Welcome
It gives me great pleasure to welcome you to Class 1's page. My name is Miss Erwin and I am the Class 1 Teacher at Birstwith School. I am very lucky to be supported by my wonderful TAs, Mrs Johnson & Mrs Plant. Class 1 is a very special place as it is the first class your child will join when they start their school journey in Reception and we also enjoy another two magical years in Year 1 and Year 2!
Our days are filled with lots of fun and learning through a variety of hands-on, practical activities within indoor and outdoor provision areas, daily phonics, literacy and maths as well as a wealth of wider curriculum lessons and experiences.
Note to parents: (Updated 7th April 2024)
PE will take place on a Tuesday and Thursday. Please could all children come dressed in PE kit on Tuesday. EYFS should come in PE kit on Thursday, KS1 should bring their swimming kit on a Thursday. Thank you!
Please ensure your child comes to school with a water bottle and appropriate clothing for the weather. As we approach summer, make sure to keep an eye on the forecast for when your child should be wearing suncream, bringing a hat and wearing light clothing.
Homework will be sent home on a Friday to be completed and returned by Wednesday - this will include weekly spelling practice and a maths consolidation activity as well as phonics practice for Reception and Year One.
Please read with your child at the very least 3 times per week, but it should be a little every day. We also encourage reading for pleasure, for example enjoying a bedtime story together or researching favourite animals or places in a non-fiction book from the library. Please ensure school reading books and records are both brought into school each day to allow teaching staff to read with children regularly and, if you have time, a comment from parents/carers is always really helpful.
If you have any questions or queries throughout the year, please do not hesitate to speak with myself or Mrs Johnson, either at the gate or via email.
Useful Website Links (please feel free to use these to supplement learning with your child, however, please ensure children are supervised when accesssing the Internet. If your child is in Year 1 or 2 they have a Times Tables Rock Stars login - look out for these in your child's book bag.
School Year 2023-2024
Curriculum Overviews
Have a look at a sample of our learning...
Trying Hot Cross Buns!
In preparation for our Easter celebrations, the children loved trying Hot Cross Buns! We discussed why there was a cross on the front, what the ingredients were and when people enjoy this special treat. The children all gave it a go and we had lots of smiling faces and happy tummies after giving them a go :)
Additionally, we had lots of discussion about significant foods and symbols used at Easter by Christians including the meaning along with learning the story of Easter.
Elderly Awareness
As part of our work to teach children about protected characteristics we were kindly lent a kit that allows children to empathise with and physically engage with difficulties that the elderly can face as they grow older. This included special goggles that replicated visual impairments, ankle weights to feel the difficulty walking, ear defenders to reduce our ability to hear along with wrist wraps that had a shaking toy attached to imitate the feeling of shaking hands caused by Parkinsons. The children talked about how this made life tricker, how we can be kind to the elderly community and the importance of equality to allow everyone to be treated fairly.
Den Building!
As part of our PSHE learning all about resilience in EYFS, the children worked together to build a den! They used large loose parts and fabric to plan and explore how they would construct the den. When things went wrong, we used mantras such as 'I can do it!', 'let's keep going!', 'I'm going to try again!'. The children worked beautifully as a team, uplifting each other and practising being resilient with a challenging activity. Well done! :)
How to Catch a Star - Oliver Jeffers
The children in EYFS were exploring their special book 'How to Catch a Star' by Oliver Jeffers. They engaged in some beautiful activities to bring the text to life and inspire them including creating their own pet star by making salt dough, cutting out the stars then decorating these to take on their adventures! They also thought of activities they could do with their star and did some super writing using their phonic knowledge. Well done!
Each Peach Pear Plum
Take a look at our super Class 1 children reciting the poem - Each Peach Pear Plum - after using it as a focus in Literacy! They loved using this to recognise rhyme, explore other nursery rhymes and KS1 created their own poetry using other nursery rhyme characters.
Becoming Historians!
Our lovely KS1 children began to use their historical enquiry skills to ask questions to find out more about the past in order to answer a bigger enquiry question. As they were learning about schools in the past, the children loved welcoming Mrs Holland into class to ask pre-prepared questions about her school experience that was contrasting in many ways to their experiences. They used answers to construct further questions, becoming increasingly inquisitive!
Previous School Year 2022-2023
Curriculum Overviews 2022-23
Phonics and Early Reading
We follow the Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised complete systematic synthetic phonics scheme to teach phonics and early reading and this begins in Reception. Please see below a progression overview for the year as well as some handy resources and helpful videos to help you understand more about the scheme and how to support your children at home.
Outdoor Learning
Exploring the nature outside, creating faces. What luck we have had to be able to be outside. Our garden in the Class 1 is in full bloom!
