If you go down to the brook today...

My goodness, time is just flying by! There's only a month left until the Christmas break and there's still lots of lovely things to do in the butterfly classroom!

This week we worked very very hard practicing our assembly. While we were in the hall, we happened to stumble across a steel drum duo who were going to play for the main school. We were very kindly invited along, and they even played wheels on the bus just for us!

After they played for a while they asked if we wanted to stand up and dance. We said yes please! Some of the other boys and girls were a bit noisy, but the butterflies were very sensible.

(I was hoping there would be a picture of me awkwardly dancing to pay back Mrs Chandarana for last week, but I seem to have done a very good job at hiding in the back ground!)

We have been having a big push on fine motor skills in the class this week. The children had great fun playing with the pegs, racing to see who could clip the most on their friend in a minute! 

 We have noticed that a lot of our children need to build up strength in their hands. There are lots of fun ways you can help at home! Playing with Plasticine or play dough, tug of war games, tearing paper, climbing on things in a playground, anything that's a bit tricky and gets them squishing! 

The butterflies had to work super hard all week to make sure our assembly was super! Here they are learning when to stand up!

Mrs Worrall demonstrates how to creep like a bear.

This super Red Admiral shows her how to do it properly!

Our star of the week looking after her friend! Well done little Red Admiral, you really showed us all how to be a kind friend.

After all that practice we needed a play! A windy day provides an excellent opportunity to learn about the world, and find out what happens when we throw things into the wind! 

We also got to run down the hill flying kites! We had so much fun! Children learn the best through real experiences, with an adult there to ask them questions which help them decide what's happening, and then explain any gaps in their understanding.

The boys became a big team this week and worked really hard together to keep the playground tidy! They even put the leaves in the compost bin to feed the worm family that live there.

After all that, it was time for our big day! Thank you so much to the grownups that came to see us. I cannot presently locate the video, I will have a hunt for it on Monday. It would be a real shame not to share that with the world!

 If you click on one of the pictures, it should pop out in a light box which may make it a little easier to see them all.

(If there's any pictures that you'd like emailing so you can have a copy let me know and I will send them to you. )

Then it was back to the classroom for our grownups to do the learning! Thank you to everyone who took time out to come today, it was very much appreciated by us all. 

We had a little play, and worked together on some buildings. Then we rushed off to lunch. Time just zoomed past today!

 

 To reward the butterflies for all their hard work we had a real treat afternoon, watching Shaun the Sheep, eating chocolate and playing with the parachute!

 Building up hand strength can be really fun!

Thank you so much to everyone who helped make our phonics meeting a success. Here are some of the links people asked for:

Jolly phonics actions to accompany the sounds.

How to say the pure sounds.

Busy things

I know that phonics can be very confusing when you start, so feel free to come to anyone in the butterfly classroom with your questions and we will do our best to help you. We all want you and your child to have the best experience of school that you possibly can have, so don't be shy!

Next week we will be learning about people who help us and careers. Hopefully you will have all got a letter inviting you to come and talk to us. We would love to hear from you, no matter what you do! One little butterfly jumped up at the end of the day, all wide eyed, and told me "MY DADDY WORKS IN AN OFFICE!", so don't think you need to have an exciting career to be welcome!

I look forward to hearing from you! Goodbye and toodle-oo.