This week in Lawley we have certainly been getting into the Christmas spirit with our Christmas lunch and the Christmas Fayre (see our separate posts). We have also been busy continuing our unit on money in Maths, as well as researching the fossil process and writing a flow diagram on how fossils are formed in English.  In ICT, we have been continuing our coding unit, and in Science we carried out research on the Chromebooks based on what humans and animals need to survive.  We also had a discussion on the things animals and humans like or want to have, and the difference between need and want. In Topic, children created a timeline based on the different dinosaur periods, and in design technology, they designed and created their own sockasurus!

Well done to Indi who was our star of the week in Lawley.  Indi is always a great role model, she is always very helpful, doing the right thing and is a good friend.  Indi extends her learning away from school, by setting herself homework challenges, as well as enjoying reading.  Indi puts 100% in everything she completes and has been gaining full marks in her spelling tests.  Well done Indi.

A big thank you to everyone who has completed this terms dinosaur mask home learning project.  We will be having a look at them over the next few days and sharing them in class.  They are fantastic and I am extremely impressed with everyone’s efforts.

Please remember on Monday we have the Santa Dash.  Children are to come to school in Christmas pyjamas or clothing, but please ensure clothing is both appropriate and suitable, as well as being warm. Also, please can all children be in sensible footwear for running during our Santa dash. We are asking for £1 per child (for those who have not already sent this into school).

Thank you and I’m looking forward to our last week in Lawley before the Christmas holidays.

We had a fantastic Christmas lunch today, thank you to everyone involved in making it so enjoyable! Thank you to the children for making a great effort with their Christmas clothes, it’s always lovely to see and to get even more excited for Christmas!

Wow, what a busy week we have had in Lawley!  This week has been arts week, and all the children have been excited showing off their art skills!  Our focus in Lawley has been Georges Seurat, the artist who created Pointillism.  In our English lessons we have carried out research on Georges Seurat using the Chrome Books, and creating a fact file based on our findings.  In the afternoons we have planned our own Pointillism dinosaur pictures, then made them using paint and cotton buds, they really do look fantastic!  We have also planned, created and evaluated our own Christmas glitter baubles ready for next weeks Christmas Fayre.  In Maths, we have been looking at money, with children developing their knowledge on coins and notes, their values and selecting the right amount of money.  In ICT, children followed a set of codes (known as algorithms) to create a haunted house background with four characters.  They then had to enter commands to make the characters to move!  In PE with Mr Smith, the children completed a hockey session, developing their ball control.

Our star of the week is Karla-May, who has demonstrated excellent reading and phonics skills.  Karla-May only joined our school in October and has settled in beautifully.  She is growing in confidence every day with reading, as well as using her phonics knowledge for reading and in her writing.  Well done Karla-May.

A huge thank you to Mrs Morgan for purchasing a real Christmas tree for class.  We have all had fun decorating it, as well as having our elf return to class, although he’s spending 7 days in isolation just to be safe!

Remember it is our annual Christmas Lunch on Wednesday.  Please can you let me know if your child wishes to have a Christmas Lunch so I can let the kitchen staff know the correct numbers.  Thank you.

The end of another busy week in Lawley, time really is flying!  This week we have been writing our own dinosaur narratives in English, with the children including full stops, capital letters, adjectives, along with a beginning, build up, middle and end, and trying to include speech marks!  In Maths, we have been sitting practise Maths SATs papers.  Mrs Morgan and I are very impressed with the children’s efforts and the way they have followed our instructions beautifully. In Topic, we have learnt about Mary Anning – the famous fossil hunter.  Children created their own fact file based on Mary Anning, followed by in our Art lesson, making our own dinosaur fossils using plaster of paris.  A big thank you to Odin’s Daddy who allowed Odin to bring in a fossil for us to look at, and to Mrs Salter who had collected a range of rocks with fossils in them.  In RE, we discussed the Christmas story, and the children sequenced pictures of the story, describing what was happening in each picture.

We ended our week with an afternoon of birthday celebrations for all children who have had a birthday from September to now.  We had fun dancing, eating, and watching a film together.  It was a lovely way to spend time together, as well as celebrating birthdays!

Congratulation to Lawley’s Star of the week – Martin.  Martin has been showing random acts of kindness in class and at home.  He has been a good friend, being helpful to everyone in and out of the class.

