Stanford Junior and Infant School
Living together - Learning together
On this page you can see updates over the term of our activities and learning.
Click on the link below and follow the video instructions to log in and use the new Go Read app.
Mrs Smith, Miss Hoad and Miss Purshouse would like to welcome you to Stanford’s EYFS and Year 1 Unit. Here you will find a friendly video showing you around the 3 classrooms. We hope you enjoy it – can’t wait for you to join us.
Today we have had another visitor in school, Paramedic Emily came to speak to us all about her job as part of our 'People that help us' topic. We asked lots of questions to aid us with our learning. We also got to go in an Ambulance and have a look around. Thank you again for visiting us Emily. We loved it!
J- Paramedics help you when you are poorly and make you better.
C- I liked being bandaged up.
P- I put a sling on for my poorly arm.
E- I liked wearing the helmet.
O- I loved the Ambulance.
F- I LOVED the siren!
This afternoon we have been planting Tomato plant plugs. The aim of these plants is to grow fresh tomatoes, and to learn the responsibly of looking after a plant, and what a plant needs to grow. The children learnt that the plants need sunlight, and water to grow. This will be their responsibility to ensure they have a healthy plant with hopefully Tomatoes to eat!
This afternoon we had a special visit from PCSO Diane as part of our 'People who help us topic.' PCSO Diane spoke to us all apart her job, and what she does to keep us all safe. We even got chance to look at her Police van with the siren and lights on! We know that if we need to contact the Police in an emergency that we need to dial 999. Thank you for visiting us PCSO Diane, we had a great afternoon!
Today we all visited the farm as part of our learning about baby animals and growth.
We saw baby goats and sheep. We saw many other animals and learnt so much about them.
Our tractor ride took us to see lots of cows in a shed along with some 5-day-old lambs.
Our nature walk was great as we found 10 different hidden animals and some strange creatures in the woods (Pingles!).
Finally we were able to use the fantastic climbing equipment outside and develop our gross motor skills. We found out we can: balance, climb, slide, swing, run, roll, jump and have lots of fun!
Look at all our photos.
Today in Foundation we had a session lead by Compass GO, they read us a story called 'The Boy with Big, Big Feelings' and we spoke about how the characters in the book were feeling. We also drew around a member of our class, and talked about all the parts of our bodies that might change when we are feeling certain kinds of emotions. Finally, we learnt some techniques to help us when we might be feeling overwhelmed like; pretending to blowing a hot chocolate to help us with our breathing.
To start us off on our new topic about Insects we all had a great day dressed up as different insects. We made insects with craft materials, paint and natural resources. We also went on a bug hunt which was super!
Look at our great photos:
In the holidays we had a special delivery for our home corner, a parcel from the post office.
We opened the brown box, which had so much brown paper packaging in it, and found a baby’s bed.
We had instructions and all the tools we needed to build it. So we got to work as a team and built the bed.
We are really happy with our new baby bed. We even used all the brown paper packaging to paint on outside.
In Reception groups today we enjoyed some new learning resources.
We used the fire and police stations to make stories of people who help us. Cars, helicopters, aeroplanes and rescue vehicles were all used.
On the large whiteboard we used our problem solving skills to work in pairs and solve jigsaw puzzles. What a great day back in school!
This week we had an exciting morning in EYFS, we invited our ‘gown – ups’ to come and play. It is the first time some parents have seen us enjoying our wonderful learning spaces. We showed them what we liked to do and they joined us with our learning. Take a look at some of the pictures and read the parent’s comments below.
Parent 1: “It was lovely to see where they are every day and how well they are progressing. Thank you for all of the hard work you put in to helping them learn and thrive.”
Parent 2: “It was lovely to come in… the staff were all lovely and took the time to talk to each parent about the children. It was nice to hear what XX likes to play with and see some of his work.”
Parent 3: “It was lovely seeing XX in her classroom environment, she has settled so well and knows the routine and layout well. She was able to explain to me all of the areas and activities she enjoys doing. All the staff were friendly and welcoming.”
It was wonderful this week to see parents and carers enjoying a reading breakfast event in the Year 1 classrooms. Adults and children alike had an amazing time. Here are some comments and photos to share:
SG: I loved my Mum coming in to my class to read with me.
