Shining at Shipley Park - part 2

Another action packed day at Shipley Park today - once more the weather was really kind so we were outside all day exploring - just brilliant! 

Thank you children for a super day!  Thank you team! Sleep well!

Shipley Park: What did you hear? What did you see?

Children, earn yourself a merit by describing what you heard and what you saw whilst you were at Shipley Park.

Shipley Challenge!

What is a male and female duck called?

Comment for a merit!

Shipley Park 2016 - part 1

Thank you children for a lovely first day at Shipley Park - the weather listened to our prayers and we got out and about all day!

Celebratory lunch in the sunshine - Happy 90th Birthday your Majesty!

Wow! All the children and staff were treated to a special lunch in the sunshine to celebrate the Queen's 90th birthday. What a lovely time was had by all!

Thank you so much to everyone who made it so special and super fun!

Queen's 90th Birthday - special lunch

As part of our special day on Thursday to celebrate the Queen's 90th Birthday the children had a giant street party in the playground.

Thank you to all our cooks, lunchtime staff and all staff who helped.

Enjoy the pictures below!

Queen's 90th Birthday - visit to Church

We had such a wonderful morning on Friday when the whole school walked to Church to celebrate the Queen's 90th Birthday.

It was so lovely to see the children and staff walk through the village together and to see the Church full.

We had a fantastic service led by Rev. Geoffrey Marshall and the children were also given a beautiful booklet about the Queen to bring home.

A brilliant start to the weekend.

Friday's First Class Post to our Royal Highness, Queen Elizabeth II

Wishing you a very happy 90th birthday,

your Royal Majesty.

Measuring out Party Pop for the Queen's birthday celebrations!

Children had super fun today estimating and measuring how much liquid would fill their party pop glass.

We thought carefully about how to use the millilitre and litre words when we were talking about the liquid, as well as very carefully measured out 50ml of squash and 100ml of either water or lemonade and pouring it into our glasses.

The children took their homemade drink to the Queen's birthday celebrations at lunchtime.

Thank you for all of the beautiful crowns that were made during the Creative Holiday Homework task.

Cheers!

Visits to Church - Smalley Flower Festival!

I have been fortunate enough to attend Church with every class this week over three afternoons to see the stunning flowers in Church around the 'Once Upon a Time' theme.

All our children were a credit to the school when walking through the village and in their behaviour at Church.

Staff commented how lucky we are to work in a village with a strong sense of community.

Enjoy the pictures!

CIRCUSOLOGY!

HOUSE TEAM REWARD

Last Friday, we had the pleasure of welcoming Alex, from CIRCUSOLOGY, into school.

KESTRELS & EAGLES were our winning teams over the Spring term, winning the most weeks over the half terms.

Each team got a session enjoying the many activities that you can in the photographs.

Members of Hawks & Falcons also had a taster session.

Please have a look!

Well done children, keep up the hard work - I wonder what will be the treat for the Summer term?

I wonder which team or teams will win?

Good luck!

Phase 6 Letters & Sounds

This week we have been looking at the end of words and investigating the rules for when we add the suffix:

tion, sion and cian

Take a look at these links and enjoy playing the games.

https://www.spellzone.com/games/index.cfm?wordlist=127

http://www.bbc.co.uk/skillswise/game/en19patt-game-wordsearch-tion

https://www.studyladder.co.uk/games/activity/spelling-rule-tion-and-sion-lesson-17390?lc_set=

1 merit if you can make a list of words which have 'tion', 'sion' or 'cian' at the end.

Briefing letter Summer 2016

Please find our Summer Term briefing letter attached.

Many thanks.

Telling the time

Here's the web link that you have asked for children to help you with telling the time.

http://www.topmarks.co.uk/maths-games/5-7-years/measures

In Year 2 we are learning to recognise o'clock, half past, quarter past and quarter to, on a clock with hands and on a digital clock.  We have also been counting in 5 minute intervals.

Good luck and let me know what you have learnt by playing the games.  A merit for a comment.

Smalley TeachMeet 2016!

Yesterday the school was host to teachers from 14 different schools across the county for our first ever TeachMeet.

A TeachMeet is basically staff from
Schools sharing good practice and learning with and from each other which we believe is the best way to learn. Each speaker has either 2 or 6 minutes so it is fast moving!

This is the first of its kind in our area so we were very proud to host and ensure it was a success.

We had international speaker and friend of the school Andy Cope to host the event and he quickly had everyone laughing whilst also passing important messages about how we can best use the 4000 weeks that on average a person lives for. We learned about 7 second hugs, the 10:5. Principle used by Ritz Carlton and how high performing teams ensure there are at least 6 positives for every criticism.

