Our year is nearly over!


Our Teddy bear picnic was great fun! We enjoyed chatting to children in other classes and spent time with our new teachers!


Myself and Mrs Brooker are feeling quite sad and sentimental that we only have 2 days left with the class, we are really going to miss them! Each child means so much to us and we've had a fantastic year together! We have some fun activities planned for the next 2 days, and will be cherishing every moment together. 


Tomorrow the children will be bringing home all their belongings from School, including their work, busy books (book containing photos of them from the year) and their creative folders. Please take the time to look through this with your child, as the have worked so hard and you will really see just how much they have progressed over the year! They have done so well!


I would just like to thank you again for all your support and hard work this year! It's really has been enjoyable. 


Thank you to all the parents who have brought presents for us or made us gifts! You really are so generous and we appreciate your kind thoughts!


Have a great summer! I look forward to seeing the children in September in their new classes!


love Miss Smith and Mrs Brooker xxx

Last week in st Clare's! Can I remind everyone to bring in a named carrier bag. Book bags are no longer needed. Tomorrow is our teddy bears picnic. You may bring a bear, and one snack.

We had such a fantastic time at the farm today! We stroked animals, went on a tractor ride, and had a great time in the soft play area! We all enjoyed learning about all the different animals!

All the children were so well behaved and represented our School proudly!

Thank you again to parents and helpers who joined us on the trip! Your help was mostappreciated!

All the photos from the day are on the School website in St Clares Class page!

http://www.st-bartholomewsrc-pri.kent.sch.uk/classpages_list.asp?Section=101&subpagename=clare

Today we said goodbye to Miss Casey! We are so grateful for all her hard work! We enjoyed a little party to say thank you for all the fantastic learning she has done with us!

We look foward to our farm trip on Tuesday!
For the trip, please remember packed lunches in a NAMED bag.
Please bring a sunhat, wellies and a raincoat!
Please apply sunscreen before School and take any travel medication if required before School.
Book bags do not need to be bought in on the day of the school trip.
No money is needed.

Thanks!

Today the whole School celebrated World Sports Day! We made cards and a banner to wish the Olympic athletes luck in the London 2012 games.


Our School is representing China in the Cluster Schools Primary Olympic festival this week, so we also learned all about China! We learned about their Olympic achievements, and also about their country and culture.


We enjoyed making Panda bears!

Thank you to all parents who came to our assembly!

We were excited to show you all our learning and loved performing songs for you all!

The children haven't stopped singing since!
I was so impressed with their confidence, clear voices, and beautiful singing. There wasn't a dry eye in the room!!!! (Us included)
Well done children!!!!!

Can I also remind you that next week is Miss Casey's last week in our class. She has taught the children so really great lessons and we've really enjoyed her being a part of St Clares!

The children are really enjoying their Royal family topic this week. They enjoyed writing letters to congratulate the Queen on her Jubilee, and making Royal family trees. Today they made boats just like the Queen saw at her Jubilee Boat Pageant! The children designed and made boats, testing to see if they would float or sink!


Please remember our class assembly is this Thursday at 9:15am sharp!

Our RE topic is all about Friends. We made a Friendship board, and chose photos from the year that show all the great friends we have made, and the special times we have shared! We all enjoyed talking about our friends, and thinking about what a good friend should be. 

Hi all!


This week we have all celebrated Adopt a Monarch week. Our class Monarch was Alfred the Great! The children have really enjoyed learning facts about Alfred, baking cakes, and today made beautiful stained glass windows of Alfred, just like the one in Winchester Cathedral.
We also made time lines of Alfred's life.


I thought I would share photos of the displays of our learning, and our castle role play area, which is currently home to pictures and facts about Alfred, as well as costumes and food!


Next week we look forward to learning all about the Royal family!

Can I please remind all parents to return water bottles and PE kits to school, as we had many missing today!
Please also check your child has bought home the correct kit as some seem to have been put back in the wrong bags!
Many Thanks
Miss Smith

Today we enjoyed learning more about our class Monarch, Alfred the Great. A story tells that Alfred, tired after a battle, found a peasant lady living alone in a small house. He asked to rest a while by her fire. She kindly agreed, asking him to watch some cakes she was baking while she popped out. When she returned King Alfred was fast asleep and the cakes were burned.
Today we baked cakes and discussed the burning process. They were yummy!

