Junior Infant Newsletter 3rd November 2015

Welcome back to everyone after midterm break. We’re delighted to see the children back with happy faces and ready for lots of work!

We have a busy term ahead!  

For the next fortnight we will be covering lots of new things such as learning:

*       New sounds: ‘c’, ‘e’, ‘h’, and  ‘r’.

*       New sight words: Look, at, the, my, look, I, am, like

*       How to write the letter ‘a’

*       Number 2

We are starting to learn all about animals. For the next fortnight we will be learning about animals that hibernate and pets we can have.

Useful Vocabulary Winter    Autumn    hibernation    hedgehog   squirrel    nuts    gathering food      squirrel nest or ‘drey’     hedgehog  nest Cat    kitten   dog  puppy   rabbit    hamster    guinea  pig    bird    goldfish      snake     turtle      tank     aquarium     cage   hutch     bed       bowl    lead       collar

Some rhymes to practice at home:
Mary had a little lamb	Little Bo Peep
Hickety Pickety	I have a pet (Super simple songs available on youtube)

How you can support your child’s learning: Literacy: *       Find things around the house/ in books that start with our ‘s’,’a’, ‘t’, ‘i’, ‘p’ and ‘n’ sounds   as well as our new sounds ‘c’   ‘e’    ‘h’   and ‘r’. *       Cut out pictures from magazines/ brochures/ leaflet with this sound *       Look for this sound in the environment (on signs, in books) *       Encourage your child to practice writing their name and the letter ‘c’ at home Numeracy: *       Practice counting to 5 *       Find things that are pink and orange *       Find 2D shapes in the environment: circles, squares, triangles, rectangles *       Encourage your child to do sorting and matching activities at home: using pasta, toy cars, toy blocks, or socks!  S.E.S.E. *       Talk to your child about winter  and hibernation: what is hibernation? What animals hibernate? Why do animals hibernate? Look for signs of hibernation (squirrels collecting nuts) *       Maybe you could help hibernating animals at home: visit http://www.dspca.ie/   to find out how you can help hedgehogs at home *       Talk to your child about animals we keep as pets. Talk about the different ways we have to care for our pets (food, bed, play time, walks, bringing to the vet). *       If you have a pet bring in a photo to show the class!

Reminders:

Ø Please return homework folders and nursery rhyme kits each day.

Ø If your child is absent please ring the office so we can record any explanations.

Ø Encourage your child to put on and take off their coat independently- this is an important skill to be learnt as the weather begins to get colder!

The Farm

Junior Infants have been busy learning all about the farm. 

We learnt about the different animals that live on a farm and made fabric and fibre animal crafts for display. 

We worked in our groups to make animal reports about some farm animals and then tell the class what we had learnt.

 We wrote about the different animals in our special farm writing books. 

We read some stories about the farm, like Farmer Duck and The Pig in the Pond. 

We also learnt some songs like 'Old MacDonald Had a Farm'. 

Junior Infants know lots about the farm now! 

The Farm

The three Junior Infants were busy learning all about the farm.

We read stories about the farm such as Farmer Duck and The Pig in the Pond.

We learnt about the different animals that live on a farm, like pigs, cows, chickens and sheep!

We even learnt that these animals give us food we eat, like sausages, eggs, and milk!

We had exciting play time with all different farm activities: we painted farm animals, we used animals and sensory boxes to make the farm, we used márla to make farm animals and vegetables and our role play areas turned in to 'Farm Shops!'.

 

We also did lots of writing about the farm. Have a look at our lovely 'farm  books' hanging up outside our classrooms.

Another busy month in Junior Infants!

 

Houses and Homes in Junior Infants

It has been another busy month in Junior Infants!

We were delighted to come back to school after the Christmas holidays and we got straight back to work!

In January we have been learning all about houses and homes.

We read stories like 'A Squash and a Squeeze' and 'The Three Little Pigs'.

 

We are getting very good at sequencing, and we were able to sequence the story of 'The Three Little Pigs'.

 

 

In Art we painted beautiful pictures of our houses and we decorated the houses of the three pigs. In Music we learned new songs like 'Gotta Build a House'.

 

Our play time was all about houses and homes too! In Ms Murray's class our role play area was transformed from the jungle  in to an Estate Agent's office. Teacher went to a real estate agent's office in Bray and got lots of magazines and pictures of houses for us. We took turns pretending to be the customer looking to buy a house, and being the estate agent helping the customers.

 

We did a lot of construction play this month. We had a sand box that we pretended was a construction site with tools and trucks. We had to wear hard hats! We used Lego, Stikle Brick, blocks and Mobilo to plan and build our houses.

 

A big thank you to everyone for a FANTASTIC 'Art at Home Project' this month! The theme was 'Box Town' and look at the amazing houses and buildings that the children made at home. Well done everyone!

 

Thank you also to the parents for attending our Parent Workshops this month, which were based on 'Play'. We wanted to show the parents all the work we do in Junior Infants, even if the children think they've just been 'playing all day'!

 

  Have a look at our video to see what we have been up to this month!

 

Halloween in Junior Infants!

We had a spooky Halloween week in Junior Infants.

We carved a pumpkin.

We made spooky Halloween patterns.

We learnt Halloween rhymes such as '10 Little Monsters, 5 Little Pumpkins and 'Pumpkins, Witches and Ghosts'.

We read 'Room on the Broom', a story all about a witch!

We did lots of Halloween activities in our play time: we made scary monster masks, we made monsters out of play dough, and we turned our play area in to a spooky monster shop!

On the last day we had a Halloween party, and it was also Jay Jay's birthday so we had some chocolate cake!

We also did some other spooky Halloween activities, check them out in our video!

 

Autumn in Junior Infants

In October we learnt all about Autumn.

We went on an Autumn scavenger hunt to see if we could find some signs of Autumn.

We saw conkers on the ground, helicopter seeds, acorns, leaves on the ground and we even saw a squirrel!

We collected signs of Autumn and put them on our Autumn table in our classroom.

We learnt Autumn songs like 'Falling Leaves' and read Autumn stories like 'Leafy the Leaf that wouldn't leave'.

We did lots of play activities based on Autumn. Have a look at our video to see what we did.



The Little Red Hen

In October Ms Murray's class read the story of the Little Red Hen. We then did lots of play activities based on the story of the Little Red Hen and her friends on the farm.

We used lots of materials such as feathers and wool to make masks of the characters.

We used our sensory boxes and farm animals to make the farm.

We used play dough to make lots of different types of breads and cakes for the bakery.

We then turned our role play corner in to a bakery!

Teacher got us special aprons and hats from the bakers in Superquinn.

Have a look at our video to see us in action!