Hello my name is Sally Wickenden and I am a trainee teacher who has been working with the Seashells since the beginning of October. It's been really lovely to see what fantastic learners the Seashells are and to work with Miss Baron, Miss Hare and Mrs English on so many exciting projects.

We've had  a lovely time in the outdoor classroom, done baking, compost making, monster making, science with Mrs English looking at the weather, making pictures in puddles, had a trip to the cinema by tram so many things!

I have been working with the children with their speed sounds every day and am so impressed with them, they really are super seashells. Together we have learnt about real life heroes. We have learnt about doctors and nurses and the equipment that they use. I was very impressed to hear the children remember really difficult words like otoscope and stethascope and they did a lovely job of administering bandages and looking after the dolls and teddy bears.

This week we have been learning about money and the value of different coins. We have looked at 1p, 2p, 5p, 10p, 20p and 50p coins! The children did some great sorting of coins and working out the value of a 5p and 10p coin and talked about how many pennies where in a 10p coin.

We played shops where the children used real money to buy things from the shopkeeper.

We have also looked at different 'cut out' artists like Matisse, Jan Pienkowsi and Eric Carle who all use cutting out like we do with scissors in  our classroom.We looked at some of their beautiful art and look ed at the painting techniques of Eric Carle. We watched a beautiful story called Snow Dreams by Eric Carle and made our very own cut-out tree decorated  with textured painted paper that the children painted mixing the colours themselves and making textures with cardboard, mesh, corks all kinds of things! They then cut them out and collaboratively we made a beautiful artwork for our classroom.

Here is the link to the story of 'Dream Snow': https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tADbkNlDc1g

 A Wonderful Christmas Performance

What a day we had on Tuesday 10th December! Not one but two fantastic performances of our Christmas show -'The Nursery Rhyme Nativity.' The children were full of enthusiasm and joy as they sang their hearts out on the stage in front of parents, siblings, grandparents, friends and the staff. I'm not sure we've ever had such an enthusiastic and energetic bunch of angels before, their celebration dance was brilliant! First the donkey and then the star led our parades to Bethlehem with so much confidence. The narrators said their lines clearly and confidently, and we even had some interpretive dance by two very excited camels during Jingle Bells. We are so proud of you all Seashells and Caterpillars, you are all little superstars!!

Thank you to the amazing staff for supporting with dressing, supervising and singing and to our fantastic appreciative audience. Lastly our nativity would just not be the same without Mr Vaughan and his wonderful piano playing. Thank you everyone!

 Heroes - Police Officers

This week we have been learning about Police Officers and how they help people stay safe. We watched a video to find out some information about the equipment that they need.

We looked at things that were similar about the Police and other emergency services such as wearing uniforms, helping people and using vehicles with a siren and flashing lights.

We looked at pictures of the uniform that they wear too.

A trip to the church

We went on our second trip of the year to St Bart's Church. The ground was very frosty on the way. We had to be careful as we walked down the steps. Mr Wilcock greeted us and we went into the warm church. We did some drama around the nativity story. Then we sang a song and had a biscuit and a drink.

Heroes - Firefighters

Welcome back!

This week we explored a box of items that gave us some clues about some heroes that we will be learning about this term.

We looked at each item and discussed what it might be for and who might use it.

The box included:

• A boot
• An axe
• A torch
• A walkie talkie
• Trousers with reflective strips
• A hose
• An extinguisher
• A yellow helmet

 Sorting sizes

In maths we have been learning about size. We looked at a book about size and learned that objects that take up more space are bigger than objects that only take up a small amount of space. We sorted objects into 3 sorting circles according to size.  Everybody was brilliant at using size words to compare the objects. We came up with lots of words for big!

We also put teddies in order by size, starting with the smallest teddy. 

 A trip to the cinema

All aboard the tram! Foundation 2 are off on a trip. We had a brilliant time on our first trip of the year to Cineworld Cinema. The INTO FILM festival came to Sheffield, which meant that we could go to the cinema for free (we just paid for the tram and a snack!)

We had to be very sensible on the tram as it was very busy. We held on tight and eventually we got to sit down. There were so many stops!! Can you remember any of the places we saw on the way?

Finally we got to our stop. We walked to the cinema and spotted another school who were coming to the same film as us! Good job we had our high-vis vests on so we didn't get lost!

We found our seats and waited for the film to start. There were lots of other schools there, including the Y3's from Walkley!

The film was called The Secret Life of Pets 2. It was about a Dog called Max and his friends. It was very funny! What was your favourite part?

We enjoyed our popcorn snack and drink too. When the film finished we left our seats carefully. We all had a photo in the foyer before we went back to school. What a brilliant day! Well done everyone for being so well behaved, polite, inquisitive and a joy to look after. We can't wait for our next trip. I wonder where it will be......