This week in Silbury, we have launched Times Table Rockstars for the Year 2 children, with the Year 4 children giving them a demonstration of how this works and answering any questions that the Year 2's may have. We also had a letter written to us from our 'glue gang' of glue sticks, who have threatened to quit their jobs if we are not more careful with them. This is our hook for our Literacy learning, which we will continue next week, and is inspired by the story 'The Day the Crayons Quit.' We have also been busy starting our 'special learning quizzes' (assessments!). The children have done a great job with these so far, and we look forward to continuing these next week to see how we are all getting on. We have also been using our independent learning time to practice our music writing skills, as well as our ability to draw circles, just like Isambard Kingdom Brunel did as a child, and creating a post office to practice our learning about money. 

This week, Silbury class have been working hard on their maths knowledge. Year 1 have been playing skittles to subtract from ten using number bonds, and have then moved onto subtracting with numbers up to 20. In Year 2 we have been focusing on our understanding of money, and we have been trying to make different amounts using the coins and notes. 
We have also been learning about The Easter Story in RE and have been looking at the symbols of Easter. To do this, we ate some hot cross buns and chocolate eggs to remind us that we are celebrating Jesus’ sacrifice and his resurrection. 
In Music we have been learning how to use the glockenspiels to play the notes to our song ‘Zootime’ and we have been particularly focusing on keeping in time with the beat of the music and counting the music in beats of 8. 
Finally, to finish off our week, we had a visit from artist Mr Becket, who came to teach us some artistic skills. We explored how emotions and feelings can be portrayed in art and did this by creating half and half face artwork. We had to think carefully about the emotions we were trying to show and think about the colours that would help us to do this. 
 

This week in Silbury Class, we have enjoyed Forest School where we have been learning about gardening and how to look after our environment. We helped to restore the school garden so that we can eventually plant some new flowers and plants. 
We have been exploring doubles in maths and using the ‘mirror game’ to make matching doubles pairs and saying the whole amount. 
We have also enjoyed World Book Day, where we all wore amazing costumes, and thought about how reading it’s important to us. We all made bookmarks to use in our own reading, and we have shared our stories with the other children in our house teams. 

This week in Silbury we have had a busy first week back! We have been exploring poetry in literacy and have read a beautiful poem about seasonal fairies. Within learning, this we have drawn seasonal fairies and been used adjectives to describe them and then we have been searching for matching rhyming words. 
We have been finishing up our History learning from last term, and wrote about what we know about 1960’s toys. 
Then we were very fortunate to be visited by the police, who told us all about how to keep safe and what to do if we were to get lost. We also sat in the police car and were shown how the lights work. We asked some very important questions about how the police do their jobs and what equipment they need. 

This week in Silbury Class, we have been busy finishing up our learning ready for the half term, as well as collaborating with other children. We were also lucky enough to have a visitor in to talk to us!

This week, we have been focusing on writing our own innovated versions of our Talk for Writing story 'The Papaya that Spoke' which the children have all thoroughly enjoyed, and has allowed them to be creative with their thoughts and ideas for the story.

The children from Savernake class were very proud of their innovated stories and came to share them with us. This has inspired us to write our best in our own stories so that we can share them with other classes when we get back to school next term!

We have enjoyed exploring Bible stories in RE and shared our favourites with each other.

Finally, we have been finishing our learning about 1960's toys in History, and were lucky enough to have a visitor who was a young child in the 1960's. We asked her lots of questions, including 'What was your favourite toy?' 'What was your favourite snack?' and 'What was it like to be a child in the 1960's?' We were very excited to hear what our visitor had to say and were very surprised by how things have changed. 

This week in Silbury Class we have exploring our Science and Art units further. 

In Science, we went on a 'tree hunt' to find different trees that we have on the school grounds, as we have been looking at trees, how they grow and whether they are evergreen or deciduous. The children worked together to find the trees and described them using scientific language. 

In Art, we have moved on with our simple printmaking unit, to look at how we can combine artistic techniques, to include continuous line drawings. This was very difficult to start with, as it is so tempting to take our pencils off the paper! But with lots of practice, we are getting the hang of it now. 