Please remember our class assembly next Thursday 21st June, at 9:15 am.

Over half term we received an exciting package.... inside were signed photos, and a note from Olympian Tom Daley!
He signed photos for the children who had personalised their letters to him!
I was so pleased that both Tom and Rebecca replied to us! Considering how busy they must be, it's great to know they appreciate their supporters!

Today in School the children will be celebrating the Queen's Jubilee with a Garden Party! They are invited to bring cakes and sweets and dress in red, white and blue!
Yesterday the children enjoyed making cucumber sandwiches in honour of the Queen. They had to butter the bread, cut the cucumber and then cut the sandwiches into 4 triangles. We were impressed by some children's skills using cutlery!

Have a great half term and we look forward to hearing about all your Jubilee celebrations in the new term!

Remember children do not come back to School until Tuesday 12th June.

Miss Smith

Mini Olympics!

We had an exciting day today in st Clare's! We began with an Olympic quiz to see just how much the children had learned! We were amazed at the level of their knowledge about the London 2012 games! 3 teams Scored 100% and the other 2 only got 2 questions wrong!
Well done children!
Later on we held out cLass mini Olympics! The children participated in events such as running, cycling and javelin! The winners received gold, silver and bronze medals to keep! Each child also recieved a certificate congratulating them on their Olympic achievements!
It really has been a great topic with all the children enjoying learning so much about London, the Olympic games and their history!

Reminders: half term next week!
Para liturgy is this Friday 1st June at 10am in the church

The class have really enjoyed learning about London, the host city for the London 2012 Olympics. We studied landmarks, learned about the Royal family. Today they enjoyed making posters advertising the London Olympics! Have a great weekend!

Please can I remind all parents to send in a sun hat for the children to wear on the playground and in our outside area.
We also advise that you apply sun lotion to your child before school to cover them when playing outside throughout the day.

Many Thanks

Rebecca Adlington letter

St Clare's class received a very exciting package today. Olympic swimmer Rebecca addlington replied to our letters, answering our questions, sharing her training schedule and sent us some signed photographs! We were so excited and thankful to her for taking the time to reply!!! Hopefully Tom Daley will reply to us!

We are really enjoying our Olympic topic in St Clares! It's great to hear your feedback on your child's learning, mnay of you have commented on how much your child is coming home and telling you! Please leave any feedback in the comments box below!

Today we enjoyed learning about the Paralympics, and celebrated how anyone can have great skills as long as they work hard and train well! We were amazed at the skills of the Paralympic athletes!

We enjoyed having the chicks in our class today! We all had the oppertunity to hold the chicks and have a picture taken with them! They have grown so much already! We could see their feathers replacing their fluffy coats, and they were very lively and noisy!

Today we wrote letters to Olympic hopefuls Tom Daley and Rebecca Adlington, wishing them good luck in the London 2012 games. Each child chose which athlete they would write to and asked them questions, offered support and wished them well!
We posted the letters to the athletes fan mail addresses, so we hope they will reply to us!

Today we also enjoyed being creative with paint. First we listened to some classical music and described how it made us feel, or what it reminded us of. We then tried to capture our feelings by visually creating them in paint!

Can you see your art work?

Enjoy the Summer Fayre tomorrow! (12pm to 3pm) Have a lovely weekend! Miss Smith x

I also wanted to let you know that for the next weeks we have a student Teacher on her final placement in class with us, Miss Casey! The children are really enjoying her exciting lesson plans and new activities!

We are lucky enough to have baby chicks in School at the moment! This morning, the eggs in the incubator hatched and we have 8 beautiful, fluffy chicks!
The children enjoyed learning about how to keep them safe, and all thought they were extremely cute!
Here are some photos of them!

I couldn't resist a cuddle!

Today we enjoyed learning about Pictograms. These are a way of collecting and storing data instead of using numbers. We used an image of a medal to display how many medals each Olympian had won!

