Acorn Class
2022 - 2023
Summer 1
Acorn Class Summer term 1 2023
Spring 2
Acorn class have had a great half term learning about the ‘Space around Us’ on Earth. The highlight being a fantastic trip to Holton Lee. They have been working very hard in Science this half term after our nature walk at Holton Lee the children went on to identify and classify garden and wild flowers and different types of trees. In addition, they have labelled diagrams to show the structure of trees and plants. By working scientifically, together we have also studied the weather and seasons. Measuring rainfall and temperatures daily, showing our results in a chart.
In our geography topic, the children have also been investigating plants in different habitats in the UK and around the world. The children particularly liked learning where our food comes from, looking at fruit and vegetables that are grown in different countries. They even used some fruit and vegetables to create their prints inspired by Orla Kiely in our art lessons.
We have worked hard on our phonics, and on our spellings and sentence writing. It was great to make connections with our topic learning in English and writing our own version of the ‘Tiny Seed’ by Eric Carl. It helped that we had learned about the seasons and how plants grow to understand the journey the tiny seed went on. The children wrote paragraphs for the diary, working on time connectives and punctuation.
We have enjoyed measuring height, length as well as maths and capacity in Maths. The children measured their friends and compared their heights. They have been using the vocabulary; heavier, lighter, the same as, balanced, greater than and less than, when comparing the mass of objects. The children enjoyed using cubes as a unit of measure to weigh different classroom objects on the balancing scales.
In RE we have thought hard about Easter and what it means to us. We have enjoyed thinking about how Easter is celebrated in Church, and we have made our own Easter garden, decorated a cross, and sung a joyful hymn.
Acorn Class Spring Term 2 2023
Spring 1
Acorn class have had a fantastic start to 2023. From enjoying the short lived flurry of snow and the many opportunities to explore the icy conditions and watch the seasons change. They have explored the nature trail, visited the allotments and made comparisons with how it looked and what was growing when we last visited. They all rolled up their sleeves and got their hands dirty to help tidy and prepare our allotment plot for Spring that is on its way.
They have thrived stepping out of their comfort zones and trying new things with celebrating Chinese new year through dance and new foods. Also, the fantastic RE linked Judaism life workshop, learning about other ways people live and their important celebrations. Having these hands-on opportunities to learn and experience Shabbat made it so much more relevant and memorable for the children, they were all engaged and asked insightful questions and their bread making skills paid off, it was yummy!
The children have travelled back in time to understand historic events in space science history, from the moon landing in 1969 to recent events in their own lifetimes such as expeditions to the international space station. They have learnt about important astronauts such as Buzz Aldrin & Tim Peake and their influence on space science. They have been excited to explore new learning and create play spaces in the classroom, including the space station. They have taken these play opportunities to use their new knowledge and vocabulary.
In English, we got outside to soak up some of the beautiful and unpredictable British weather to inspire them for their weather poems. Working in pairs they all chose a month and explored what weather we experience in that month and how do we enjoy it. Using talk for writing storytelling and planning strategies the children were fully inspired by the space adventure story written by Julia Donaldson- 'The Smeds and the Smoods'. It is a wonderful tale of friendship and family which the children enjoyed retelling. They worked incredibly hard to adapt the story and create their own characters and space adventures. using exciting sentence starters and adjectives to re write it in their own words.
The children explored their artistic skills with an amazing effort on their self-portraits. Taking a photo and cutting it in half they were set the challenge to try and draw the other half of their faces, and the results were fantastic! All the children have been working hard on persevering and giving a 100% and this was one activity that really showed all their hard work.
We ended the term with lots of fun events and visitors to enrich our learning. 'Number Day' was a great opportunity for the children to work together in teams to solve number problems such as 'The river crossing' and Buddy's key challenge.
Autumn 2 Acorn Class
What an exciting half term it has been in Acorn class. The children started the half term with an Autumn festival reward for reaching their 100 Dojo target. They had been working hard to think about each other and work as a team to earn their individual Dojos for everyone.
In Art and Design Technology this half term the children have enjoyed getting creative. They started focusing on colour and brush stroke, practicing how to use paint brushes and water colours effectively and then tried mixing colours and experimenting with what new colours they could create. They then used these skills to produce vibrant firework pictures inspired by their experiences on the 5th of November. The children enjoyed being able to talk about the facts they had learnt about Bonfire Night and discussing their opinions on Guy Fawkes and his gunpowder plot, it led to some in depth conversations about right and wrong.
Our next focus in Art was Giuseppe Arcimboldo inspired portraits. All the children were fascinated by his pictures and how he created his faces. They were keen to have a go themselves and the results were fantastic. Every single one of them gave it their full concentration and tried really hard.
In D.T our focus was around Christmas celebrations. They made yummy Christmas biscuits, helping to write the shopping list then taking it in turns to measure out ingredients, mix, kneed, roll, and cut. Also, with the help of the talented Miss Cotton all children sewed a Christmas tree decoration. This activity highlighted some budding seamstresses amongst the children. It was great to see them all try so hard, take their time, and concentrate on all the details.
