Welcome to Reception

PLEASE CHECK THE FOUNDATION STAGE LINK FOR THE MOST RECENT INFORMATION ABOUT RECEPTION. THANK YOU

Welcome to Reception class. We had a great first term in school and have lots of exciting things planned for Spring term. Please check our page for information and photographs of our learning and don't forget to read our newsletter each Friday to keep up to date with Foundation Stage learning and events.

​If you have any comments about your child's development and learning, please write them on post it note. You can find these in a basket by the door. We will add them to your child's learning story.

Reception Staff

Mrs Casson, Mrs Renshaw, Miss Wilding, Mrs Bodell and Mrs Hewson

IMPORTANT

* Please label all of your child's clothing.

* Ensure that you bring your child into class, do not leave them at the door. One member of staff will be supervising the gate and may not be available to talk. Please come into Foundation Stage and speak to another member of the team should you have any queries or concerns. 

* Encourage your child to hang up their coat, find their name and spend a few moments with them sharing a story or an activity, allowing them to feel confident and happy before you leave.

* Please inform a member of staff is someone different is collecting your child.

* Children need to have their red reading bags in school EVERY day. Thank you.

*Support your child to develop their skills of independence. Practise putting on shoes, zipping coats and tying laces, children are expected to 'have a go' themselves in school, please encourage this at home. 

Our Three R Rules

* Respect

* Responsibility

* Resilience

Children are encouraged to show respect towards others.

They are encouraged to be resilient, have a positive attitude and keep trying.

They have to be responsible, looking after themselves, each other and things they use in Foundation Stage.

Congratulations

A huge well done to Grace the only member of Reception to achieve 100% attendance for the Autumn Term, we are all very pleased and proud. Fantastic!!

Our 'Super Scientist of the term' was Cady for her brilliant questions, inquisitive nature and interest in finding things out. 

Well done to Reception, you had a brilliant term settling into 'big school', getting to know rules and routines and making lots of new friends. You are all working hard, and developing a 'can do' attitude, keep up this up next term!!

Spring Term- January 2015

Welcome back and Happy New Year, we hope you had an enjoyable and restful holiday. We have busy half term planned. Our topic this half term is 'Weather' and we will begin by talking about 'Winter'.  The children will be exploring ice, talking about how it is formed and making ice cubes, balloons and freezing different objects to see what happens. They will be finding out about different materials, and what clothes are best to keep explorers warm!

In our whole class sessions we will be using the floor book to create questions that will help us to find out about animals that live in cold and snowy climates and how they survive. 

In Maths the children will be looking at, identifying and ordering numbers to 20 and beyond. They will be completing simple calculations and using identifying more and less. The children will also be encouraged to develop their skills of estimations. The children will begin to look at measurement and be comparing length and weight.

​We will be sharing stories including 'Cuddly Duddly', 'Snow Bear's Surprise', 'Winnie in Winter' and 'Snow Bears' and using these to develop our writing of sentences. Phonics will continue with phase 3 digraphs and the children will be developing their writing skills and using capital letters and full stops.

​In art the children will be using chalk and pastels to draw Polar animals as well as making penguins and polar bears. We will be developing a 'Polar explorer camp' and will role play being 'Arctic Explorers'.

We will be using music from 'Still life at the Penguin Cafe' to inspire movement and dance. We will also be continuing our gymnastic sessions in the hall, developing our travelling and balancing skills using the apparatus.

​Please check our class page regularly to see photographs of learning.

Supporting your child's learning at home.

* Please read with your child for a few minutes every night. It is more beneficial to spend a few minutes of quality time together, sharing a few pages of the book and taking about it rather than trying to read the whole book in one go.

​*Continue to share stories and favourite books as well as the books sent home from school.

* Encourage independence. Let your child have a go at dressing themselves, encourage them to zip up their own coat, fasten buttons and put on their own shoes.

* Encourage numeral recognition, what number is your house?, what number bus do you get?  which numbers can you see? etc. Count every day, how many plates for dinner, how many stairs, how many steps to the end of the road? etc. All of this will support your child's learning in school and support their counting, calculations and problem solving.