Andy also spoke about changing our thinking so we didn't get the same results if we wanted to be World Class for our children. A truly brilliant start to our session.

Our own Chair of Governors Sarah Armitage spoke about National Leaders of governance and their role which was fantastic.

We had a wide range of topics after from Racing to English, Modern Foreign Languages, Class display books, chickens, newspaper in a day, effective times tables, travel smart and lots of other fascinating talks.

Amazing artist and friend of the school Anthony Greentree captured the event and you can see what a fabulous job he did in the picture below.

Our Local Authority was well represented; Paul Livingstone, head of IT was a huge technical support ensuring the evening ran smoothly, Rob Bounds spoke about Travel Smart whilst Senior Advisers Carolyn Brearley and Sue Potter attended too and enjoyed the evening.

The event was kindly sponsored by Teacher Active who supply teachers across the country and wanted to give something back to schools whilst providing training for their staff as well. This positive event was nothing more than we've come to expect from this forward thinking company.

They also provided a fantastic buffet which was enjoyed by all.

We finished on time at 6:00 with a few speakers missing out which means we must now begin to organise Smalley TeachMeet 2!

We couldn't be happier with our first event and huge thanks to everyone involved for their help and support.

Enjoy the pictures below!

Piano skills!

Isobel played beautifully as the children walked into our assembly on Friday.

123......Dodgeball!!

As part of our Sports Premium funding our children benefit from excellent coaching from Miss Elizabeth every Tuesday afternoon and Mr Willdig each Wednesday. We also have access to a wide range of clubs and competitions.

Part of the coaches role is also to up-skill staff so as well as staff joining them for lessons each week we were also lucky enough to receive staff training from Mr Willdig yesterday which ended with a few games of Dodgeball.

The staff demonstrated amazing skill and teamwork and we also had lots of fun!!

A huge thank you to Mr Willdig for a wonderful staff meeting, we appreciate your expertise.

We have been challenged to a match by the staff from Loscoe Primary and after seeing the talent on display last night we are more than happy to accept!

Enjoy the pics below!

Rapid Recall of number bonds

In our Maths this week, we have been adding.

We have been taking a two digit number and thinking about how many more we need to make it into a multiple of 10, for example - 63 + ? = 70

We have been trying to sharpen up our number bonds to 10, 20,50 and 100.

Try these games at home to practise speeding up your mental maths.  There are more game choices down the right hand side of the screen.

Type which number bonds you tried and your score in the comments - there will be a prize next Friday for the highest score.

http://www.mathplayground.com/number_bonds_20.html

Good luck.

Spring Term Briefing letter

Please find attached our briefing letter for the Spring Term.

Year 2 termly letter

Here is a copy of the briefing letter that will be sent out today.  Please have a read to see what exciting things we'll be getting up to this term.

A Miracle in Town!

We were so very proud of all 90 of our children as they sang and

performed to the packed audience on Monday evening and Tuesday afternoon. 

Well done children and a very Merry Christmas!

More photos to follow when technology allows....!

The Sorcerer's Apprentice - Blunderbus visit Smalley!

Our children loved the Blunderbus performance of 'The Sorcerer's Apprentice' today.  From start to finish, the excitement and delight on the children's faces was very clear to see!  The children giggled, sang and joined in with the performance - a real delight.  If you get chance to see any of the Blunderbus performances, we'd recommend them!  Here are a few photos to share.......

Holiday homework

Presents come in all sorts of shapes and sizes!

We'd love to make a 3D shape display in our class. Please bring in any boxes or packaging that you use during the Christmas holiday so that we can talk about the shape and their properties.

To help with a Design & Technology project that we will be doing, please send in any empty shoe boxes that you may have....we need 29!

Christmas Numbers

Our class maths task this week is to think about all the numbers to do with Christmas.

Can you make  list of 10 numbers which are important to Christmas and explain why.

For example 12 because December is the twelfth month and Christmas is in December.

As a special Christmas bonus, earn yourself 3 merits by completing this task.

Christmas disco!

Great fun was had at the Christmas disco - thank you so much to our valued members of the PTFA for organising and running the event.

We Three Kings

Our homework task for this week is....

The 3 Wise Men brought gifts of Gold, Frankincense and Myrrh to Baby Jesus.

What are Gold, Frankincense and Myrrh?