Acorns also had fun celebrating important dates in history. They learnt about Bonfire Night through drama and role play, Remembrance Day with thoughtful words of thanks and poppy decorating, Thanksgiving by looking at a timeline . The children also used the geography skills to look at atlases and maps to find where these events originally took place. As well as the traditions we have in our country as well as how others around the world celebrate Thanksgiving and Christmas.
In RE the children were able to be very reflective on what Love means to them and how we can share it and show it. Also, we talked a lot about why Christmas is important to Christians. They had lots of thought-provoking ideas about how the nativity story helps people today, what they are thankful for, and all children had a good understanding of the story and what happened. This was helped by our other big focus this half term, our nativity!
The children all worked incredibly hard on their nativity. Choosing their own roles, coming up with their own actions, practicing the songs, words and moving around tirelessly. The nativity gave them so many opportunities to grow and develop, through listening skills, sharing ideas, turn taking, being OK if their idea wasn’t chosen, supporting their peers, patience, resilience, and confidence. It was a privilege to watch all of them shine!
So, all that is left to say is stay safe and have a wonderful relaxing Christmas.
Merry Christmas everyone!
Acorn Class Autumn Term 2 2022
Autumn 1 Acorn Class
Wow, what a busy first half term it has been.
The new reception Acorns have settled in brilliantly. They have been practising the school routines and enjoying their new lessons. Especially phonics with our new scheme ‘Sounds Write’. They have been learning their initial sounds, along with letter formation and reading simple CVC words.
Our topic has been celebrations and in Humanities and our Knowledge and Understanding of the World this half term, the children have begun to explore different celebrations, including birthdays and harvest. They have learned about harvest traditions in the UK and how they have changed through history. As well as understanding how harvest is important to farmers and how farmers help us grow and gather the food we eat. We also looked around the world to see what harvest traditions are different and why. The children enjoyed practicing their song ‘Cauliflowers Fluffy’ for the Harvest service and making their fruit and vegetable hats in art to wear in the church. We also celebrated Harvest in RE talking about different ways we thank God for creation. The children worked hard learning all about the creation story and what God created on the different days. In peer massage they reflected on what it is like to live in such a beautiful world and what were their favourite parts of it.
We have also been celebrating other people who help us in our writing as we read the story 'Percy the Park Keeper and The Lost Acorns'. We considered his character and what a kind person he was, as he always helps his animal friends and looks after the park. The children
gathered lots of words to describe him and wrote sentences explaining what he is like.
We have got outside to explore as much as possible this half term including reading time, reflection in Tom’s Garden and season spotting walks. They enjoyed using the natural environment as inspiration for their Autumn poems.
In Science we started our materials topic in the nature trail on an un-nature spot, the children had to find all the hidden objects that didn’t belong in the woods, they then discussed why they didn’t belong there. This lesson led to identifying the properties and materials of these objects and then investigating if they were waterproof and whether they would sink or swim. The children also really enjoyed the ice experiment where they had to try and rescue a farm animal trapped in the ice by using different materials to help the ice melt quicker!
Well done Acorns, fantastic start to the year. Enjoy your break and we are looking forward to seeing you in Autumn term 2 for more.
2021 - 2022
Summer 2
Acorn Class has had a fantastic term! We cannot believe the children have reached the end of their Reception year.
Acorn Class has particularly enjoyed learning more Traditional Tales this half term, and their favourites include The Little Red Hen, The Elves and the Shoemaker, and The Gingerbread Man. They have enjoyed acting out scenes from the stories, sequencing the action, singing songs, and watching The Elves and the Shoemaker Ballet.
In Maths, we have continued with First, Then, Now, where we learned addition and subtraction facts, and we have moved on to shapes and patterns . We have looked at odds and we also continued counting to 20 and beyond, and our number bonds to 5 and 10.
We loved our trip to Leeson House, exploring the grounds, hearing about the history, and pond dipping, scavenger hunting, and mini beast hunting. We’ve enjoyed going on nature walks, particularly to the allotment where we were thrilled to see our new plot.
We loved Outdoor Classroom Day, and can’t wait to do it again! French Day was 'tres bon'! We loved dressing up, French food, music and songs!
Sports Day was great, and we all tried our best in our races. The best part was the ‘art lesson’ race where we had to dress up in an apron and carry a paint palette and brush! We loved all the activities and getting as many points as we could on each one in five minutes! Sometimes the five minutes felt like a very long time!
We have continued to think about bring a good friend and what this means, and this has culminated in our performance of ‘Friends’ at the end of year service. We have also been thrilled to welcome new friends into our class this term, and Acorn Class have welcomed them with open arms which has been a delight to see.
