Prophet Eesa (AS) & Miracles

As usual, we began by reading the different versions of Eesa (AS)'s story from the books which we have.

The girls are already a little familiar with Prophet Eesa (AS) as it's been brought up in discussion for the past couple of Christmases (What's Christmas? Who celebrates it? Why?) so this time I wanted to focus on the concept of miracles, using Eesa (AS)'s story as the example.

After reading the stories, I asked the twins what they thought the word "miracle" meant... After some talking, they decided it's "a thing that's not supposed to happen, is amazing and good!" I asked if they could think of any miracles to do with the prophets we'd looked at so far... They came up with Ibraheem (AS) being protected from the fire, Yunus (AS) surviving after being swallowed by a whale, and Adam (AS) being made from clay with no mother or father. 👍 But in Eesa (AS)'s story, there were a lot of miracles mentioned!

For our next session, which was a few days later, I asked them if they could remember any of the miracles to do with Eesa (AS) - the ones which came to mind straightaway for them were making a bird from clay fly as if it were alive, he spoke as a baby, and knowing what was in people's houses without looking. So I told them I wanted some more examples... so what could they do? Look in the books again! As they flicked through the pages, searching for the relevant ones, I told them what they were doing was called research and that I would make notes on the whiteboard as they found more information. After a while, the 8 miracles they came up with were:

- no father
- spoke as a baby
- knew what was in people's houses without looking
- bird from clay came to life
- dead people came back to life
- cured sick people
- made a blind man see again
- table of food sent from heaven

Next, I gave them a piece of white card each and told them to write the word "miracles" in the centre - demonstrating on Z's card. Around the edge, they then needed to choose at least 5 of the miracles on the board and draw a picture to represent each one... When they were done, they could either write what the miracle was themselves or I could do it for them (as I was explaining the task it seemed like they were getting overwhelmed, which is why I offered!) - in the end, they both asked me to do the writing. 😂 Before they started, we talked about the possible pictures they could draw (e.g. a speech bubble for Eesa (AS) speaking as a baby) because they weren't allowed to draw Eesa (AS) himself, or his mother, Maryam (AS)!

Finally, we took the watercolours out again so they could colour everything in. Why watercolours? Because they could thin the paint appropriately in order to paint over the top of the captions but still be able to read them! So they were practising experimenting with the ratio of paint:water and seeing the effect it had during this activity, too. They coloured in the centre bubble first, so it had time to dry as they did the rest of their painting, then I asked them to paint over the writing in a different colour - so this time they needed to make sure their watercolours were less watery to ensure they showed up!

As usual, Z did her own version! I wrote a caption in the corner of her page too, upon her request. 😂

As they worked, we had a little discussion about Prophet Eesa (AS) in Christianity... How he's known by the name Jesus and how Christians believe he's the son of God. Allah is God - can Allah have children? No! So why do Christians believe Jesus is God's son? Because normally, to get a baby inside a woman's tummy, you need a man, a husband to help - like Papa is Mama's husband and your father. But did that happen for Eesa (AS)? No, Maryam (AS) didn't have a husband! Allah just put a baby in her tummy just like that, because He can do anything! But the Christians, they thought if Allah, if God was the one who put baby Eesa (AS), baby Jesus in his mummy's tummy, then that must mean God is the father! So if God is his father and Jesus is God's son, that must mean Jesus is like God too! So Christians pray to Jesus and worship him too. Is that what Muslims believe? Is that what we believe? No! Eesa (AS) doesn't have a father; that's just one of Allah's miracles. And he's not Allah's son! But he is special because he's one of Allah’s prophets. Can we worship anyone or anything other than Allah? No!

As we spoke, I helped by drawing a simple diagram on the whiteboard, similar to the bottom branches of a family tree: crossing out the dad and writing Allah’s name as part of the tree when talking about Christianity, and crossing out the dad completely and writing Allah’s name separate when talking about Islam. We also briefly talked about people who are neither Christians nor Muslims and they don't believe in Eesa (AS) or Jesus at all - they think Maryam (AS) had a baby with a man who wasn't her husband and Eesa (AS) isn't special at all! But we know that's wrong because? Allah put Eesa (AS) in her tummy and Eesa (AS) is special because he's one of our prophets. 💕

Maths Update: Times Tables (2x, 5x, 10x)

We've been focusing on multiplication and the times tables facts for the past couple of weeks. The NC for Year 1 introduces the 10x, 5x and 2x tables, which the girls are familiar with now, and the NC for Year 2 mentions them again - so I wanted to concentrate on quicker recall to help with their mental maths.

