Class 2; 2020 – 2021

In PATHS, we were discussing overcoming difficulties, and what strategies we could use in school if we found something particularly tricky (so tricky – it felt like we were pushing ourselves up a steep mountain). 🏔

We went litter-picking and collected a LOT of litter that had blown in to the school grounds or had been dropped by litter loiterers over the weekend. #keepourschoolbeautiful!

Subhan – We used the litter pickers to pick up the litter! It’s important to look after our community.

Bilal – We looked after our local area.

In Maths, we were practicing doubling and halving single and two-digit numbers. We used lots of concrete materials like cubes, finger-painted spots, Numicon and Tens and Units dienes. Remember, doubling or halving is like a repeated addition or a repeated subtraction sum.

Bilal – It was awesome. I love to use numicon.

Subhan – Everybody should use numicon, it will make Maths easier for you.

Ivo: I loved this!

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Literacy

During Hammer the Grammar time, we were learning about singular and plural nouns, and how if we have more than one of something (plural), we might add s, es, ies to the noun’s ending. There were quite a lot of rules…and we will definitely revisit as it was quite confusing hehe!

We read the story of Rama and Sita, and sequenced the plot using keywords and story-mapping.  We answered Reading Comprehension questions on The story of Dipal’s Diwali.

Khadija and Kareem were learning the D sound, and making great CVC words like den, dig, dad etc.

On Friday afternoons, Duncan does some karate with us. It was great fun!

Hector: It was good!

This week, we have been exploring the Hindu festival of Diwali. Here are some interesting facts that we have learned this week;

• the Story of Rita and Sama
• We made Rangoli patterns with rice and dye colouring. 🍚
• We made diva lamps using paper plates and decorating them with paint, glitter and tissue paper.🪔
• We learned about Goddess Lakshmi, and how Indians and Hindus give her presents and blessings at the temple.🕌🛕

In the spirit of exloring Indian culture, during Dance time, Miss Cohen taught us the Indian Bharatanytam routine.🩰🎭

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Subhan: We used food colouring and put our hands in the bowl!

Subhan: I loved when me and Miss Cohen took a photo together.

We made Diwali ‘Coconut Ice Squares’ by …

-mixing coconut, icing sugar and condensed milk! We rolled it into a rectangle and put in in the fridge to set. We think it will be super tasty!

Today will mark Miss McCafferty’s last day working with Class 2 🥰💜😪Thankfully, she will still be around the school for us to see her and continue our positive relationship!

Times we enjoyed and things we love about Miss McCafferty;

Subhan: Miss McCafferty is so nice.

Khadija: Miss McCafferty does nice work and has soft hair.

Bilal: I like it when Miss McCafferty helps me learn. I will miss her so so much and I’m sad.

 

Hope you have a lovely weekend!

Miss Cohen

Hi everyone 😁

Mrs Chapman, the class’ new teacher will be starting next Monday 16th November.

We are doing a visual countdown in class, as well as learning lots of lovely new facts and asking questions about her interests. We have her photo on display, and a little Class Passport Mrs Chapman has written about herself;

My name is Mrs Chapman. I am 43 years old. I am originally from Aberdeen and moved to Glasgow in July to be closer to friends and my brother and his family (especially my nephew Keir in the picture). My husband is Australian and we have been living in Sydney for the past 12 years before moving back to Scotland at the start of last year. I like spending time with friends and family and going on big walks in the countryside. Nice smells and stroking things that feel soft and smooth (like nice material or a cat) makes me feel relaxed. While noisy and busy places sometimes make me feel stressed. When I feel stressed, I take deep breaths or count in my head to calm down. I like to use technology to help make jobs quicker and easier and I like to help children to use technology to help with this too, but I am not so keen on playing computer games. However, I do love playing board games and other more active games. I have been a teacher for 18 years. I chose to become a teacher because I wanted to help children and make learning fun.

Here is a video Mrs Chapman has made that we played today in Class 2;

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1nv8Ypu2YwwjpWwJBBHK2BlyQMW__1M_s/view

I hope you enjoyed learning new things about Mrs Chapman 🥰 Our first impressions were that she sounded really friendly and personable.

