It has been an exciting first week back as the children have taken part in the Legacy Project, organised by our School Council, to raise money for the charity The Rainbow Trust. The children have really enjoyed dressing up for the various themes each day and it has made the return school even more fun. Thank you very much for your donations and for supporting the children's entrepreneurial skills to generate money for an excellent cause.

During our first Circle Time of 2026, we all shared our Christmas break news and chatted about the things we had been up to during their time away from school. The children have also enjoyed sharing their Home/School Journals, which further supported them to tell us all about the special times shared with family and friends during the holidays. The children then wrote about what they had been up to in their literacy books and drew a picture to accompany their work.

In maths, the children have been revisiting counting skills and number recognition and the children loved the challenge of counting all the way to 100! Using the 100 square, we started to explore number patterns and place value. The children then made a giant number line to 20 on the carpet and focused on the sequence of the teen numbers and explaining how they knew which number would be next. The children then completed a challenge to identify and fill in the missing numbers on a number track.

The children have loved exploring inside and outside the classroom and it has been wonderful to see them creating their own games and building relationships with one another. This is an important part of settling back into school as the children refamiliarise themselves with the resources available to them and where everything belongs.

Den building has been particularly popular outside as well as making structures on the carpet using the wooden blocks. The children have also enjoyed playing in the roleplay area, creating their own stories and scenarios with one another.

The weather has been very exciting (if not rather chilly) this week and the children have loved playing in the snow. They were excited to find all the different shaped pieces of ice in our water tray and various containers (that had been filled the day before in anticipation of freezing temperatures!) The children tried to make towers using cubes of ice as well as explored what happened when the ice was brought inside. They also enjoyed making holes in the surface of the ice in the water tray and watching paint being poured into the hole and spreading out under the surface. We even tried painting ice! This led the children to find out about igloos and we watched a video that showed us how to make one - if only we had enough snow to try this for ourselves!

The children also explored colour mixing this week and tried to see how many cool shades they were able to make using blue, white and purple paint.

Our new arrivals to Form 1 have been busy painting their portraits to add to our Form 1 classroom display. Mrs Leigh has been helping them to mix the correct colours for their skin, hair and eyes and by looking in a mirror, the children worked hard to include all of their features as accurately as possible.

The children also enjoyed their first gymnastics lesson of 2026 as well as music with Miss Norford and French with Madam Boff. Of course, they have also loved playing outside on the paddock at lunchtime play and making good use of the Pirate Ship! It has certainly been a wonderful start to 2026 and the Spring Term!