Key Stage One Curriculum Letter
Autumn Term 2015
Dear Parents and Carers,
Welcome back, we hope you have all had an enjoyable and restful holiday! We are excited about
the term ahead and hope the children are ready to learn!
Our topic this term is ‘Dinosaurs’ and we are planning lots of fun activities to support our
learning.
In order for you to support your child at home, we have briefly explained some of the things we
will be doing at school this term.
Literacy
In Literacy the children will be exploring the world of Dinosaurs through a variety of texts. We
will begin with rhyming poetry. We will then move on to narrative and non-fiction work based
around the following books ‘If the dinosaurs came back’ ‘Tom and the Dinosaur Egg’ and ‘Tom and
the Island of Dinosaurs’. We will identify features of a non-fiction text and then begin to
gather information to make our own class book about dinosaurs. We will develop our skills when
understanding and writing our own narratives, using topic based vocabulary. We will end the
term with performance poetry, with the children learning and performing a poem to the class.
Maths
The children will continue to build on the great number work done last year in relation to
counting, counting on and back from a range of numbers, grouping (multiplication), sharing
(division) and comparing measures. We will be learning about the place value of each digit in a
number and how to group objects, as children begin to learn their times tables. We will develop
our skills in addition and subtraction with Year One using tens and ones and Year Two working on
recalling number facts (number bonds) to answer calculations mentally. We will recall our
knowledge on 3D shapes to identify edges, faces and vertices. During our work on fractions Year
One will work on the concept of finding ½ of an object, shape or quantity. Year Two will
recognise and find ⅓, ½, ¼ and ¾ of a length, shape, set of objects or quantity.
R.E
This term we will look at Hinduism and Christianity. We will discuss our opinions on some
important questions – ‘How can Brahman be everywhere and in everything?’ and ‘Has Christmas
lost its true meaning?’
Humanities (Geography, History + Science)
In Geography children will focus on the development of skills and fieldwork, including: using
maps, atlas work and identifying human and physical geographical features of the local area. We
will go for a walk around the local area, using our map reading skills.We will look at the names
and location of continents and oceans. Historical studies will focus on the history of dinosaurs
and fossils, including eras of time. We will be looking at two significant people in relation to the
past; Mary Anning and Roy Chapman. In Science we will be learning about Animals (including
humans) and Living Things and their Habitats. We will link our work to dinosaurs and the local
environment. We will continue to use the surrounding environment to notice seasonal changes.
Art, DT + Music
In Art we will be building our skills in drawing and painting by looking at and creating cave
drawings/paintings. We will learn to use a pencil correctly to create lines of different widths.
We will add colour using pastels, chalks and paints.
In Music we will be learning the musical terms; pulse (beat), pitch (high and low sounds) and
rhythm. We will be using different songs to tap out the pulse and rhythm. We will look at the
differences between pulse and rhythm. We will be exploring untuned instruments to help us
understand pitch, pulse and rhythm.
In DT we will be looking at what a moving picture is. Then we will plan and make our own moving
picture using a range of resources. We will be fine tuning our cutting, drawing and measuring
skills to make these.
P.E.
We will continue to use the whole school programme of Real PE which develops our fundamental
movement skills: agility, balance and coordination. We will then use these newly developed skills
through games of Tag Rugby and Gymnastics.
Please can you ensure that all PE kits and uniforms are named, it would help us out and stop
items of clothing going missing. Appropriate footwear will be needed.
We will continue to practice our handwriting and join our letters in the correct place.
We hope you find this curriculum letter useful and are as excited as we are to start our new
topic! Thank you for your continued support.
Mrs Spratley