King's coronation May 2023
We had such a wonderful time celebrating the King's Coronation. The children enjoyed developing their understanding of changes within the King's line of succession and finding out about the King's coronation. Everyone joined in with planting a welly with decorative plants, creating a miniature garden fit for a king and drew a beautiful portrait of the King. Which the children paraded through the hall with pride. Parents, carers, governors and special guests from the village were so impressed with the children's performances of a coronation songs, concluding with the National Anthem. Such an historic day!
Autumn Term 2022
Trip to Abbey House Museum
To enhance their mini topic on the Victorians, Class 1 journeyed back in time when visiting the amazing Abbey House Museum in Kirkstall. In addition to exploring the Victorian street and many shops, they took part in a wonderful workshop all about Victorian Christmas traditions. They were able to draw on their previous knowledge aqcuired from our 'Toys' project last year as well as extend their understanding of the differences between the rich and poor. All the children were shocked to learn that most children used their own socks as stockings and may only have recived one homemade toy. It was great fun dressing up in Victorian clothes and comparing these to those we wear today. To conclude our terrific trip, the children explored the grounds of Kirkstall Abbey in the crisp Autumn air.
Roald Dahl Day
In celebration of Roald Dahl Day, the children enjoyed the magical story of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. The children wrote their own recipes, designed new sweets and 'lickable' wallpaper for Willy Wonka's Factory. This inspired the children so much that we decided to turn our Dough Area into a sweet factory and one child even made their own model factory!
Trip to Skipton Castle
On Wednesday 28th September 2022, we ventured out on our first school trip to Skipton Castle to enhance our history and DT topics. We travelled on a huge coach, which was exciting in itself, and walked around the castle's outer walls, before catching sight of the magnificent castle in front of us! We met our tour guide, Lyndsey, who was great fun and had so mnay interesting facts to share with us! We learnt that Skipton in Old English meant 'Sheep Town' as skip = sheep and town = ton. She told us lots of information about the different parts of the castle and how it had changed over the years. The highlights had to be turning out the lights in the dungeon and imagining what it must have like to be a prisoner in Medieval times as well as climbing the spiral staircases.! After our inspiring tour, we made detailed observational sketches of our favourite parts of the castle.
Thank you to the team at Skipton Castle for being so welcoming and sharing the stories of the past with us!
Everyone - both the staff and public were really impressed with the children's behaviour. You are all a credit to Birstwith School!
![IMG_7583[1]](/n-yorks/primary/bwbt/arenas/websitecontent/web/IMG_7583[1]-91257_20221031163501497.JPG?scale=MAXSIZE&height=460&modified=1)
Outdoor Learning
The children are having so much fun exploring all of our fabulous new resources for our beautiful outdoor area. They have particularly enjoyed building large scale constructions of castle and vehicles, making magic potions and being firefighters and police officers!
Last Year's Curriculum Overviews
Last Year's Homework Projects
Summer
Caterpillar friends
We have been fascinated by our new visitors in Class 1. They started out as tiny, wriggly caterpillars and have now hidden in their cosy cacoons or chrysalides. Every day the children check on their little friends (as they like to call them) to see if they have emerged, eager to feed them before setting them free into the wild as beautiful, painted lady butterflies. This has inspired further research into the life cycles of different animals and plants and has also inspired discussions around changes in our own lives and school journeys. We will keep you updated with any news! Fingers crossed we have some fluttering butterflies very soon!
We are so incredibly proud of all our Year 1 children for being phonics superstars this week! After working extremely hard in their phonics lessons this year, they rose to the challenge of completing their Phonics Screening Check with enthusiasm, confidence and resilience. You are all amazing, Year 1. Well done!
Amazing Africa
The children have been really inspired by our mini topic on Africa. They have located Africa on a map, compared African village life with village life here in Birstwith, been on a virtual safari, designed and made their own African animal print-inspired costumes, composed their own African music, practised carrying fruit in a basket balanced on their heads and learnt about foods which are grown in Africa and then brought to England to be sold. They loved sampling African fruits and making their own fruit salad.
African Drumming Workshop
The children greatly enjoyed their recent African drumming workshop. What an amazing opportunity for them to learn more about African culture and enhance their topic on 'Africa' through this first-hand experience.
A Jolly Jubilee
We had such a wonderful time celebrating the Queen's Platinum Jubilee. The children enjoyed developing their understanding of changes within living memory whilst learning about Queen Elizabeth 11 and our Reception children were brilliant at creating timelines of the Queen from a baby to present day, using some impressive vocabulary linked to chronolgy and sequencing. Everyone painted a beautiful portrait of the Queen and decorated bunting to display for our special celebration on the last day of term. Parents, carers, governors and special guests from the village were so impressed with the children's performances of a traditional English country dance and Jubille songs, concluding with the National Anthem. Such an uplifting finale to our busy first half of the summer term.
