Kingfishers Class

Kingfishers Planning Letter: Spring Term 3/4 2023 - Mrs Pemberton-Bouzon and Mrs Pepper

Dear Parents and Carers,

Firstly, we would like to wish you a warm welcome back after the Christmas holidays and a very Happy New Year! The children have settled back into school really well after the break and we are having lots of fun getting to know each other!

This newsletter will outline the learning that will be taking place in the spring terms in Kingfishers as well as giving you additional class information and any reminders. We have attached a copy of the weekly timetable at the end of the letter to let you know which curriculum subjects your child will be learning each day. Mrs Pemberton-Bouzon will be teaching on Mondays and Tuesdays and Mrs Pepper will be teaching on Wednesdays, Thursday and Fridays.

This term our exciting new topic is CHOCOLATE. This will be mostly Geography based with a focus on the enquiry question ‘Where does chocolate come from?’ but there will also be lots of wonderful opportunities for cross curricular learning through a range of subjects and experiences.

English

In English we will be reading the book ‘Grendel: A Cautionary Tale about Chocolate’ by David Lucas. After half term we will be reading Charlie and the Chocolate Factory! The children will be given lots of opportunities to write in different forms culminating in them planning, creating and editing their own cautionary tale. There will be a grammar focus each week allowing them to use different sentence types and punctuation and also to develop their vocabulary to excite the reader and extend their sentences. In addition to their English lessons, the children will have a daily phonics session based on the Sounds Write programme and a daily reading session which is largely focussed on developing their comprehension skills. In the next week, we will be sending home some bookmarks with examples of questions for you to use with your child when you are hearing them read to help you support them with their comprehension.

Please, please continue to support their reading at home every night! We do appreciate how busy things can get of an evening after school, but even 5-10 minutes of one to one reading with you on a regular basis will help enormously not only with their literacy learning but other curriculum areas too. If your child is too tired then try different times of the day. Maybe straight after school would suit them better or after breakfast in the morning. We urge you to try and find a time that is convenient for you and your family. Many thanks for your support.

Geography

In Geography, we will be investigating where chocolate comes from. This will involve a recap on identifying the 7 continents of the world, the tropics and the poles and comparing the physical and geographical features of a town in Kenya (where chocolate is grown) to the town of Uckfield.

Maths

In Maths over the next two terms we will be continuing our learning on addition and subtraction with a particular focus on money as well as introducing new units on multiplication and division and fractions. It would be very helpful if the children could be practising counting up in 2s, 5s and 10s with you at home (particularly with coins) as well as accessing their Mathletics and completing their weekly maths activities in their homework books. These will continue to be set on a Thursday to be returned to school the following Thursday. We will also be continuing with our daily early bird maths and developing our mathematical fluency with a daily practice of number sense activities.

Important Things to Remember

The children’s PE days will be on Mondays and Tuesdays so please ensure they have a full PE kit in school for these days.

They also need a water bottle every day (please ensure this only has water in it!) and a warm, waterproof coat for the winter season.

We are gently reminding parents, as a whole school, that toys, teddies and other precious items should not be brought to school due to the risk of damage or loss and please could the children have only one small keyring on their book bags as an identifier, as lots of extra keyrings takes up too much space in our book box!

If you have time to help hear some readers in our class please contact a member of staff.

Thank you for your support in this.

Science

In Science the children will be learning about Animals including humans. They will be working scientifically to identify, name, sort and compare animals in different ways. This will include a focus on the foods animals eat and correctly using the terms carnivore, herbivore and omnivore. We are looking into organising an exciting educational visit to in term 4 to further develop the children’s learning in science so please look out for a letter in the next few weeks!

Art

In Art the children will be using a variety of media and materials to create their own work based on the paintings of the artist Guiseppe Archimboldo. We will be exploring the concepts of shape and space and developing techniques in using colour and lines. In term 4 in Design Technology the children will be designing, making and evaluating healthy snacks for eating and drinking. These will be served to parents and carers at our healthy café on Thursday 23rd March at 2.15 where you will also have an opportunity to view the lovely work your children will have completed over the spring terms (an invitation will follow nearer the time!)

RE

Our RE learning will be based around the enquiry question ‘How and why do we celebrate special and sacred times?’ This unit will allow the children to begin to learn about the religions of Islam and Judaism with a specific focus on some of the festivals and feast days observed and celebrated by Jews and Muslims. In term 4 there will be a specific focus on Easter and we will be exploring why it matters to Christians.

PSHE

Our PSHE unit is entitled Dreams and Goals and we will be identifying our learning strengths and investigating different ways we can work with others to achieve a specific goal.

Homework

Spellings to be given out on a Monday and assessed in school the following Monday

Maths to be given out on a Thursday and returned to school for marking the following Thursday

Topic grid/Mathletics/Spellings Shed – It would be wonderful to see the children completing some of these activities at home to support their learning, in addition to their reading, maths and spellings and rewards and praise will be given for all homework!

Many thanks for your continued support and co-operation. The Kingfishers team are very excited about the learning planned for the next few months and we hope the children will be too! Please do to speak to us or Mrs Cosshall (who remains our class teaching assistant) if you have any concerns about your child’s learning, you want to inform us of incidents or behaviour at home that may affect their school day or you would like to share and celebrate any achievements outside of school. Our email addresses as an additional means of communication are:

epemberton-bouzon@framfieldcep.e-sussex.sch.uk

spepper@framfieldcep.e-sussex.sch.uk

Please be aware that due to the busy nature of the school day we may not have time to check emails regularly so if you have an urgent matter, speak to us directly or send a message via the office. For non-urgent matters we will endeavour to reply to you within a few days.