Moulton CEVC Primary School Parent Portal

A message from Mrs Shipp

It has been lovely to welcome everyone back for our first week of the new half-term.

A big thank you to our Collective Worship Committee (CWC), who led a wonderful assembly this week all about Diwali, which takes place this weekend. They did a super job sharing their learning with the rest of the school. See the photos below.

Rev. Chris also came into school this week and led a Collective Worship about All Saints' Day. It has been lovely to see the children learning about both Christianity and Hinduism this week, developing their understanding and appreciation of different faiths and traditions.

At the beginning of the week, Mr Turner led an assembly exploring viewpoints and fairness. Using some clever optical illusions, he encouraged the children to think about how we can all see things differently and why it is important to consider other people's perspectives.

Please can I remind all parents and carers that the area opposite the school, directly in front of the car park fence, must never be used for parking. Unfortunately, some families used this area towards the end of last half-term. Parking here obstructs the view of drivers trying to exit the school car park, creating a significant safety risk for pedestrians and other road users. Being late for school must never be a reason to park irresponsibly or compromise the safety of our children and families. If you witness this happening, please alert us as soon as possible so that we can speak to those involved and help them understand the dangers. We take the safety of our school community extremely seriously and need everyone's cooperation.

Our Lost Property box is looking rather full! With the colder weather arriving, children will increasingly need their jumpers and warmer clothing, so please do take a look to see whether anything belongs to your child. As always, please make sure all clothing is named – it makes returning lost items so much easier!

We were delighted to welcome eight trainee teachers into school on Wednesday. They were visiting to observe how our staff use questioning to support and develop pupils' understanding. They were impressed by our children's behaviour, engagement and interactions. It is always lovely to hear such positive feedback about our pupils.

Our attendance on Monday was approximately 90%, which is considerably lower than we would expect and is a concern. Our Education Welfare Officer (EWO) discussed this with us during her visit this week and asked us to ensure that we are following procedures to ensure high attendance at all times. Where children are absent immediately following a school holiday, we may request medical evidence to support the reason for absence, where appropriate. We are required to follow the attendance regulations and local authority procedures, and ensure that attendance is recorded accurately and consistently. I appreciate that some of our families have siblings attending settings with a two-week half-term break. However, as a Local Authority school, our term dates are determined by the Local Authority and are outside our control. I appreciate your support with attendance – thank you!

Next week, we will be marking Remembrance. On Wednesday, some of our older School Council members will visit the church for a short service, while the rest of the school will mark the occasion together in school. I hope to see some of our Scouts, Cubs, Beavers, Brownies and Guides at the church this Sunday for the Remembrance Sunday service.

We are looking forward to welcoming our local MP, Nick Timothy, for a short visit next week. He will have an opportunity to see the school in action, and I am sure that, like our trainee teachers this week, he will be impressed by our pupils.

Have a lovely weekend – see you on Monday!

Learning Updates

Year 1

What we’ve been learning this week:

Phonics ir /ur/ in bird ie /igh/ in pie

ue /oo/ in blue /yoo/ in rescue u /yoo/ unicorn

Sentences: The girl has some birds on her skirt. I looked at the pie and tried not eat it! The clue led us to the blue bench. We spied unicorn tracks in the mud.

Tricky words: here today one their people oh your

English Writing an invitation to our animal to come to tea again. The tiger came to tea! With fruit and squash.

Non-chronological reports: Mrs Shipp

Maths Introducing part-whole and using a part-whole model. Writing number sentences 2+3=5

Fact families: Addition fact families (if 4+3=7, 3+4=7, 7=3+4 and 7=4+3)

Handwriting Practising the one-arm robot letters: 'h', 'n' and 'm'.

Topic What is history? A personal timeline. Describing Superheroes.

RE Judaism: Belonging: It’s a Mitzvah: A good deed or charitable act

Science Animals: How are animals different to each other? Describe a goldfish and a dog.

PSHE Friends and Family: my friends and what we like to play together.

Computing Tinkering with Bee-Bots.

Homework this week: *optional* Make your own Part Part Whole Models

*Please practice our new Sounds this week: ir ie ue u. New Tricky words: their people oh your

(Please keep a paper clip in the reading record for new words and sounds)

Enjoy your weekend, Mrs Brandon

Year 2

A great first week back; check out what we’ve been up to…

English: We have been learning a poem all about Fireworks Night and we also did some reading work about Ada Lovelace.

Maths: We have been completing subtraction on a number line before subtracting tens from any number within 100.

Science: Mr Turner showed us pictures of himself at different stages of life and we thought generally how people develop and age. For example, babies cry a lot to communicate!

History: Linked to our English, we explored some key words to do with Guy Fawkes and Bonfire/ Fireworks Night. We also wrote about what we already knew.

RE: It was interesting to think about the idea of rescue. We built Lego models of a rescue or saving situation. This was linked to our question about why Christians call Jesus saviour.

PSHE: This term our focus will firstly be exploring emotions that we have. We were able to register a range of emotions in ourselves and others.

Spellings: This week, spellings have begun and we have even been able to use a new app called ‘Ed Shed’.

DT: We began to think about structures for our unit in DT.

PE: With Mrs Crook.

Music: We explored pitch patterns to begin this unit of work!

Computing: We remembered logging in and practised some touch typing basics.

Have a great weekend, and it will be great to speak with you next week.

Thanks,

Mr T

Year 3

We have had a super week in Year 3, and the children have settled back into their learning well as the week has progressed. Thank you for supporting their half-term home learning - they have produced some fantastic presentations about prehistoric animals!

Maths – We have launched our multiplication and division unit, exploring equal groups, multiples of 2, 5 and 10, and multiplying by 3. The children have also tackled counting in 8s. Times tables-tastic!