We also enjoyed learning some facts about Tom Daley, Rebecca Addlington, Chris Hoy and Jessica Ennis, our Olympic hopefuls!

PLEASE CAN I REMIND ALL PARENTS TO ENCOURAGE CHILDREN TO KEEP TOYS AT HOME!

We have had a few incidents where toys are being bought in and misplaced or broken. Thank you.

Today the children enjoyed making edible Olympic torches! We used ice cream cones, squirty cream and yellow sprinkles to create yummy Olympic torches!
The children were fascinated to learn how the real Olympic torch is carried around the country! We also looked at the London 2012 torch and discussed what it was made out of, and whether we liked the design!


Here's some photos of us making our torches!

This is a photo of our class Olympic torch! We also have a class Olympic table, decorated with flags, London 2012 fact sheets and stickers! If you have any Olympic themed items we would be happy to display them here!

Today the children looked at pictures of the Olympic torch! We used our own St Clares Olympic torch and marched it around the School, to let all the children know that the Olympics had begun. We also run the torch around the field to celebrate the Olympics! The children all had a photo with the torch! We know that London 2012 is a proud time for us and are enjoying learning about the celebrations, events and activities going on.

This morning we discussed how Olympians work so hard to become Gold medalists. We thought about the skils they acquire and how they train to improve them. We thought about what we were good at, and the things that we would like to improve on to make ourselves better at something. On gold medals, we wrote a target, something the children felt they wanted to be better at. These will be displayed on our 'Going for Gold' Display board.

Today we enjoyed a class Holiday. We danced, played games, and ate yummy food. This reminded us of how happy celebrations with friends and family make us. This is part of our RE topic this term
We continued our Olympic topic by designing new Olympic logos on the computers! The children displayed improved mouse skills and I was impressed with their creativity!

Welcome back to School!

I hope you all had a great Easter!

The children are really enjoying our new Olympics topic. We have a ticket and souvenir role play area which they are really enjoying playing in!
We all suggested something we wanted to learn about within the topic of the Olympics, and have put this on our wall. This means we can assess our own learning and ensure we are taking control of our own development!
This week we have also started looking at Number Bonds to 10!

Reminder: PE kits need to be in School everyday!
Please also send in a drinks bottle, as the weather it gets warmer, we will be taking these outside more so it is vital we all have a bottle!

Olympic Theatre and Assembly

On Wednesday we were lucky enough to watch a Theatre performance all about the history of the Olympics! It was great fun and full of crazy costumes, singing and dancing! We all enjoyed joining in by singing along and saying phrases with the characters!

Thank you to all the parents who came to our Class Assembly about Noah's Ark on Thursday! It was a great success and the children were so proud of their achievement. I was impressed with how beautifully they sat, sung and spoke. Please leave your feedback about the assembly below!

Next week is the last week of term, and please remember to bring in your book challenge sponssorship money.
PLease also be aware that School closes at 2:30pm on Friday 30th March.

Spiders Web

Yesterday St Clares really enjoyed weaving our own Spiders Web!

We have been reading the story of Anansi the Spider, which describes Anansi's six sons and their unique special talents!
We used wool and took it it turns to say our thoughts and comments about the boook, before throwing the wool to another person. We each held onto our corner and eventually we had weaved a giant web!

On Monday we enjoyed writing about our own talents and skills. We wrote these on Spiders and now they are displayed on a web in our classroom

Display

We did Observational drawings of Fruit from the story Handa's Suprise. This is the display of our work! We used pastels to mix the colours.

Parents Evening and Aborigine Art

First Parents evening was really successful, and it was lovely to hear how happy you are! I'm looking forward to seeing the rest of you on Wednesday.

In the Hall we currently have an art Display. Our Class has recreated Aborigine art. Our display board is pictured below.

Rainbow Birds

We have all really enjoyed reading the story of the Rainbow Bird and learning all about the Aborigines in Australia this week.
Please let us know if the children have taught you anything at home from School!

We made our very own Rainbow Birds today using card and feathers!

