We had a great time at the Trinity on Friday, watching Clifford the Big Red Dog! I hope the children enjoyed the film as much as I did and their behaviour was amazing, an asset to the school!

Again, a quick note about homework. Please do encourage the children to complete all elements of the homework, both in their books and online. If there are any issues, either with access to the online elements, or understanding of the homework, please do email on the class email address.

This week in English, we will continue our new unit, based on the book Stone Age Boy, by Satoshi Kitamura. Due to our visit to the Theatre Friday, we be completing our drama based on the story this week and then moving on to prepare a debate regarding the story, later in the week.

Guided reading this week will continue with an extract from Dick King Smith’s ‘Henry the Pond Poet’. The children will again listen to a reading of the extract and then share the story to build familiarity, reading in pairs and answering questions to discuss the narrative and language features of the text.

In Maths this week we will continue our unit on addition and subtracting, with the focus this week on adding and subtracting 10s and 100s. Times tables will continue through the week, with opportunities for the children to practise their tables and complete a times table challenge.

In our Stone Age topic, we be looking at what life was like living in an Iron Age Hill Fort and in IT, we will be developing our animations.

Mrs Johnson will continue the Incarnation unit in RE this week, investigating what the texts about baptism and Trinity might mean to Christians today.

Mrs Tompsett will be working with the children to create their own volcanoes! I am looking forward to seeing the results. The children will complete the weekly spelling test on Friday too (words can be found in the home learning section) and have their weekly French session.

Maple class have PE on Mondays and Thursdays, and both sessions will be with myself and Mr Luckhurst.

Reading Records will generally be changed on a Monday and Thursday. We are not seeing all records in school at the moment, so this is a gentle reminder! Children should bring their books and Reading Records in to school each day and aim to read daily, ideally with an adult – details of this can then be recorded in the Reading Record. Pleased do contact me if you feel your child’s book is either too easy or too difficult, or if your child’s book has not been changed. There are times when a book will be sent home more than once, either because a child is reading chapter books, or if it is felt that the book needs to be read more than once to enhance familiarity.

I am always happy to answer any questions you may have so please do contact me if you have any queries, using the class email address:

maple@st-barnabas.kent.sch.uk

Best wishes

Mrs Smallcombe and the Maple Team