This week in Puma class we made our own information booklets about an animal, using all the features we had been exploring last week. Below are a selection of some of the pages children have written (we have all be thinking really hard about our writing targets this week). 

We also explored adult animals and their offspring in our science focus. Looking at pictures of baby animals and trying to guess what the adult animal would look like and why. Then we matched a selection of pictures together and wrote short captions to explain the pictures and how they were related. 

For a very special piece of writing, and building on some creative art drawings we had been exploring, the children got to make their own fantastical, wacky animal using a combination of animal body parts from different animals! Have you ever wondered what a 'duckephant' looks like? (A cross between an elephant and a duck.) Or a 'Rhiger'? (A cross between a rhino and a tiger.) The children got really excited to write a quick information sheet about the features and habbits of these fictional creatures.

This week we have been working hard to explore information texts. We have talked about contents pages, index pages, titles, headings, diagrams, labels, fact sentences and captions. Puma class worked hard in groups to find these features in non=fiction books as well as reading a range of them.

We have been studying the artist Henri Rousseau and his jungle paintings. Looking carefully at the shapes he used to create jungles that he had never seen, we were inspired to sketch our own jungle pictures for our class animals.

Following from our work on the body parts of humans and animals, we also talked and acted out the importance of exercise. How many facts can your child remember about why exercise is important?

This week we have been looking at human and animal body parts as well as writing instructions. But how better to explain more about a snap shot of our week than with Leia and Shepard giving us a quick summary...

And here is a nice little song we were looking at and made our own actions all about the needs of living animals!

What an amazing couple of weeks we have had in the Puma Class! We've sketched our portraits, decorated 'hands of hope' for Year 2, made a long list of Puma Class Rules for us all to follow, started our handwriting practise and launched front paws first into our new topic: "Into The Wild" (please check our documents page to see our curriculum overview for more details of specific objectives and areas of the curriculum).

We worked in pairs to make lists of things we thought we knew about pumas and questions we'd like to find out about our class animal. We played some memory quiz games and watched some video clips to learn more information about pumas. Did you know they are in the Guinness Book of World Records for the animal which has the highest number of different names! 

Exploring the life of elephants we did a bit of acting and brainstorming to think about what life was like for an elephant and wrote some sentences to describe it. We have also enjoyed looking at rhinos and a sorting activity to think about which rhino facts were about its appearance, its habitat or its diet. Pouncing like jaguars we alsoi played some quiz games to learn some interesting facts about these spotty mammals.

After a great couple of weeks settling in, we are now all very much looking forward to the long weekend!