AB: I enjoyed helping pass the food round to everyone as well as reading with my Grandad.
VS: It was good to show Mum around the classrooms and enjoy reading.
TT: We loved the food and would like to do it again. AH: I loved reading in school with Mum.
We have been very busy decorating bottles to hang in our outdoor area. They look great when they catch the sun!
This afternoon in Foundation and Year One we have been appreciating the beautiful things around us. We learnt this can help how we feel, by taking time to stop, and appreciate the small things in our life that we may take for granted. We went on a nature walk to see if we could do this first-hand. However, we all got a massive shock when a surprise visitor came to see us!
This afternoon in Foundation we have been learning all about St. Patrick's Day. We also completed lots of linked activities too, like looking at traditional Irish dancing, and we practiced what we had learnt outside with our friends.
As part of our ambitious curriculum for all in Foundation we have been looking at animals. This week we have been specifically looking at farmyard animals. So today we focused on a cow, looking at what a cow produces and what it can be made into. In conclusion to this, we found out milk makes butter, so we had a go at making our own butter! We had to do lots of shaking to turn the cream into butter which was a LOT of fun!
Today in Foundation we put the bird cake we had made into the trees in our nature area. We sat together to see if we could hear any animals? We could hear lots of different birds sitting in the trees. We really hope that the birds enjoy our cakes; and we hope to go back soon to see if they have eaten their delights all up!
Our daffodils have begun to open!
Today the children all came dressed up as different book characters. Foundation children looked at a book by Michael Morpurgo called Jemima the Pig and the 127 Acorns. Year one children looked at Rocket Rules by Nathan Bryon and Dapo Adeola. Throughout the day we completed activities related to the books, we also enjoyed some peer reading and shared our favourite books with one another.
We have had lots of fun in Foundation learning all about Pancake Day. In English we read Mr Wolf's Pancakes and wrote shopping lists of ingredients we would need to make a pancake. In Maths we paid for our ingredients. Then in the afternoon we made and tried pancakes with lemon and sugar on.
In Reception the children are set ‘challenges’ in their learning environment. These range from writing tasks, drawing tasks, number challenges, art tasks and games. When they achieve one of these they are given a coloured stick to collect in their ‘Rainbow Pot’.
Children love to see the colours as they achieve their learning challenges. At the end of the week they use those colours to make a rainbow to take home and share with grown-ups. Children can then tell their special grown-ups all about the learning they’ve done in school. Well done to all the reception children!
On Friday we looked at one of our Human Rights. The right to be ourselves, the right to be different, the right to be heard.
We listened to the story of Rosa Parks and compared this to Elmer the Elephant. Rosa fought against being different and segregated and Elmer didn’t like being different either. We learnt that it is GOOD to be different, it is GOOD to be ourselves and we are all AMAZING!
To show our work, we each made a ‘patch’ in the pattern we liked and we glued them all onto Elmer. We love our display do you?
‘I drew dinosaurs because that’s what I like.’
‘I drew flowers because they make me smile’
‘I drew rainbows and unicorns because I love them.’
‘My patch has stripes because I like the pattern.’
This week Reception children have been using cubes to measure how tall different objects are in the classroom. Look at all the measuring we did!
Year 1s have been looking at pictures, colours and patterns of Africa and made headbands.
‘We had lots of fun’
‘I enjoyed looking at the pictures’
‘The headbands are great!’
In the autumn we planted miniature daffodil bulbs. The children have kept a close eye on them during the winter. We are very excited that they are now growing, and hope to soon have some flowers.
To go with our English text foundation have been having a go at making their very own African Drums this afternoon. We made our drums by using a yoghurt pot, paper and an elastic band. Here are some of our drums we created!
Today we celebrated National Storytelling Week by reading our favourite stories that we brought into school. We shared our stories with our friends and spoke about what our favourite parts of the stories were.
Our current story, The Leopard’s Drum, is really exciting. It is an African story with a large African drum as a centre piece.
We have been looking at the drum, describing and exploring it, as well as enjoying playing it ourselves. We also listened to professionals playing the drums and singing. It has been great fun.
