Primary 2/3

Dear P2/3,

This note is very difficult to write, to think it might be such a long time before our classroom has the sound of us all playing and learning together makes me very sad indeed.  I am asking you to be very special to your new teachers (your Mums and Dads).   I am asking you to listen to your brilliant new teachers and do what they say without too much complaining as they love you so much and remember they were your very first teachers.  I am very sad about how things have turned out but remember I miss you all and cannot wait to see you all very soon.  

Stay safe, look after your family and hopefully we will see each other soon.

Mrs McPolin

P.S. Well done to Mums and Dads for completing Week 1 of being a P2/3 teacher (trust me it is easier when the pupil is not your own).  I know you are doing a fantastic job! 

Updates for Parents

• A big focus this year for our class has been reading – we have been working extremely hard on our reading skills and have been making excellent progress since Christmas.  Please continue to read to your children and encourage them to read to you every day.  Collins Big Cat Reading scheme has provided a fantastic resource to allow children to continue reading at their own level and recommend that P2/3 use the yellow, blue and green bands.  There is a wide variety of books available: fiction and non-fiction for every level.  As non- fiction books are more difficult, I would encourage you to use these to challenge your child.  Feel free to move up and down the colour bands as you see fit.  The ebooks are available to be read independently, or you may wish to have your child supported by a reader on the website.  There is an activity at the end of each book to allow the children to consolidate what they have read.  There are also worksheets available and the children can record their answers in the purple exercise jotter provided in the home pack.   Please take advantage of this fantastic resource to keep your child’s reading skills up to speed.  Click on the link to bring you to the correct page http://connect.collins.co.uk/school/Portal.aspx

Click on Teacher sign in and enter:

Username – parents@harpercollins.co.uk

Password – Parents20!

• NI Libraries are offering free books online simply follow the link http://www.librariesni.org.uk/
• Prim Ed have created free parent packs for you to download.  The link is

http://www.prim-ed.co.uk click on parent section to download the pack.   It is important that you save the pack to your desktop to allow you to open.

• Education sites are offering free support and textbooks to help with remote learning : examples include:-
  Cjfallon.ie
  Folensonline.ie
• As part of our topic “People Who Help Us” we were going to enter into this colouring competition.  It is still possible to enter; just email Tricia on roadsafenicharity@gmail.com for the colouring sheet.  The closing date for the competition is 15/05/20 and the prizes are well worth winning:-    1^st prize : £15 Symths Toys Voucher and 2^nd/3^rd prize : a £10 Symths Toys Voucher.
• Give the children lots of practical activities that will improve their Numeracy skills e.g. making buns (weighing out the ingredients, subtracting, adding, more than, less than), ordering leaves according to size and counting lambs (Eoghan and Eddie, I know you will enjoy this task)!  
• Finally, use the play based learning experiences to develop writing skills e.g. ask your child to keep a diary of what they have been getting up to each day, get them to draw a picture and then label it.

Here are some practical activities/ideas that I have been doing with my son, Koa who is P1 and some more which we intend to do. 

Good luck and I will be in contact soon.

World Book Day

Local author, Charlie Graham came to visit our class.  He read his book "The Giraffe with the Chocolate Belly Button" to us and it was great! Niamh wrote her own book "The Kind Fairy" and read it to Charlie and the class - Charlie was very impressed.  Watch this space - an author in the making!!

A Busy Week in P2/3

This week the children have been learning about the "th" sound and topic book "Can't You Sleep Little Bear."  We made a space story using our coding skills on Scratch Jnr with a beginning, middle and end.  It was very impressive! In Numeracy, we have been learning about number names, shapes and odd and even numbers.  In WAU, we looked at nocturnal and diurnal animals.  We are now going to say goodbye to our Spaceship and our looking forward to our new topic Emergency Services. 

Post Lady Visit!!!

Niamh's Mum came to school and told us all about her job.  She brought along some equipment used in the Post Office and brought her van for us to explore.  We had great fun, thanks for all your help with our new topic!

Art Workshop

Jennifer Cunningham came to school and helped us print our faces on stamps.  Take a look at some of our beautiful photos!

STEAM - Sight Challenge!

As part of our topic "All About Me" - we made glasses out of multilinks.  We had to use our Numeracy skills to estimate and count out how many cubes we needed and then build accordingly.  We had to use our technology skills and ensure they fitted us and stayed on our face for 5 secs and we used our artistic skills for the design.  It was tricky, but we did a fantastic job!