Welcome to Year 1
Whales - Miss Gerrard & Miss Wilkinson
Parrots - Miss Sears & Mrs Bingham
Pandas - Miss Woodhouse & Mrs Ratcliffe
Welcome to Year 1! We are very excited to teach your children and watch them grow this year. We’re looking forward to a fantastic year of learning, exploring, and achieving together! This page is for our parents and children to use together. It includes information about what Y1 are learning, key dates, homework and helpful websites. This year our main aims are to develop self-confidence in our learning (even when we make mistakes), to become resilient learners who never give up when faced with a challenge and to become more independent in the classroom.
Our Summer 1 topic is: Amazing animals
In English, we will be writing a character description on the book ‘That rabbit belongs to Emily Brown.’ We will be doing a second character description based on Paddington. We will also be writing a list of instructions on how to make a fruit kebab. We ALWAYS need to remember capital letters, finger spaces and full stops. We will be looking at amazing adjectives and making sure we include them in our writing!
In Maths, we will be learning about arrays. We will be focusing on counting in 2s, 5s and 10s. We will also be looking at fractions, focusing on finding a half and a quarter.
In Science, we will be learning all about animals. We will be learning: What is an animal? What are the different types of animals? How can we tell animals apart? What do animals eat? Where do animals live? How can we identify animals?
In Geography, we will be learning about the World. We will be learning: Can I locate the UK and Europe on a map? Can I name all 7 continents of the world? Can I name all 5 oceans of the world? Why are some places hot and some places cold? Where in the world you want to live?
In RE, we will be learning: What does it mean to belong to a faith community?
In art, we will be learning about the artist ‘Frida Kahlo’ and portraits.
Important Information
Whales' P.E days are Tuesday and Thursday.
Parrots' P.E days are Tuesday and Friday.
Pandas' P.E days are Thursday and Friday.
Please make sure your child’s P.E kit is in school on these days and labelled with their name and class.
Vocabulary
Dates for your diary
Yorkshire wildlife park: Wednesday 20th May 2026
Home Learning
Each half term we will send out a home learning bingo grid with tasks for you to complete at home. Here are this half term’s challenges for you to try.
Other home learning activities for Summer 1 are:
- Read at home each night.
- Practise the class spellings.
- Practise reading and writing the tricky words and Year 1 common exception words.
- Practise phonics - there are some great free games and activities on the Phonics Play website. https://www.phonicsplay.co.uk/
- Practise counting forwards and backwards to 20
- Recap all number bonds to 10.
Useful websites
https://www.phonicsplay.co.uk/
https://www.bbc.co.uk/teach/supermovers/ks1-maths-the-2-times-table-with-bridget-the lioness/zrrx92p
https://www.bbc.co.uk/teach/supermovers/ks1-maths-the-5-times-table/zhbm47h
https://www.bbc.co.uk/teach/supermovers/ks1-maths-the-10-times-table-with-webster-the-spider/zm32cqt