Aborigine Face Painting

Today we all had our faces painting in the style of the Aborigine People in Australia!

 We also enjoyed designing our own patterns on faces!

One of the children painted myself, ane another did Mrs Brookers!

Aborigine Artwork

Today we enjoyed creating Aborigine Artwork! We used outlines of Australian animals and used cotton buds to paint small dots in colourful patterns. This style of art is done by Aborigine people in Australia! 
We are displaying our Artwork next week in the hall for all parents to see on the Open evenings when you come and meet us teachers!

World Book Day

The children loved wearing their pjamas for the day! We enjoyed writing book reviews, designing front covers for our favourite books and making book marks! We also enjoyed milkshake with a story!
I think we could all get used to comfy PJs and slippers in School!!!

Behaviour pledges

This shows our Behaviour Pledge display! Each child signed a pledge to agree to follow the class rules that we all decided on together!

Letters home!

The children really enjoyed writing their addresses and letters to be posted home! Please comment here or in the Learning Journal if you receive your letter! Thank you to parents who bought in a stamp!

Tweezers!

To help build our fine motor control muscles in our arms we have been using large tweezers to seperate pasta from glittery beads! It's fun trying to only get the beads!

Book Day

Just a reminder that tomorrow is World Book Day! You may wear Pjs to School!

Para liturgy Friday at 10:30am in the Church!

Our class!

Here are some pictures of new displays in our room!
The children made Lenten promises and wrote them on leaves. They promised to be kind, to help each other, and to share with their friends! We put our leaves on a tree!

In our role play area at the moment we have a Music Corner, full of different instruments to play, and ways to record our musical creations!

We have also got our new Rainbow Ladder. Each day the children begin on the yellow step. If they are well behaved, do good learning and are kind to others, they will move up the ladder. If they are unkind or do not follow school rules, they move down. The children are in House teams and moving up the ladder gives them house points! We have house captains to encourage and keep track of who is awarded points!

Rob the Robot

You may hear your child talk about Rob the Robot. This is a wall display that allows the children to put together letters together to try to make words. Sometimes they turn out to be nonsense words (we refer to them as silly words), but sometimes we manage to make real words! The children love playing with Rob the Robot and treat him like another member of the class

Time

This week in St Clares we have been learning to tell the time.
We made our own clocks which we can practice with, and can now all tell the time on the hour. We can even draw the time on blank clocks. We always remember that the big hand points to 12, and the small hand points to the hour of the time.
We should now be able to start learning the time at half past as well!

I have posted a link to a blank clock to make below, so the children can practise at home!

We have been so impressed with how quickly they picked this up and how much they have enjoyed using the clocks! The have even been telling the time using the real clock in the classroom!

This is the link to make a clock;
http://www.enchantedlearning.com/crafts/clocks/clock/


Here is a picture of our Time display in class!

Our Father

As we have now learned the Hail Mary prayer, we are going to begin learning the Our Father, so we are able to join in at Mass and in Assemblies.

Both prayers are shown below incase you want to support the learning at home!

Our Father, who art in heaven,
hallowed be thy name;
thy kingdom come;
thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread;
and forgive us our trespasses
as we forgive those who trespass against us;
and lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil.

For the kingdom, the power, and the glory are yours
now and for ever.

Amen.

Hail, Mary! Full of grace, The Lord is with thee;
Blessed are thou among women, And blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus.
Holy Mary, Mother of God, Pray for us sinners, Now, and at the hour of our death. Amen.

Welcome back!

Welcome to the new term!
I hope you all had a great week off!

This week the children have really enjoyed looking at the story of Cinderella. Today we wrote a wish that we would like our own Fairy Godmother to make come true! Our wishes ranged from going on holiday to Spain to being able to stay in bed all day!

In RE today we talked about Lent, and discussed what we could give up. We also thought about the people who help us in our daily lives. We realised that without our Mummy, Daddy, Grandparents, families, and friends, we wouldn't be able to do very much!

