Yeadon Westfield Infant SchoolOur blogs
Spinosaurus and Dilophosaurus Class Blog - Autumn Term 2
Date: 20th Dec 2024 @ 10:24am
Christmas already?!
What an amazing half term we’ve had! The children have settled into their new classes now and we are having a great time.
In literacy, year 2 have looked at fiction and non-fiction texts. The children have continued to use adjectives to enhance their own versions stories and have worked hard on writing skills. We are continuing to work hard on the presentation of writing and accuracy in spelling. You could help your child at home by practising to spell the Common Exception Words (the sheet was given out at parent’s consultation meetings). Year 1 children have been looking at sound families in phonics and working hard to use new sounds in simple sentences.
This half term in maths, year 2 have looked at multiplication, division, 3D Shape, time, money and fractions. We continue to use practical games and methods to work out the answers. The children in year 1 have worked hard on measuring length, 3D shape, multiplication, early division skills, finding half of numbers and more!
In Topic (science, history, geography and DT), we have had focused weeks on Guy Fawkes and Remembrance Day and have become quite the historians! In geography, our key question has been: ‘Where is our school?’. We have been doing lots of fieldwork outside, looking at maps of our school grounds, using a compass to find north and making our own maps. It has been really interesting and lots of fun. In DT this half term we have made pictures with moving parts (sliders, levers and wheels). The children have loved building up their picture over 6 weeks and have followed the design criteria in order to make a successful product. As the seasons changed we enjoyed looking at evergreen and deciduous trees that are on our school grounds in science. We have also looked at the structure of animals and compared a rhino to a triceratops. The children also carried out an investigation and compared the teeth of herbivores, carnivores and omnivores. We are so proud of the children but more importantly, they are proud of themselves.
In PE, we have been looking at gymnastic movements and particularly rolls. Mrs Jones and Mrs Sharp are now confident in teddy rolls after much practise! We have also been working on team work skills and games in our outdoor P.E lessons. It has been a little chilly but the children love going outside and so we have wrapped up and got stuck in!
We have had lots of other busy and exciting events this half term including our Beauty and the Beast pantomime, the Santa dash, Christmas fair and, of course, our nativity. What a show! Thank you to all the parents who showed their support and came to watch the performance. The nativity will also be uploaded on to the school website. We are so very proud of the children and they thoroughly enjoyed it!
Thank you so much for your support this half term. If you have any questions, then please speak to a member of staff and we will be happy to help. Mrs Jones will be moving to a new school in January. She has been a wonderful part of our team as she covered Miss Worton’s maternity leave. She will be truly missed and we wish her every success in her new school, they are lucky to have her. We are also looking forward to welcoming Miss Worton and Mrs Whitehead back to our team in January.
Many thanks for your continued and happy holidays.
Mrs Jones & Mrs Sharp
PS, please bring in shoeboxes after Christmas for our art project. They are needed the first day back.
Velociraptor Class Blog - Autumn Term 2
Date: 20th Dec 2024 @ 10:19am
The year is nearly at its end and, can you believe it, the children are one third of the way through their time in Year 1! Once more they have worked incredibly hard and are certainly in need of a good rest over the next few weeks.
They have continued to make great progress in phonics, reading and writing, learning lots of new ways to make different sounds and becoming more and more fluent in their reading. It is great to hear them reading along with me in their everyday work in all our subjects!
In maths, we have been learning the different ways of making ten, which is one of the most important things children ever learn as it is a crucial building block for future calculations. In our main lessons we have covered measuring length, 3D shape, multiplication and division skills, using coins to pay for shopping, comparing mass, finding half of objects, 2D shapes and amounts and, finally, odd and even numbers.
The children loved learning about Guy Fawkes in history and then thought carefully about Remembrance Day and why we wear poppies. We have been doing lots of fieldwork around our school in geography, starting with thinking about the physical and human features surrounding our school, then using compasses to find north, learning to use a real plan map of school then adding detail to the map, and finally having a go at drawing our own maps of a small area of the playground.
Continuing under our umbrella topic of “dinosaurs”, in our science we have been investigating why animals (including humans) have different teeth, whether there is any correlation between body height/length/size and foot length, and comparing the structure of various animals to think about their similarities and differences.
Mrs Gilligan has continued to teach the children about different religions, their customs and their stories, as well as introducing them to a range of music skills. The children love these lessons, so thank you Mrs Gilligan!
In PE, the children have been building up their stamina for running around the playground as well as skills in body management, problem solving, team games and jumping.
The last few weeks have been particularly hectic, what with our “special visitors” and the preparations for the nativity performances. The children really rose to both occasions, impressing the visitors with their confidence and attitudes, and impressing the staff with how they quickly became performers in their roles as busy villagers and lambs in our nativity. They can’t wait to be Year 2s so that they can dress up in the various costumes and take on the major roles!