Have a good week! 😌

Miss Cohen

Maths

-Finding the next number in a sequence on a hundred square or thousand square, counting forwards and backwards in sequences of 2 and 4.

Bilal Sarwar: I found it easy to count forward in 2s and 4s! It was a bit tricky counting backwards.

Kit: I enjoyed this activity. It was really good!

2D Shape

Bilal: We went outside and looked for 2D shapes in the playground!

Khadija: We found squares and triangles and even pentagons and hexagons! Pentagons have 5 sides!

Ivo: That’s an oval that I found!

IDL; Water and its symbolism in different cultures and religions:

Inspired by the South-African ‘Gumboot dance’, we took our choreographed routine to the streets and puddles for extra sensory fun!

Kit: It was nice and wet!

Khadija: We wore our wellies and counted 1, 2, 3, 4! Splash!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uuSuKKFzaho

Ivo: It’s the water cycle!

Subhan: We learned about condensation and evaporation.

Literacy

Mark-making and fine motor control;

Learning the ‘m’ sound; Khadija and Kareem did some FANTASTIC blending reading CVC words like man, men, miss and him.

Grammar focus: Adding -ly (adverb) openers.

Playing Adverbs Charades – more videos posted on Microsoft Teams!

Here was our Guided Reading text, where we read the important instructions in red and yellow font about ‘How to keep safe on Bonfire Night’, and made this into a Health and Safety video (also posted on Teams).

Window Wanderland

School focus; Inter-faith week

Music

Choosing Time

Rate your week: 😁🤓

Ross: 8/10

Subhan 10/10

Khadija: 10/10

Hector: 8/10

Kareem: 9/10

Ivo: 10/10

Bilal: 10/10

Kayden: 10/10

Kit: 7/10

In PE we continued with our Athletics block. The weather was lovely so we went to the MUGA.

Kit – We were throwing beanbags into hoops to improve our accuracy and underarm throw technique.

Bilal – We were running and having fun! We ran up to touch the fence and ran back as fast as we could. It was so cool.

 

Drama – we played ‘The otter and the heron’ 🦦🦩game. Miss Cohen also told the story of the Awongalema tree 🌳 and we acted it out, giving pupils in Class 2 the role of the different animals in the story. It’s a beautiful story – all about appreciating nature and not taking too much from Earth’s natural resources (without considering the consequences and planning for recovery/repopulating with living things etc).

Subhan – It was fun! I liked being the otter and the heron. It was great and awesome.

Maths –

We have been partitioning 4 digit numbers. We have also been learning how to use symbols like =, > and < to compare numbers and quantities.

Some of us were working on the number before and the number after! We were also looking at ordering events on a timetable and ordering the days of the week.

Literacy

Khadija – I made a potion! We put in all of the h words.

On Tuesday and Wednesday, we worked on creating spooky Halloween stories using prompt cards and keywords. The story mountains we made using notes, and then the final stories that were created were so imaginative! I was very impressed by the creativity in the room!

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IDL – We were learning about the tradition of Dias de los muertos in Mexico. We watched the Disney movie ‘Coco’ which featured many of the aspects of this event that we had discussed in class this week; papel de picado (paper bunting), skeleton skulls, candles, marigold flowers, decorated altars etc.

We made our own skeleton masks with floral hats – they looked really effective!💐🌸🌼

Halloween; PREPARE TO BE SCARED!! 💀🎃👻

We rated our week;📊

Ross: 10/10

Kit: 5/10

Khadija:  10/10

Kayden: 7/10

Kareem: 10/10

Ivo: Yes to 10/10

Bilal: 10/10

Subhan: 10/10

 

Hope everyone has a wonderful weekend, and see you again on Monday!

Miss Cohen 🥰

Hi all,

Here is a summary of what we hope to cover during Term 2 in Class 2…lots of interesting content and, as always, we will look to do this in the most creative and motivating ways possible.

Miss Cohen 🙂 💜

To celebrate the season of Autumn we made beautiful Autumnal wreaths.🍄🍁🍂

Subhan – First we went outside and collected leaves. they were nice colours like red, orange and yellow. Then, we stuck them on our wreaths with glue and added glitter!

