It’s been a very busy and emotional start to the week and Mrs Cotton is very sad to say goodbye to the Otters. She will be in after Christmas to introduce them to the newest member of the Otter class and can’t wait to hear all about how they are getting on from Miss Hobbs!

In Maths, we have continued with multiplication and division. We have been working on the 7, 11 and 12 multiplication tables. We looked at multiplying by 1 and 0 which the children said was very easy but I know is an area where little mistakes have been made so far this year so it was good to have a lesson on this to clear up some misconceptions. We then looked at dividing by 1, which is also something that the children can get into a bit of a muddle with but they have done very well. 

In English, we have finished writing our instructions. We have been so impressed with the writing this week and everyone has worked so hard to include time conjunctions, imperative verbs and rhetorical questions in their writing. 

In RE this week we have focussed on Baptism and what this meant for those joining the Christian faith. We explored what this meant to us through words, images and poems with some beautiful ideas! In Computing we learned about conditions and sensors within a game format while looking at how to use questions and ‘if, else’ statements. We will build on this next week where they will begin to plan their own game to build in Scratch. Swimming is going swimmingly and Mrs Cotton is so impressed with how much progress everyone has made since September! It’s great to hear how proud they all are of their swimming and giving themselves little challenges like not using the noodle or trying to develop a new stroke.

In topic, we have looked at Viking longhouses. We looked at the materials that they were made out of and we were surprised that they used to bring their animals in to sleep inside the longhouses with their families! We have also learnt about jobs in the Viking times. We looked at the hierarchy of the 4 social classes - Kings, Jarls, Karls and Thralls. 

In PSHE, we have been looking at changes and how sometimes changes can be a little difficult. We watched a lovely clip where a little boy was moving house and we thought really carefully about the emotions of the characters.