So I think we all deserve a well-earned rest! We will see you in the new year, ready for the next stage in our Year 1 journey! Have a great Christmas everybody!
Mrs Nolan and the Velociraptor Team
Diplodocus Class Blog - Autumn Term 2
Date: 20th Dec 2024 @ 10:05am
We’ve made it!
Can you believe it we have finished Autumn 2! We had our first Parents’ Evening, a trip out to watch The Snowman, we dashed for Santa, had a disco and went to Bethlehem!
The weather has got colder but this hasn’t stopped Reception enjoying our outdoor area. The children are using the outdoor space incredibly well and are developing their physical, imaginative, speaking, listening and social skills whilst they play.
The children have been working hard on developing their fine motor skills. They have been busy building models in the DT area and participating in weekly fine motor activities in our ‘Funky Fingers’ area. Furthermore, the children have been working extremely hard using a pencil. Correct letter formation is being taught and children are encouraged to write in all areas of the classroom. We have now introduced all 26 letters of the alphabet. The children are growing in confidence when forming their letters. We are beginning to write simple words and are working hard on segmenting a word in order to spell.
Children are now reading on a daily basis as a whole class and these books are coming home. They are developing their blending skills in order to read simple words and sentences. Please continue to read with your child at least three times throughout the week and return your child’s book by Wednesday so a new one can be sent out on Friday. Thank you for your continued support with this.
In maths, we have explored the numbers from one to ten. The children have really enjoyed investigating numbers practically, using everyday objects and mathematical resources. They have also focused on exploring and finding different ways to make a number using Numicon I.e. 6+3+1=10. The children are developing their 1:1 counting skills and continued support at home is much appreciated.
Tapestry is now a well-established way of communication. We hope you love it as much as we do! Please continue sending in photos and video observations of your child, this will enable us to achieve a well-rounded picture of each individual child. As always, if you have any questions or need any support in using Tapestry then please speak to a member of the Reception team. We regularly put photos up so please give them a like!
Children have made super progress this half term. We are so, so, so proud of them. We look forward to helping them grow and develop in the Spring term. We are also excited to have Miss Holmes back in our Dream Team!
Wishing you a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.
Team Reception
xxxx
Stegosaurus Class Blog - Autumn Term 2
Date: 20th Dec 2024 @ 9:58am
The children have been very busy learning now they are settled and familiar with the Nursery environment. The children have learnt about different events and celebrations as well as learning about themes related to their own interests. They have learnt about Bonfire night, Antibullying ( our focus was filling our kindness bucket) and of course the last 2 weeks in particular have been focused around that highly anticipated event – Christmas!
In phonics we having been looking at Phase 1 and have spent lots of time learning to listen and join in with different forms of sounds around our environment and also experimenting with instrumental sounds.
In maths we have learning lots of counting songs, recognising and reading numbers in our environment and have been learning how to use flashcards – just ask us how quickly we can say our name!
We have done lots of learning around different stories with Dear zoo, We’re going on a Bear Hunt and Brown Bear coming out as clear favourites.
Despite the weather the children have enjoyed playing outside, jumping in muddy puddles and then using the puddles to paint our hut.
The bikes are still a popular hit and a few children have been setting up a café in the hut. Pizza slices and hot chocolate have been a fabulous snack in this cold weather!
This final week before Christmas has seen us making reindeer food, modelling for our calendars, developing our fine motor skills by punching out those hearts and designing and writing our Christmas cards. We have also had a great time decorating our very unique Nursery Christmas tree!
We were so proud of all the children in our Nursery sing-along. They were so brave, looked fabulous in their outfits and had worked so hard learning all the songs and actions. We hope you enjoyed the performance!
Mrs Waterworth and I are so proud of the huge progress the children have made in their confidence and independence this term.
We would like to wish you all a very Merry Christmas and look forward to seeing you all in the new year.
Christmas Message from Ms Lowry
Date: 18th Dec 2024 @ 1:40pm
Another busy half term. It feels like we have packed a lot in. There have been quite a lot of trips to Bethlehem with one more to go! Everyone has made it back so far.. Thank you for your support this half term particularly during our visit from Ofsted. We will hopefully receive the report in January. Have a lovely break and we look forward to seeing you in the new year.
Date: 18th Dec 2024 @ 1:37pm
Merry Christmas to all the STARS children and their families.
Date: 10th Dec 2024 @ 2:50pm
The children have been adding symbols and a key to the map of the school grounds.
