Infant – Page 7 – Toftwood Infant and Junior School Federation

Music Autumn 1 2021

During the first half term the children in Years 1 and 2 have enjoyed returning to our regular ‘Singing Assembly’ times. The children have enjoyed singing songs such as ‘Big Red Combine harvester’, and ‘Consider Yourself.’ They also have been enjoying listening to a different piece of music every week that can range from modern pop to classical and other music such as movie soundtracks or music from different parts of the world.

After listening to music, all children spend some ‘reflective time’ thinking about how listening has made them feel.

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In Reception classes, the children have enjoyed listening to and singing along to many songs with their class peers.

A variety of music has also been experienced in the classrooms, as well as created in the outdoor classroom. Children have been observed making music independently, singing and moving to the music experiences throughout this half term.

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In Year 1, the children have been listening to and learning about the well-known song ‘Hey You!’ They have been learning about pulse and rhythm as well as having a go at learning the lyrics and playing instruments, such as glockenspiels. When doing this the children used the C note to play alongside the music.

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In Year 2, the children have been learning about feeling the pulse and clapping along to a beat. They have also been using Charanga to learn some new songs like ‘Music Is In My Soul’.

RE Summer Term 2021

Reception

This term in Reception the children have been exploring ‘The Lion StoryTeller Bible’. Everyone enjoyed looking at the beautiful illustrations in this Bible, and have listened to several of the Christian stories. A favourite was ‘A Special Promise’ that tells the story of Noah, his ark and an exciting rainbow. The children really enjoyed talking about the different stories and retelling them with their friends.

Year 1

This term in Year One, the children have been looking at a variety of different religious stories. We have retold the story of The Good Samaritan and made sure to order it correctly. We then looked at the story of Passover and Moses and the children were able to make puppets to re-enact the story. We also listened to the story of Rama and Sita and the children found out about the Diwali Festival.

Year 2

In Year 2, the children have been learning about Islam. They looked at pictures of mosques and prayer rituals. They talked about who is part of their own community, and wrote their own rules that they thought would make the world a better place.

The children have also looked at a variety if religions as part of a philosophy focus, listening to videos from Ian Gardner and Marsha Parker about why people have different ideas of God. The children thought about morals, and if different scenarios were right or wrong, and sorted similarities and differences between religions. They ended their RE learning this year by drawing their own Rangoli patterns on the playground!

Science – Autumn Term 2019

Reception Understanding the World- Autumn 1

This term in reception the children have been learning about healthy and non-healthy food. The children read The Very Hungry Caterpillar focusing on what is a fruit, a vegetable and a special treat. They have also been learning that some foods give us lots of energy and why is it so important to have a balanced diet. Everyone in the year group looked at body parts and spent time learning the names of them. To help us remember the names of some body parts the children have been singing the song ‘heads, shoulders knees and toes.”

Year 1 Science- Autumn 1

This half term we have focussed on identifying and classifying enquiries about animals. The children worked together to classify animals into groups (mammals, fish, insects, reptiles, birds and amphibians). They also thought carefully about animal diet and classified the animals as carnivores, herbivores and omnivores. We thought of fun actions to help us remember the names of the groups!

The children also had an amazing educational visit to Banham Zoo, learning more about animals and completing a workshop about animal diet with expert zoo staff. For more information about this please see our Year Groups, Year 1 page.

The children have also enjoyed a ‘Mad Science’ visit for another fun filled assembly and we are sure the after school club will inspire the children who attend to continue to be curious and to ask lots of scientific questions.

Year 2 Science – Autumn 1

In science this half term, year 2 have been looking at different materials. They have enjoyed exploring materials such as wood, plastic and metal and described them. The children also enjoyed going on a material hunt around the school. The classes discussed the objects they found around school and what materials they were made from and then discussed the suitability of these materials for their uses. The children also learnt a materials song which helped them to understand the properties and suitability of a range of different materials. Have a listen and sing along at home; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xOKr462HLc0

Well done to all the children who completed some amazing home learning linked to this work!

Science Summer Term 2019

Nursery

Barefoot sensory walk. We talked about the textures of items as we walked through them.

Rainbow walk- we looked at the colours in the rainbow and made coloured footprints!

Bubbles-children had a go at blowing giant bubbles using a hoop. They talked about techniques for making the best bubbles.

Shadow puppets! Children talked about shadows and how they were made.

Reception

This term the children have enjoyed exploring the outdoor areas. They have encountered several mini beasts and this led to lots of questions! When the children found a worm they were very keen to try and measure the length of the worm and made estimations first. They also thought carefully about what they could do to help a spider that they found. Some of the children were inspired to write their own mini beast story about what they found!

Year 1

Year 1 children have enjoyed learning about inventors during our Step Back in Time topic. We have learnt about Thomas Edison and how he invented the light bulb. We explored lamps, wires and batteries and investigated how to make a circuit. We were very pleased when we found out how to do it and we switched all the lights off so we could see our lamps shining!

We also learnt about Alexander Graham Bell and his telephone. We looked at different photos of telephones through the years and made our own phones using cups and string. We explored how the different length of string affected the sound.

Year 2

This term the children have enjoyed learning about habitats and environments. They built on their previous knowledge and explored the school grounds, including the pond area, identifying and classifying different animals. The children researched some of the animals they found and created amazing non-fiction fact file booklets in Literacy.

As part of this topic we visited Easton Farm and were able to ask lots of scientific questions about the animals and their habitats. More information about this can be found on the Year 2 tab of the website.

Literacy Infant Summer Term 2019

Nursery

Nursery children have been writing their own scribe stories with an adult. Some children heard initial sounds and were able to write their initial sounds. They have come up with some amazing story ideas and characters! They have also written their own party invitations including firework pictures.

Reception

The children have written about going to Gressenhall and the magical journey they had been on. The children wrote about their favourite part of the trip. A big highlight of their day was getting magic from the tree and finding a golden egg!

Year 1

The children used their recent trip to Holkham Hall to write about real events in the style of a chronological report. They used photos from the three activities to order and write about their day. The children loved this trip and it really inspired their writing to add extra information.

Year 2

The children watched a Disney short clip called Lava. They then researched about Hawaii using holiday brochures and talked about the descriptive language written. They then wrote and made their own brochure! These were fantastic and made the staff want to visit each of their hotels!

They have also written to inform by making a non-fiction Minibeast booklet. They were very excited to make this in to a book to share with the year 1 children.