St. Urban's Catholic Primary School, a Voluntary Academy

Welcome to Year R

2023 - 2024

World Book Day 2024

We have had a great day in Year R! The children looked wonderful dressed as a "word" and have been very creative! Our words were: Buzz, Builder, Rainbow, Law, Batman, Superhero, Brave, Dinosaur, Teacher, Camouflage, Rescuer, Spiderman, Fire, Fast, Fly, Delicate, Beautiful, Strong, Good, Normal and Sunshine! We have shared stories with Mummies and Daddies this morning,  and Year 5 came to read stories to us this afternoon. We ended the day with a Book Swap session, with all the children taking home a new book to enjoy at home. Thank you to everyone for joining in with so much enthusiasm!

Our February learning has included thinking about our feelings and considering others. We have been doing lots of problem solving and developing the skill of breaking down words to write them. We have been looking at the composition of numbers and how many different ways there are to make a given number. We have learned about Chinese New Year and know that it is the Year of the Dragon!

January has seen us learning about the animals that live in the Arctic and the South Pole We have had lots of opportunities to work together with our friends, taking turns, collaborating and sharing ideas. 

We have been digging deep into the numbers 4 and 5 lately. The children have been playing lots of subitising games and looking at different representations of the numbers. We have been exploring the composition of numbers 4 and 5, as in the different ways of making a number, which strengthens our understanding of number bonds up to 5.

We have been reading lots of rhyming stories and singing lots of songs and nursery rhymes. We love "Oh Dear!", a poem by Michael Rosen. We hope you enjoy our Poetry Recital! 

Our first two weeks at school have seen us making new friends, exploring our resources, following new routines and enjoying our days!

We hope you enjoy our Coronation Songs!

Our Summer Term so far. Cricket, Caterpillars, Sunflowers, Gardening and playing "Hospitals"!

Lots to learn about this term along with our phonics, maths and The Easter Story! We explored the planets and looked at the different features of each planet and why there is only life on Planet Earth. We went to the Moon with Baby Bear, sent postcards from the moon and acted out the story of "Whatever Next!" by Jill Murphy. We have been looking at information books and making our own, and tasted real space food. We have made planets to hang in our classroom,  described lots of aliens and decided which  planet to visit in our role play area.

So far this term we have been finding out which animals live in the Arctic Circle. We have been making books about Polar Bears and creating our own stories about them too. We now know that penguins don't live with the Polar Bears in the Arctic and we will be finding out about them in the coming weeks. We have been investigating how we can make ice melt more quickly and estimating when it will melt if we leave it alone. We have been using a range of resources to make igloos and dens for the snow animals and developing different techniques to make Polar Bear pictures.

Some brilliant drawings of Pirate Pete, inspired by one of our favourite stories, "Pirate Pete", by Nick Sharratt. A wonderful story that enables the reader to decide what happens....

We think the crazier, the better!

When it rains, we love to take the opportunity to develop our colour mixing skills. We love to stand and watch as our paints mix and our artwork changes as the rain falls down!

Today we had great fun making potions in the Witch's Kitchen and making brand new broomsticks for all the little witches! Of course, we first had to write our spells, which we took to the witch's tray in order to get things started. Then we added Gnomes Blood, Skeleton Bones, Witch's Water and Spider's Slime....and waited for the potions to fizz!

Outside, spells had to be written in order to power up our Broomsticks so we could fly away!

We have had a lovely Autumn Walk this afternoon collecting lots of sticks, sticks and more sticks! I wonder what we will make with our sticks this week.....

Thank you to our parent helpers  - we really appreciate your help.

How many ways can you recreate a Skeleton? This week we are exploring the story "Funny Bones" by Janet and Alan Ahlberg, In drawing club we are thinking about the characters, the setting and thinking of our own ideas about what might happen next. A real skeleton came to join us in the classroom as some of the children wanted to know whether a skeleton has ears. They looked carefully at the skeleton and came to the conclusion that no they don't because "ears don't have bones". Today the children were challenged to find different resources to make some skeletons outside. Many skeletons later, I think they've met the challenge!