We began by recapping multiplication theory i.e. What does 2 x 5 mean? It means counting the number 2 five times. This is the same as 5 x 2, counting the number 5 two times - all demonstrated physically with cubes first then as dots on the whiteboard.

Over the week they then did a mixture of worksheets, oral questions, online games (we've signed up to education.com as someone organised a cheap HE lifetime deal!) and simply chanting both as facts (2 x 1 is 2, 2 x 2 is 4, etc) and as sequences (2, 4, 6, 8, etc) forwards and backwards as and when fit with our schedule - to give them plenty of practise and repetition in a variety of ways.

These were mainly to do with the 2x and 5x tables since, after a quick verbal quiz, they showed they understood the pattern for multiplying by 10, i.e. the number becomes 1 place value bigger - an easy trick being to put a 0 at the end (language is important here! I made sure not to say "add a zero", since mathematically adding 0 to a number means it stays the same! And I emphasised it's the place value which changes, which is an important building block for when they move onto decimal numbers in the future inshaAllah). They're able to recall/work out the 10x table up to 10 x 12, as well as calculate random whole numbers x 10, e.g. 24 x 10 = 240, 523 x 10 = 5230, etc. at a good speed, mashaAllah.

I printed out a multiplication square each for them each, up to 12 x 12, which I'm planning for them to keep until they memorise all their times tables... So a few years inshaAllah! I glued the square into a piece of coloured card, to help it last longer, and so there's also space to keep a log of which times tables are tested when. When they're able to quickly recall a multiplication fact, they can colour the corresponding square in - so the goal is to have the whole sheet coloured in. By quickly, the aim is for them to have memorised the fact rather than count it out each time, so I guess under 3 seconds? Instantly, ideally! But they're still young so inshaAllah with more repetition over the years, the speed of recall will only increase. (The girls asked me if I knew my times tables to which I said yes... When did I start learning them? Probably at around their age and I remember having a sheet like them at school to colour in too! So how long did it take for me to finish colouring them all in? I suppose around Year 3 or 4? So around 7 or 8? To which they both laughed because why did it take me 3 years just to learn this tiny square of numbers? F then said she'd definitely finish it all before she was 7. Lol. 😂)

You can download the multiplication square we used here, though a quick Google search will probably turn up many others!

As a craft activity to visually represent the multiplication families, we used pony beads to make "bracelets" for the 2x, 3x, 4x and 5x tables. So for the 2x table, they needed to use 2 beads of the same colour together, then 2 beads of a different colour, then 2 beads of a different colour, etc. etc. until they had a chain of 12 sets of 2 beads together. Then I helped them tie the elastic off into a bracelet. For the 3x table they used 3 beads of the same colour together, for the 4x table 4 beads and for the 5x table 5. So they could see visually the difference in size between 12 x 2, 3, 4 and 5 and I showed them how they could use the relevant beads as a kind of number line to help them count the answer to e.g. 3 x 6 or 7 x 5 etc. The activity itself was good fine motor practise as well as a lesson in concentration! M made the 2x, 3x and 4x bracelets in the same amount of time as F took to do the 5x as she kept getting distracted. 😅

We also played some card games to help practise faster recall, similar to the card games we made up for learning the number bonds to 10: Snap, where instead of saying "Snap!" for a matching suit they needed to say the answer to the multiplication fact for the card on top (e.g. if we were practicing the 2x table and the 10 of clubs was played followed by the 4 of clubs, the first person to shout the answer to 2 x 4 and touch the cards would win them), and also just a speed competition whereby I would shuffle the cards then hold up the one on top - the first person to say the answer (for whichever times table we were practising, e.g. if we were doing the 5x table and I held up the 6 of diamonds, the first one to shout "30!") would win the card, the winner being the person with the most cards at the end.

I made a quick worksheet of word problems, based on the 2x, 5x and 10x tables, set in Chuggington - as this is the current favourite TV show for the girls! Using their interests is an easy way to get them excited and keep their focus for a task. 😂

You can download the worksheet here.

