It has been a fantastic week here at Rockliffe Manor! The classrooms have been alive with awe and wonder as the children dive into their learning across the curriculum. I have had the pleasure of seeing many wonderful moments this week, from Year 4 becoming scientists and testing the impact of different materials on melting ice cubes to Year 1 immersing themselves in the story of Beegu and identifying different emotions. It was also wonderful to walk around the school and hear the children using key vocabulary in their lessons to deepen their understanding.

A big thank you to everyone who joined us for our annual Meet the Teacher sessions last week. It was a great opportunity for you to meet your child’s new teacher in their classroom, hear important information about routines and timetables and learn more about how to support your child’s learning at home. We also welcomed parents into school this week for our Year 6 secondary school transition meeting and our RHE policy consultation. It was fantastic to see so many of you involved! If you were unable to make any of these sessions or would like to review the materials, you can find the presentations on our website here. 

As mentioned in this week's letter, we are delighted to share an exciting new initiative launching across our school this term: Makaton Sign of the Week. As part of our commitment to building a truly inclusive environment, we are introducing Makaton to help every child communicate, feel understood and support one another. Makaton uses signs and symbols alongside spoken language to help children express themselves, boost their vocabulary and develop strong social connections.

Next week's signs will be for ‘Please’ and ‘Thank you’, which will be introduced during Monday’s assembly. If you would like to practice these at home with your child in the meantime, please do! You can watch a quick video guide here:  Makaton for 'Please' and 'Thank you'

We wish you all a restful and enjoyable weekend, and we look forward to welcoming everyone back on Monday.

With very best wishes,

Mrs. Cook and the Rockliffe Manor Team

Let’s take a look at some of the learning this week … 

Nursery have had a great week this week, continuing to navigate their first full week of school. In class the children have been busy learning different routines such as tidy up teams where they will get to know different areas and know how to tidy up correctly. They also created their own portraits with natural resources, the children have been so engaged and are so excited to continue being creative in class! 

It has been another great week in Reception with the children starting their first phonics lessons! The children were so excited to learn their new phonemes and have even been spotting them in their provision - Chris shared ‘I can see the sun, the sun begins with an ‘s’’. In composition the children have been learning about how we are all special even though they do not look the same! 

Year 1 this week has continued to enjoy diving into their English learning journey. The children put themselves into Beegu’s shoes and described the emotions that Beegu felt during different events in the story. William said ‘I feel alone and scared because I don’t know where I am’. Sophia added ‘I feel excluded because nobody wants me’ In maths, the children have been deepening their understanding of numbers. They enjoyed using different resources to find one more and one less of a given number. 

Year 2 have continued to be so excited about their core text Paddington, in English this week the children have read the full story and got to work on creating their own story maps to retell the story in their own way. The children have also been working hard in handwriting and it was amazing to see how settled the class were while practicing their letter joins!

Year 3 have enjoyed exploring their core text further. Kemana and Rayan were very proud of their writing in English and were excited to share facts about elephants. In maths, the children have been working hard on partitioning numbers up to 1,000. Science has continued to be successful as the children identified key features of rocks with Cara proudly explaining that granite contains crystals.

In Year 4, the children enjoyed looking closely at the relationships between different characters in their core text and using evidence to support their opinions. Ollie said that Hercules has an interesting relationship with his friend because his friends did not help him with his project. The children also loved their science lesson on states of matter, where they pretended to be particles in solids, liquids and gases. This engaging activity strengthened their understanding of how particles behave in different states of matter.

Year 5 enjoyed their first geography lesson, where they learned about the location of Awra Amba and the community culture fostered by its leader, Zumra Nuru. In English, the children have been using relative clauses to add additional information to sentences based on A Long Walk to Water. In maths, they have continued to strengthen their understanding of numbers by identifying numbers on a number line. Lastly, Ikena had a wonderful library trip and Miss White was very pleased that he enjoyed the experience alongside his peers.

Year 6 enjoyed their science lesson this week, learning about the classification system of living things. They built on their knowledge from last week about classification keys and explored the classification of plants. In art, the children have used colour theory to create different shades and hues in preparation for building towards their outcome.