Year 1 blog:

See, hear, smell, taste and touch - our five senses tell us so much

After labelling the different parts of our bodies, we learnt that we use our eyes to see, our ears to hear, our nose to smell, our hands to touch and our mouth to taste, but did you also know that we can use our senses to keep us safe?  Without our sense of hearing, we would not be able to hear the fire alarm warning us of a potential danger.  Without our sense of sight, we would not be able to find our friends on the playground.  And without our sense of taste, we would not be able to enjoy our school dinners!

This also applies to our lives outside of school as we have thought about road safety and how we use our senses to keep ourselves safe from possible hazards.  Did you know that when the green man lights up to show traffic should have stopped and that it is safe to cross the road, a small plastic or metal cone on the underside of pedestrian crossings starts spinning to show people who do not have their sense of sight that it is safe?  All they have to do is keep their hand by the cone.

Oh, the places you'll go!

We have looked at maps of our local area and plans of buildings, including our own school, looking at and using compass directions, keys and scale. We also discussed the size of real life houses, cars and schools and how they look on a map.  Once we had the knowledge, we then drew our own maps and plans of the school, thinking about why the different areas are special to us:

"The kitchen is important to us as they cook our dinners."

"The library is special to me as I can find new books to read."

"The prayer corner is special to us because it is where we can think about God.