Year 1

Key Information 

Spellings

Knebworth Visit

On a very, very hot July day, we visited Knebworth House and Gardens. We learnt about the plants that grow there, got lost in the maze and had great fun playing in the adventure playground. It was a lot of fun! 

Sports Day 2025!

Our annual sports day saw Purple Sparrowhawks emerge victorious. Well done to everyone who took part. 

Money

To consolidate our learning about Money, we had fun playing lots of maths games such as Bingo and pairs. 

Fun on the Field

As part of sports week, we had a fun on the field session with Reception and Year 1. We tried out lots of sports equipment and had lots of fun choosing our own activities. 

Drama Session 

We enjoyed a fun drama session from Perform and became the animals trying to rescue the snow lion who had been captured. It was a lot of fun being all of the different animals. 

Brushetta

As part of our DT learning, we all made bruschetta, practising our skills of chopping fruit and vegetables safely. 

Aladdin's Lamp

This half-term we are creating our own stories based on Aladdin. For our creative hook, we made our own magic lamp. 

Our Shop 

In maths, we are learning about money and have made our own shop. We are learning to recognise notes and coins by finding the right notes and coins in the shop. 

Rock Steady 

Just before half-term, we had a visit from Rock Steady. They demonstrated the instruments to us and then we had the opportunity to make our band. It was great fun! 

Exploration Timelines

In Geography and History, we have been learning about exploration. We learnt that history means things that happened in the past and a timeline can be used to show when something happened. We learnt about some of the famous explorers and placed them on the timeline. We will be learning more about these explorers in the coming weeks. 

Map Making 

In Geography, we have been learning about maps. We are going to be making our own maps of the school. We went for a walk around the school to find the information that we will need to put on our maps. 

VE Day 

To mark VE Day, we learnt about the end of the war and why the war happened. To celebrate the end of the war, we played 1940s games in the playground. Thank you to Mrs Hay, Mrs Bond and Miss Passmore for organising these for us!

Capital Letters 

This term we are focusing on perfecting our writing before we go up to Year 2. One of the things we have been focusing on is using capital letters and full stops. You can use the practice sheet below to practise your capital letters at home. 

Welcome Back!

It's the Summer Term! Our final term in Year 1 and we have lots of learning to do. We are going to be writing stories, poems and reports, working with numbers to 100 and learning to measure and tell the time. We'll also be learning about famous explorers, the seasons, sculpture and much, much more. We have a very busy term ahead! 

Our Learning 

Easter Service

As part of our Easter Celebrations, we attended an Easter Service at St Peter's Church. Thank you to Reverend Kate and Peter for the service. 

Easter Egg Hunt 

Thank you to F.O.S.P. for our Easter Egg Hunt. We had great fun hunting for eggs and meeting the Easter Bunny!

Silly Science Workshop

Along with Year 2, we enjoyed taking part in a silly science workshop with 'The Professor'. We took part in lots of experiments and learnt about the science behind the experiments. It was great fun!

Super Spellers!

We have been working very hard to practise our spellings. Well done to all our super spellers this week who scored highly in their spelling test. Well done for all your efforts!

Woodwork

Mr Haslett has been kind enough to spend some time teaching us how to use woodworking tools. We have learnt how to use a hammer and how to stay safe when using the tools. We had a lot of fun!

Happy World Book Day!

We came to school either dressed as our favourite book character or, in our bedtime story pyjamas. Can you work out who we came as? 

Planting Beans

In science, we have been learning about plants. We have planted bean seeds so we can observe how they grow. We learnt about the things which a plant needs to grow so we can look after our plants. 

Pizza!

In our new English unit, we are learning to write instructions. For our creative hook, we made our own pizza. We will be learning to write instructions so other people can make our pizzas. We have started our learning by finding out about imperative verbs. (These are sometimes known as bossy verbs because they tell us what to do.) Some examples of imperative verbs are roll, sprinkle, knead and mix. We made our own videos to explain how to make pizza and practised using imperative verbs as we gave our instructions. 

Volume and Capacity

In maths, we have been learning about volume and capacity. Capacity is how much space there is inside a container and volume is how much liquid is actually inside the container. We have been using the terms full, empty, half-full, nearly full and nearly empty to describe how much liquid is in a container. We have also been measuring how much water containers hold, using non-standard units, e.g. a jug holds 6 cups of water. 

