Exploring the natural world

This afternoon we were learning the Creation story and talking about all the wonderful things in the world that God has made. After reading the story we used sequencing cards to help us retell the story - good practice of ordinal numbers! Then we went outside to see what things we could see that God made. We saw lots of things, including: the sun, the sky, trees, flowers (there are daffodils in the bark area that are starting to grow!), grass, birds, a squirrel and people.

Back in the classroom we chose something that God has made that we really like and thought of some ways we could describe it, such as "twinkling stars" or "the golden, shining sun." We all drew a picture of something we like and wrote a descriptive caption to go with it. We also talked about ways we can take care of the world God has made for us, such as not dropping litter, taking care of animals and being kind to people.

Here are our descriptive captions:

"A climbing monkey" - Blue

"A bright moon" - Harry

"Shining yellow sun" - Charlie

"Soft sheep" - Finlay

"Black horse" - Tommy

"Soft cat" - Olivia

"Funny dog" - Summer

"Beautiful butterfly and nice smelling flowers" - Lucy

"Soft fluffy clouds" - Harrison

"Kind giraffes" - Fallon

"Soft donkey" - Emily

"Green fern and lovely squirrel" - Jack

Creating animals

This morning we were challenged to create an animal, using whatever materials we wanted! We could make a model, draw a picture, use chalks, paints... or anything else we could think of! We had to think carefully about what our animal looked like so we could get the right colours and patterns, the right number of legs, the right kind of tail (or no tail at all!). We talked about where we could look for the information if we weren't sure and decided we could either look in books or use the internet (on the whiteboard or using iPads). We really had to use our thinking skills when making our animals to decide what the best material to use would be, what tools would work best, how we could do something if our first try didn't quite work out... we were very busy planning and making!

Animals and their babies

This week we are learning all about animals and how they grow. This morning we were learning about how animals change from babies to adults, including the different names for baby animals and how they look different to their parents.

We sorted some picture cards and matched the mothers with their babies. Some of the words for animal young we knew, such as puppy, kitten and lamb, but some words were new to us, like fawn (a baby deer) and kid (a baby goat).

We talked about how the babies looked different to the adults. With some animals they look quite similar, just smaller, but with some animals they are quite different.

"The chick is a different colour to the chicken, and the chicken has red on its face and the chick doesn't." (Fallon)

"The big goat has horns and the little one doesn't." (Luke)

"The butterfly has wings and the caterpillar doesn't." (Paul)

"A tadpole doesn't have legs and a frog does." (Dexter)

"This one's big and that one's little." (Tommy)

"They're different sizes." (Finlay)

"The mummy sheep has more fur." (Amber)

Fun at the farm!

This morning we went on a trip to Ledgemore Farm in Great Gaddesden to see the new lambs and support our learning on growing and spring. It was a beautiful sunny day and as soon as we arrived we were lucky enough to see a lamb being born! Soon after that the farmers came and helped to deliver two more lambs. We spent some time looking at the new lambs and then split into two groups to explore some more things around the farm.

We saw sheep and lambs inside and stroked a little lamb. We learnt that in summer the sheep's wool will be sheared off. It will then be sent away to be cleaned and made into things like woolly jumpers!

We learnt that the sheep have numbers on them so they know which lamb belongs to which sheep. At Ledgemore Farm they have around 600 lambs born every year! We looked at some of the food the sheep are given to eat and saw the lambs drinking some milk.

Then we went to see the chickens. The farmer put some food out and the chickens all came hurrying out to peck at it and eat it! We talked about chickens laying eggs and how we like to eat our eggs. The chickens on the farm provide about 24 eggs a day between them. We also saw how the top of their water had frozen. Luke explained that it had been cold so the water had turned to ice and become solid. Great use of scientific vocabulary Luke!

Then we went to see the horse in the field and see the lambs one more time. We also enjoyed squelching in the mud!

Thank you very much to Mr and Mrs Cornthwaite for letting us visit them and for taking time out of their day to show us around their farm. Also a big thank you to all our parent helpers - we couldn't have done it without you!

Next week we are going to continue our learning on how animals change and grow and how the natural world changes during springtime - keep watching our blog to find out what we are learning!

Mysterious beans..!

Today when we came in from playtime we found something very strange in our classroom... some mysterious beans! Where did they come from? What will they grow into? We explored the beans using our sense of sight, touch and smell and talked about what to do with them. We decided to plant them to see what will grow!

We know that things grow in soil - but is that the ONLY place something can grow? We decided to find out by conducting an experiment! We decided to plant the beans in bottles with something different in each one. After discussing our ideas we looked outside and inside to find things to put in our bottles.

We put soil in one.

In another one we put sand.

We put stones in this one.

We filled this one with water.

We put some paper in this one.

Finally, we poured rice into this bottle.

Then we had to plant the beans in the bottles! We talked about whether we should just put the bean on top or whether we should push it down so it was underneath the soil, sand etc. We decided that was the best thing to do. Can you guess what happened when we put the bean in the bottle of water?

Then we watered the beans. We didn't put water in the bottle of water though! We have put them on the window sill so we can watch and see what happens. Do you think any of them will grow? What will happen when they do? Will the bean get bigger - or will something else happen?

Exploring growing!

Today we started our new topic, growing! We talked about what 'growing' means and what things grow. We came up with lots of ideas of things that grow such as plants, flowers, people and animals. We explored the new things on our discovery table and looked closely at different plants, including looking at the seeds, stem, petals and roots. Fallon and Emily also did some super writing about what they had seen.

We also have a new class plant to take care of. What do you think we'll have to do to help it grow? Here's a clue!

This afternoon we were learning about living and non-living things. Which group of things do you think contains things that grow?

We came up with lots of ideas about things that don't grow, such as stones, tables, pencils and dolls. Summer also said "seeds won't grow if you don't put water on them" - good thinking Summer!

We sorted some photos of things into two groups - living and non-living. Then we created some living and non-living posters with pictures and labels - we thought of lots of living and non-living things, including birds, dogs, snowmen and puddles! We also used our phonics really well to sound out the words for our labels.

Learning about Purim

Earlier this week we received a letter from a Jewish girl called Riva who told us she was excited about celebrating Purim, playing a greggor and eating Hamantashen. We didn't know what she was talking about, so we had to find out! Riva had sent us some photos, a book about Purim and the story of brave Queen Esther. We acted out the story and looked at and talked about the pictures. We also used an iPad to find out what Hamantashen are - they are a kind of cake with jam in the middle, and they looked delicious!

We made Hamantashen - they were yummy!

We also made some Purim masks and made some shakers. When Jewish people go to the synagogue during Purim they listen to the story of Esther and shake their instruments, called greggors, and make lots of noise when the wicked Haman's name is mentioned! We retold the story of Esther and played our shakers and stamped our feet to make lots of noise when we heard Haman's name!