We have spent some time reflecting on our favourite things from our first year of school. It has been lovely remembering all the things we have done together. We agreed we have all enjoyed, baking, sewing, Lexia, Doodle, playtime, nature walks, Leeson House, Maths, Phonics, and Reading! Acorn Class enjoyed their transition morning to Year 1, and are ready, willing, and able to embrace all the challenges their next year in school will bring them.
Congratulations Acorns. We are very proud of you all!
Mrs Hollard and Miss Bower
Summer 1
Acorn Class have had a wonderful half term. We have particularly enjoyed getting outside in the sunshine and seeing our sunflower and tomato plants growing, and we are very excited about the prospect of an allotment! The flowers in our Easter garden have also grown really tall, and they look and smell amazing.
During our outside learning, we have enjoyed our Maths topic ‘To 20 and Beyond’ and have explored these numbers using blocks, chalkboards, and numicons in the garden. We have ordered numbers to 20, forwards and backwards, we have explored tangrams by manipulating shapes which was great fun (and quite tricky!), and we have counted backwards and forwards playing dice games including Snakes and Ladders.
We have also enjoyed our new literacy shed, which magically changes into a house or a train when our learning takes us in that direction. We have really enjoyed our Traditional Tales topic, including The Three Little Pigs, Jack and the Beanstalk and The Ugly Duckling. We have re-enacted these stories outside and changed the endings!
In RE, we have been enchanted by stories from around the world, particularly Bilal and the Beautiful Butterfly when we acted out a caterpillar’s transformation in to a butterfly and looked at their life cycle. We also enjoyed The Crocodile and the Priest and loved playing the Crocodile game in the playground.
We’ve also enjoyed exploring Doodle Maths, playing tricky word matching games on our interactive white board, and pretending to be robots in our Understanding the World explorations.
We have enjoyed our Castle role-play area and we have designed shields and crowns, as well as handing out tickets to explore the castle, and making models of castles in our art lessons.
On the last day of term, we explored what the Platinum Jubilee means, and made crowns to celebrate this exciting event.
Spring 2
What a wonderful Spring Term we have had! This half term, Acorn class have been enjoying Birdwatching as part of our topic, The Natural World. They made a fantastic display, went on a bird watching walk, and had a talk on birdwatching from our resident ‘twitcher’ Mrs Portsmouth. It was lovely to see how engaged the children were in this subject.
We loved dressing up for World Book Day, the costumes were amazing and all the children adored sharing their favourite books with the rest of the class. They especially enjoyed the Books at Bedtime event too.
In Maths, the children have explored tallest and shortest, and longest and shortest, and enjoyed going on outside scavenger hunts looking for items to compare, as well as arranging themselves in height order.
We have also been looking for Signs of Spring, talking about Spring flowers, baby animals born in Spring time, as well as planting our seeds which linked to one of our books of the week ‘The Tiny Seed’. Another book of the week, ‘Owl Babies’, gave lots of opportunities for making puppets, story sequencing and word building.
In RE, we have been looking at the Christian Festival of Easter, and the special days associated with that, which the children have found really interesting. We’ve made hot cross buns, palm leaves, and an Easter Garden as part of our learning.
The children were also thrilled to make and decorate a clay bowl to take home to someone special on Mothering Sunday, and discussed how this formed part of the period of Lent.
We have been so impressed with the progress the children have made in reading, writing, and maths this half term, they have been a pleasure to teach, and we are looking forward to the Summer Term when our new topic, ‘Traditional Tales’, begins.
Have a lovely Easter holidays.
Mrs Hollard
Spring 1
Acorns have had a fantastic half term exploring our topic, The Natural World.
We have introduced a ‘Book of the Week’ which the children have loved, and we have linked activities to this.
In phonics, we have begun our phase 3 phonic sounds, which the children have really enjoyed, and every child has now received at least their first reading certificate this half term – well done! Lots of the children have now completed Lexia for Reception year – well done to those who have - and those who haven’t started it yet will now get the chance.
In Maths, we have been following White Rose, ‘Alive in 5!’ activities. This has included looking at equal and unequal groups, composition of numbers to 5, and comparing mass. The children enjoyed getting outside using the scales to weigh objects. We have also introduced Doodle Maths and the children have all enjoyed this, and there has been some brilliant learning taking place at home – well done again!
We have travelled around the world in RE, looking at how the New Year is celebrated in different religions, and the children have exhibited some really deep thinking while discussing these celebrations. As part of our New Year celebrations, we have talked about our dreams and goals, for the coming year. The children have talked about when they have achieved a goal and felt proud of themselves and what dreams they would like to come true in the future.
We have been lucky enough to get out for some walks in our local environment, taking part in a nature scavenger hunt and a thankfulness walk, and it was fantastic to see the children outside engaging with and enjoying these opportunities.
It has been a fantastic half term, and we remain proud of every child and what they have achieved, and the progress they have made.
After a well-deserved break, we will continue our topic The Natural World, in the final half of the Spring term.
Best wishes,
Mrs Hollard
