Author: Mrs Johnson

This week in P1/2 we have been looking back in time, using our imaginations and following lots of our own creative ideas through play.

Big Question – What can we learn from the past?

Our Big Question this week took us into the world of toys from the past. We compared toys from the 1950s, the 1980s and today and noticed how much they have changed.

We discovered that many toys from the 1950s were made from materials such as metal, wood and fabric. Some were wind-up toys, but many were very simple and relied on children using their imaginations to decide how to play with them.

By the 1980s, plastic toys had become much more common. Battery-powered toys, familiar characters and simple electronic games were beginning to appear.

We then compared these with toys today. We noticed that many modern toys are made from plastic, are linked to characters from television, films and games, and often include electronics. Some are highly interactive and give us lots of instructions about what to do.

For homework, the children became toy historians! They have been asked to interview a grown-up family member and find out about their favourite childhood toy. Don’t worry if you haven’t done yours yet please pop it in at the start of the week. We are looking forward to comparing their favourite toys with those of their grown ups.

Drawing Club – Mog and the Vee Eee Tee

This week’s Drawing Club story was Mog and the Vee Eee Tee.

We began by drawing Mog, before designing our own version of the vet. Later in the week, we used our imaginations to answer our latest Drawing Club challenge:

I wonder what animal might visit the vet next, and what might be wrong with it?

As always, there were lots of wonderfully imaginative ideas, with the children using their drawings to create their own characters and problems.

Play and Explore

There has been lots of imaginative play happening around the classroom this week. Animal masks have inspired plenty of role play as children have taken on different characters and developed their own games and stories together.

Music has also been very popular, with spontaneous dance parties breaking out during play. No Scotland No Party and Golden have been particular favourites on our class playlist! If your child has a favourite song do let me know so we can add it to the list.

We have also noticed a real interest in drawing and colouring vehicles, with lots of children choosing to spend time carefully creating cars, buses and other forms of transport. There have been some wonderfully neat and detailed drawings done this week!

We were very lucky to have a visit from some extremely cute kittens which everyone loved!

It has been lovely to see so many different interests appearing through play and to watch the children take their own ideas in new directions.

This week our learning has taken us from the islands of Katie Morag, to maps of our local area, and even into our very own café!

In Drawing Club, we explored Katie Morag Delivers the Mail. We drew Katie Morag, the post boat and something we would like to receive in the post. As always, we used our drawings as a starting point for lots of talking, imagining and early writing.

Our Big Question was “What is a map?” We finished our collaborative campsite map pictures before looking closely at a map of Cunningsburgh. The children enjoyed spotting familiar places and talking about where different landmarks were located. We then created our own maps, using a simple key to show features such as roads, rivers, houses and other landmarks.

Our Play Project this week was Food and Restaurants, and this led to some wonderfully rich play. The children designed their favourite pizzas and wrote recipes before transforming the home corner into a busy café. They took orders, set the table, created a candle centrepiece, made menus and prepared pretend food for their customers. There was lots of purposeful talking, writing, problem-solving and imaginative play as the café developed throughout the week.

I have been especially excited to see our P1s choosing to do lots of writing and mark making during their play this week. It has been lovely to see them independently exploring the sounds they have learned and beginning to use these in their own ‘writing’.

Just a little extra bonus, we set up hopscotch this afternoon, it was extremely cute (and quite funny) watching them figure out the rules and the movements required. There was great turn-taking, patience and helping each other out.

From tigers and traffic surveys to rainbows and wild weather, there has been plenty to explore in P1/2 this week!

Drawing Club

Our Drawing Club story this week was The Tiger Who Came to Tea by Judith Kerr. We explored the new vocabulary devoured, delightful and dangerous, before drawing the tiger, the little girl and, finally, something we would like to devour ourselves!

Big Question

Our Big Question this week was ‘How do we get around?’ We talked about different forms of transport and worked together to create a fantastic collaborative road, paintings of air transport and illustrations of how we get to school. We also became traffic researchers, carrying out our own road traffic survey and recording the different vehicles we spotted.

Play Project

This week’s Play Project was Weather Watchers. The learners took the theme in lots of different directions, creating rainbows, snowmen and lightning bolts, as well as writing and illustrating some wonderfully dramatic stories about weather disasters!

We have had another busy week in P1/2, with lots of opportunities to imagine, create, build and work together.

✏️ Drawing Club

This week our Drawing Club story was Would You Rather? by John Burningham. We began by drawing one of the main characters before creating our own “Would you rather…?” questions and illustrating our ideas.

The children’s imaginations were definitely working hard! We had some wonderfully exciting and creative suggestions, including a cheetah riding a bike and a cheetah being chased by a bull. We used our drawings and ideas to develop our storytelling, vocabulary and early writing skills.

⛺ Play Projects – Camping

Our Play Project this week was Camping, and the theme appeared all across our play and learning. The children explored a campsite through small-world play, created campsite pictures, junk-modelled tents and used construction toys to design tents that were just the right size for Bailey Bug.

We also took our learning outdoors, where some children worked together to build a tent.

Camping is also the theme for our Learner Led Event. It is always lovely to have the opportunity to welcome families into the classroom to share in our learning through a range of camping-themed activities and challenges.

