Classroom Gallery 

News from the Years 1-2 Classroom

Year 1/2 Learning  

Our Learning: Year 1/2 continues to enjoy their learning. We have been looking at our class goals for next term to improve our learning. 

The Gruffalo:

On Tuesday we visited Tamworth to see the fabulous show, The Gruffalo. It was a great experience for us to see a live show. The Gruffalo is based on the award-winning picture book by Julia Donaldson & Axel Scheffler.  The audience joined Mouse on a daring adventure through the deep, dark wood in this magical, musical adaptation of the classic picture book by Julia Donaldson and Axel Scheffler. Searching for hazelnuts, Mouse meets the cunning Fox, the eccentric old Owl and the party mad Snake. Will the story of the terrifying Gruffalo save Mouse from ending up as dinner for these hungry woodland creatures? After all, there’s no such thing as a Gruffalo – is there?

Archie and Mila have written a recount of the excursion.

Hello readers, 

Do you want to hear about the Gruffalo?… well it was great!  We caught the bus from Walcha to Tamworth and we saw kids from Central School there too.  We then sat down in the most comfy seats and got ready to watch the show.

The mouse took a stroll through the deep, dark woods.  The fox saw the mouse and the mouse looked good.  “Come into my underground house little mouse,” mumbled the fox.  “It’s terribly kind of you fox, but no!” cried the mouse.  “ I’m actually going to have tea with the Gruffalo.  The fox asked the mouse what a Gruffalo was? “ A Gruffalo… Why don’t you know?  He has dazzling eyes and mysterious warts.”  The fox said goodbye to the mouse and then the mouse came across an adventurous owl.  The owl said “Come and have tea at the top of my tree house.”  “It’s terribly kind of you owl, but no!” cried the mouse.  “ I’m actually going to have tea with the Gruffalo.”  The owl asked the mouse what a Gruffalo was?  “A Gruffalo… Why don’t you know!  He has green warts at the end of his nose!”  “Goodbye little brown mouse.”  A snake saw a mouse and the mouse looked good.  “Come and have tea in my log pile house?” asked the snake. “It’s terribly kind of you snake, but no!” cried the mouse.  “ I’m actually going to have tea with the Gruffalo.” The snake asked the mouse what a Gruffalo was?  “A Gruffalo… Why don’t you know?  He has purple spikes on the end of his back!”  Silly old snake..  A GRUFFALO! 

“RUN!” yelled the mouse.  Well I am the scariest mouse here.  “Ok” said the Gruffalo.  “Just walk behind my back.  I hear a slithering snake.”  The snake took one look at the Gruffalo.  “Goodbye mouse,” said the snake.  “Mmm,” said the Gruffalo.  “Tweet, tweet,” said the owl.  It’s owl!  Owl took one look at the Gruffalo. “Goodbye mouse,” said the Owl. “ I hear feet. “ The Gruffalo whispered mysteriously. Fox took one look at the Gruffalo. “Goodbye mouse,” said the fox. “I am hungry,” mumbled the little brown mouse “and my favourite food is… GRUFFALO CRUMBLE!”  “AHHHHHHHHHHHH!” the Gruffalo screamed frighteningly.

After the show, we walked down the street to the most amazing park in the universe.  We had so much fun playing on the deadly slides and swings.  Mr. Hyatt said we had to go home and everyone cried out “Nooooooo!”  We sadly got on the bus and went back to school.  

We can’t wait to go on another excursion next year.  Thank you to the teachers for organising this and for taking us to The Gruffalo. 

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If you are interested in watching the story on youtube you can watch (and read) as the mouse takes a walk in the woods. Along the way Mouse meets different predators and has to use his wits to outsmart them! Type in The Gruffalo (animation) or follow the link:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=425kAJU-EOo 

Playground: We can see the light at the end of the tunnel with our fantastic playground project. Soon we will be running around in our new play area exploring all of the different options. We may have already had a quick visit up there to check it out, as well as visiting the Chicken castle. 

In Religion we have recently started a unit titled, ‘Love One Another.’ This unit focuses on the concept of relationship. It begins with the children’s experience of friendship and broadens to the Christian way of relating to others. It then focuses on forgiveness and gratitude in relationships.  Last week students completed a Thank You card to someone who they feel has taught them well.  Mums, Dads, grandparents, teachers and friends all got a mention.  

In Maths for the last few weeks we have been learning about Division. We have completed some interesting activities and we have also started to see the connection between Multiplication, area and division. 

Our Learning Intention over the past 3 weeks has been to learn how to share or group to solve division problems.

The content we covered included

To:

• model sharing division by distributing a collection of objects equally into a given number of groups to determine how many in each group
• model grouping division by determining the number of groups of a given size that can be formed
• describe the part left over when a collection cannot be distributed equally using the given group size

For parents: 

Ask your child to practise division by sharing objects equally. For example,  share 8 objects into 2 equal groups. Using objects such as your child’s toys, items of food, or buttons helps them visualise what the calculation means and keeps them interested.

Ask your child to find out how many objects there are to begin with. Can they share the objects equally between the two of you? Help them to share objects one at a time between the two groups. When all the objects have been shared, ask your child how many there are in each group. If you have the same number, explain that your child has shared the objects equally into two groups which is the same as dividing by two.

If you do not have the same number, ask your child if the objects have been shared equally. For example, “We started with 11 objects and shared them into two groups. I have 6 objects and you have 5 objects. Are they equal? If they are not equal then 11 cannot be shared equally into two groups so 11 cannot be divided by 2 equally using whole numbers or objects.”

Science & Technology

This term our science unit has been focused on the weather.  We are learning the importance of using our surroundings to predict the weather and understand why the weather changes.  Over the next two weeks we will be designing and creating a rain gauge.   This design and creation aspect is an important part of the science curriculum as it allows the students to plan and draft an experiment, choose appropriate materials needed to realise designed solutions and the most exciting section: construct the design.  A valuable part of this process is allowing students to evaluate their experiment and make changes to encourage successful results.  We will keep you posted with our designs and constructions in the next 1/2 newsletter. 

Whilst the playground is being finalised, and we have minimal playing area, we have discovered that we can be inventive and still come up with fun games.  We have great imaginations in our class. 

Have a great week everyone.

Love from Year 1/2.