Finally, during the times when the children are able to 'choose' their learning, they have chosen to build using the 3D shapes, explaining why they have used the shapes based on their properties, and naming the shapes as they use and share them between themselves. 

They have also been choosing to make a 'zoo' where they created independent writing opportunities, using a signing in sheet to check who was at the zoo, and making name labels to be handed out when visitors arrived. They were also being scientists and explaining what the different animals needed and how they lived. 

Another busy week in Silbury Class! We have been being excellent mathematicians and continuing our exploration of 2D and 3D shapes, using them independently and creatively whilst using our mathematical vocabulary to describe and name them. 

As a class we have learned about Chinese New Year, where we talked about how it is celebrated. We then created our own Chinese lanterns in the traditional lucky colours of red and yellow. We also made Chinese dragon and lion masks which are traditionally used during celebration ceremonies and dances. 

In Art this week we have been continuing our 'simple printmaking' unit by designing and creating incised prints. We found it very enjoyable to colour mix whilst we painted our prints and were amazed by how our artwork turned out!

This week in Silbury we have been very busy. In Year 1 we have been exploring 2D and 3D shapes and printing using the flat faces of the 3D shapes to create prints of the 2D shapes. In Year 2 we have been using our place value knowledge to use tens and ones to add and subtract two-digit numbers. 

We stopped for a couple of minutes on Thursday to watch and talk about the incredible hail stones that we had. We were amazed at how quickly it fell, how big the hail stones and how loud it was on our canopy roof. 

In PE this week we have been learning about how movement with our body can also calm our minds and how this is a good way to let out some energy. 

In Maths this week, Year 1 have been exploring addition and subtraction, including solving addition and subtraction word problems. In Year 2 in Maths, we have been developing our addition and subtraction skills by understanding the place value of digits and using resources to add and subtract two digit numbers. 

In Music, we have begun our new unit titled 'I wanna be in a band' where the children have enjoyed finding the beat and pulse of the music with movement, and begun to learn how to sing the song. 

We have also been exploring our outdoor area this week, and have introduced water play, where the children have been using their maths knowledge of capacity to fill containers, measure how much they have and talk about how they can move water from one place to another. 

Finally, in Science, we have been discovering what a seed is and is not. 

This week in Silbury Class, we have had a lovely start to the term. We have explored our outside environment in the cold and wintery conditions, where we became scientists and talked about ice and water, becoming a liquid and a solid, as well as what causes the ice to melt. We were asking 'I wonder...' questions about the ice on Tuesday, asking 'I wonder why there are shapes, like triangles, in the ice today.' From this we decided to check on the ice on Wednesday as well and see whether there were shapes in it still. The children observed that there were not shapes this time, and predicted why this might have been. We also discovered that on Wednesday the ice was thicker than on Tuesday. We discussed how this might have been because on Tuesday we went out to look in the afternoon, when the temperature had risen, but on Wednesday we went out in the morning, when the temperature was still low. 

We have also been introduced to our new Talk for Writing model text which is 'The papaya that spoke.' All of the children touched, smelled and tasted the papaya, before exploring the story which links to our 'Supertato' from last term, as the children noticed that they both contain talking fruits, vegetables, and in 'The papaya that spoke' even a talking throne!!

Finally in Art, we have begun our 'simple printmaking' unit, which begins by looking at how we can print using paint and our bodies. The children thoroughly enjoyed this.

This week in Silbury we completed our Christmas Nativity: Simply the Nativity, where the children performed a traditional Christmas story with all of the traditional characters plus a few less traditional characters! The children all did a wonderful job and the performance was enjoyed by many. 
We were lucky enough to have a quick visit from Father Christmas who stopped by after visiting for our Nursery 

Nativity performance. We have also enjoyed having our parents and family members join us for a Christmas lunch. A very festive time is being had. 

