Year 1

Year One is the beginning of Key Stage One and the start of the National Curriculum. In Year One, we still believe there should be a balance of learning through play and we take pride in providing the children with lots of creative, practical opportunities.

In Year One, our learning will occur through three exciting topics. More information about these topics can be found on the Year One curriculum map.

The Team

Year Group Leader: Ms Hempston

Hedgehog Class Teacher: Miss Williams

Squirrel Class Teachers: Mrs Collier (Mon - Wed) Mrs Holdaway (Wed - Frid)

Rabbits Class Teacher: Mrs Hubbard

Year One teaching assistants: Miss Din, Mrs Samyani, Mrs Rehman and Mrs Maqsood.

Trips and Visitors

This year we will embark on trips or engage in workshops that link with our topics of learning. These include:

Autumn
- Brooklands Museum where we will learn about the ‘History of Flight’. We will be able to board old buses and planes as well as have a go at creating our own flying creations. The approximate cost of this trip is £25 a child.

- The Space Dome will also be paying us a visit this term to help ignite our science exploration of space. This mobile planetarium will allow the children to watch a moon landing and enjoy exploring space from the comfort of the school hall. The approximate cost of this visit is £3.50 a child.

- As the fantastic finale to our science topic, the children will be invited to dress up for our ‘Aliens and Astronauts' themed day - homemade costumes encouraged!

Spring

- To support our celebration of World Book Day and help promote a love of reading, the Year One children will take a visit to Tolworth Library. The children will be able to explore the differing books on offer and choose one to bring back to school to keep in the class library for a short period of time. This trip has no cost.

- To link with our learning about Florence Nightingale and Mary Seacole in history, we will be visited by a doctor, nurse or paramedic. This experience has no cost.

Summer
- Each year group has the opportunity to visit one of the parks that has inspired our school team names. Year One visits Claremont Park where the children will enjoy a day at Bocketts Farm learning about the different animals. The approximate cost of this trip is TBC.

- Coinciding with our mapwork in Geography, the children will visit Alexandra Park. This trip has no cost.

- The children will take part in Sports Day at Kingsmeadow this term. The children will be practising the races in their PE lessons, so this is a chance for them to showcase their skills and cheer on their teammates! This event has no cost but children will need to be dropped to Kingsmeadow.

- In line with our learning about sustainability, the children will finish the year with a workshop from the Junk Orchestra. They will play a range of instruments made from recycled materials as well as enjoy making their own. The approximate cost of this trip is £3.50 per child.

There may be additional workshops over the year which link to themed events or occasions the school is celebrating. For many of these trips, we will need parent helpers so do make yourself known to the class teacher if you are available.

PE and Swimming

In the Autumn and Summer term, Year One will be taking part in their swimming lessons. We require parent helpers to help supervise the children walking to and from the swimming pool. If you are available to help, please let your child’s class rep know and they will add you to the timetable. Our current swimming days are:

Squirrels: Friday afternoons
Rabbits and Hedgehogs: Thursday afternoons

PE days are as follows:

Squirrels: Tuesdays
Rabbits and Hedgehogs: Fridays

Sharing our learning

Performances

Across the year, Year One classes will be an array of assemblies to celebrate their learning. The dates of these will be announced nearer the time.

Open Afternoons

Every term, Year One will host open afternoons to share the children’s learning with you as parents. You will be invited into school to engage in phonics games or maths investigations, which will help you gain a greater understanding of how your child has been learning in school.

The dates of these are:

Wednesday 4th December or Thursday 5th December at 2.15pm
Monday 24th March or Friday 28th March
Tuesday 17th June or Thursday 19th June
(parents will be asked to sign up to a day nearer the time)

How parents can support

Home Learning:

Every Thursday, home learning is set on Google Classroom. This assignment will give you an overview of skills the children have been focusing on in school this week. There will also be a set challenge for the children to complete in their Home Learning Book. The Home Learning Book will be reviewed every Thursday.

As well as the Maths or English home learning set on Google Classroom, is an optional sheet on ideas for challenges linked with our current topic. You and your child may wish to choose one of these challenges and complete it at home. Your child may then either upload a photo of the completed challenge or bring in the final masterpiece to share in class.

Reading:

Please try to read with your child every day. Share and enjoy the book together, making it a relaxed and special time. When your child reaches an unknown word, encourage them to sound the word e.g. t-r-u-ck and blend the sounds together to read the word, truck. Children are also encouraged to learn the spelling of common exception words. These are words that are spelt without using the normal spelling rules. Click here to see the list for Year 1.

We are always looking for parents/grandparents to read with the children in school. If this is something you would like to be involved in, please let your child’s teacher know.

Maths:

Please continue to use the Numbots login you received last year to access the site and continue your child's story. We encourage you to access this site for short periods of time regularly. For example, 5 - 10 minutes a day.

There are also lots of things you can ask your child to do at home which will support their mathematical learning. Below are some examples:

Count your steps as you take a walk. Count in 1s, 2s, 5s, and 10s, forwards and backwards.
Give your child coins to practise counting money.
Give your child maths problems to solve. Ask your child to explain how they solved the problem. E.g we have four people eating dinner tonight how many knives and forks do we need altogether?
Cook with your child. Cooking involves a lot of counting and measuring and makes the maths purposeful.
Help your child learn maths vocabulary (more, less, add, subtract, makes, total, greater, altogether etc)
Play number bond snap with playing cards. If the numbers add to 10 you can snap (remove the picture cards; King, Queen, Jack)
Show your child that maths is in our everyday lives.

English:

Below are some ideas of how to make writing fun at home:

Your child can write letters and cards to family members and friends. Encourage them to respond too.
Encourage your child to write stories about their favourite things.
Have different writing tools at home, such as gel pens, crayons, pencils, felt tips etc.
Take turns writing back and forth with your child. Leave a note by their bed or in their lunchbox.
Play word games with them such as ‘I spy’ and ‘Hangman’. ‘Boggle’ is also a great word building game.
Have a place at home to display your child’s writing.
Encourage your child to plan their writing. This can be simple or more detailed. They could rehearse a sentence out loud or even draw a story plan.
Get your child to edit drafts and write up in neat.
Publish the writing at home. For example, your child could create a special folder or a digital book in which to keep their writing. You can then publish and send to all your family and friends!

Handwriting:

Keep practising forming letters and numbers correctly. Click here for guidance on how these should look: Year One Handwriting.pdf