Finally, I linked it all to division as the inverse of multiplication, ie 2 x 3 = 6 so 6 ÷2 = 3... demonstrated with physical objects first before using drawings and lastly just number sentences. With this knowledge they were then able to quickly answer missing number problems for multiplication (eg 5 x ? = 35) as well as division problems (18 ÷ 2 = ? 60 ÷ ? = 6) while practising their 2x, 5x and 10x tables at the same time.

Teaching Resources for KS1

I thought I'd compile a list of books I've found useful over the past couple of years as either reference material or worksheets for KS1.

[Last updated: 22.02.19]

LITERACY/NUMERACY

Letts Make It Easy… Maths & English (Age 3-5)

Letts Make It Easy… Maths & English (Age 5-6)

Letts Make It Easy… Maths & English (Age 6-7)

Letts Make It Easy… Maths & English (Age 7-8) [link]

LITERACY

Letts Monster English – Reading (Age 5-6)

Letts Monster English – Grammar & Punctuation (Age 5-6)

Letts Monster English – Spelling & Phonics (Age 5-6)

Letts Monster English – Handwriting (Age 5-6) [link]

Collins Easy Learning – Comprehension (Ages 5-7) [link]

Schofield&Sims - First Comprehension 1 [link]

Schofield&Sims - First Comprehension 2 [link]

NUMERACY

Letts Monster Maths – Maths (Age 5-6)

Letts Monster Maths – Addition & Subtraction (Age 5-6)

Letts Monster Maths – Multiplication & Division (Age 5-6)

Letts Monster Maths – Fractions (Age 5-6)

Letts Monster Maths – Measurement (Age 5-6)

Letts Monster Maths – Telling the Time (Age 5-6) [link]

Collins Easy Learning – Mental Maths (Ages 5-7) [link]

CGP Key Stage One Maths – The Question Book [link]

Schofield&Sims – KS1 Problem Solving 1 [link]

Schofield&Sims – KS1 Problem Solving 2 [link]

Schofield&Sims – KS1 Problem Solving 3 [link]

SCIENCE

Science in Action Collection - KS1 [link] (see this post for a note re: the Fossils book)

Fundamental Science Collection - KS1 [link]

ISLAM

Migo & Ali: Love for the Prophets [link]

My First Quran Storybook [link]

Safar Islamic Studies Textbook 1-6 [link]

ARABIC

Madinah Arabic Reader Book 1 [link]

OTHER

Dictionary Work & Nonsense Poems

This week, we focused on nonsense words in poetry.

We read a few examples (e.g. On The Ning Nang Nong by Spike Milligan) and the whole of the book Noisy Poems from the library - their favourite inside being one about spaghetti (Spaghetti Spaghetti by Jack Prelutsky) so we decided to use it as inspiration for their own nonsense words poem.

I asked them which food they loved which they wanted to write about and they both agreed on cake - specifically the cake they had on their 5th birthday! So I put up a picture of the cake and asked them to describe it, making notes on the whiteboard as a spider diagram as they went, prompting them with the idea of the five senses for description as well as how it made them feel.

Once they had a lot of ideas down, we tried writing the first verse together - what kind of rhythm did they want? Did they want their poem to rhyme? Which lines? We came up with:

You look so yummy,
I can't wait to eat you,
You're beautiful, colourful and

And? So they needed a word to rhyme with "yummy"... so let's make one up! Any word which ends in an "ummy" sound! And they went with "numummy".

In this way, crossing off ideas from the spider diagram as we went, we worked together to turn their ideas into a poem with nonsense words.

When the verses were all done and we read it through, I asked them if it was clear their poem was about cake... To which they said no! So what could we write so the reader knows they're talking about cake? And so we ended up with the couplet at the start and end of the poem.

Now the poem was complete on the whiteboard, I typed it up into Word so they could take turns on the laptop editing it to make it more personal. Then I printed it out for them to illustrate.

Our next few Literacy lessons were spent looking at dictionaries: what are they used for? (meanings of words) How are they organised? (alphabetically) How do you use them? (look up the word you don't know) What information do they have inside? (also the kind of word, e.g. noun, adjective, etc.)

Then, I gave them a template so they could make a mini dictionary for the nonsense words in their cake poem. First, they highlighted all the nonsense words in their poem and wrote their words alphabetically down the page on the template. Then they wrote what kind of word it was (they were all adjectives!). Finally, they wrote what their nonsense word meant, referring back to their poem to help them.