Year 1 Learning Division Skills
Date: 27th Nov 2024 @ 3:16pm
Today Year 1 have been using cubes to practise division skills.
Date: 25th Nov 2024 @ 1:53pm
These are photos from our geography lesson last week in which we used compasses to find out which direction north was in and the children then had a go at drawing a compass rose pointing directly north.
Date: 13th Nov 2024 @ 2:49pm
Year 1 children have been creating anti-bullying themed graffiti in the playground.
Date: 13th Nov 2024 @ 2:00pm
Spinosaurus and Dilophosaurus Class Blog - Autumn Term 1
Date: 25th Oct 2024 @ 9:42am
Welcome to the first blog of the year! This first half term has gone incredibly fast as we have all been busy settling into a new year. The year 1 children have transitioned extremely well into KS1, they have made new friends and settled into new routines. KS1 comes with more responsibility for the children who are now the role models of the school! There are lots of weekly jobs the children can volunteer for such as ‘Playground Friends’, bell ringers, door openers, chair monitors and more. Year 2 children who have school dinners are given the opportunity to be ‘servers’ and help at lunch time, and we have found that the children have risen to these roles brilliantly. Well done everyone.
The topic for this half term has been ‘Dinosaurs’. It is such an interesting and engaging topic and will run through until the end of the next half term too. Our highlight was having the dinosaurs visit!
Year 1 children have been consolidating their phonics knowledge from reception and have been introduced to lots of new digraphs and sound families. They have been working hard on letter formation and writing simple sentences based on the phonics they have been taught.
In English, year 2 have consolidated key phonics skills that were taught in year 1 and looked at the story ‘The Tiger Who Came to Tea’. The children used adjectives to enhance their own versions of the stories and adapted them to, ‘The Dinosaur Who Came to Tea’. We have been impressed with their originality and unique ideas. They have been working hard on the presentation of writing, correct letter formation and spelling key words correctly.
In maths, year 1 and year 2 children have impressed us with their understanding of key concepts. This half term we have looked at place value, counting in 1, 2, 5,10s, naming familiar 2d shapes, doubling, halving, addition and subtraction. We continue to use practical games and methods to work out the answers. We have a bank of favourite maths songs on YouTube, ask your child to show you these!
In Topic (science, history, geography, art, DT, PSHE), we have looked at continents and were amazed that dinosaur fossils have been found on all 7 continents! We have classified living things (living, dead and never been alive) and identified and named dinosaurs that were carnivores, herbivores and omnivores. In art, the children have been looking at the work of famous artists (Michelle Reader, Barbra Hepworth and Eva Rothschild) and have made their own abstract sculptures inspired by these artists. Did they tell you about their marshmallow dinosaurs? It was been lovely watching them work individually, in pairs and in small groups.
In PE, we have been looking at body management and how to control our movements. The children have also spent several weeks developing their ‘send and return’ ball skills. Rolling, pushing, bouncing, catching and working out which is their dominant and non-dominant side. We stress the importance of being physically active in school and encourage the children to develop these key skills at home. If you don’t have a ball to hand, you could play catch with a pair of socks!
The children in Year 1 and year 2 take part in whole class reading sessions. These sessions help to develop confidence, pace, fluency and reading with expression. Please continue to read at home with your child at least three times a week. Please return reading books promptly and we will exchange the book and send a new one out.
Thank you so much for your support this half term. It has been a great start to a busy and fun year. If you have any questions then please speak to a member of staff and we will be happy to help.
Many thanks,
Mrs Sharp & Miss Dales
Stegosaurus Class Blog - Autumn Term 1
Date: 25th Oct 2024 @ 8:53am
Well that first half term went quickly! The Nursery children have been fantastic and have settled beautifully into their setting. We have been so proud of the bravery they have shown coming in on their own and organising themselves.
We have been learning new routines, rules have been established and it has been a pleasure watching friendships beginning to form and grow.
The children have been developing their gross motor skills outside with lots of climbing, running, rolling and riding bikes.
They have also been developing their fine motor skills through mark making, painting, building using duplo and wooden bricks.
All of this gross and fine motor development will be getting their muscles and their brains ready for writing.
Lunchtimes have been a hit and the children have been learning to speak clearly using sentences and remembering their manners when talking to each other.
We have also seen lots of imaginative play both inside and out with dinosaur lands being conquered, operations taking place in the Westfield Hospital and opening up Nursery’s very own ice cream café serving fabulous food and drinks.
Nursery, well done on a fantastic first half term. Have a lovely break and we’ll see you after the holiday ready for lots more learning and fun.