We had something very exciting happen in Lawley Class this week – a T-Rex came onto our playground, left two huge footprints, and left an egg in our class!  We were lucky enough to go outside, study the footprints and measure the length of them – they were 90cm long!

This week in Lawley we have also been completing our unit in Maths on addition and subtraction, where the children have been using their number bond knowledge and adding three 1-digit numbers together.  In English, we have been looking at using capital letters and full stops, using verbs, adding adverbs, and using the conjunctions and, and because.  In Science we have completed our Science unit of Everyday Materials by observing which cup was the best to keep hot chocolate warm.  We used a plastic cup, a cardboard cup and a metal cup.  We made sure we carried out a fair test by using the same amount of liquid, starting at the same temperature and keeping the cups together in the same place.  We found out that the metal cup kept the chocolate the warmest, and discussed the reasons behind this, learning that the metal is a good insulator.  Everyone then enjoyed a cup of hot chocolate!

In topic, we became Dino Dentists, learning about the different shapes of dinosaurs teeth and the reasons behind why some were quite flat, and others very sharp.  We discussed what dinosaurs ate and this was the reason behind the type of teeth they had.  The children were confident about the difference between herbivores and carnivores, with them grouping the teeth together correctly.  Finally, the children chose their favourite dinosaur tooth and made one out of clay.  In RE we learnt about the meaning of Advent, learning about the significance of the candles, the importance of advent to Christians, and we even designed our own advent calendars.  In PSHE we had a session based on anti-bullying week, with children defining what a bully is and how we can make sure bullying doesn’t happen in or out of school.

During next week (beginning Wednesday, 25th November) we will be taking our Phonics Screening Checks.  This will be done by myself and Miss Wright, in a relaxed environment one to one with each child.  Everyone has worked so hard towards their phonics, I am looking forward to seeing all children shine and show off their phonics knowledge.

Congratulations to our star of the week, Anabel.  Anabel is a fantastic role model in Lawley, always on task, following our instructions and doing her best in everything.  Anabel has been working hard on her handwriting, reading and phonics, as well as on her column addition and subtraction.  Well done Anabel!

One final reminder, please ensure you are listening to your child read at home daily.  This is so very important as it helps children with their phonics, their understanding, as well as developing their vocabulary for their speaking and writing.  Thank you, Mrs Thompstone.

What a busy but respectful week we have had in Lawley.  The children have been learning and understanding Remembrance, and we have had some lovely, in-depth discussions in class.  In English, children have been imagining they are a soldier, considering the feelings they would feel, the senses they would experience and their surroundings.  From this they have then created an acrostic poem, using the would Poppy, Remembrance or Soldier.  Everyone has worked extremely hard, and we have had some outstanding poems produced.  In Maths we have been adding and subtracting two 2-digit numbers using base 10, number lines and hundred squares, with some children attempting to use column addition and column subtraction.  Despite it being tricky, the children have taken it in their stride and tried hard.

In the afternoons we have been producing artwork based on Remembrance.  We have created a picture by using oil pastels for the background, followed by paint the next day to create the poppies.  We have designed and created our own wartime medals, and were fortunate enough to see two real war medals.  On Friday we concentrated on Interfaith Week and looked at the worldwide soldiers who helped in war.  Following this we looked at the different poppies, and selected an Interfaith symbol and drew Poppies on them.  In Lawley we concentrated on Sikhism, Judaism, and Muslims.

Congratulations to Junaid for receiving Lawley’s Star of the Week this week.  Junaid has a fantastic attitude in class, he is always happy and puts 100% in all of this work.  Junaid has been concentrating on improving his handwriting, presentation and phonics skills, with all of these being apparent in his work.  Well done Junaid.

Well done also to everyone who entered the Poppy Day Home Project, we had a lot of entries in Lawley, all for which we could see how much effort had gone into them.  Thank you for your ongoing support at home, we really were impressed!  Congratulations to Scarlett and Hanna for being Lawley’s winners and receiving a certificate and prize.

Finally, just a reminder to ensure your child reads every night at home.  This is something so many of you are doing already, however it would be fantastic for every child to receive as many reading dojo points as possible as well as the opportunity to develop their reading skills.