You can download our dictionary template here.

Everyday Materials

Finally covering the topic of "Materials" formally!

Here are some of the things we've done over the past few weeks:

1) Finding examples of everyday materials.

First, I asked them to explain what I meant by the "material" of something. They came up with "the thing it's made from". Then we brainstormed as many different materials as they could think of onto the whiteboard and when they were done I gave them a spider diagram of common materials to read through.

We went round each room in the house and tried to find 2-3 examples of objects made from each material on the spider diagram. As we went round, we talked about whether all the objects made from the same material were similar or not... And if the same object (e.g. a spoon) could be made from different materials - and why might that be? Why were certain materials chosen for some objects and not others? What made them good for that job?

You can download our worksheet here.

2) Learning new vocabulary to do with properties of materials.

We read through a couple of our science reference books on materials, then on a separate occasion went back to the pages relevant to properties to study them again in more detail: what do each of these words mean? Can you think of any other examples of objects with this property, that you could describe using this word? Can you find examples around the house?

The words we covered (inspired by the NC, but replacing e.g. the words "bendy" and "not bendy" because why not lol) were: hard, soft, rough, smooth, shiny, dull, flexible, inflexible, stretchy, stiff, transparent, opaque, waterproof, absorbent.

Then I gave them the following worksheet to complete by working together:

You can download the worksheet here.

3) Investigation into which material would be the best for a specific job.

I decided to go with the scenario of trying to keep a hot drink from cooling down so fast, as it was an easy one to link to the topic of materials and also introduce the idea of planning an experiment with making it a fair test in mind (the girls are now familiar with making predictions based on scientific knowledge, recording results and comparing them to their prediction, but in the past I've always just done the method myself).

So I wrote up a couple of sheets as an investigation template and we worked through them together.

I think this is also the first time I've introduced a diagram to them too! So I didn't go through it in much detail, just modelled the conventions as we spoke about how the experiment would be set up.

This was also good revision for their work on measuring, since we had to get the thermometers out again, and good practise for reading scales!

The idea of checking the temperature of the hot water for a mug without any material wrapped around it was important too, as it's the first time I've hinted at the need for a control. So this little experiment was really a way for me to slowly introduce and build up a lot of scientific conventions when designing investigations. 😀

Here's how we set everything up before pouring the hot water in. They were in charge of two mugs each and they had a thermometer each. They sensibly said they should wrap the mugs before pouring the water in, because otherwise it might make a mess! And I also told them it would make it fairer, because what if by the time they'd finished wrapping the first mug a few minutes had gone past before they even poured the water into the second mug?! We also spoke about how to measure the water before we started - i.e. they needed to make sure they were measuring the water and not the mug... What did they think I meant by that? They had to make sure the thermometer was touching the water and not leaning against the mug, because otherwise it would be measuring the temperature of the mug! Z was watching as we did it, and kept repeating this fact throughout: "You need to measure the water, don't touch the mug!" 😂

We used my phone as the timer, which is why there are no photos of the experiment in action. 🙈

I had to hold my tongue quite a bit as we did this activity... Lol. Reminding myself they're only 5 and the experiment doesn't need to perfectly fair, so long as they get the gist of things! Reflecting back on how they could improve their experiment as a conclusion can come later, inshaAllah. 😂

You can download the investigation templates here.

Heavy & Light Letters / Venn diagrams

As part of their hifz practise and improving their pronunciation, it was suggested to us by a friend to look properly at which Arabic letters are "heavy", which are "light" and which can be either depending on where they are in the Quran.

We started by simply sorting the letters in the alphabet into the three groups: heavy, light, either.

Then I helped them make an A3 poster to help them visualise and so remember the information better (similar to how we made a poster of the "sun" and "moon" letters - which I've not written up a blog post for yet!).

You can download the letters to cut out here.

Next, we practised their sorting skills in terms of a Venn diagram on the whiteboard. I explained how the diagram worked with a couple of examples, then asked them where a letter would go before asking them to tell me a letter which fit into each section.

To check their understanding of Venn diagrams, I drew another one for them to sort the sun/moon letters with. This time, I just asked them where letters went before asking them for examples. Then I coloured in the centre section to emphasise that there are no letters which belong in both categories!

