Year 2 - Gymnastic obstacle course with Sycamore Class

This week Sycamore class and Year 2 have been putting our gymnastics skills to the test with an adventurous obstacle course. All of the children attempted the course and took it in turns to be safety monitors, helping each other through each part. 

Great team work!

Nursery - Mini-Beast Hunt

We went on a mini-beast hunt in Forest School and found lots of different types hiding under logs.











To our surprise, we found tadpoles in the pond!

Rose found a small frog hiding in the bush.

We have been learning the nursery rhyme 'Wiggly Woo' with makaton.

Year 2 - Ocean Art

Cedar class have been learning about oceans this term. We created our own underwater scenes using pastels to fill all the available space. We researched the types of animals we would find in the Sunlight Zone of the ocean and made sure they were included in our pictures.

 

 

Year 2 - Celebrating Religious festivals in Sycamore!

This term Year 2 are learning all about different religious celebrations. This week, Sycamore class learnt about the Jewish festival of Passover and how Jewish people eat a special meal from a Seder plate to remind them of the past. Here are some of our special Passover meals.

 

Year 6 - Electrifying Elder Class

In Elder Class, we have been enjoying the start of our new science topic - electricity!

We spent time discussing our prior knowledge and developing interesting research questions that we hope to test in the coming weeks.

Our first challenge was to create a human circuit to demonstrate the flow of electrons. We had to use a variety of communication and teamwork skills, as well as demonstrating our scientific knowledge!

Year 6 is certainly full of bright sparks!

Analysing language use in Year 6

As part of our Literacy learning, we have been exploring what makes effective persuasion. We read and discussed some examples of persuasive texts to identify some of the techniques that authors use.

We also listened to a speech by the Prime Minister, Theresa May, because we wanted to see how she uses language to persuade people. We identified that she used repetition a lot!

"I found her speech irritating because she was repeating herself- she wasn't saying anything new."

"I thought her vocabulary was very limited- she didn't use very many different words."

"I thought her speech didn't have very much meaning because she was repeating the same phrase and her speech was very vague."

"She kept saying 'strong and stable' because that's what she wants people to think she will provide. She used repetition but she didn't give any examples- she didn't say specifically what she would do. It made me not trust her."

"I didn't trust that she was thinking about other people- it felt like she was doing it for herself because she was just repeating the same words over and over."

"I found the way she spoke similar to Donald Trump- he repeats 'Make America great again' but he didn't say how. She used 'strong and stable' in the same way- she says it but doesn't explain how."

Days Out for Children with Additional Needs

As part of my role as SENCO I occasionally have the pleasure of accompanying classes on their educational trips and visits. On Thursday this week I joined the whole of the Reception Year group on their day out to Colchester Zoo.

To support the teaching team with particular needs of individual children I suggested that we put together a Social Story in advance, showing what will happen on the day. When I investigated further, I was happy to find that Colchester Zoo already had their own version available on line. Although this version was probably more suited to an older age group, we were able to adapt and make use of the story to help support children's understanding of what we might see or do on our trip to the zoo.

Colchester Zoo also have a dedicated part of their website outlining access and support for any visitors with additional needs, which certainly helped me in supporting the Reception Team on this trip.

If you are a parent or carer of a child with additional needs, planning any days out at weekends or during holiday time, you may find some of the ideas on the Scope or Skybadger websites useful. There is also lots of information and helpful advice to be found here:

Alternatively you can always come and speak with me, Mary Long (SENCO for EYFS and KS1) or any member of the Inclusion Team.