St Mary's
Year 1
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Welcome to our Year 1 page
September information for parents 2022
Our teachers in Year One are Mrs Trickey and Ms Chow and our Teaching Assistants are Mrs Crathern and Mrs Dolata.
Our priority is to ensure the children experience a smooth transition from the Foundation stage into Key Stage One. The Year One curriculum builds upon the learning experiences and knowledge that the children have gained in the reception class.
The Curriculum
Running through our curriculum are 10 ‘Big Ideas’. These ‘Big Ideas’ are found in every subject in our curriculum and serve to ‘thread’ the subjects together. This helps the children to connect their learning, leading to fully embedded knowledge.
In Year One we have a new topic for each term. The main topic is known as a ‘Driver Topic’ and forms the foundations for the learning over the term with other subjects complimenting this.
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Autumn Term |
Spring Term |
Summer Term |
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Childhood This project teaches children about everyday life and families today, including comparisons with childhood in the 1950s, using artefacts and a range of different sources. |
Bright Lights, Big City This project teaches children about the physical and human characteristics of the United Kingdom, including a detailed exploration of the characteristics and features of the capital city, London. |
School Days This project teaches children about their own school and locality, both today and in the past. They compare schooling in the Victorian era to their experiences today. |
The emphasis of our teaching is to engage and enthuse the children in learning and allow them to gain the knowledge needed on which to hook future learning. We pride ourselves on our supportive and nurturing environment which allows the children to feel confident to learn, ask questions and challenge ideas.
The children in Year One benefit, along with the rest of the school, from exciting school trips, visitors to the school who share their expertise and outdoor learning. Another highlight are our ‘Spectacular Days’ which celebrate the breadth and creativity in the curriculum. Our Spectacular Days will focus on these Big Ideas. The children will be mixed with other year group within the school and will have a chance to work with other teachers doing a range of activities both inside and outside the classroom.
English
We teach a spelling/phonic/reading lesson every day. We follow a scheme called ‘Sounds Write’. This is a structured teaching programme which teaches the letters and letter patterns associated with sounds. The children practise both blending and segmenting the sounds in words. These are key skills in reading, writing and spelling.
We teach writing composition skills through a scheme called ‘Talk for Writing’. This involves the children learning and internalising texts, in order to identify transferrable ideas and structures. Texts are explored through drama, reading and writing activities.
As well as sharing class texts, the children also learn reading skills through reading with the class teacher both in a group and 1:1.
Please refer to our Literacy page for ideas of how to support your child with reading at home.
Maths
Maths is taught every day at St Marys. The emphasis is on developing the children’s fluency in maths skills through practise and then applying these skills in order to solve problems. We believe that the use of concrete apparatus and pictures is essential to the children developing a strong ‘number sense’. Number sense refers to a child’s ability to understand what numbers mean and is essential in their mathematical development. Language and symbols are also an important part of the curriculum, as together with pictures and concrete experience they are integral to a child’s understanding of maths.
Learning is shared through whole class teaching, group activities and class discussions. Learning is also explored through open ended tasks and investigations. It is then reflected upon in terms of what the children’s next steps in their learning might be.
We are keen to set ‘open ended’ challenges for the children, in order to help them take their learning on themselves and apply their mathematical knowledge, ensuring mastery and depth as well as breadth of learning.
Please refer to our Maths page for further information about your child’s maths learning.