Hello Children. You are doing a fantastic job of solving these riddles and finding out all about the different minibeasts each week; we are really impressed! It has been lovely to speak to some of you on the phone and find out from your grown ups all the lovely things you have been up to. We will carry on making phone calls this week so if you haven’t heard from us yet, you will this week.

We have a new riddle this week for you to solve so you can work out what minibeast we will be finding out about. It is a very special minibeast! Can you work out what it is?

Once you have, use it to help you with your maths activities below.

Maths

Hello Crocodiles and Elephants,

Do you know the rhyme about Incy Wincy Spider? Can you sing it? What happened to Incy when it rained? What did he do when the sun came back out?

This week we would like you to play an Incy Wincy Spider Game with a grown up at home.  Click on the links below for all the things you need to play the game and the instructions.  As you are playing the game, look carefully at the numbers, what do you notice about the numbers as you move up the numberline? What do you notice as you move down the number line? Can you tell your grown up?

Have fun!

Eric Carle has also written a story about this minibeast called “The Very Busy Spider” Do you have it at home? If not here is a link to a video of it.

Writing 

Now in this week’s riddle, we asked you "Are all minibeasts the same? Do they all have the same number of legs and body parts? Are they all insects? How could we find out?" Talk to the children about where we could find information from. They will almost probably all say Google or Alexa but also talk to them about non-fiction books and other ideas too.

This week, we would love you to think of your own question about spiders write it down in the speech bubble,  then research the answer and write it down.

Mr Groves would ask "Why do spiders not stick to their own webs?"  What would you like to find out?

Remember to use a question mark for your question rather than a full stop. Remember to use your tricky word mat, finger space stick and phonics strips to sound out all of your words. Can you use a range of conjunctions?

Phonics and Reading

This week we are continuing to learn how to build bigger words.

We are now looking at CCVC words where there are two consonants, a vowel and then a final consonants at the end. For example, frog and step.

There are games in Education City- Subjects- English-F2- Letters and sounds- Phase 4 and 5. Please encourage the children to play these games, along with any others of their choice.

Please play Spot the Frog and Star Clown

There are lots of games you can play with these words that you already know such as pairs games, hangman, writing on ground grass, sky boards, magnetic letters, eye spy, anagrams, buried treasure in the sand etc.

More games can be found at https://www.phonicsplay.co.uk/Phase4Menu.htm

This week on Espresso (which you can login to through the SIMS ID login):

Please can you play the two games called words beginning with CC.

Then watch the two videos called words beginning with CC.

Finally, there are 6 games we would like you to play: blending, reading and spelling with CCVC words.

Please let us know if you are having problems signing into SIMS ID.

The two new tricky words for this week are ‘there’ and ‘out’ please show your child these words written down and on their tricky word bumblebee mat provided at workshops. The action for ‘there’ is point with a single index finger to the floor and the action for ‘out’ is made by bending your hand and moving it forwards twice. Imagine a beak pecking somebody.

The children enjoy coming up with sentences for the new words; playing stations with them (where they have to run around the outdoor classroom to find the word) and splat the tricky word where they are all laid out and first person to splat the word wins. Last week I heard of two children playing this using a trampoline to splat which is a great idea!

In Espresso please play the tricky word games shown here.

For reading this week, we have allocated either 2 or 4 books on Bug Club at the appropriate level for your child to read and answer the questions to the quizzes as they go by clicking on the bugs so we can see how they are doing. We have ensured all children have the minimum books allocated to them as of Sunday afternoon.

Below are some comprehension tasks the children might like to have a go at. 

Computing

This week, could you create your own minibeast puzzle? Use all the drawing and painting skills you have learnt at school to create your picture. Remember to use the fill tool and to use the pencil for thin lines and details and the paint brush for larger colouring.

Start with a normal rectangle puzzle and then make it harder by choosing one of the other designs. Can your grown ups at home solve your puzzle?

Creative

Hello Crocodiles and Elephants,

Wasn’t the spider busy spinning the web?

This week we would like you to have a go at making a spider’s web.

As well as photographs showing you how to make the web, there is also a video link so you can watch someone really quickly make their web.

Once you have made it you could hang it in a tree or bush in your garden.  You might find that a real spider decides they like it and spin their web into yours!

The thread that spiders spin their webs with is super, super strong.

Parts of their webs are sticky, this is to help the spider catch their food. Little insects like flies get caught in the web.

A web that has been left by the spider because it doesn’t need it any more is called a ‘cobweb’.

Do you know any more facts abut spiders?

Enjoy your web making!