Year 1

Welcome to the Year 1 page! 

On this page, you will be able to find out about all of the children's learning and gain an insight into what we are doing in class.

The Year 1 teachers are:

Miss Beardsley is the Phase Lead for Year 1 and 2

Mrs Ind and Miss Nadin - Class 3 

Miss Kittle -  Class 4 

Mrs Cooper and Miss Oakey also support the children's learning every day. 

Message from the Year 1 teachers: 

 We have been so impressed with the children's learning so far. 

Important Information: 

In Year 1, we recognise how important PE is as part of the curriculum.

Our PE lessons are as follows:

Indoor PE -  Tuesday

The children will need their PE kits in school for their PE lesson. This should consist of:

- blue, black or grey shorts/ bottoms

- a white or house coloured t shirt 

- pumps or trainers which the children can fasten themselves. 

Homework: 

We are really keen for the children to use Numbots - https://play.numbots.com/#/account/school-login/52740 

This website allows your child to practice and apply their understanding of number. It supports them with their maths learning in school. We recommend that your child uses their login at least three times a week.

Reading at home:

In Key stage 1, we value the importance of reading. We know that learning to read is a priceless, life-long skill that will unlock the whole curriculum for your child. Reading is important in all year groups but particularly in Year 1 as your children will sit their Phonics Screening Test in June. This assessment includes testing your child's phonics knowledge and how well they have progressed throughout the year.  

It is important that your child reads regularly at home to help them consolidate their sounds that they have been learning in school, develop their fluency and support their comprehension. It is really important that all children have their reading records and reading books in school each day. Within their reading record, it is really important that you record every time they read at home as this provides important communication between home and school. When your child reads at school, you will receive feedback in the reading record too. 

Continuous Provision in Year 1: 

We aim to prepare the children for their school life and beyond by making them enthusiastic readers, writers, mathematicians, scientists and so much more. While there is a change in curriculum from EYFS -> Year 1, continuous provision makes this transition less of a barrier for the children. We facilitate and build upon provision moving into Year 1 through a blend of teacher-led sessions, small group work, independent practice tasks and time for children to demonstrate and deepen their learning by accessing a range of activities in our continuous provision area. Eventually, we will move towards a more formal timetable in preparation for Year 2.

We have the following areas which are shared across the two classrooms:

• Reading Garden
• Creative Area
• Maths Area and Numbots Station
• Construction Zone
• Storytelling Station
• Phonics Area
• Writing Corner
• Fine-Motor Gym
• Topic Table – relating to our focus in history/geography

We believe that continuous provision in Year 1 enables the children to explore and apply their recent learning, communicate confidently, think critically, while crucially building on their independence.

Year 1 Curriculum  

Maths

In maths, we will be building on the EPIC number work that the children did in their Reception year.  We will spend the first few weeks back reviewing the numbers to 10 and introducing the children to new mathematical vocabulary.  We will look at the numbers in detail, ordering and comparing them.  The children will have lots of opportunities to present their maths in different ways. They will also be learning how to record their work in the maths books.  After this, we will look at addition and subtraction within 10, building on the work completed in the first unit.

In Year 1, the children will be introduced to Fluent in 5.  This is completed by all children in Years 1 – 6.  Each day the children will spend 5 minutes completing some basic calculations as a class, with the methods and answers then being discussed as a class.  Fluent in 5 aims to improve the children’s fluency in maths.

Writing  

We are going to be focusing on our basic sentence structure and letter formation for the first term, through the use of a class story – Butterfly Island.  We will continue to learn the story (as in Reception)  and use this as a model for our own journey story.  The children will be given lots of time to rehearse their sentences and practise using capital letters, finger spaces and full stops correctly.  We will also be teaching the children how to form their letters correctly through our handwriting scheme – Nelson Handwriting.

 ELS (Essential Letters and Sounds)

In Year 1, the children will continue on their ELS journey, helping all children to learn to read quickly.  During this first term, we will be reviewing the sounds that the children learnt in their Reception year and looking in particular at ay, ou, ie, ea, oy, ir, ue, aw, wh, ph, ew, oe.  We will use these sounds in real and alien words to help to develop the children’s blending skills.

We will also be encouraging the children to use their sounds that they are learning in their writing using this method:

Say it, stretch it, segment it, blend it, count the sounds, say the whole word.

In ELS, Year 1 will be introduced to the alternative sounds. Please look out for the flashcards that will be added to the children's previous sounds each Friday. The children will be reviewing phase 5 sounds in preparation for the phonics screening test that they will sit in June. 

Science 

In Science, we will be looking at animals, including humans.  We will be Scientists by asking questions and using our observing and measuring skills.  We will start the unit by labelling the parts of the human body and then moving onto exploring our 5 senses.  After this we will focus on animals, comparing them and looking specifically at birds, fish, mammals, amphibians and reptiles.  We will also learn what is meant by the terms: herbivore, carnivore and omnivore.

Throughout the year, we will also be looking at the seasons.

History

In History, we are going to be answering the following question:

How have the toys that children have played with changed in the last 100 years?

We will be looking at chronology and what we mean by a timeline.  We will be finding out how we can find out about the past by asking questions of people who lived then and exploring artefacts.  We are very excited to be welcoming the Wilson Museum into school to share some old toys and complete a workshop with Year 1.  This will give the children some hands-on experience of old toys, allowing them to compare with toys now.  Within this topic, we look at how technology and toys has changed.

Computing 

We will be having fun programming the beebots in Computing this term.  We will be learning about algorithms and how we can get our beebots to follow a route.

Art 

Our first unit of work this year will focus on the skill of drawing.  We will be exploring how we can make different lines using different materials.  We will then move onto drawing waves to show water, using different mediums to create marks and ending the unit by producing an observational piece of drawing.

RE

In RE, we will be exploring what it means to be a faith community.