Last week children wanted to turn their animal pictures into stick puppets. They were amazing! The children then enjoyed taking it in turns to perform stories using their puppets in our theatre. An audience began to gather, some with their babies, others filming on their smart phones!
What a great afternoon we had, all initiated by the children themselves.
Today we have been learning all about Chinese New Year and that this year is the year of the tiger! We dressed up in some traditional Chinese clothes, made marks to create Chinese numbers in rice, and wrote some Chinese symbols.
This week some reception children decided they wanted to make crowns. They selected the materials they wanted to use, problem solved to make them fit each other, worked together to help everyone succeed and were successful in their chosen challenge.
Well done to all those involved!
As part of our learning about animals, reception children are exploring crocodiles. We have learnt how to mix two primary colours to make the green we needed to paint crocodiles. We made a huge crocodile outside with wooden bricks. We also painted, drew and cut out crocodiles for a display. In the story making area we used wild animals to make stories about how a crocodile hunts and kills its prey. Look at the fun we’ve had along the way.
We explored the ice in our outdoor tuff tray. We had fun rescuing the polar animals that were trapped.
Today the children came to school dressed as animals for our hook day into our new topic of animals. The children completed animal themed activities in the afternoon such as; making masks and playing with the small world animals, which they all really enjoyed. It was a great day!
Today we went on a shape hunt for squares and rectangles which has been our focus in Maths this week. We looked inside and outside, then counted all the squares and all the rectangles that we could find. Here are some of the things we found!
Today for our polar express day we came to school in our pyjamas and dressing gowns. We watched polar express and enjoyed hot chocolate and marshmallows. We even pretended to be the polar express train, and made our own believe bells.
Today the children helped Miss Purshouse wrap Christmas presents ready for our Santa's Workshop. The children took their own pictures with the iPads using their skills they had learnt in ICT.
Today in Miss Purshouse's phonics group we wrote our sound of the day (i) in the snow. The children really enjoyed this!
Year 1 and Foundation pupils paired up to experience their first ever school trip. It was certainly one to remember! Take a look at our activities:
We all watched and joined in the elves’ show.
We really enjoyed seeing and feeding all the animals.
To find Santa we had to go through a magic forest and find his house.
He gave us all a magic token to spend in the toyshop. We all got a chocolate coin for our change! And an amazing toy to take home.
A really long journey around the farm was great, as we saw lots more animals.
We had great fun helping lazy elf make toys in the workshop.
There were lots of games and activities around to play with, We were so worn out on the way home from having SO MUCH FUN!
We have been busy in Marigold Class planting bulbs, looking after them and decorating the pots.
We hope you like them and will want to buy them.
Year 1 have also made posters to advertise the product.
Today the foundation children have been on a bear hunt using positional language they have learnt to explain where the bears were hiding. We had lots of fun, and managed to find all the bears!
Some of our Year 6 pupils discussed how they would like to support some of the younger children with their learning. This week, a group of six Year 6 children choreographed and delivered some PE/fine motor development moves to music in the hall with Marigold and Cornflower class. As you can see, it was enjoyed by all!
We have started to vote for end-of-the-day story in Marigold Class.
We look at each book, choose which one we want to read, put a cube in the correct side of the scales and then at the end of the day whichever has the most we share the story together.
It’s great fun looking and choosing which book we like and it also helps us with our maths skills.
This was today’s result, can you see which book won?
Today we have worn non-uniform to raise lots of money for Children in Need. This afternoon we have completed work it out with Joe Wick's and lots of Pudsey bear activities.
Marigold, Daisy and Cornflower Class: To help with our keeping clean topic, we were lucky enough to have a lovely visit from Mrs Smith's new baby- Cooper! We watched how Cooper enjoys bath time and what Mrs Smith and his Grandma do to keep Cooper clean. This was a great experience to help us with our understanding of the world which features in the EYFS curriculum.
A big thank you to Mrs Smith, Cooper and his Grandma for coming to visit us, and helping us learn!