🏠 Big Question – Where Do We Live?

Our Big Question learning took us from the big picture right down to our own local communities. We explored where we live, beginning with Scotland, then locating Shetland and talking about our local areas, including Cunningsburgh, Quarff and Sandwick.

We then investigated different types of houses and some of their features. The children had been particularly interested in playing and building with LEGO, so we used this enthusiasm to extend our learning about houses and homes.

Each child created their own minifigure before working in teams of three to design and build a house. Their houses had to meet particular criteria, including a living space, a bedroom and furniture. As well as developing their understanding of homes, this gave the children lots of opportunities to plan, collaborate, solve problems and adapt their ideas as they built.

Learner Led Afternoon

We had a wonderful time welcoming families into P1/2 for our first Learner Led Event of the year!

Our classroom was transformed with a range of activities linked to our Camping Play Project, giving the children the opportunity to share their learning, explore and create alongside their grown-ups.

Families investigated animal footprints in Who Came to the Tent?, searched for hidden objects in our Camping I-Spy, and worked together to add their own ideas to our collaborative campsite map. Our Build a Tent STEM Challenge was a particular favourite, with some fantastic structures created using spaghetti and marshmallows!

There was also time to slow things down and enjoy Stories Around the Campfire, where children and their grown-ups could choose a book to read together beside our classroom campfire.

The children were also very proud to share our new class Would You Rather? book, created from this week’s Drawing Club. It was lovely to see them sharing their imaginative ideas and talking about their work with their families.

Thank you so much to everyone who was able to join us. The children loved welcoming you into their classroom and sharing a little of what we have been learning and enjoying together in P1/2.

Another fantastic week of learning through stories, play, creativity and lots of construction!

It’s been another creative, curious and fun-filled week in P1/2.

Play Projects

This week our Play Projects were inspired by pirates. The learners made a life-sized pirate skeleton, a massive parrot, lanterns for the pirate ship and maps stowed away in bottles. There has been lots of imagination, problem-solving and teamwork as their pirate ideas have developed throughout the week.

Drawing Club

Our story this week has been The Owl Who Was Afraid of the Dark, the perennial favourite about a baby owl who is afraid of the dark and is coaxed out of his fears by the people he meets. Our vocabulary words for this week have been nocturnal and afraid, and we have enjoyed exploring these through our conversations and drawings.

Big Question

Our Big Question learning this week has focused on families. We have been looking at the different ways families can be constructed and discussing what it means to be a family. The learners have enjoyed talking about the people who are important to them and noticing both the similarities and differences between families.

Continuous Provision

Dinosaurs, mobile phones (pretend, of course!) and LEGO minifigures have been some of the most popular play resources this week. These simple resources have sparked some wonderfully imaginative play, with the learners creating characters, stories and whole little worlds together. There has been lots of negotiating ideas, taking on roles, solving problems and adapting plans as their play has developed.

The biggest excitement this week, however, has been in our book-making area. The learners have thrown themselves into becoming authors and illustrators, creating, writing, dictating and sharing their own books. You can read more about how this interest developed — and where we are taking it next — in our floorbook page below.

It’s been another busy and fun-filled week in P1/2!

Our Drawing Club story this week was Peace at Last by Jill Murphy. We drew Daddy Bear, Daddy Bear’s bed and then imagined a place where Daddy Bear could have slept to finally get some peace!

Our Big Question this week was ‘How have I changed?’ We talked about the different stages of life and all the things we have learned to do since we were babies. We then created a simple timeline showing the different parts of our day.

This week’s Play Project has been Under the Sea. The learners have created some fantastic artwork, models and books — and even designed a game!

There has been lots of fantastic play happening across our classroom too. Barbies have been very popular, with the learners creating a myriad of stories about the lives they are living. We’ve seen lots of animal habitats and enclosures being constructed, while our home corner became a very busy ice cream shop! There have also been plenty of drawings, stories and other works of art being created.

Following on from our painting last week, we added coloured water to the messy play area. It was great to see the learners exploring colour mixing again, this time in a completely different context.

We have also added game time to our afternoons, when all the learners sit down together for a calm activity before home time. This gives everyone an opportunity to transition gently from school to home, while also practicing important skills such as taking turns, following rules, communicating with others and, of course, winning and losing gracefully!

Lots of learning, creating, imagining and playing in P1/2!

We had a super first day in P1. We learned how to unpack our bags in the morning, there are lots of steps so Mrs J made a poster to help us remember.

We had lots of fun playing in all the different zones of the classroom we were; bank robbers with the jewellery in the home corner, under sea explorers with the Octonauts in the small world corner, zoo keepers with the stuffed toys in the library area, engineers making super tracks with the hot wheels in the construction and builders outside making a den!

We heard a lovely story about a boy who was nervous to go to school but ended up making a new friend and having lots of fun, Harry and the Dinosaurs go to School. We even managed to fit in some maths and some painting!

All in all it was a very busy but fun filled day. I expect that everyone was a bit tired at home time, including Mrs J!

This is our classroom. Bailey Bug in the top picture is our class mascot. Here you can see some of the spaces that you can play and work in our room. We are looking forward to welcoming you for a fun year of learing and playing together.

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