Our Senses

In Science, we have been learning about our five senses: sight, hearing, taste, touch and smell. We took part in different activities to explore our senses. We smelt different foods to try to identify them, we listened to the sounds made by different instruments, counted how many different things we could see, described how different materials felt and tasted different foods. We pulled some funny faces when we tasted the lemon - it was very sour! 

Measuring

Our new unit in maths is 'Measures'. We have been learning to compare lengths and heights and measure different objects in the classroom using cubes. 

Chinese New Year

Kane told us all about his family traditions surrounding Chinese New Year. We learnt about the importance of the number 8, red envelopes and vegan food. We celebrated the new year in class by making dragons, snake masks and creating our own dragon dance. It was lots of fun and we learnt lots. 

Giraffes Can't Dance 

We have been learning the story 'Giraffes Can't Dance' in English. We have acted out the story to help us memorise it ready to innovate on it and create our own wishing stories. We have also created story maps and role-played the characters. 

Exploring Time

This term, we are working hard as we are now half-way through Year 1! Our lessons are a little longer now, but we still have time for some exploring!

The Jungle Dance 

We are reading 'Giraffes Can't Dance' in English and for our creative hook, we held our own Jungle Dance. We played musical instruments, danced, made masks and made flowers. It was lots of fun and set the scene for our learning. 

Numbers to 50

In maths we have been using manipulatives to make numbers to 50. We have partitioned numbers in to tens and ones and represented numbers with Base Ten. 

Design Technology 

In D.T. we made Christmas cards using levers and sliders. We practised using the class examples and then designed and made our own. It was lots of fun! We hope that our families enjoyed receiving our cards!

Christingles

We were very lucky to be visited by Reverend Kate and Peter who led our Christingle service. Before the service, we learnt about Christingles and made our own. 

Making Wind Socks

As part of our science learning, we have been looking at different ways to measure the weather. We made rain gauges to measure the amount of rain which falls and wind socks so we can see the direction of the wind. 

Shapes

In our maths lessons, we have been learning about 2D and 3D shapes. We have had lots of fun going on shape hunts making patterns with shapes and printing with 3D shapes to discover their 2D shape faces. 

Dentist Visit

We were very lucky to have a visit from a local dentist, Talia and her dental nurse, Abi. They told us how to keep our teeth clean and healthy and spoke to us about how dentists can help us. 

Children in Need Ramble

As has become a Shephalbury tradition, we donned our wellies, hats and gloves and embarked on a ramble around Shephalbury Park on Friday in aid of Children in Need. It was lots of fun! 

Properties of Materials

In science, we have been learning about the properties of materials. We used what we have learnt to design and make an umbrella for a teddy. Once made, we took them outside and made it 'rain' to see if our umbrella designs had worked. 

Beegu

We arrived at school to find that Beegu had landed in our garden! Beegu is a friendly little alien who was lost. We read her story and learnt about how she tried hard to make friends with the Earth creatures she met, but sadly no-one wanted her. Eventually, she had a happy ending and her parents came and collected her. We enjoyed acting out the story and learning it by heart so we could innovate on it and write our own versions. 

Maths - Comparing Numbers 

In Maths, we have been comparing numbers to ten and are moving on to comparing numbers to 100. We learnt to use the symbols <, > and = and played lots of maths games to practise our skills. 

Meet the Teacher 

It was lovely to see so many parents at the 'Meet the Teacher' afternoon. The slides from the presentation and the curriculum newsletter can be found by clicking on the links below. 

Cinderella

We received an invitation to Prince Charming's ball on Tuesday. We made crowns, wrote our invitations and off we went! We used our magic to turn a pumpkin into a carriage and had great fun dancing at the ball. When the clock struck midnight, we ran back to class quickly. 

Exploring Our New Classroom

We still have time for exploring in Year 1, after we have finished our lessons. We enjoyed exploring the inside and outside areas of our new classroom. 

Our Week...

On Monday afternoon, Mrs Spiller teaches us WRE and Music. 

On Tuesday afternoon, we have P.E. which is taught by Mrs Robinson.

On Wednesday afternoon, we visit the school library to change our books. 

On Friday, we take home our new spellings and get tested on those from the week before. 

Welcome to Year 1!

We have a fun-filled year of learning planned and can't wait to get started! 

Mrs Cargill and Miss Gibson are looking forward to working with you.