Just a note to start: Myself and Mrs Dunne would like to say a massive welcome back to everyone. It was lovely to see all of your happy faces on Monday morning when we opened the door. 

The main focus of this week has been to try to get some normalcy back into the classroom environment. We wanted the children to come back in and start to feel safe and comfortable once more in the physical environment and leaving all of you at the door. It may have been a little bit daunting for them to have so many other children in the space too and they had to get used to this and get used to us, the adults, again. Well done to all of the children they have adapted amazingly to being back in school.

It has been a while since the children have had to think about the expectations of the classroom so this has been a big focus of the week. We have spent a lot of time looking at the rules and routines and why we do these just to remind everyone. 

It has also been Science Week, which was focused on inventions and innovators. We looked at the books ‘Not a Box’ and ‘Not a Stick’, in both of these stories there is a rabbit who is playing with a box/stick and he keeps telling the reader it is not just a box/stick as it is all of these amazing things that he imagines it to be. If you would like to have a watch of the story they can be found on Youtube.

We then had our own opportunity to become innovators like the rabbit. On Tuesday afternoon we read the story and then we put all of our normal toys and games away and only had out the boxes. The children came up with some creative ideas about what the boxes could be and even began creating their own games using them.

We also did an experiment throughout the week, on Monday we looked at a slice of bread, and described what it smelt, looked, felt like and we also thought about what the taste is. We then put it in our curiosity cube (or cylinder…) and watched as it changed throughout the week. The children drew pictures and wrote labels explaining the changes. It didn't go mouldy, but it did go very hard, smell a little bit funny and crack throughout the week.

It was lovely to have all the children back, we look forward to seeing you all again on Monday. Make sure you sleep lots. I know I’m going to...