In class this week the children have been learning about butterflies and waiting for our Painted Lady caterpillars to arrive. They arrived after lunch and they are tiny. We will be checking them daily to see if they are eating and growing.
We have read some great stories about butterflies. Starting with the informative Usborne ‘Butterflies’ with its useful website, to the classic fiction text, ‘The Very Hungry Caterpillar’ by Eric Carle.
This is the Usborne website about butterflies in case you are interested:
http://www.usborne.com/quicklinks/eng/catalogue/catalogue.aspx?cat=1&loc=uk&s=1
‘Ben plants a butterfly garden’ has prompted us to plant some wild flowers which will hopefully attract butterflies.
Our art and technology lessons have been about model making, to show the life cycle of the butterfly and give the children experience of working with different materials such as Hamma beads and paint, collage, wool, pipe cleaners and tissue paper.
A big well done to all of the children with their ‘Big Write’ lesson yesterday. There were some brilliant story starts and some children are starting to use some excellent vocabulary. ‘Wow Word’ certificates were in book bags yesterday. This weekly independent writing, has highlighted that the target for most children is still to be writing in proper sentences, with a capital letter at the start of each sentence and a full stop at the end. Each new idea should be a new sentence. Most of the class are still joining each idea by ‘and’. Reading through as they are writing is also a target. In some cases the brain is working faster than the pencil and some stories get repetitive or don’t necessarily make sense when read back as words have been left out. Everyone is making progress on a weekly basis, which is the aim of these lessons.
Some of the tadpoles have had to go back to a pond as they have changed into froglets and need to be able to climb out of the water to breathe air. We watched them under the visualiser and then said goodbye. The rest of the tadpoles should be ready for the pond next week.
We have started our practices for Sports day which is the morning of 18th May. (Reserve date 20th May). Jumping in a sack is a challenge for some children as they are not travelling forward enough. Try having some jumping races at home to practise. Keeping in between the lines in their track is improving and egg and spoon is not a problem.
Snails next week so don’t be surprised if you find some new pets appearing! If everyone could try and find a few snails for our investigation on Wednesday, I would be very grateful. Bring them to school in a box with some air holes and a few leaves to chew on!
Have an enjoyable weekend and fingers crossed that the rain stays away!