Christingle

We had the pleasure of attending a lovely Christingle service this afternoon at St. John the Baptist Church, Smalley. It was so good to see so many of our school community at Church enjoying this lovely tradition. Our choir performed two songs beautifully and I am so proud of them. I would like to say a huge thank you to the church, especially Reverend Lisa for the warm welcome and excellent service. Thank you also to our choir who were brilliant and to all the parents and grandparents for your support. Massive thanks also to Mrs Mason for playing and organising the choir and to Mrs Evans and Mrs Rhodes who supported the event. What a fantastic way to spend Sunday afternoon, enjoy the pictures below.

Helping us to cross the road safely!

This week, as part of Road Safety week, we have been looking at these road safety adverts:

We thought about why hedgehogs were used in the advert, which led us to read some of the book 'The Hodgeheg' by Dick King Smith.  We have also started to read some factual information about hedgehogs and we are looking forward to finding out more this week.

Can you help your classmates and write 3 hedgehog facts? Or find a really good hedgehog website and let us have a copy of the weblink so we can visit it too? You will get a merit for your comment.

Road Safety Week

Happy Retirement

We send you all our best wishes for a long, healthy and happy retirement.

FRACTION ACTION!

We have been looking at how to find 1/2 and 1/4 of different shapes.  We have have also looked at how to show that 2/4 = 1/2 and what 3/4 of a shape looks like.

This week for your Maths task, try out these fraction action game links.

http://www.counton.org/games/map-fractions/spring/

http://resources.oswego.org/games/fractionflags/fractionflags.html

http://www.counton.org/games/map-fractions/racing/

Part 2 of your challenge........

If 12 is the answer - what is the question?

An example of a question is:  What is 20 subtract 8?

Keeping us safe online

In Class 2, we are thinking about how to keep ourselves safe on the internet.  

We watched this video to help us think about the important messages.  Share the important messages with your adults at home to show them how you're going to make safe choices when surfing the internet.

Giving compliments

Today Class 2 thought about FRIENDSHIP.

What does friendship mean to us?

What makes a good friend?

How are we good friends in Class 2?

How do we show our friends that they are special?

How do we show our friends that we care?

How do we tell our friends that we appreciate them?

Our school song for Friendship and Respect week 2015

Each morning, we have been listening to this song by Bruno Mars.  We have been learning the lyrics together and we plan to sing together during Friday's special Friendship Assembly. We will also find out how each class have been celebrating Friendship week....watch this space!

The Creation Station

Smalley School welcomed Rebecca and her 'Creation Station' into school this afternoon to run her after school club.  The club was very popular and Rebecca has a waiting list where in 5 weeks time, new children will be able to come and join the fun.

Thank you Mrs Hird for helping to make this first session a great success.

The children loved making their pencil toppers and can't wait until next week!

Link to Hope

Length and Width

Children in Class 2 have had fun this week measuring the length and width of objects in our classroom - we even had a visit from some enchanted worms on Thursday!

What objects can you find at home that are shorter than 15cm in length?  Find 5, pop them in a post and earn yourself a merit!

Children in Need

We will remember them

Following our poignant Remembrance Service, wonderfully led by our Year 6, Class 2 went to visit our school war memorial and we spoke about why it has such an important part in our school and local history.

We have listened to 'Poppy's Day' on Cbeebies, which is a lovely story explaining some of the key points about Remembrance Day and we have also analysed a short animation by the BBC called 'Poppies' - we worked hard to be able to explain the story, why the colours had been used, what happened to the music and the feelings of the animals in the short film.  Please see the links below to have a look at them yourselves.

http://bbc.in/1uNxEup

http://www.bbc.co.uk/cbeebies/radio/poppys-day

Our Appeal

Proud children, proud teacher

Wowsers! I have been thrilled with the homework that has come into school this week- what I especially like to see is the children's smile of pride as they present, share and talk about their projects - just brilliant. The children's projects have really supported their learning and understanding in class - thank you.

A built in bonus is that we have delicious cake to eat every day this week! Yum! Thank you!

A letter of thanks!

We received an email this morning, from the Padley Centre, to say thank you for our generous Harvest gifts. Thank you again everyone.

Money, money, money!

In Class 2 this week, we will be investigating money. We will be looking at the different coins and thinking of different ways of paying for items with different coins. Here is a link to a few games involving money, which will support your learning in class. http://www.topmarks.co.uk/maths-games/5-7-years/money Have fun trying them and let me know how you get on. Please post any questions on the school website or ask me at school the next day.

Thank you for our Harvest

What a special way to end an action packed half term with our Harvest assembly today.

