • They settle to writing an entry into their diary.

English Our English lessons in Year 1 are all about developing independent readers and writers, and providing a range of reading and writing experiences in many different contexts. We link our English lessons to our main topic where possible in order to provide a greater purpose and enjoyment. We use texts as stimulus for the children’s writing, and unpick the features of writing used, including vocabulary, punctuation, rhyme, spelling patterns. The children take part in lots of practical activities leading up to their writing, including role play, puppets, talk partners, drafting on a whiteboard, drawing picture plans, listening to stories, researching information.

English Themes • • Stories with familiar settings Poetry Instructions Fairy stories and traditional tales Recount and dictionary Information texts Fantasy stories Stories from a range of cultures

Spelling, Punctuation and Grammar • • • The focus for Year 1 is: How words can combine to make sentences and sequencing sentences to form short narratives Joining words and joining clauses using and Separation of words with spaces Using capital letters, full stops, question marks and exclamation marks to demarcate sentences Using capital letters for names and for the personal pronoun ‘I’ Use of regular plural noun suffixes –s or –es [for example, dogs; wish, wishes] Using Suffixes that can be added to verbs where no change is needed in the spelling of root words (e. g. helping, helped, helper) Knowing how the prefix un– changes the meaning of verbs and adjectives [negation, for example, unkind, or undoing: untie the boat] Terminology we use: letter, capital letter, word, singular, plural, sentence, punctuation, full stop, question mark, exclamation mark We are sending home a list of focus spelling words each half term for your child to practise. We also practise these regularly in school.

Phonics We have a 20 minute session each day including a spelling focus. We include a wide range of activities and practical resources for these sessions to enable the children to learn effectively. We follow the Letters and Sounds scheme of progression through the phases of phonics teaching. In the summer term, Year 1 children nationally are screened on their phonics skills. This consists of a booklet containing a combination of real and ‘alien’ words for the children to decode. The materials for the screening are sent to us a few days in advance of the ‘week’ and the benchmark for meeting the expected standard is not given to schools until all of the marks are submitted. Your child’s outcome is reported to you in the end of year report.

Handwriting • The children will continue to form their letters using the cursive script and when they are ready to join their letters we will encourage them to do so.

Reading • The children have all been given reading books now, continuing initially on the phase they were at the end of last year. • Reading books are routinely changed each Monday and we ask you to bring the book bag in each Friday. • The children also have a reading book in their tray to read to an adult in school. • We have a ‘Read, Write and Sparkle’ session each day where the children are either reading to an adult or independently working on a carousel of reading, handwriting and spelling activities.

Maths • Our Maths teaching follows the National Curriculum and aims to ensure all children: • • • Have fluent recall of mental maths facts e. g. times tables, number bonds etc and use of informal and formal written methods. Can problem solve – applying these skills to reallife contexts. Are able to reason mathematically – children need to be able to explain the mathematical concepts, how they got the answer and why they are correct.

Mastery Once your child is fluent in a skill, we encourage more in depth and investigative work to allow a greater mastery (a deep and secure knowledge and understanding) of concepts and ideas. A child shows mastery of a concept it they can • • describe it represent it in a variety of ways explain it to someone else make up their own examples see connections between it and other facts recognise it in new situations make use of it in a variety of ways

Topics for the Year • Autumn 1 ‘ Out and About’ • Autumn 2 ‘Blast Off!’ • Spring 1 ‘All Dressed Up’ • Spring 2 ‘Nurturing Nurses’ • Summer 1 ‘Fantasy, Dragons and Castles’ • Summer 2 ‘Hooray for Holidays!’

PE • PE lessons are on Wednesday for Sunshine 1 / Thursday for Sunshine 2 Please make sure your child has tracksuit bottoms and a sweatshirt for cold weather. We will try to do PE lessons outside as much as possible.

Homework • Learning Logs • A choice of tasks for the half term are on the school website • Please send the learning log into school in the week before half term to be marked.