We are enjoying our Habitat topic and have been thinking about 6 different Habitats-

grassland, woodland, Polar regions, ocean, desert and the rain forest. We generated lots of questions that we wanted to find out about aswell as thinking about what we already know.

This week we will be creating our own Habitat fact files. The booklets will describe an animal in it habitat and the reader will have to guess. In side the booklet we will write information we have found out using Google.

In PE we moved around the 6 different Habitats pretending to be different animals- our partners had to guess what we were thinking about the habitat and the way we moved our bodies. We learnt how to move in different ways, directions and speeds on new equipment and learnt new things from each other about the different animals that choose to  live in the different habitats.

Can you guess the animals we are pretending to be?

Desert

 Ocean- Coral reef

Rainforest

 Woodland

 Grassland

 Polar regions

We have been moving as animals in out PE lesson this week. In Science we are learning about Animals and their habitats we know that animals are all different and move in different ways. We developed sequences using the equipment thinking about moving in different speeds, levels and using different body parts.

Our Science topic this half term is Animals and their habitats. We have been finding out what makes things alive. We developed a set of questions to help us to find out-

1. Can it move?

2. Can it breath?

3. Can it have babies?

4. Can it see, hear, feel, taste and smell?

5. Does it need water?

6. Does it need food?

We looked at lots of different images and decided if they were alive or not. We then used the images and discussed if they were living, non-living or  were once living. 

We had lots of discussions about the things that were once living. We looked at a tree with leaves, a broken tree branch and a tree in winter. We talked together about the winter tree and why it looked dead but was still alive.

Wood from trees.

Meat from animals.

A cotton bobbin, wood from a tree and cotton from a plant.

We have been very busy this week developing our writing skills by writing for a range of purposes. On Monday we read the story the Biscuit bear and thought about his personality, appearance, likes and dislikes. We used our ideas to write a character description of Biscuit bear thinking about writing in full sentences using conjunctions, adjectives and challenging themselves to write similes. 

On Tuesday we came into the classroom to find a mess on one of the tables. There were mini footprints, broken biscuits, and a biscuit box turned over. We found tubes of icing on top of foil and cling film and the flour tipped all over the table. We had  to pretend  we were police investigators writing a report at the scene. To describe the mess and explain where things were we used adjectives and  prepositions (positional words) Our sentences only told the truth about what we could see.

We then developed our design skills and drew biscuit bear dressed up in fancy dress. We worked together to follow a recipe measuring out and mixing the ingredients to make biscuit dough. Using the cutter we created a bear shape before baking them in the oven. We labelled our design telling people what decorations the design will be made from e.g. The round eyes will be chocolate drops. We were then able to create our design using icing, sprinkles and sweets. We also made Mr. Burnley a superhero bear biscuit and Mrs. Roberts a dancing bear biscuit.

In maths we have been working hard to share objects equally and we now understand this as division. We have taken part in different activities and have written the problems set us as number sentences.

Now we understand that we can share out objects and have thought about sharing odd and even numbers of objects between odd and even amounts of people we have started to think about fractions.

We are beginning to understand that a whole one can be one big thing or lots of things put together. We can find a half or a quarter of a big blob of play dough or a set of objects and understand that this means the same as divide by 2 and divide by 4.

We have also been looking at the different language we can use when we are thinking about and solving problems relating to division.

We have really enjoyed developing our art skills this week and have learnt how to thread cotton, sew fabric together using a running stitch, plait ribbon, join fabric to card using glue, cut around a template and thread beads onto ribbon.

We used all these skills to create out own winter scene with a penguin being the focus in the picture. We used a range of materials to create different textures and choose the colours carefully to match the object/place we were creating. We  enjoyed spending every afternoon adding more detail and layers to our piece of art.

Come and have a look at them on display in the classroom.

We had a challenge this week and we used the TASC wheel and the thinking hats to help us to develop our ideas, share our thoughts and feelings and use our knowledge and understanding to solve the problem.

How will we get the polar bear out of the ice quickly?

We talked together and used the thinking mat to develop our ideas and questions.

We generated our own ideas and thought about bashing the ice with tools, using a hairdryer and one child suggested wrapping the ice up in a sleeping bag. We were then able to talk to our friends and magpie ideas before we move on to thinking about ideas and using black hat to think of problems. Lots of us were concerned for the polar bear, hitting the ice would scare, we also wondered if we could lift the ice block into a sleeping bag?

We decided to carry out a test and choose three different ways to melt the ice-
1. Using hot water
2. Using salt
3. Putting it on a radiator

We talked about it being a fair test and decided that we should-
* Use three plastic bowls that were the same
*Use the same amount of ice cubes (3 in each pot)
*Check the ice cubes after the same amount of time
*Use the same amount of hot water and salt

After 5 minutes we check all three bowls and the ice cubes that had been in the hot water melted the quickest.

We must use hot water to get the polar bear out of the ice.

BUT...

What if the polar bear was real and stuck in  ice in a polar region?
Could we use hot water then?

Lots of children really thought about this and decided they would not be able to get hot water so would use salt as it also melted the ice, it just took a bit longer. They would be able too carry bags on snowmobiles or sleds.

Look how busy some of us have been at home completing the extra homework activities. Come and have a look at them on the  display in the classroom.

Maisie F has been busy developing her cutting and joining skills, using a needle and thread to join the pieces of felt she had cut to the correct shape and size. She created her very own penguin.

A fantastic jigsaw created by Brooke C

What fantastic sewing skills you have Brooke C. You have created a brilliant felt fish.

Cillan has made a brilliant whale out of card. You have made it a 3D model using a toilet tube in the middle. This is fantastic.

 Thank you Brooke C for baking and decorating a brilliant igloo cake. It was delicious.

Reuben has created a polar habitat for his lego penguin.