Bluey the lamb
One of our Reception children brought their pet lamb Bluey for a very special Show and Tell. We learnt all about what he likes to drink and eat, how he will grow up and what his wool might be used for in the future. Everyone was so gentle and Bluey loved meeting all the children and teachers too! This experience really enhanced the children's learning about new life and spring.
Reading for Pleasure
'Reading for pleasure is the single most important indicator of a child’s success.’ (OECD 2002). 'The will influences the skill and vice versa.’ (OECD 2010)
We value reading for pleasure highly and work hard as a school to grow our Reading for Pleasure pedagogy. We read to children every day, choosing these books carefully as we want children to experience a wealth of quality texts.
- Our classroom has an inviting book corner that encourages a love for reading.
- In Class 1, children have access to the reading corner every day in their free flow time and the books are refreshed to match current learning, topics and interests.
- The children also take home Sharing Books regularly which they select from a range of non-fiction, fiction and poetry books in school. We encourage families to enjoy these books together and value this experience of quality time together with a good book. Our Reading Ambassadors from KS2 sometimes help with our Sharing Book Library.
- The school library is made available for classes to use at protected times. It must be booked via the school booking system. Children also have regular opportunities to engage with Reading for Pleasure events such as World Book Day.
Spring Term 2022
Mrs McIntyre visits Grace Darling's home in Northumberland, the Longstone Lighthouse
Victorian Workshop
To give the children a sense of what life was like in Victorian times, one of our Birstwith School grandparents brought in a selection of Victorian household artefacts which have been passed down through the family over time. The children enjoyed playing a game of 'what does this remind you of' and learnt a great deal about how common household objects have changed over time. This really brought to life what life was like in Victorian times to enhance the children's topic on Grace Darling, Victorian heroine.
Learn about Grace Darling, famous Victorian heroine, by following the link below
Hindu Workshop
It was amazing to see our Reception and Year 1 children transform into the most dazzling dancers during their 'Hindu Experience' workshop. After being 'transported' to India through stories, music and dance, the children dressed up and performed their own dances complete with percussion accompaniment. We were all so proud of the children's confidence, engagement, focus and enthusiasm. Such an exciting experience for everyone!
World Book Day
It was a pleasure to invite parents into school to join us for our World Book Day celebration. This year we chose to focus on a poetry book entitled, 'An Emotional Menagerie'. Class 1 chose Serenity as their focus poem and enjoyed taking part in a range of wellbeing, yoga and meditation activities throughout the day as well completing some super poems of their own linked to the theme. The children performed their poems to their parents and this was such a special occasion for all.
Comic Relief
We loved dressing up in red and getting creative with our whacky hairstyles to celebrate Comic Relief and raised lots of money for this worthy cause. A really fun day!
Autumn Term 2021
Christmas
For the past week and a half, Birstwith School has transformed into a magical Christmas wonderland. The children have experienced so much...from carols around the tree to singing on the radio and Christmas Lunch to a ride on the Polar Express, Christmas Jumper Day...not forgetting Christmas Party Day and a visit from Santa himself! What fun they've had.
Although we were disappointed we could not invite our families to watch our Nativity Play this year, this did not stop us from enjoying dressing up, saying our lines and singing all the songs. Everyone felt like a film star being recorded and rose to the challenge of remembering when to come on stage and perform their part. The stars certainly did shine for Class 1 on this very special occasion!
The children have worked incredibly hard to make beautiful cards, crafts and even delicious truffles to share with their families over the Christmas holidays.
A Winter Wonderland
The winter weather has provided a wonderful opportunity for the children to explore snow and ice. From observing nature trapped in the ice to watching it slowly melt and rolling giant snowballs to creating snow creatures, the children have certainly made the most of the winter wonderland in our beautiful outdoor setting.
Harvest
It has certainly been a Happy Harvest in Class 1. From a walk around the village, stopping off to harvest produce from the Community Garden to making pumpkin soup and performing a special Harvest song and poem in the Harvest service at Church.
ZooLab visit
During the Autumn Term we enjoyed an incredible workshop led by ZooLab. The children met many different animals including a Madagascan Hissing Cockroach! Everyone was so brave handling the animals and some children even overcame their fears of certain little creatures. This was an incredible experience for the children and enhanced their science topic all about Humans including Animals. They learnt so much about the animals' diets, behaviour and habitats - a wonderful event to kickstart our year.