Some really good work in phonics and literacy support this week, where we also worked on our auditory memory. Trying to develop our memory for what we have heard, can really help us with reading and spelling, as well as remembering our PE kit for school! You could play a game of: ‘I went to the zoo and saw…’ Try to see how many animals you can remember…the more you practice, the easier it gets!

The groups have begun a new project this week. We are looking at habitats and are using Bloom’s Taxonomy as our focus to develop our thinking skills. Dr Benjamin Bloom said that there are different levels of thinking and we want to aim for the higher order thinking skills of analysing, evaluating and creating. When we begin thinking about something for the first time, we need to use the lower order thinking skills of remembering, understanding and applying. He used the idea of a ladder, to show how we can ‘climb’ up to different levels of thinking skills.

The superstars who received certificates this week were:

* Indy (year1)

* Aiesha (Year 1)

* Oliwier (Year 6)

Well done all of you!

This week’s challenge (brought this week, from www.nrich.maths.org/36 )

Uncle Raj has three children. Next year, when they've had their birthdays, Naomi will be 5, Alex will be 6 and Chris will be 7. The family has decided on something rather unusual for part of their presents.

All three children have their birthday in the late spring and since they are keen on gardening they are going to buy some plants for the garden, one for each year they have been alive.

Here is the plan of their house and garden:

You notice that there are three circular paths that cross over each other. Each child is to have a circle but there will be some bits that are shared, around the middle.

When the time comes, the four of them go off to the garden centre to choose the plants. They do not have a lot of money so they're looking for special offers. They find a very special offer which gives a good discount if you buy ten plants altogether. The three children say that that is no good because they need more than ten. But Uncle Raj realises they can manage with only ten.

They go to the cafe and have some cool drinks, and Uncle Raj draws a plan of the three paths and puts little marks to show the plants.

Here is his idea:

The children are fascinated to see that Naomi has 1 and shares 4, Alex has 2and shares 4 and Chris has 3 and shares 4. They think that's rather cool and it saves them a lot of money. So they finish their drinks and off they go to buy their ten plants.

Well now it's your turn to have a go and find some different solutions.
REMEMBER:- You must use exactly ten plants (no more, no less)
REMEMBER:- The circles must contain 5, 6 and 7 plants (no more, no less).

As you try, you may find that you are developing a system for getting the next one. If so, we'd love to hear about it.  You might like to try to find them all, and write about all the things you notice about each solution.

Some people find it's easiest to draw the circles out on a large piece of paper and have ten objects to move around in different places.

As with most of these challenges you can and should ask "I wonder what would happen if ...?" Well you might try a different number of objects (plants). You could try different numbers for each circle, as if the children were different ages.

Have fun and enjoy!