Week Ending 16th January 2014
News from Class 1
On Monday we discovered why Humpty Dumpty had mysteriously appeared in our classroom. It
turned out he had fallen off his wall and straight through our time portal! The Time Shifter called us to
let us that the king's horses and king's men were all running wildly around Nursery Rhyme World
trying to find Humpty Dumpty. One of them had bumped poor Mother Goose who now has a broken
arm. Due to her broken arm she can no longer answer any of the nursery rhyme character's
problems. The Time Shifter was very worried so Class One have set up a temporary cottage and we
are answering the problem letters for her.
In maths we have been helping the king, who had been in his counting house, counting out his
money. Unfortunately, with all the king's horses running around he kept losing count. So he sent us
bags of money and jewels via the time portal to carefully count, label and send back. Luckily the king
sent the bags in a special order so some children practised counting his jewels and finding the correct
digit card to show how many there were. Other children counting the kings 10ps which helped
practise counting in tens. Other bags of money had a mixture of 10p coins and 1p coins which meant
we could strengthen our understanding of place value.
Later in the week the baker from Nursery Rhyme Land found he was similarly distracted by the horses
and men running around. So Class One had to take over running his bakery, counting buns, counting
out coins, buying bun for different around using 10p and 1p coins.
Alongside our Nursery Rhyme theme we have started to learn about the rainforest. We have been
investigating where the rainforests are in the world and the four layers of the rainforest; the floor, the
understorey, the canopy and the emergent layer. Today, in Forest School, the children will be
identifying the equivalent layers of Diptford woods.
In art we have been mixing primary colours to make secondary colours and then adjusting the shades
by adding whites, greys and black.
News from Class 2
This week in Class 2 in English we have focused on writing adverbial phrases and expanding noun
phrases using the language from the Paperbag Prince as well as making up our own sentences. The
language used in these sentences and the creativity has been fantastic and we will be amazing when
used in our stories.
In maths we have focused on addition and subtraction of 2 digit and 3 digit numbers using different
maths equipment to help us. We have addressed the different ways we can add and subtract and
discussed which ways we find easiest. We have also been practicing our mental maths with quick
recall of number facts in a game that we play each week.
We had a brilliant afternoon at Forest School. We have started our project of renovating the forest
school area in the woods. This will continue for the next 4 weeks and we aim to celebrate the new
area with a fire in our new fire pit and hot chocolate around the base camp.
In PE we started to make up our new gymnastics routine ready for a performance to the school before
half term. In art we have started our collages of our disused setting – thank you for the contribution of
materials, much appreciated. In topic we found out what a monsoon was and why they happened in
the tropics and have made a monsoon collage using tissue paper which will be put up in the window
to make it feel like a monsoon is happening at Diptford!!
News from Class 3
In English this week the class have innovated their own text, 'The Day the Instruments Quit.' They
have been exploring personification to add humour to their writing and they have been focusing on
using a range of more sophisticated punctuation. They have really enjoyed designing their
instruments, bringing their characters to life. For their final text they have made a book with
illustrations. In maths we have looked at both negative numbers and Roman Numerals this week.
Roman Numerals is a new addition to the maths curriculum and I was really impressed with how
quickly they grasped the concept.
In art they have begun manipulating their willow to make their rainforest inspired structures and in
Dance they have begun learning a dance sequence inspired by Rio 2. In French this week they have
learnt their Rainforest song and they are beginning to use the learnt vocabulary to create new
sentences. They have also been practising their puppet shows retelling the story in French. We are
now experts on the properties of solids, liquids and gases and some of us can explain why they
behave as they do. Charlie discovered a strange element that changes straight from a solid to a
gas. The years 5 & 6 children had their first session at KEVICC with Mr Irish. We learnt all about
computer aided designs and had a look at 3D printing. The children began designing egg cups this
week, learning about techniques designers use when developing a prototype.
School News and Dates
Tuesday 20th Jan
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Wednesday 21st Jan –
Friday 23rd Jan
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Monday 26th Jan
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Tuesday 27th Jan
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Friday 30th Jan
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Forest School Class 2 afternoon
Class 2 Tesco recycling center visit, morning, transport provided.
Forest School Class 1 afternoon
PreSchool AGM 6pm Village Hall
Year 5&6 Keviccs Design & Tech afternoon
Forest School Class 2 afternoon
School Committee Meeting 3.30pm School
Puppet Craft Show, all pupils, morning
Forest School Class 1 afternoon
Correspondence out this week
No correspondence sent out this week
This weeks Achievers
Achiever for Class 1
is William Spencer
for his amazing
progress in reading,
writing, phonics and
maths.
Finlay Hawkins is
Achiever for Class 3
this week for
excellent work in
both English and
Maths.
Class 2 Achiever for
this week is Seb
Lethbridge for his
amazing work in
Forest School.