Finally, we recapped the sun/moon letters along with this new heavy/light information by sorting some of the Arabic alphabet using a two-way table, again on the whiteboard, and labelling it as a Carroll diagram.

The heavy/light letters poster is currently on display in our front room and we use it to sing the alphabet to the tune of this song: starting with the light letters, then the in between and finally the heavy letters in alphabetical order (they're kind of arranged alphabetically on the poster!). We sing it through 4 times; first with the letter names, then as if each letter has a fatha, then a kasra and finally a damma. The girls enjoy it as finishing with the heavy letters sounds good! And it's a fun way to practise for them too. 😁

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While we were there, we looked at a Venn diagram in the context of numbers, too! Just to reinforce understanding and to recap our recent work on their multiplication tables. I drew the diagram on the board and asked them where certain numbers would go, then for examples of numbers from each of them which belonged in each section. Lastly, I gave them a number which wouldn't fit in any category and asked them where they thought it would go - M laughed and F said nowhere! As a joke, she pointed in the corner of the whiteboard so I said yes, she was right - if something doesn't fit in any of the categories, then it just goes outside the diagram! And we did a couple more examples to finish.

Maths Update: Properties of 2D & 3D shapes

Through looking at examples around the house (toys, packaging etc) and consolidating their knowledge with a couple of worksheets, the girls now:

- can explain what a polygon and quadrilateral are

- know that vertices mean corners and count them on a shape

- know what an edge and face are and count them on a shape

- can distinguish between straight and curved edges and faces

- can identify cones and square based pyramids, along with spheres, cylinders, cubes, cuboids, triangular based pyramids and triangular prisms (from a while ago!)

- know what a prism is and give examples (M said a banana isn't a prism because the ends are pointy but if you just cut the middle bit it is because it's like a cylinder!)

- can sort shapes based on their number of faces, edges and vertices


Next time we look at shape, I plan to cover symmetry with them inshaAllah. 💪

Prophet Yunus (AS) & Making Mistakes

We read through the story of the Prophet Yunus (AS) from the books we have at home, talking about it as we went along. When we were done, I asked them to try and summarise the story back to me, so I could check their understanding.

As we're still working on our growth mindsets at the moment, I decided to use Yunus (AS)'s example as a way to highlight the moral of making mistakes then going on to fix them... Making a mistake isn't the end of the world. If we make a mistake, we should just try our best to fix it, however we can. Allah (SWT) is the only one who never makes mistakes and He is always there to listen to us when we need help. We can always make dua to Allah whenever we're in trouble or we need help... What was the mistake Yunus (AS) made? He left the people before Allah said he should stop delivering his message... How did he fix his mistake? He admitted he was wrong and asked Allah for forgiveness, by making dua.

Finally, we made a simple craft to make the story and moral more memorable... Because we can't draw the Prophet Yunus (AS), what would be a good picture to remind you of the story? A whale! 🐋 I decided to link this to their current work in Science on properties of materials by having them make a sun catcher. We didn't have any tissue paper to hand, so we improvised using tracing paper and felt tips! And, with help, this was an activity the toddler could join in with too.

I printed out the outline of a whale (to fit onto an A5 piece of paper) for them to trace onto tracing paper, which I'd pre-cut to A5 size. Then they chose a piece of A4 coloured card each and folded it in half. In the centre, they drew a circle by drawing around a bowl. While they were colouring their whales in using felt tips, I cut this circle out for them. Then, as if their card were like a book, they glued their tracing paper in between so the whale lined up with the cut out circle. Finally, I helped them cut around the edges so the card became a frame.

After I'd blutacked their sun catchers to their bedroom window, I asked them if they thought the tracing paper part of their sun catcher was transparent or opaque... M said transparent and F said opaque! Fortunately for me lol. So I explained the tracing paper is kind of in between: it blocks some light but lets some light through, so we can kind of see through it but not really - and the word for this is "translucent". Which part of the sun catcher was definitely opaque? They both said the card frame. And can you see anything in the window which is definitely transparent? They both said the glass of the window. I then pointed to each part in turn for them to describe as either transparent, translucent or opaque.

Later on, when we went downstairs and they were playing with their tracks, M asked if the box was transparent or translucent... Because it was see through but it wasn't clear, it was purple! After some talk, we decided that it was both - because the ridges on the lid were a bit cloudy to make them translucent while the rest of the box was transparent even though it was tinted a colour. 😄