Diplodocus Class Blog - Autumn Term 1
Date: 25th Oct 2024 @ 8:13am
Wow! We’ve made it! This half term has seen the children settle into school life incredibly well and it has been a joy to watch new friendships form and the children develop their independence. It’s been tricky for the children to learn all the new rules and routines but they are working hard every day to follow these to the best of their ability. We are super proud of all of them.
The children are working hard on speaking in clear sentences and listening to others when adults or children are speaking. We have learnt lots of new, interesting and amazing things about our reception class already and have loved receiving the Family Bags!
The class have been busy learning new sounds in phonics and are trying hard to sound out words and blend them together in order to read. We will continue to learn new letter sounds next half term too.
We are having lots of fun developing our gross motor skills. Climbing, crawling, and using chalk outside, ‘painting’ large areas with water and much more. We are also busy developing our fine motor control by using Lego, being creative in the DT area, using scissors and investigating ‘funky fingers’ activities. All these activities (and many more) will help your child develop strength in their fingers and will help them to gain more pencil control.
In maths we have been learning all about a number each week. So far we have learnt all about 1, 2,3 and 4. Within these number sessions we have looked at 2D shapes, objects that have 1, 2, 3 and 4 things. We have been counting lots of things in the classroom (saying each number as we count each object).
We have been enjoying our weekly PE sessions learning new skills and developing on existing ones. We have been concentrating on body management and the fundamental skills such as hopping, skipping, jumping, walking and running. They have learnt lots of new warm up games and they are becoming quite competitive!
They have had a really busy first half term in school and are so ready for a week off ( as are the staff!) They were amazing in the Harvest Assembly and definitely perfected those actions! Well done reception for a successful first half term. We look forward to seeing you all after a week off and starting a new half term of learning and fun.
Thank you to all the grown ups as well for your support.
Team Reception 😊
Velociraptor Class Blog - Autumn Term 1
Date: 25th Oct 2024 @ 8:03am
This might have been a long term but it has flown by and the children have blossomed into proper Year 1s! We have been incredibly busy and have had some great fun.
So first of all let’s congratulate all our children on learning the songs for the Harvest Celebrations this week. They have worked very hard on this in our weekly singing practices, a time together as a key stage that they seem to greatly enjoy.
Over the past eight weeks we have not only worked on our daily phonics (don’t forget to check out the FFT Phonics Parents’ Portal by the way), reading and writing lessons and maths lessons, but have covered a full range of other subjects.
Under the umbrella topic of Dinosaurs, the children have learned about the amazing lady fossil hunter Mary Anning in history lessons. This week they have reflected on what they learned about her and I was so pleased with what they could recall and what good historians they are becoming! To tie in with this, we learned in geography about the countries of the UK and where in the country Mary Anning found her fossils, as well as learning that dinosaur fossils have been found in every one of the current seven continents of the world. If you want to know what the world looked like in the time of the dinosaurs, just search for Pangea Time Lapse on YouTube!
In science, the children have learned about the different groups of animals and their characteristics, about grouping them into carnivores, herbivores and omnivores and whether they lay eggs or give birth to live young. Currently we are thinking about seasons, so please help us with this by supporting the children in their Autumn Scavenger Hunt (sent home this Friday). They should bring this back completed after the half term holiday so it can be stuck in their science books and they will then receive a certificate.
With Mrs Gilligan, we have learned about different religions and stories in RE and the children have done some fantastic work in computing using all our laptops to explore digital imagery. Favourite lessons with many have been PE times in which the children have practised a variety of jumping and ball skills, including using rackets to hit a tennis ball that has been sent towards them. Why not work on some ball skills over the holiday? You don’t even have to have a proper ball – they seem to be quite happy to use a screwed up piece of paper! Try using your hand as a racket too!
Thank you for all your support over the half term. We do hope you all have a well-earned rest and come back refreshed at the beginning of November ready to learn why we celebrate Bonfire Night on the 5th.
Mrs Nolan and the Velociraptor Team
Date: 25th Oct 2024 @ 7:49am
It has been a busy half term. I cannot believe it is almost Halloween! The children have made a great start to the year and it is so lovely to see them enjoying their learning every day. Reception and Nursery have settled really well and it has been lovely getting to know them. Have a lovely break and we will see you all on Monday 4th November at 8.40am.
Date: 16th Oct 2024 @ 11:39am
The children at STARS have enjoyed reading and sharing books this week.
Date: 10th Oct 2024 @ 8:11am
The children sorted dinosaurs into carnivores, herbivores and omnivores.
Date: 10th Oct 2024 @ 8:08am
Subtraction partner game - the children had great fun doing this!
Dinosaur Building in Velociraptor Class
Date: 10th Oct 2024 @ 7:50am
The children have been making model dinosaurs with cardboard boxes.
Date: 8th Oct 2024 @ 2:03pm