Bilal – I put berries on mine too and it looked really nice.🍇🍒

We started Athletics in Gym this week. 🥇🥈🥉

Ross – We did lots of things. My favourites were the javelin and the shot putt. We had to hold them in a certain way before throwing them.

Subhan – We also practised running and jumping over the hurdles and we did a bean bag throw.

We matched our Spelling words to their accompanying definitions and synonyms (words that have similar meanings). Not cinnamon, as Ross was giggling about hehe! 😉

Ross – In Paths, we spoke about different ways that we can make up with our friends after we’ve had a falling out or disagreement.
Here are some of our thoughts when we Stop ✋ 🛑, Think and Make a Plan 🚦;

Hector – We started our new topic; Rituals, Ceremonies and Traditions.

During Term 2, we will be focusing our Topic/IDL work on a historical theme. We played Hangman to reveal what our context for learning would be this Term – we will be learning about Rituals, Ceremonies and Traditions around the World.

We started our IDL work this week by looking at images of different rituals, ceremonies and traditions globally, and by commenting on what we could see and what we wondered…

I see a baby. I think the baby is sleeping – Kareem

I wonder why are they playing with the baby’s feet? – Ivo

I see a man hiding – Bilal, I wonder why he is hiding? – Ivo

I see a pirate – Ivo, I see a man – Khadija

He is looking rather shifty – Hector

I think he is a Dad – Kareem

I think he is about 60 years old – Kayden

I wonder if he’s a wanted criminal? – Subhan

I wonder if he’s trying to hide between people’s legs and if he’s under attack? – Ross

I wonder if he’s trying to annoy people by hiding in their armpits? – Hector

I see a man – Ivo

I think he is praying – Khadija

I wonder if he’s tired – Kareem

I see a sunset – Miss Cohen

I think it’s the river Ganges – Hector

I wonder if he’s praying? Maybe he is scattering ashes/fire? – Bilal/Subhan

I wonder if it’s a Summer or Winter solstice? Could it be a solar eclipse? – Ross

I see ladders – Ivo, They look about 40ft tall – Kayden

I see  a shadowed figure and lots of smoke – Bilal

I think someone is climbing – Kareem

Could they be setting of fireworks or launching rockets? – Miss Cohen

Maybe there was an explosion underground after hundreds of years? – Subhan

I wonder if that is an old launchpad that has been blown up? – Ross

I see lots of trees – Khadija

I think it’s a fire, BBQ, and a bonfire! – Ivo

I see a nearly naked man, it looks like he is wearing only underwear!

He looks a bit dirty/muddy

He is balancing on a beam and looks like he is cutting the end with a saw – Ross

I wonder if he’s retrieving an arrow? – Ross

I wonder why he hasn’t got any safety equipment on and how high he is from the ground? – Hector

I wonder what’s below? – Miss Cohen

It looks muddy and slippery – Kayden

I see men carrying a heavy ball. It looks heavy – Subhan

I wonder if this is a trial that the teenagers have to go through to prove themselves as a worthy adult? – Ross

I wonder if they’re playing football? – Bilal

I see lots of surfers. Maybe they are all teaming? – Bilal

I see water – Kareem, I think they are swimming – Ivo

I wonder if they’re near the seaside?

I wonder why lots of the surfers are sinking and have fallen off their boards? – Hector

I wonder if they are one big family and they are reuniting? – Ross

I wonder where are they going and where have they come from? – Subhan

I see bodies on a roadside – Kayden

I wonder if the people involved are related? – Bilal, Are they safe? – Ross

I wonder if they’re in the mountains in Asia? – Miss Cohen

I wonder if they’re praying? – Hector

I wonder if they could be homeless? – Bilal

I wonder if they’re trying to sleep? – Subhan, Are they alive? – Kayden, Are they hiding from someone? – Hector

 

In Maths, we were working on Time.

Ivo – I was doing matching. It was half past and o’clock times. I like telling the time.

Ross – We used a stop watch and put a minute on the timer! Then we did different things, like how many jumps can you do in a minute over a hurdle, or how many times you can pass the basketball around the Class 2 circle.