Foundation and Year 1 children celebrated the start of Diwali on Thursday 4th November. We had already joined an online workshop with the authors of the book, ‘The Best Diwali Ever’ and learnt all about the celebrations. We loved sharing the story book and meeting the authors too. Our celebrations on Thursday were great and ranged from Diwali dancing and making Divas to creating Rangoli patterns in lots of different ways. We hope you enjoy looking at our photos.
Year 2 invited all the Year 1 children to special story telling session.
They told the story of 'The Adventures of Egg Box Dragon' by Richard Adams. They showed them their drawings, read their writing out loud, used their story maps to tell the story in their own words and even acted out the story with great character voices. The children were proud to show their wonderful writing on display too and were able to teach the Year 1 children lots of wonderful vocabulary and exciting story words.
H- I liked drawing the dragon. I didn't know this story before, but now I can write some words about him.
E- I enjoyed listening to the Year 2 children reading.
L- I liked it when I told my story and when I acted it out. It was fun.
Mrs. Wink (School Governor)- It was great to see such enthusiasm from everyone.
L- I can use the special words on the wall now.
W- I felt like I was a teacher.
Foundation, Year 1 and Year 2 children had a very special assembly today to learn all about keeping themselves and others safe on Bonfire Night.
J- My mum puts a carrot on the end of my sparkler to stop me burning myself.
D- Children must never touch fireworks. Grown-ups need to be in charge of them.
S- Loud fireworks can scare pets. They should stay inside.
C- Don’t stand too close to fireworks or bonfires, so you don’t get hurt.
E- Don’t throw fireworks- they are very dangerous.
W- If a spark lands on your clothes, you must stop, drop and roll. Don’t roll back into where the fire is.
A massive thank you to Morrisons for gifting us a gift voucher for our Maths topic. We used the voucher to purchase fruit for making patterns for our Foundation Maths. This also gave the children an opportunity to try new fruits they hadn't before. Thank you again Morrisons! 🍒🍓🍉🍎🍊🍌🍏🍍
Today the Foundation children finished their Maths unit by making their very own fruit patterns. (It was hard not to eat the fruit before we made a pattern!)
In Foundation we love working and learning outside with our friends. We always have lots of fun as well!
At the Be Safe, Be seen event we all got a free bag packed with goodies! We learnt about bike safety and how we always need to be seen when we are on our bikes.
We all had lots of fun doing creepy crafts at our Halloween Night! Look at our pictures (if you dare MWAH HA HAAA!)
This week we have all been making the most of the lovely Autumn weather. In English the foundation children went out to investigate grasses to help with their poetry work.
In the afternoon we all went outside to investigate trees in the autumn. We learnt a new word deciduous.
We found different trees as well as leaves, acorns and other autumnal grasses.
We even had a go at bark rubbing.
Foundation children have been learning how to compare amounts in maths. They have made two groups of bears – one with less and one with more bears. They also made towers – one with more cubes and one with less cubes. Look at our amazing work.
We share books with our friends.
We have really enjoyed painting our families.
Thank you all for your wonderful donations of food for our harvest table. We all went to put our donations in the hall and look at how much we had.
Today we had 'Big Talk' come to talk to us all about our private parts and who to tell if anyone asks about our private parts. We also enjoyed listening to The Pantosaurus Song.
Marigold Class have had a fantastic day! Miss Purshouse read some of our favourite books we had brought in, and she wore her favourite Llama t-shirt. We spoke about how wearing our favourite clothes makes us feel and why our books/toy were our favourites.
Year 1s have been learning how to represent numbers on a ten frame this week. We have used all sorts of materials to help us.
Year 1s and Reception children have been using their new story shelves to make stories and write their own books this week.
Our new starters have had a brilliant day today in Marigold Class, we have had so much FUN! Here are some pictures of what we have been learning today.
Year 1s have had fun today, it’s been a bit quiet without our new starters but we are all looking forward to welcoming them in gradually this week. Here’s some of our learning today.
We have all had a lovely day today – our first day as Year 1s. Here is what the children enjoyed:
SG: “I loved building a huge train track and connecting it to another one!”
RA: “I enjoyed doing craft with my friend”
MC: “I liked making a den and playing with the water.”
JM: “I enjoyed playing outside.”
CP: “I liked making my big pictures on the long paper.”
Take a look:
