We have a new self-service station in our playdough area! The children can come and collect the ingredients they need to make playdough, select the colour and mix it all together. It has been a bit of an experiment to see how much water and how much flour is needed to get the consistency right but it has been fun (and messy!). Thank you for your '£1 a week' contributions that have enabled us to do this.

This morning we arrived at school to discover a dinosaur egg and footprint in our playground! We noticed that the egg seemed to be empty to we spent the morning investigating what kind of dinosaur it could be - and where it might be now! We also did a dinosaur dig in the sand and made fossils using salt dough for our dinosaur museum.

We have set up a new 'deconstructed role play' area in our small playground. The children use boxes, paper, crates, fabric etc alongside their imaginations to turn that area into whatever they want it to be! Today we had spaceships, a Batmobile, cars, a boat and a den for their pets. This will really encourage their creativity and collaboration and we can't wait to see what they come up with next!

When we returned to school this morning, we noticed that someone rather large had visited our playground! A beanstalk had grown around one of the poles and someone had set up a giant chair and table. We found a note to tell us that the giant had returned home because it was too windy but he left us some beans of our own to plant and look after.

We will be learning the story of Jack and the Beanstalk off by heart in our Literacy lessons over the next few weeks and using it to help us write our own stories. We will also be learning all about plants and watching the progress our beans make over the coming weeks.

We continued to celebrate Chinese New Year with our marvellous creations of concertina dragons and Chinese inspired fans.

Hedgehogs have had a fantastic first full week back to school - Mrs Hill would like to say a huge thank you to all parents and children for making her first week so positive and is looking forward to the many more learning adventures ahead.

This week we have had doctors and patients in the role play; we've been exploring magnetism in the investigation area; and lots of puppets have been made for the puppet show stage. 

We are so proud of the fantastic performance the Reception children gave. They were all amazing and their hard work over the past few weeks really paid off! Well done Hedgehogs!

The children had great fun in their PE lesson today. They had to work in teams to release the presents (balls) from under the cones and kick them into the goals, while the opposing team attempted to get the balls back under the cones! 

Something very exciting happened in Hedgehogs today! Mrs Morgan's gingerbread man that she was going to eat after her lunch disappeared! We set off to hunt for him and found a trail of flour and some clues left by a horse, a cow and a suspicious looking fox. At the end of the trail we discovered a story map which told us the fate of the gingerbread man. 

We will be learning this story off by heart over the next two weeks and will be using it to help us create our own. Please take a look at the story map below and see if your child can tell you the story and teach you the actions!

This week in Hedgehog class, we have been learning about the Hindu festival Diwali! The children enjoyed learning how Diwali is celebrated and why it is an important time for Hindus. The children made diya lamps using clay and created medhi patterns using different materials. 

The children had a brilliant day today at the 'Magical Tea Party'. We spent time in the hall playing games and dancing, decorated biscuits and ended the day with some fun magical craft activities! 

This week we have been learning about 2D shapes. We've learnt new vocabulary to describe their features as well as using shapes to represent real life objects. Below are a selection that have been created so far!

The children had great fun designing and creating their rockets using junk modelling materials today. We explored using both PVA and glue sticks to join materials.

The children loved doing the daily mile today. It was our first time on the field completing it and they all did a great job. There were lots of competitive participants. Well done Hedgehogs!