The Juniors and Seniors have been doing a lot a work on addition over the past few weeks. Juniors began using the + and = symbols in their sums, and Seniors have been doing lots of sums both mentally and written.
A good game we have used for practising addition is Marble Maths on abcya.com. The children can use the marbles at the bottom of the page as visual aids if they are finding a sum difficult.
Junior Infants are doing sums where the answer is between 0-5, Senior Infant sums have answers between 0-10. Children can use counters (these can be anything from lego bricks to pasta) and number lines to help them to work out the answers.
For example, if the sum is 3+4, the child starts on 3 and 'jumps' on 4 numbers:
It is also very important that children recognise their numbers and are writing numbers correctly and the right way around. This is the way we write our numbers.
There are also number formation poems here which can be helpful reminders when writing numbers.
Our theme for the month of April was 'Houses and Homes'. Here are some of the learning activities we did over the past few weeks....
In History we discussed what our homes looked like and what was used to build them. Everyone got a sheet of paper and drew their home on one half of it. Then the children looked at pictures of homes from the past in pairs. They had to find things that were different to their homes and circle them. Some children came up and explained the differences they found to the rest of the class. The children then drew a house from long ago on the other half of their page.
For Geography the children learned the names of different types of homes, and actions for each type to help everyone to remember them! We learned about detached, semi-detached and terraced houses, flats or apartments, bungalows, igloos, caravans and tepees. Everyone completed a writing activity about the type of house they lived in. During playtime the children were in role as builders and made different types of homes and buildings using the pictures below and others as stimulus.
As part of playtime the children were also given shoe boxes and assorted furniture and characters in their groups. They created different rooms and engaged in free play. This helped develop social skills, oral language and teamwork, as well as building on their vocabulary about homes and different rooms.
In English we read the story of The Three Little Pigs and discussed which house we would have built. The children then made whichever house they liked using straw, match sticks or red ribbon for bricks.
We then heard another version of the Three Little Pigs, this time told from the wolf's point of view!
We then came up with our own version of another fairy tale-Little Red Riding Hood orally as a whole class. Once we had the story written, the children had to become the illustrators and read their page and draw an appropriate picture. Now we have a very interesting class book!
We also looked at a story called Town Mouse and Country Mouse. We talked about where we would rather live, the town or the country, and why. The children then did some writing about their reasons and for art they were given lots of materials, e.g. lollipop sticks, coloured paper, ribbon, matchsticks, etc., and allowed to create their town or country house.
Hopefully everyone is enjoying the well earned week off after a busy April :)