I am sure you will agree from the evidence below that all our new starters are settling in beautifully! Well done to all our children in Year R for giving us a great first week!

As we come to the end of the School Year, we can thank God for a lovely year and for keeping us all safe and well. I hope you enjoy the memories!

Oh we do like to be beside the seaside! We have had a beautiful day at Bridlington as part of this term's  curriculum. There are so many happy faces in these photos - a bit of sea air is so good for us all!

Here are the Year R children performing in our Jubilee Assembly. Thank you to those that came this morning, and if you were unable to come, we hope you enjoy this little film!

We are thoroughly enjoying learning about the life of the Queen and preparing for her Platinum Jubilee. We know lots of facts about the Queen and have enjoyed lots of "Queen" stories. Following on from reading The Queen's Knickers, we designed some beautiful Royal Knickers, and when the Queen's Knickers went missing, we made posters with the aim of finding them. And of course, after reading "The Queen's Hat" we had to make some hats that were fit for a Queen! We have modelled them here for you - some more keen than others!!!

To start our Summer Term off, we have a had a fabulous "Play and Stay" session making Castles for the Queen. We have been finding out which castles Queen Elizabeth likes to live in; we know her favourite is Windsor Castle. I think you will agree that we have made some very impressive ones today!

We have had a wonderful day celebrating our favourite books and the children spent the day dressed as one of their favourite characters, or ready to have lots of "bedtime" stories in their cosy pyjamas! Luckily, we had plenty of stories thanks to our lovely Year 5 children, who spent some of the morning reading to us. Thank you Year 5, and thank you to all the parents who have been our "mystery readers". The children have been so excited to see who was going to read to us at story time each day!

This half term we have been exploring The Arctic and Antarctica. We know lots of Polar Bear and Penguin Facts and which animals live where.  We planned how to get to the South Pole to take a lost little penguin home, made posters in case anyone was looking for him, and wrote lists so we would know what to pack. We have made "Who am I?" lift the flap books and wrote clues about different arctic animals. We wondered what it would like to be a penguin; it would be fun to swim and slide and eat plenty of fish! We have painted penguins and sketched polar bears, and made igloos inside and out. I think we might be Snow Animal Experts!

We have also been programming a Beebot, drawing maps, learning some digraphs, looking at different ways of making a number, mixing "tiger" colours for Chinese New Year, thinking about gifts we can give to Jesus, and making music. And lots of other things too! Take a look below!

Year R have had a very busy month getting ready for Christmas. On top of our daily activities, we have been working hard in Santa's Grotto, writing letters, wrapping presents, being Santa, partying,  and most importantly, telling the story of the First Christmas, which the children did beautifully.

This week, it was lovely to welcome some parents for our first Play and Stay session of the year. We got to use all the sticks we collected on our walk and have made some fabulous Stick Men and Stick Lady Loves! The children decided what were the best materials to join their sticks and they were able to show off their skills to our visitors. Next week we will be looking at the book "Leaf Man" so please bring in any beautiful leaves you see on your travels!

What can you make with a stick? Hopefully, over the next few weeks, we will find out! After reading the book "Not a Stick" by Antoinette Portis, we set off on our Autumn Walk to find some STICKS!!!

Year R 2020 - 2021

What a wonderful day at the seaside! Despite the cold on the East Coast, we had a great day out breathing in the fresh sea air, digging, playing and having fun! How lovely to get out and about at last!

The Pirates have arrived this week in Year R! 

Christmas Holiday Activities = click on this link if you want to do some phonics in the holidays!

We have now had all our Play and Stay sessions in readiness for next week. The children have all had a great time and it has been good to get to know them in small groups. We look forward to seeing you all next week!