English – The children completed a ‘cold task’ about different pets to begin our new unit on non-chronological reports. We have started learning our new text map, all about tigers, and identifying the key features of this text type. We also enjoyed an extract from The Wild Way Home, followed by a reading comprehension to develop retrieval and inference skills.

History – We explored images of the Stone Age, shared our existing knowledge and considered when this prehistoric period began and how early humans might have worked together to survive.

Science – Some challenging geology this week! We investigated how the three main types of naturally occurring rock are formed: igneous (intrusive and extrusive), sedimentary and metamorphic. Plenty of scientific vocabulary and concepts to get our heads around!

PE – The children began developing their skills in tag rugby.

PSHE – The children explored how we can all contribute to a safe, positive and successful classroom environment.

RE – The children began their new unit on Islam, exploring the question: Why do Muslims call Muhammad the ‘Seal of the Prophets’?

Art – We were introduced to Stone Age art, considering how and where it was created, the materials used and what it can tell us about prehistoric life.

Computing – We investigated physical systems, exploring how they work and the ways we interact with them in everyday life.

Have a wonderful weekend! I look forward to seeing you at parents’ evenings next week.

Miss Murphy and Mrs Dobson

Year 4

Welcome back to the second half of the Autumn term. This term usually becomes busy and excitable as we move towards 'the seasonal time', so buckle up for the ride! The children have returned well and are getting back into working hard and having to use their brains again. They were full of chatter on Monday about their Halloween adventures.

Our learning this week;

Maths - we have carried on with our multiplication and division unit looking at multiplying and dividing by 0, 1, 3 and multiples of 10. With Mrs Harper the children were learning about measuring in metres and kilometres.

English - we have started a new piece of focused text, a non-chronological report. This week we have looked at the features of one and have looked at an adjective, adjective sentence type. We have also started looking at Kenning poems. With Mrs Harper the children had a reading comprehension about Electricity.

Topic - we are continuing with the Anglo-Saxon theme but will be focusing on King Alfred or 'Alfred the Great'. This week we recapped our learning and looked at Alfred's family tree.

French - we recapped classroom instructions and learned three new imperative verbs, then put them all to the test in a game of Jacques a dit (Simon Says). We revisited animal vocabulary and learned some new ones, writing simple sentences about them and singing Le Vieux MacDonald a une ferme.

Science - with Mrs Harper the children learnt how to be safe around electricity.

Computing - with Mrs Harper the children learnt how to use some important tools in the 'SketchUp' software, including orbit, pan and zoom.

PHSE - the children were looking at what is a need, a want or a right.

DT - we have started a unit about fastenings and fixings which will include sewing a book sleeve.

Next week is parent consultations please make sure you have signed up, I look forward to seeing you.

Have a great weekend, keep safe if you are off to/having at home fireworks.

Mrs Chittock

Year 5

We have started our new history topic this week (and it is my all time favourite). We are learning about the crisis for the crown in 1066. On Monday, we had an almighty 'setting the scene' lesson, where we learnt about all the place and the people involved. We looked at Edward the Confessor's life and thought about why he caused the crisis. We then looked at the 4 contenders for the crown and analysed their kingly qualities by making Top Trumps cards.

In English, we have been looking at persuasion. We've thought about how persuasive speakers use language carefully to get their point across. On Thursday, we looked at some of my favourite adverts and considered why they were particularly persuasive.

In Maths, we've had a look at 2D shapes. We've classified them by their properties, remembered lots of shape terminology and had a go at calculating perimeters.

In Computing, we created the pixel pictures we designed last half-term on the laptop. We still need to print some (we had some technical issues...) but we'll look to do that next week.

In RE, we looked at the 5 roots of the Islamic faith and thought about why those are 5 key aspects for Muslims. In Science, we used scientific terminology to describe the properties of materials. We are all very grateful that glass isn't flexible, money isn't magnetic and that clothes aren't transparent!

Next week it is parents' evenings on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. It will be great to see you there to chat about how your children are getting on. There are still some appointments available if you haven't yet managed to make one – email me, and I'll see where I can fit you in!

Have a wonderful weekend,

Miss Rutter, Mrs Marsh and Mrs Nichols

Year 6

It has been another busy and exciting week of learning!

In English, we have moved on to our new text type: flashbacks, with a World War Two theme. We have been revising our use of 3 bad-dash sentences to create atmosphere and tension, as well as learning how to construct outside-inside sentences to add greater depth and detail to our writing.

In history, we have been exploring how World War One came to an end, including the significant involvement of the USA.

In RE, we have been learning about the importance of Tawhid to Muslims. This led us to reflect on the values that we hold dear and consider how these values 'ripple out' into different aspects of our lives and influence the way we behave.

In PE, the children have been developing their netball skills, focusing on improving their technique and working effectively as a team.

In PSHE, we have started to explore how we describe and understand our emotions. We have been thinking about how our emotions are often triggered by particular events or situations, but that we are still responsible for how we choose to respond to them.

In maths, we have been developing our mental calculation strategies, including tackling the challenge of multiplying three large numbers without using a written method. The children have been working hard to build their confidence, fluency and flexibility when calculating.

A little plea from me: If you know that your child finds maths challenging, please could you make sure they practise their times tables regularly at home? Having a secure knowledge of times tables makes such a HUGE difference in the classroom, particularly when tackling more complex calculations. Just a few minutes of regular practice really can go a long way!

Home Learning: This week's Maths homework focuses on mental calculations and estimating. The children have also been set their weekly spellings, with a focus on investigating the use of 'y' as 'i'.

Thank you, as always, for your continued support. Have a lovely weekend!

Nuala Gilmore