All the children shared the importance of food and thinking about others using poetry, songs and special words.

Thank you to you, our Smalley family and friends, for all of the kind Harvest gifts for the Padley Centre - all of your thoughtful gifts will be warmly welcomed at the centre and will help people in Derby all through the coming year.

It was so very special to have such a full audience too. Thank you again for your generosity and sharing in our special Harvest message. Wishing you all a very safe half term holiday.

Travel Smart......

During our art lesson this week the children created dinosaurs and we have entered them into the 'Travel Smart' competition.

October's Gold Bookers

Thank you children for all of your hard work.

Please Join Us.....

19th - 23rd October 2015 Please join us for 'Travel Smart' week by encouraging your child to stand out from the crowd by ' Making a Monster Move' and choosing active and environmentally friendly ways to travel to school.

Year 2's Athletics Competition

Mrs Drury and I were very proud to take our 8 Year 2 representatives to Heanor Leisure Centre yesterday to participate in the local school's athletic competition.  The children did themselves and our school very proud as they jumped, bounced, threw, ran, ran and ran some more!

Thank you to all the mums, dads and grandparents for supporting us and transporting the children to and from the venue.  I think we came fifth overall out of twelve schools - great for our first competition of the year.

In Class 2, there are other children who have expressed an interest in representing our school in competitions - brilliant....watch this space as there are more competitions through the year.

Carefully following instructions!

Counting in tens!

The children were challenged today to help Mr Bates to count out 100 objects.  The children had to come up with a good way to reliably count them.......

Great work boys!

Fun at playtime with Miss Elizabeth.

How do you count yours?

Children were challenged to find good ways to count a large group of objects today........

Starting in ones........

Then into twos......

Into fives and tens.......

And even into twenties!

Class 2's vegetables!

Class 2 have been having fun reading 'Oliver's Vegetables' by Vivian French.  We especially liked Friday's session when we all did a little food tasting of the vegetables that were in the story!  Eating the food really helped us with our language work, as we thought of describing words to describe the feel and taste of the vegetables.

Some children enjoyed the tastes of food they had tried before, whereas other children tried brand new foods and were keen to go home and ask to try it again.  The children loved how the beetroot turned their tongues to reddy pink!

We were so very lucky today, as we welcomed Graham to take his last assembly with Smalley School.  Our children listened beautifully as they heard that Graham and his wife are soon leaving the U.K. for an exciting adventure to Zambia in Africa.  Graham's wife is a nurse so will help to care for people and Graham is going to work with the children in Zambia.

Graham has visited our school for many years and is held in high esteem by all members of staff and children.  Our children have loved his assemblies, classroom activities and a lunchtime group - 'God's Club'.

Graham, thank you so very much for all the thoughtful work that you have done with our children.  We will all miss you dearly and know that Zambia are extremely lucky to have you.  We wish you all the very best and hope that you'll keep in touch and let us know how you're getting along.

How much?!

Class 2 have been using their arrow cards to investigate the different digits in a two digit and three digit number.  

They loved using this website during our teaching session today so please have a look at home too.

http://www.topmarks.co.uk/place-value/place-value-charts

Well done Class 2 for your careful thinking!

Spotting patterns

Class 2 enjoyed spotting patterns on their number squares when counting in twos, fives, tens and threes:

Little Red Hen puppet shows

Class 2 have been working hard to retell the story of 'The Little Red Hen'.  We even videoed our shows when Mrs Smith came to join us for the afternoon on Wednesday.  Thank you Mrs Smith - how wonderful to see you.

Writing we're proud of....

The children really impressed me with their super Little Red Hen writing this week.  We looked closely at using our super 5 - full stops, capital letters, finger spaces, question marks and WOW words....

We then worked in pairs to make our writing better.  We called this 'editing our work'.

Gold Bookers in Class 2

A BIG well done to the children in Class 2 for getting their names into the first Key Stage 1 Gold Book of the year.  Super work - keep it up!

Golden Book assembly 18.9.15

Well done for achieving Headteacher's Award and Random Act of Kindness Award - Smalley School is proud of you.

Class 2 Briefing letter: Autumn term

Please find attached a copy of Class 2's termly letter for the Autumn term.

Our Brand New Class 2!

Children in Class 2 are settling in well to their new classroom.  Children have been thinking about how they work well and how the learning environment helps them to learn.  Super smiles and super attitudes.....

Let me know something that you really like about Class 2 already or suggest something that you'd like to do in Class 2 through the year.  Earn a merit for your post.