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News and Updates
At Thornbury, we believe that every child has the potential to achieve great things. That's why we are committed to providing a dynamic, supportive learning environment that helps our pupils thrive.
Foundation - Our Learning This Week - 4th November
We have been exploring festivals and celebrations that are happening this week.
First, we will learnt about Diwali the Hindu Festival of Lights, which takes place between October and November.
Then, we will learn about Bonfire Night which took place on Tuesday.
We thought about the similarities and differences between the two festivals and learnt about why they are important celebrations.
This will then lead into next week, where we will being to explore the importance of Remembrance Day.
We began by finding out about the Hindu celebration of Diwali.
We watched Deeya and her mum while they prepare for and celebrate Diwali, the Hindu the festival of light. We found out that Diwali is one of the most important celebrations for Hindu people. It is about light defeating darkness, spending time with your family and praying.
As we watched we thought about some of the important words we could hear Deeya talking about. We worked together to create a class word bank. Have a look at all the new words we found!
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We then joined in with some Diwali dancing.
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We ask why Diwali is the festival of light?
We heard the story of Rama as he searches for Sita with help from Hanuman the monkey.
We then used puppets to act out the story. At the end we all used our hands to show the kingdom's lights that showed Rama and Sita the way home.
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We found out that a Diya lamp is a little lamp made from clay or mud that is lit during Diwali.
We began by exploring the clay and found out it is a natural material.
We talked about different items we use everyday that are made from clay or ceramics.
We began by rolling a ball of clay.
Then making a hole with our thumb.
Next we pinched the sides to make a pot.
This is called a pinch pot.
We are going to wait for our pots to dry before we paint them.
We can’t wait to share our creations with you.
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There were lots of ways to continue exploring about Diwali in our Enhanced Provision.
For example, in the sensory tray we could use loose parts to create a Rangoli pattern. We had to be a friendly Otter and share the resources with our friends.
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We could also use the magnetic tiles to create a Rangoli.
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In the creative area, we could use the different types of brushes to create a firework inspired painting (we know fireworks are used in both celebrations).
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In the malleable area, we could use different tools and techniques to create play dough fireworks.
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We have continued our outside where we created our own mehndi painting using paints from natural ingredients (blueberries).
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We could also use natural materials to create a Rangoli.
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Our favourite activity has been writing Diwali cards and giving them to our friends.
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In maths this week we have been thinking about one more and one less.
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In Foundation, we follow the children's interests. The week the children have loved working on their cutting and sticking skiils. So we created a Snipping Station with lots of interesting resouces. We enjoyed seeing the children supporting each other. Look at this teamwork.
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We having been making the most of the dry weather and enjoying lots of time outside.
Bikes and Trikes are a great way for us to develop our gross motor skills.
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We have also been using coloured water and pipettes to develop our fine motor skills. We enjoyed creating this auautm tree and mixing coloured water.
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