This week in Dexter class

Phew, it's turning out to be a hot one this week already! Thank you for sending in those sunhats and popping on the sunscreen. We are making sure the children stay cool, hydrated and get some time in the shade.

As we have had a little bit of rain this week I told the children that they could bring in a snail (or two) for our snail hotel. We will also welcome the odd caterpillar or worm as our new story is Superworm by Julia Donaldson and Axel Scheffler. We will be looking in more detail at garden mini-beasts in preparation for our upcoming visit to Robinswood Hill Country Park.

In our literacy, language and communication journey we will be looking at using describing words (adjectives) to talk about the main characters in Superworm. We will orally retell it using a story map to support us so watch out for a video of that soon on Tapestry. On Tuesday we will 'box it up' to show that we understand the sequence of events. On Wednesday we will read sentences as a whole class tracking the text as we go and then on Thursday we will rewrite the first part of the story. The children are starting to compose and write strong sentences including capital letters, finger spaces and full stops. We are encouraging independent writing where possible in readiness for the transition to year 1 and it is lovely to see children choosing to write in their learning power time and at home.

In maths we are continuing to look at sharing and grouping and will also be working on odds and evens and doubles. The children will take part in the rapid recall club maths challenges on Thursday.

Our phonics focus is on the ew and aw sounds this week and these are the last two Phase 5 sounds that we will learn this term as we will then focus on blending and segmenting, reading and writing of tricky and high frequency words and spelling choices when writing. For example, would we choose er, ur or ir when writing the word bird?

In outdoor play the children are enjoying the sand pit, den building and games such as skittles. We are also looking for bugs and the children have used some of the apparatus to set up a bug hotel, complete with a slide and swimming pool!

In PE on Friday we will be starting some practise for Sports Day. As long as this can be done safely and the temperature isn't too hot we will do this on the Green and if not we will do it in the hall.