This week in Silbury Class we have had a very busy week! We have had our first week of advent, which we have been learning about in RE, and we have been looking at our calendar in maths to work out how many days of advent we have left, and will continue to do so in the lead up to Christmas. We have been very busy completing our ‘special learning’ (assessments!) which the children have really enjoyed doing! 
We have also been busy rehearsing our Christmas Nativity which is going well. The children were very excited to get into their costumes today and do their first dress rehearsal. 
We have also been very lucky to be invited to Dauntsey Forest School where the children were dropped off first to visit the Manor House Christmas tree and enjoyed a Christmas dance. After this we walked into the woods to play some nature games, hunting for natural objects and racing to find the items on the scavenger hunt list and be the first to show the adult. Then, we were taken to the woodland play area where we helped to rebuild the village, went through a portal into a magical land, climbed trees and enjoyed all that the forest had to offer. 

This week in Silbury class, we have been continuing to practice for our Christmas Nativity, including singing lots of the songs and putting action to them, and using the stage for the first time on Friday morning, which the children were VERY excited about. 
We have also been lucky enough to have had a couple of visitors this week to enhance our learning. On Wednesday we had a visit from a Jewish lady named Ruth who taught us all about Judaism, especially Shabbat. This included wearing some traditional Jewish clothing that would be worn to worship, designing a Shabbat table and eating and sharing Challah, traditional bread from a Shabbat celebration. 
We then had a visit from a tortoise called Dave, where we learnt that tortoise cannot swim, they sleep for roughly 16 hours a day, and they are herbivores. This visit then inspired us to do some research about tortoise and then write a fact file about them. 

In Silbury Class this week we have been learning about our story of ‘Supertato’ in literacy, and created story maps and actions to accompany the text to help us to learn it. 
We have been revisiting number bonds in maths this week and playing some maths games to help embed these key number facts. 
As part of our ‘Rainbow Challenges’ this week, we have been learning about Guy Fawkes as part of our History learning, and created firework paintings and wanted posters to describe Guy Fawkes and write about the crimes he committed. 

It has been a very busy week in Silbury Class this week. We spent some time talking about the importance of Remembrance on Monday, where we created collage poppies and took part in a Remembrance assembly, including a 2 minute silence.

We then had an invasion from ‘The Evil Pea’ as our hook for our Talk for Writing unit based on the story of ‘Supertato’! The children were very surprised to see that the Evil Pea had been behaving badly and being very disrespectful of the other vegetables. 
We then had a visit from SCARF (which is our provider for PSHE learning). We talked about ‘big’ feelings and how we can use breathing techniques and strategies to help with these. 
We have been exploring ‘Autumn’ as a follow up from our learning about the weather and seasons last term, looking at how the leaves look and feel at this time of year. We also incorporated some maths, looking at and noticing differences and similarities between different leaves. 
Finally, we have spent some time talking about ‘Children in Need’ and creating Pudsey Bear masks to mark the day. 

This week in Silbury, we have been exploring number bonds in both Year 1 and Year 2. Year 1 have been focusing on number bonds to 5 and then 10, and Year 2 have been focusing on number bonds to 10 and then 100. 

We have also been working hard in our new phonics groups for this term, and exploring new sounds. 

In Geography we have been rounding up our unit on Weather, within which we have explored why the weather is different in different places in the world, and why we remember Captain Scott. 

In Computing, we have begun our new unit of 'Online Safety' where we talked about the importance of being safe online at home and in school, and the importance of talking to parents at home about online safety. 

Finally, in PE, the children have been learning how to balance in their gymnastics lessons, which they have been thoroughly enjoying. 

This week in Silbury Class we have been lucky to have two visitors. The Year 1 children enjoyed a 'Walk Safe Training' visit where they learnt all about how to safely cross roads, use zebra crossings and ensure that they are safe when out in the community. 

Following on from this, some of the children independently created a vehicle and road safety role play, where they built a car, and talked about the rules of car safety, including wearing a seatbelt and sitting in their own seats, as well as acting out roles such as traffic wardens.

Year 1 and 2 were then visited by a nurse who explained all about oral hygiene and how to look after our teeth, including how to brush them, and what foods are best for our teeth to stay healthy. 

In Maths this week we have been exploring partitioning numbers, writing number sentences from part-whole models and understanding number bonds. 

Finally in Music, we have been looking at note reading and have been playing instruments alongside this. Some of the children chose to write their own music notes down and compose their own pieces of music.