Welcome to Dormouse class! Our teacher is Mrs Jackson, who has been teaching for 17 years, and has worked at Bedwell for the last 9. Her favourite things are Lindt chocolate and reading her Kindle. She doesn’t like running very much, and is scared of spiders!

• Our curriculum map - find out about our current topics
• Our latest school newsletter
• Meet our school councilors, Richie and Amiya

Home learning ideas:

• Try to do as much maths as you can when you're out and about:
  • Keep on practicing counting whenever and wherever you can - how many cars are there in the street? How many trees in the field? How many trollies in the supermarket, players on the team or stairs on the way to bed? Our focus is on numbers from 10-20 this term, so things that come in groups of this size are ideal for counting practice.
  • Practice writing numbers in sand, salt or water, or try making numbers out of groups of pebbles.
  • Practice counting in 2s, 5s and 10s - counting in multiples as you go up or down stairs; counting in 2s as you pair up socks; totalling up everyone’s fingers and toes by counting in 5s...
• Constant practice of reading and phonics is just about the most valuable thing you can do at home. Try to read with your child as often as possible and talk to them about what they’ve read - we've put together some guidance and advice on using the books your child will bring home here.  
• We follow the Read Write Inc phonics programme, and they have provided lots of guidance on supporting your child at home, which you can read here.
• Our history topic this term is the Great Fire of London, which provides lots of opportunities for learning beyond the classroom - try investigating the history, building models, drawing, painting pictures or reading about the lives of people who lived through it. There are loads of resources available through the Museum of London site at www.londonmuseum.org.uk/.
  
• Do a little bit of exercise together and talk about the effect it has on your body - can you feel your heart beating a little faster? Can you feel which parts of your body are getting tired or sweaty? Help your child to understand that these are good things (so long as you don’t overdo it) and are a sign that your body is working hard.

Our latest news:

• In Year 1 and 2, we have been learning all about plants and animals this term, and to support our topic we spent a lovely day out at Whipsnade Zoo. While we were there, we got to meet lots of the animals that we have been investigating in class - everything from bears to penguins to ostriches! Whipsnade is huge, so to help us to see as much as possible, we took a trip on the zoo train to try to spot some of the animals that were hiding at the back of their enclosures! We also talked to some of the zoo keepers, who told us about the ways in which they look after their animals and try to protect endangered species. 
 

 
• In Year 1 and 2 this term, we have been learning all about animals and their habitats. We have investigated the differences between animals with fur, scales and feathers, and linked this to the creatures we saw on our trip to Whipsnade. We have also investigated places where animals live and linked this to the food that they eat and the ways in which they move. Having developed all of this knowledge, we then put it to good use on our latest art project, making paper mâché animal masks. We built up the basic structure of our masks by adding lots of layers of newspaper and glue, and then built up ears, beaks, noses and snouts that matched the shape of the creature we had chosen. Finally, we painted the masks to match the colouring of our animal, working carefully to include the spots, stripes and markings that make each of them unique. We were super proud of our finished masks, and loved showing them off in class!
 

 
• We loved getting involved in this year's Sports Week - you can find out more about everything we got up to here.  
 
• We thoroughly enjoyed all the different activities in Science Week and particularly loved the construction challenges, making egg drops and K’nex helmets, as well as our session with the visiting planetarium.
 

 
• To finish off our First Flight topic we went to visit Shuttleworth. We had a fantastic day and loved the different activities we completed, many of which you can see on the opposite page We learnt about mono-planes, bi-planes and tri-planes, found out why aircraft are painted different colours to keep them camouflaged and tried on some of hats that pilots wore. We also had the opportunity to have a ride on a vintage bus and watch planes taking off, flying and landing.
  
 

 
• This term it has been our turn to take part in Forest School sessions each week. We have had great fun exploring the forest, engaging in new activities and making our own snack.
  
 

We have been learning about... 

Maths - We have spent a long time learning how to tell the time and at last we think we’ve cracked it! We now know our o’clocks, half pasts, quarter to and quarter past. We are also super confident counting in 2s, 5s and 10s and are beginning to recall tables facts. Tables superstars, here we come!

Forest School  - This term it has been our turn to take part in Forest School sessions each week. We have had great fun exploring the forest, engaging in new activities and making our own snack.

English - In the first half of the term, we read and learnt all about Blue Whales. We found it fascinating learning facts about them and turning these into statements. We then drew together all our knowledge to write non-chronological reports. In the second half of term, we have been reading Julian is a Mermaid. We have learnt the difference between past and present tense and created our own stories, writing about something we would like to be.

This term's topics

English - We will begin the half-term by returning to story writing, using Milo imagines the World, by Matt de la Peña as our starting point. We will use this text to explore the way that characters and settings are described, and will also be working on the use of conjunctions to link ideas together. After that, we will move on to letter writing, this time using Meerkat Mail by Emily Gravett as our core text. We will learn about the way letters are organised and then write some of our own, asking for help and describing our discoveries! Throughout the term, we will continue to work on sentence construction, ensuring that we use full stops and capital letters correctly.

Maths - We will begin by focussing on mental addition and subtraction, becoming quicker and more confident in our use of numbers to 100 by building on our knowledge of place value and number bonds. We will then apply these skills to measure and missing number problems. Later in the term we will move on to working with money, making totals using a variety of different coins and working out change when we are shopping. We will then investigate the language of comparison, using phrases like difference, more, less and fewer, before finishing the term by beginning to estimate and measure using different scales.

Science - We will be looking at how we can keep ourselves healthy. We will be looking at different food groups we should include in a balanced diet, and investigating how exercise can keep us strong. We will also be looking at the human body and discovering how different parts of the body work and why they are important to us.

Humanities - We will continue to learn about the Great Fire of London over the next few weeks. We will explore eye-witness accounts of the Great Fire by reading diary entries, so that we can understand what it would have been like to live in London at the time. We will also discover how the City of London fought the fire and the way that the London Fire Brigade has changed over the last 300 years - which should help us to think of lots of questions to ask when we (hopefully) get to interview real-life firefighters later in the term.

Take a look at our curriculum map for more information on our topics.