Miss Smith

Classroom

Today myself, Mrs Brooker and Mrs Carmichael have created a new book reading corner in the classroom. The books are colour coded by genre and are divided into boxes! We were lucky enough to be able to buy some new books to have in class! We hope that all children, and parents who attend our Reading meetings, will enjoy using the new area! We hope the the children will be enthusiastic about books and learn to love reading!

To help foster a good attitude towards reading, we will also be starting allowing the children to choose a book from school to take home every week to read for fun! The books should encourage the children to not only explore new books and genres but also choose to read for pleasure. We will let the children have a completely free choice on the book, and they can keep the same book again, or choose it again at another time if they have enjoyed it! After all, we all have a favourite book we love to read time and time again!

Displays

The children work so hard, and enjoy celebrating their work when it is displayed in class.

I have posted pictures below of our displays to share with you.

Half term!

It's half term!
The children have had a great term of learning all about Fairy Tales and are looking forward to starting our new topic of stories from around the world!

We had another successful reading session. If you want to come to our reading sessions you will need to complete a List 99 form with Mrs Teather in the office.

Emjoy the week's rest and we look forward to seeing you on Monday 20th February.

Hail Mary

St Clares have been learning the 'Hail Mary' prayer, and will now be able to join in with the prayer in Church and assembly. We also learned about Mary being the Mother of Jesus.

Hail Mary,
Full of Grace,
The Lord is with thee.
Blessed art thou among women,
and blessed is the fruit
of thy womb, Jesus.
Holy Mary,
Mother of God,
pray for us sinners now,
and at the hour of death.
Amen.

Today we also enjoyed planting cress seeds and writing instructions about how to care for them.

The children have bought their seeds home, and their homework over half term is to observe and monitor the changes as the seeds grow, and record the changes they see on their homework sheet.

Please remember tomorrow is the last day of the week (Friday is an INSET day, no School for children!)

Snow!

I hope you all enjoyed playing in the snow this weekend! St Clares had a little wander through it in our wellies but most of it had melted! The children enjoyed sharing their stories of their adventures in the snow over the weekend!

3 little pigs!

Today we enjoyed building houses out of bricks, straw and sticks, just like in the story of THe 3 little pigs. To see if the story came true, after we had built our houses we all huffed and puffed like the big bad wolf and blew them down! The houses made of sticks and straw fell to pieces but our brick house remained standing!

Money

Today we have been adding using real money. The children learned that 2p is the same as two 1p coins and were able to count how many coins they had altogether. If we could see a 2p we remebered to count it twice.
We were very impressed with how quickly they learned this! I've set the children a challenge to count how much money (2ps and 1ps) parents have in their purses to practice this skill. Please leave comments if your child is able to do this!

Below I have pasted the coins we used when recording our answers on paper if you woulld like to use them for any work at home!

Australia Day

The children really enjoyed celebrating Australia Day today. We learned about all the animals found in Australia, and moved around as if we were jumping Kangeroos, lazy Koalas, running Wallabys and scary Spiders.
We imagined we were celebrating Australia Day on a hot Beach in Sydney and wrote postcards to our friends and families a home. We also planned what we would pack if we were really to travel all the way to Australia.
We enjoyed listening to the Australoian National Anthem and making Australian flags.
We also looked at amazing images of the Great Barrier Reef. We especially loved spotting the Clown fish that looked just like Nemo!

Fine Motor Control

Today we have been working on our fine motor skills. These activities strengthen the muscles we need for writing.
We have been doing threading with pasta and beads, pouring water into small beakers, threading buttons, and picking up small items from rice.

Chinese New Year

Today we celebrated Chinese New Year in St Clares. We made red and gold lanterns like they do in China, snd enjoyed decorating the classroom with them.These colours mean good fortune and hope in the new year. As it is the year of the dragon, we made dragon masks and a large dragon to dance with.

We also tried writing our numbers using Chinese numbers which was fun!

After lunch we all helped cook a Chinese stir fry with noodles. We also had fortune cookies, which gave us predictions for our lives. They also tasted yummy!

In China it is tradition to visit a temple on New Years. Here people will toss coins at a gong as they make a wish. If the coin hits the gong, the wish comes true. We all had turns throwing coins at the gong and made wishes for the coming year.