Red Class have had a relaxing start to the new school term with swimming and time spent in the soft playroom featuring heavily after the long summer break. Our weekly swimming lessons at Crystal Palace have resumed. These are then backed up with quality time spent in the soft play area. Both activities are great for exploring different sensory skills, and allowing each pupil to understand more about their own bodies and reactions.

This is an important transition year for most of our pupils in Red Class. Making the move up from Key Stage 1 is a major event as our pupil’s progress through Turney School. Red Class have managed this move in a smooth manner.

Red Class have really enjoyed reading our current class book of Not Now Bernard – so much so that we have built our very own Turney School friendly monster! All of the children took part in helping to create the magnificent display. We carefully cut out the materials needed, and then worked as a team to complete our display.

We have also been very active out in our local community. Red Class have been visiting the nearby Rosabelle Allotment over the recent weeks and helping out with the gardening. The children have been learning about different types of soil, as well as learning how we can use stone and other natural resources around our gardens.

Red Class have been reading and acting out the wonderful story of The Gruffalo. We have used this book as the starting point for a pice of work that will conclude with an assembly for the rest of our primary schools friends before half term. We have introduced the children to the different animals within the story, and then asked then which are their favourite.

The Gruffalo has also been helping Red Class during drama and music lessons. We have been acting out the movements and sounds of each animal, and then learning a special Gruffalo song that we will be singing during our assembly. All of the characters will be signed out, with Red Class showing their knoweldge of the story. You can watch a short video of one of our early rehearsals above.

We are very pleased in the way that the brand new Red Class is settling into the new term at Turney School. We have welcomed children from four other previous classes into our classroom. We have been spending the first week getting to know all of our new friends, and understanding how we can learn and play together well whilst at school. Once all of the children feel comfortable, then we will start work on what promises to be a busy term ahead.

Red Class will be reading The Gigantic Turnip as their main class book for this term. This is a fantastic story that features many different animal characters. We will be able to use this to help with our animal recognition skills. Plenty of D & T artwork based around the book will also take place. Red Class will be staging a school assembly later on this half term. Our work on The Gigantic Turnip will be able to be presented to the rest of the school.

As part of our preparation for Wicked Mr Wolf, Red Class have been exploring different sounds made by various percussion instruments. We encouraged all of the class members to choose an instrument. These included drums, shakers and cymbals. We experimented with these to see how each instrument can create a different sound. With the rhythm section in place, we then added in some of our favourite songs from Wicked Mr Wolf. Pupils from around the school have been working on this production throughout the whole of the summer term. Our singing and signing show is starting to fall into place. Red Class are incredibly excited ahead of the main show. You can listen to a short burst from our music session in the podcast below.

Preparation for the Turney School end of term play is in full swing in Red Class. We have been practising our different roles as part of the grand Wicked Mr Wolf production. To help us out with some of the songs and the sign actions, red class have welcomed some of our friends from Yellow class into our sessions. All of the children are now familiar with the plot, and we have been thinking about the sequence in which the songs appear. With the grand performance almost upon us, there is tremendous excitement around Red class.

Rehearsals are well under way in Red class for the prestigious end of term Turney School concert. We are performing Wicked Mr Wolf, a unique play that incorporates characters from both Little Red Riding Hood and the Three Little Pigs. Red class have been practising many of the songs that all of the school will sing on the grand day. We are hopeful of also adding in some acting and dancing parts. We have been using our rehearsal time to try and see which pupils would like to take up one of these roles. This week we rehearsed the performance from start to finish, to try and get a good understanding of the timings involved. This is the first time that Turney School has staged a grand musical as the end of year performance. We are all incredibly excited! You can listen to some of the Red class singing in the podcast below.

Red Class are deep in preparation ahead of their Primary school assembly. We are going to be telling the story of Jack and the Beanstalk to the rest of the children. We have been learning the sequence of events in the story, and then putting together our assembly based on signing out the main events that take place. We will be re-telling the famous tale also using song, helping to add a new enjoyment to a story that is very popular around the school. Good luck, Red Class!

We have been introducing different objects to the children in Red class, to help them explore their senses and to improve their communication skills. The items that we worked with included a heart shaped box containing some chocolate; a jack in the box and a large box containing smaller sized boxes inside. Having explored the objects during class circle time, we asked each pupil to communicate what they could see and feel. This exercise also helped us with out focus and concentration. Presenting the pupils with an item that requires exploration encourages good listening and looking skills.

Red class have been incredibly creative this week, producing a number of brilliant art displays. As part of the preparation for our school assembly, the children have produced some beautiful butterfly pictures. We have been seeing how the wing patterns on a butterfly are symmetrical. We used this technique in our paintings, folding over the picture to create a mirror image of one of the wings.

Red class have also produced a class display based around our current reading book, No Room for Pooh Bear. The story tells how Pooh Bear stores everything in his pouch – our artwork reflects this too! Finally, red class have also made a selection of puppets to accompany our work on the Brown Bear book. We have been using these to act out the story.

Red class had a brilliant PE session using the school trampoline this week. Our aim was to listen to instructions, add in some new movements and of course have some fun! The children practised jumping, turning and using their arms for extra balance. This is a great activity to help improve our coordination, as well as a useful listening skill. Red class were able to carry out the instructions on the trampoline, as you can see in the video above. We all left our PE session feeling incredibly happy, with big smiles all round in Red class!

Much of our literacy learning in Red class this term will be based around the Brown Bear book. We are learning about the many different animals that are found around the world. Brown Bear is a great character to be starting with! We will also be reading other animal themed books throughout the term, such as The Gruffalo. Red class will be working towards presenting an assembly to the rest of the primary school children, where they will share their work all about animals.

Red class are having great fun reading Rumble in the Jungle! This is a highly interactive book that provides us with many opportunities to explore the different animals across various parts of the curriculum. We started off our session by remembering how to sign each animal in the story. These include a crocodile, a snake, a monkey and an elephant. Working with a set of animal cards, Red class practised their signing as each child was presented with a different card. We then moved on to our singing activity for the book. Rumble in the Jungle has been a great story to help all the children in Red class with their word and sound recognition skills. You can listen to our red class singers in the podcast below.

Red class have now completed their autumn term of weekly swimming lessons. Our trips to Crystal Palace are proving to be beneficial to the children on many different levels. As well as the fitness we are able to gain from swimming, it is also a wonderful opportunity to gain confidence in the water. Red class have also enjoyed being out in the local community, and getting to use such a wonderful leisure resource.