Friars Weekly Newsletter friday 2nd may 2025

Nursery

The sun is shining and everyone in Nursery is happy. The children love being outdoors and this week they have certainly made the most of it. We have had a range of different toys in the water tray to promote fine motor skills. Different sized bottles and containers, spoons and scoops have been used for filling and pouring. We have also opened and revamped our mud kitchen where the children can explore natural materials whilst engaging in imaginary play. We will continue to develop these areas throughout the term as the children all love to use them.

REMINDER: The Nursery class photo was taken on Wednesday please look out for the leaflet that was sent home with your child on the same day.

Reception

It has been a super week in Reception. The children have enjoyed the sunny weather in our fantastic garden. They have used natural resources to create their own recipes and written them down to make a cookbook. The water tray has provided lots of opportunities for exploring sinking and floating, comparing volumes of containers and keeping us cool! We have read the book Errol’s Garden and spoken to the children about caring for and growing plants. We wrote captions for a range of pictures from the book. Out maths sessions have focused on counting up to 30 items in sets and adding two groups together.

REMINDER: Our school trip takes place on Wednesday 25th June. It will cost £14. There will be a letter with all the details in due course.

Our Sports Day is taking place on Thursday 22nd May at 1:30pm.

Year 1

We have had a lovely week again in Year 1. In maths, we have begun to look at multiplication by grouping items to make them easier to count. We have learnt about using arrays to help us with our repeated addition.

In English, we have taken on the character of Lila from our story “Lila and the Secret of Rain” writing diary entries about her life. We had great fun in art this week, we explored mark making with paint. We used things like string, sponges pipe cleaners to see what effects we could create. Great job Year 1!

In RE, we thought about stories and books that are special to us.

REMINDER: Miss Goodwin will be running an information session about the phonics screening check where she will explain how the check is carried out, show some past assessments for you to take a look at, explain how you can help your child prepare for the phonics screening check and answer any questions you may have. There will be two sessions, a morning session 9:00-9:30am and an afternoon session 2:20-2:50pm. These sessions will be held on Tuesday 6th May in the KS1 hall which can be accessed via the KS1 hall door, located between the KS1 gate and the Main office.

Please kindly confirm which of these sessions you will be attending by using the link or QR code below:

Year 2

In English, this week we have written about the incredible animals living in Antarctica. We used research tools to find facts to include in our non-chronological reports. The children really rose to the challenge and wrote using the present tense, connecting their ideas using conjunctions such as but, because and when. We have begun to explore printing in our art lessons and created some Antarctic animal inspired relief prints. We have also begun to create our class VE Day celebration doors ready for the competition next week. We hope that 2S or 2W win the prize!

In maths, we have explored finding quarters and thirds of shapes and numbers, with some rather challenging word problems to solve! The children have now carried out their ‘Gig’ to assess where they should begin their TT Rockstars journey. They can access their account using their Numbots username and password and should play the ‘Garage’ games to progress through the levels. Regular access to this program will support both the development of their times table knowledge and quick recall of facts.

In geography we have learnt about the seven continents and used an atlas to locate these areas of land on a world map. We listened to a super song which will help the children to recall the names of the continents.

Reminder: A letter about our school trip to Call of the Wild on 19th June was given to each child on Monday. It was also emailed to parents/carers. The children are already excited about this great learning experience. Previous year groups have really enjoyed their close encounters with some rather amazing animals.

Year 3

What a great week!

We started off really eager for our trip on Tuesday to Colchester Castle. Then Tuesday came and we ran into school at 8:15am, buzzing for the day ahead. We travelled to the castle which took a lot longer than we would have liked, but eventually we arrived to complete a jampacked day. We learnt so much in such a little time. We visited the vaults of the castle and all of the history was explained in such an enthralling and captivating way. We are sure some will say the best part of the day was when we sat outside in the glorious sunshine, to eat our lunches!

In the rest of the week we had our class photos taken, started to rehearse our assembly in the hall and wrote about our trip in English. We also finished our topic on fractions this week and will be moving onto a new topic next week.

Boy, how time seems to be flying here in Year 3!