Our first week back has been very busy. We have been learning about the lifecycle of frogs. We have been using watercolours to paint pictures of the lifecycle.  We have wriggled like a tadpole and froglet.  Using different shapes we made a frog crown, so then we could hop and jump from the lily pad to the brick pit pond!
There was lots of problem solving and fun, as we explored different ways of making the ducks move from one water tray to another one.  

This week we have been reading The Very Busy Spider by Eric Carle. We have been very busy making our own handprint spiders and weaving our plate webs. In the garden we made a large elastic web that we could explore moving across in different ways. The sand pit has been very popular in the sunshine. We have also been on a minibeast hunt around the garden.

The Barn owls have been reading information books to find spider facts and make our own picture factsheets. We were very surprised to find that spiders have six to eight eyes!

The tadpoles are settling in the temporary pond in our garden and we are looking forward to see how they grow and change in the next few weeks.

This week the Barn Owls have been learning about nocturnal animals. The Wendy House has become a night den with the black out tent in and using torches we have found different animals that are awake at night.

We have used our fine motor skills to shape clay to make a model of a nocturnal animal.

The children have shown great maths skills when sorting animals by the number of legs they have.

On Thursday we learnt about VE day and why is it celebrated. We decorated the garden with bunting, and made our own flags. 

Inside the classroom our homecorner became a garden centre and the children have shown great customer service skills! The snack shop allows children to take turns and practice their counting. The Barn Owls are always polite, saying 'please' and 'thank you'.

This week we have been reading The Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle. The children have enjoyed learning about the lifecycle of a butterfly. At the beginning of the week we printed our own hungry caterpillars using potatoes. Using watercolours we made symmetrical patterns on our butterflies. 

The Barn Owls have been very busy in the garden this week. The Wendy House became the Hungry Caterpillar cafe, where children took turns  writing orders and serving customers. 

Using just three colours from the water pump, there were many different colours created. An impromptu car wash appeared outside the cafe too!

This week our story was Pip & Egg by Alex Latimer. Pip and Egg are great friends, but as they grow, they change. Pip grows roots and Egg grows wings. The story has inspired the children this week to create their own birds. In the story Egg flies over the city, and this encouraged the class to build their own city, using a variety of blocks, inside and outside of the classroom. There was also nest building too.

The eggs and nests in the story has been a focus for our counting and maths skills this week. We also used eggs on a spoon to demonstrate our careful balancing skills, getting ready for our races next term!

The beanstalk that has been on our class display for two terms now, has a leaf for each child with their height recorded at the beginning of term 4. We measured our heights at the end of term 5 and could see that we had all grown!

The tadpoles continue to change and it is exciting watching and waiting to see what will happen next.

It was lovely to see children share their Learning Journey books with their parents this week. Proudly showing what they have been learning this term. Well done Barn Owls! Enjoy your half term week.