* Support your child with their homework, sometimes it will be a talking activity but this is as important as a written activity. homework will be sent home on Friday to be returned by the following Tuesday.

* Help your child to learn their high frequency and tricky words. Children will be bringing home words that we have been learning in school, encourage them to read them with you at home. Some words are decodable, they can be sounded out e.g. c-a-t, m-u-m, w-e-n-t' but some words are 'tricky' and the children have to learn these by sight. examples of tricky words are 'the', 'to', 'she' and 'go'. 

* Ask your child about their learning. What can they tell you about their school activities? If your child has a particular interest or shows real enthusiasm for a particular theme, please let us know and we can also follow it up in school. Children learn best when they are motivated, interested and engaged by their learning.

This half term our topic is 'Colour, Texture, Shape and Pattern'. The children will be finding and making their own repeating patterns. They will learn the names  of 2D and 3D shapes and identify their features. They will use shapes to construct pictures and models and explore texture using different materials such as sand, wood, paper, dough and various other materials in their creative work. 

​We will continue with our phonic sessions, focusing on sounds and blending to make words as well as learning some new high frequency words. The children will develop their phoneme / grapheme knowledge and begin to write simple captions and sentences.

​The children will be learning the names of common 3D shapes and identifying their properties. You can support their learning at home by encouraging them to find examples of cubes, cuboids, spheres, cones and cylinders in and around your home. The children will make their own 3D shape monsters and use a variety of construction materials to make their own models.

We will also be looking at and talking about repeating patterns. The children will have the opportunity to make their own patterns using paint, stampers, shapes and a variety of collage and construction materials. Can you help them find examples of patterns in the environment?

As part of our whole school art focus we will be learning about the work of the American painter, Jackson Pollock. The children will explore many examples of his work and use his techniques to create their own 'splatter paintings'.

​The children have shown real interest in fantasy characters and we will be following this line of interest over the coming weeks. We have shared the story of the 'The Princess and the Wizard' by Julia Donaldson, made potions and crowns and we will be developing our role play area to link with this theme.

Our PE sessions with Kyle will continue and this half term the children will be developing their gymnastic skills. They will balance on different parts of their body and create sequences of movement using different equipment. Please ensure your child has a pair of black velcro pumps for their PE sessions.

 Thank you to all of the parents and carers who came for lunch. The children really enjoyed sharing their first lunch experience with you. Please could you return the questionnaire as soon as possible. Many thanks for your support.

Lunch Reminder: Thursday 11th September 11.30

The children will be having school lunch for the first time on Thursday. To help them settle into this routine we are inviting you to come and share this experience with your child and try a delicious and healthy school lunch. Unfortunately we can only accommodate one parent / carer per child and we ask that if possible younger siblings do not attend. If you do need to bring a young child, please be aware that we cannot allow prams in the hall.

Please could you inform school if you will be having a vegetarian option. 

We look forward to seeing you on Thursday.

Phonic Challenge Rocket

In May we achieved our phonic challenge and completed our last reading of all the high-frequency words and diagraphs in under two minutes. Our reward was to go to KFC for lunch, (Mrs Jones said she was so pleased that she would pay!)

On the way we met a police man how exciting! We had a fabulous time and everyone in KFC said how well behaved we were.

"We're all connected in Reception"

We like playing a game called "Connections" to show how we are all connected, but in different ways. Look at the shape we make with our connections.

Summer Term 

This term we are learning about:

In maths - Using money to solve problems, beginning to use ordinal numbers to describe position, looking for, and designing our own patterns.

In literacy - we will be finishing our class story off, called Jenny and Sharky and beginning to understand how to write a letter. Perhaps we will get a letter from our PE fairy!

How can parents and carers help?

• Always talk to your child about what they have done in school.
• Attempt home/school activities.
• Give your child opportunities to write all the time; for example, write a shopping list, write thank you letters, use chalk on the yard to encourage writing and mark making.
• Read regularly to your child, try and use a variety of books. Read your child's library book with them daily.
• Look for number and shape in the environment. Ask challenging questions such as:- "that bus says number 6 what is 1 more, or 1 less than 6?"
• I can see a rectangle over there "Can you tell me what a rectangle looks like?"