Hello everyone!

It’s been a super busy week here in Hazel Class with Mr Cummings and Miss Martinez, and we can’t wait to tell you all about our learning adventures.

Here’s what we got up to in English, Maths and History…

English

This week we became storytellers using the Talk for Writing method to master The Highway Rat. First, we listened to the story and made up fun actions to help us remember all the sneaky bits (we especially love pretending to ride a horse and snatch the animal’s food!). Then, working together and sharing ideas, we created our very own story maps. Some of us gave the rat a silly new sidekick, others sent him off on a treasure hunt instead of working in a cake shop —our endings were very creative! Finally, we practiced our new stories with our friends, sharing are new ideas and giggles every time someone added a funny twist.

Maths

We are water scientists!

To explore volume, we gathered five different containers—cups, tubs, even little yoghurt pots – and predicted which would hold the most water. After our predictions, we carefully filled each one from the big bucket, watching the water level rise. We measured and then lined them up from smallest to largest. It was brilliant to see our guesses come true (and even better when they didn’t – surprises are the best kind of learning!). Next, we dove into fractions and explored part–whole models. We shared our cubes into halves and quarters, and soon we got so clever we could work backwards – “If this is one quarter, what’s the whole?” – and we soon cracked it every time!

History

We’ve carried on our adventure learning about Charles Darwin, sharing lots of facts about his life and his famous voyage on the HMS Beagle. We talked about how he spent years exploring the Galápagos Islands, observing turtles and finches, and making notes about how animals and plants adapt. Inspired by this, we discussed insightful questions we’d love to ask him – like “What was the most surprising creature you discovered?” and “How did you feel sailing across oceans in the 19th century?” We even imagined what it would be like to have a species named after us, just like Charles Darwin’s frog (Rhinoderma darwinii). It made us feel like real little naturalists on our very own voyage of discovery!

Dates to Remember:

  • Sports Day – Get ready to cheer us on! – Friday 23rd May
  • STEM Café – A chance for families to join us for exciting science, technology, engineering and maths activities – Wednesday 21st May
    • 1:45-2:15pm Key Stage 1
    • 2:30- 3:00pm Key Stage 2

What a great week we have had! We’re looking forward to more stories, more experiments, and more Darwin discoveries next week.

Have a wonderful weekend and enjoy the sunshine!

Mr Cummings and Miss Martinez