Bilal – We played different instruments (samba drums, bells, tambourims, shakers, glockenspiels). I played the bells and followed a rhythm.🥁🎼

Kit – We went outside for drama and outdoor learning. 🎭We played I-spy 🔍👁and moved like different things in nature. Then we went on a scavenger hunt.

Khadija – I found a tiny yellow leaf and a tiny twig.🍁

Subhan – We had a campfire and had hot chocolate. Miss Cohen read us a story about how stories began.🔥🍫

We celebrated Kareem’s belated birthday in class on Friday! 🥳💜🥰

Have a lovely weekend everyone!

Miss Cohen 💜😊

Outdoor Learning Fortnight highlights

Today we evaluated what our best bits were from OLF, whilst looking at photographs documenting our fun times! Here are the results;

Week 1:

• I loved being around the campfire – Bilal
• Being in the muddy puddle in Maxwell Park – Kit
• I liked knot-tying a lot – Subhan and Ivo
• Being on the tyre swing and Miss Cohen and Duncan pushing us all really high – Ross

Week 2:

• Having a picnic in the park and then have s’mores around the campfire – Khadija
• Making the tents, “and calling them home” – Ross, Subhan, Kit and Bilal.
• Making pancakes around the campfire – Bilal and Ivo
• Smelling the spices before sensory painting – Khadija

Here are some lovely snaps from today’s adventures…💜

Have a well-deserved, restful October holiday!

Love to all,

Miss  Cohen 🥰

Today, we discussed natural happenings in the world that occurred, particularly during the Autumnal season. 🍁🍂🦊🦔🐿

We talked about starling murmurations and how, collectively, the birds travel. We discussed how no one bird leads the rest, and how together they create an extraordinary beauty to behold! Check out the site below if you’d like to learn more about the starlings’ migration Southwards, and their behaviour;

https://www.rspb.org.uk/birds-and-wildlife/wildlife-guides/bird-a-z/starling/starling-murmurations/

Afterwards, we looked at different traditions and cultured around the world which celebrate nature and natural elements.

We decided to use the nature around us to inspire us to connect and be at one (sensorically) with the elements. We collected berries and leaves and flowers, as well as mixing natural spices. We combined them to create Art. The results were just beautiful! Class 2 loved using a range of senses for this task.

Celebrating our Eco-genius Miss Brook’s birthday! 🥳💚

The Art that followed…

Exploring patterns and Symmetry today during Maths;

Making pancakes on the campfire was great fun!

A happy day for Class 2! ☺️🥰

We began Week 2 of Outdoor Learning Fortnight with some music outside in the school gardens. We played the tambourin to the tune, “Play the tambourin like this”, the bells to “I like to play the bell” and the samba drums to “Have another one, 2, 3”. We then changed the lyrics to suit our weekend news and how we were feeling on Monday morning. The class were really good at keeping a rhythm and playing in small music combos. 🥁🎼🦻🏽👁

We then wrote our Spelling words, some using the ff sound and others with the silent k pattern, on paper and Ninja-sprayed them to life using the coloured paint! 👨🏿‍🎤👩🏼‍🎤🧑🏼‍🎤

Round 2 of Shelter and den building and I was super impressed by the group’s efforts. We discussed how important it was that shelters were water-resistant, spacious (if someone perhaps was claustrophobic; Kayden’s idea), cosy and warm, and easy to assemble and then take down.⛺️🪒

We couldn’t resist an impromptu game of Limbo when the bungee cables were so inviting…

and then a well-earned game of Hide and Seek to end off the afternoon.

On Tuesday, we took the bikes out to see what everyone’s capabilities were before our trip on Thurs afternoon. 🚴🏼‍♂️🚴🏼‍♀️🛴

We played Game of 1️⃣5️⃣and Knoughts and Crosses outside in pairs during Maths time.
 

We went to the Eco Garden this morning to do some Drama outdoors. We transformed common objects (like the apple) using our imagination. It became a teleporting device, a future-telling crystal ball, a football, a nuclear bomb and an arching, flowering tree. We also worked together to create freeze frames of a particular scene, and then brought them to life and performed them to an audience.

What amazing actors we have in Class 2…all about the DRAMA and action and never a dull moment haha!🎬🎟🎫

Excited to keep you posted with our next Outdoor Learning adventures!

Miss Cohen 💚☺️