Last week, the Year Ones were very excited to go on a field trip to the dentist. We learnt all about why it is important to keep our teeth healthy and clean. One of the highlights of our visit was when we were able to dress up as the different people who work at a dental clinic.

Do you know why our teeth are important? They help us to bite and chew our food so that we can swallow it easily. They also help us to talk clearly and they are important for our appearance. We would look very strange without teeth!

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This term in Year One, the children are learning about castles.  For a home-learning project this week, they were asked to design and make their very own castle.  The final results were absolutely amazing.   Every castle was unique with the children using different materials and styles!  Click on ‘Read more…” below to see some photos of our wonderful castles.

Can you identify the different features of a castle?   Need some help?  Then click on to find out more about castles and to have a go at a couple of interactive castle activities on the Internet.

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In Year 1, we have been learning that some of the food that we eat comes from plants. In fact, many of the fruits and vegetables that come from the supermarket have grown from plants.

We were very lucky to be able to visit one our classmates’ garden to see some of these different types of fruits and vegetables. We tasted fresh tomatoes and sugar cane from the garden and we even got to plant our very own cucumber! We looked very closely at the different plants we could see.  This helped us when we carefully drew and labelled them.

We had such a lovely time and would like to thank our special family for allowing us to come and visit them.

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This term, in Osprey class, the Year 1s have been learning how to recognise whether a book or story we read is fiction or non-fiction.  We are remembering that fiction is an entertaining, make-believe story that is not real and non-fiction is true information that gives us facts to explain something.

A non-fiction or information book also has a few other features we have learned about, such as:

• Contents Page: Contents pages are found at the front of the book. They tell you the page number that you can find information on;
• Index: The index is at the back of the book. It has key words and tells you where you can find the information in the book. It is in alphabetical order;
• Glossary: The glossary is at the back of the book. It helps to explain what difficult words mean;
• Pictures: Pictures are used to give more information;
• Captions: Captions are next to the pictures. They explain the picture. [Read more…]

This term in Osprey Class we are learning about ‘growing’ which means that we get to plant our very own sunflower seeds!  We have been learning that before they can grow, seeds need to germinate. This mean that a seed will produce its first shoot and root using its stored food. Most plants need moisture and warmth to germinate and water, warmth and light to grow.  This means that in order for a plant to stay healthy and grow it needs to be watered and have access to sunlight. We have been wondering what would happen to a plant if it was left without water or sunlight. We have decided to carry out an investigation to find out. We will let you know what we find out…

This week in Year 1, we have been learning about reindeer. We have discovered that reindeer are part of the deer family. They are strong runners and good swimmers. Reindeer have white tails and necks. Their coats are brown and white. The fur of the reindeer turns a light colour in the winter and a darker colour in the summer. Reindeers are herbivores.  This means they eat plants. Reindeer live in very cold places such as Canada, Russia, Alaska and Scandinavia. We have been writing our very own fact sheets about Reindeer. We have been remembering to use capital letters, full stops and finger spaces. We are hoping to catch a glimpse of Rudolph on Christmas Eve…

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In our Year 1 Osprey Class, we have been designing our very own superheroes.  We created a checklist of the qualities we expect to see in a superhero as well as a villain. We talked about what makes a superhero and a villain different.  We filled in our superhero’s details, including special powers and known associates. Then we drew a photo of our superhero thinking very carefully about what he or she looks like. We imagined our superheroes in different scenarios and thought about how they would react and what they do. We have created our very own superhero story, thinking very carefully about the beginning, middle and end. We are now beginning to sketch our scenes as a storyboard and then we will add our speech bubbles for our different characters at the end. We are looking forward to sharing our finished comic strips with you!

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In Year One, we have been exploring throwing and catching in PE.

This week, we practiced catching our ball using only one hand.  We remembered to use our ‘big hands’ stretching up towards the ball to catch it. To make it even harder, we tried clapping our hands together before catching the ball.  We counted how many times we could clap our hands before catching the ball. After that, we attempted to throw the ball, spin around once completely and then catch the ball again. To finish our PE lesson, we perfected our throwing and catching skills with a partner. We remembered to aim for our partner’s hands as we were throwing.

We are looking forward to showing you all that we can do on Friday 9th November at our ‘Year 1 and 2 Gym and Court Sports Showcase’ at the Graceway Sports Centre – starting promptly at 9:10 AM.

In Year 1, we have been learning about how a tadpole develops into a frog.  Frogs are amphibians.  They can live in water and on land.  We have researched the different stages that occur during a frog’s life cycle.

Miss Tracy’s Kindergarten class has tadpoles in their classroom and very kindly invited us to take a look.  We used magnifying glasses to study the tadpoles more closely.

We discovered that on the first day, female frogs lay thousands of eggs in the water   At first, they need to stay in the water to survive.  As amphibians grow, they change.  After a while, they are able to breathe air and go on land.

But do all frogs lay their eggs in water?  Click on read more below to find out!

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