Prep 1 Curriculum Brief

We will continue with our ‘Get Writing’ scheme, working on comprehension, composition, grammar, and key literacy skills. We will review our graphemes and phonemes, working on blending and segmenting.

This term our fiction work will be focused on traditional tales and repeating patterns, non – fiction will be focused on instructions and letter writing.

Reading and spellings will continue throughout the term.

This term we shall cover the following areas, building on previous knowledge: Number and Place Value, Addition and Subtraction, Measures, Doubles, Halves and Sequences, Measure and Data to include; Money, Weight, Graphs, Height, Lengths and Capacities.

This term we will investigate everyday materials. We will be learning about building materials, completing an investigation into the 3 little pigs houses, before examining how different materials float or sink or are magnetic.

This term we will be exploring the Polar Regions, developing our geographical skills by locating both the Arctic and Antarctica. We shall investigate climates, animals, and people in both poles along with learning about famous explorers and how we can help protect such incredible habitats.

Our history this term will be focusing on the beginning of life on earth, concentrating on the Jurassic, Triassic and Cretaceous periods. We will be helping Archie the Archaeologist who is stuck in the Jurassic Jungle on his jungle quests such as discovering animals that lived through this period, what they ate and what they left behind (fossils).

This term we will be looking at the vocabulary for clothes, animals and fruit and vegetables. We will learn phrases for expressing hunger and telling others our name and age. We will be using the Skoldo Elementary Book, looking at some basic children’s books in French and singing lots of songs to consolidate our learning.

Our RS lessons will follow on from the Christmas Story before moving on to Jesus’ early life in Nazareth, we will finish the term with the story of Easter.

This term we will be covering ‘Health and Wellbeing’ where we will cover; Being healthy; hygiene; medicines; people who help us with health. Also, we will introduce ‘Living in the wider world’ where we will look at Money, making choices and needs and wants.

During the first half of the term the class will be creating work inspired by creatures, making two and three dimensional pieces, reinforcing their colour mixing, exploring and developing their ideas.
In the second half of the term they will be looking at the work of graphic designers and creating their own designs.

We will start the term by studying ‘The Nutcracker’ by Tchaikovsky. We will look at the history of the piece and learn the story by listening to a retelling and by watching extracts of the ballet. We will also be composing a piece of music to add to the suite.
Later, we will be looking more closely at how to create different effects by varying the timbre and tempo of the music we compose. We will also be concentrating on using our voices to make music.

Due to the exploratory and ‘spontaneous’ approach in this subject, we will often go off in different directions depending on the ideas and interest of the children. And so the formal lesson plans are often deviated from to preserve a flexibility and originality of approach.  New projects often ‘evolve’ from the children’s ideas in the sessions and it is an important part of the approach and style in this subject  to maintain this flexibility and spontaneity.  This generates a feeling with the children that they are going on a ‘journey’ in this subject each term. The formal lesson plans are only intended to be used as a basis and guide to the type of work and projects that are covered and are not intended to be rigidly adhered to.

Weeks 1 and 2 – Vehicle designs using two wheels and forward sledge as a runner. The children will be involved in designing and making the vehicle to travel on a track.

Weeks 3 and 4 – Puppet designs incorporating fabric, dowelling, 360 micron card and blockwood.

Weeks 5, 6 and 7  – Three dimensional designs, incorporating mechanical movement using laser plywood, blockwood, dowelling and modelling foam.

Weeks 8 and 9 –  Picture Frame designs using mounting board card, blockwood and the children’s themes for artwork and ideas.

This term the pupils will continue to use various programs to help to develop keyboard skills. They will be introduced to basic programming using floor robots to understand about algorithms and de-bugging.

This term we will further our work on role playing and creativity by introducing simple acts for the children to perform. We will introduce how body and facial movement along with voice projection can be changed to reflect different scenarios.

PE: Development of catching and throwing skills. Development of movement into space within small sided games.

Games: Development of ball skills through football with various drills and games. Game situations will be kept small so as to encourage as much participation as possible.