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Year 1 98.2%
Year 2 95%
Year 3 98.2%
Year 4 97.3%
Year 5 98.2%
Year 6 96.5%
Year 7 94.5%

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Phoenix Primary School ‘Where We Rise to the Challenge’

Foundation Stage

Welcome to Phoenix Foundation Stage 2016 -2017

We will be adding lots of information to our Foundation Stage page. Please check regularly for updates, information and photographs of our learning. Don't forget to read our regular Foundation Stage Newsletter to keep up to date with FS learning and events.

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

Foundation Stage Staff:

Phase One Leader and Foundation Stage Teacher: Mrs Casson

Unqualified Teacher: Mrs Christopher

Support Staff: Mrs Renshaw, Miss Wilding & Miss Cotton

Important information:

Reception times: 8.50- 3.10

Our Nursery session is currently only an afternoon session from 12.15 - 3.15

Please bring your child into Foundation Stage each morning. As part of our safeguarding, one member of staff will be supervising the door and may not be available to talk. Please speak to any other member of staff should you have any queries or require any information.

Please join your child for a short activity or story at the start of the session. The door will be open for a little longer very morning except Thursday and we hope you take this opportunity to spend a few minutes with your child. We look forward to seeing you there.

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.

* Reception 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.

Summer 2

We have a busy half term planned. The children will be exploring transport and travel and thinking about the places they would like to go and how they would get there. This will also link to our work on World Wise week when the children will look at different countries around the world. We have started the topic thinking about Space. Through the story 'Whatever Next' by Jill Murphy the children have explored space travel and begun to learn about the planets. They have been learning about space travel and as part of our science week work the children have been learning about Sally Ride the first woman in space.

In Maths the children will use their knowledge of shapes to make models linked to their space theme. They will discuss the properties of different shapes and also use their mathematical knowledge to solve problems including doubling and halving and sharing.

Transition will be a focus for this half term as some children in Nursery are preparing to move to Reception and the children in Reception complete their time in Foundation Stage and make the move into Key Stage 1. The Reception children will be spending time with their new teaching team and the children will be talking about what they can expect to stay the same and what will be different in Year 1. Towards the end of the half term the children will spend time in their new classroom and explore the upstairs environment in groups, looking at the different areas they will access.

There will be a meeting for parents of children starting Reception to discuss the transition and expectations for Reception. More information will be sent home.

We will be completing work based on Refugee and World Wise Week. The children will use the story of Snow White and the Seven Dwarves and talk about danger and how Snow White has had to leave her home and the people who helped her.

If you have any questions please speak to a member of the FS staff. Thank you.

Science Week - Thank you to Jacob's Grandad for coming to make rockets with us, the children really enjoyed your visit and had lots of fun making their own rockets throughout the week.

The children have loved reading the story 'Whatever Next' and acting out the story of Baby Bear's adventures to space in his rocket. The children have made their own rocket models and pictures, shared their thoughts and ideas about space in the floor book, had picnics with their friends and retold the story in detail. Well done Foundation Stage.

Summer 1 2017

This half term our topic is 'Change'. We will be looking at life cycles and growth. The children will learn about Spring and be encouraged to observe the changes in and around the school grounds. They will be busy planting lots of seeds, caring for them and thinking about what they need to help them grow. They will be observing caterpillars grow and keeping a diary of the changes. The children will also be thinking about how they have grown and changed since they were babies and toddlers.

The children will continue sharing some 'Traditional Tales' reading the story of Jack and the Beanstalk. They will use their talk for writing strategies to map out the events in the story and learn how to orally retell it. Ask them to tell you the story, is it the same version you were told as a child? What is different? Please talk to your child about how traditional tales can differ.

The children will also be reading stories by Eric Carle including 'The Very Hungry Caterpillar' and 'The Bad Tempered Ladybird'.

The children in Reception will continue with their daily phonics sessions. Please practise the high frequency and phase 3 tricky words sent home. If you need another set please speak to a member of staff. The Nursery children will be continuing with their Phase 1 phonics, listening for rhymes, identifying alliteration and segmenting sounds they can hear in cvc words such as c-a-t and v-a-n.

Children in Reception will continue with their handwriting practise and be encouraged to write for different purposes. This half term they will be writing letters from Jack to the Giant, a list of ingredients to help the Little Red Hen, instructions for how to plant a beanstalk and they will be identifying and labelling parts of a plant. The Nursery children will continue with their daily mark making and development of fine motor skills through a range of different activities.

In Maths the children will be developing their knowledge of 2D and 3D shapes, identifying examples around school and using them to build with and in their art work. Challenge your child to find examples of shapes in and around your home. They will be comparing heights, measuring using standard and non-standard forms when looking at their 'beanstalks' and finding different ways to measure time. Children will have daily opportunities for counting and ordering and the Reception children will be practising counting in 2's. 5's and 10's as well as consolidating their doubling and halving skills. The children will also be completing maths challenges that encourage them to apply their problem solving skills. Please continue to talk about your own daily use of maths as part of 'Numeracy for Life' work.

The children will be using a range of technology to support their learning and will be encouraged to develop their independence by completing simple programmes on the MacBooks, Interactive whiteboards or on the iPads.

The children will be exploring the work of Artists Vincent Van Gogh and Monet and using their work as inspiration for their own paintings.

As part of our P4C sessions the children will be considering whether Jack was right to climb up the beanstalk, go against his mother's wishes and take the Giants hen. The children will consider making choices and identifying the reasons behind those decisions.

Reception children will continue to bring home their reading books, please try and listen to them read for a few minutes each day and record a comment in their diary.

Children need black velcro pumps for PE, please check with your child that the ones they have in school still fit.

Many thanks for your continued support. We are looking forward to a busy and fun filled half term.

Any questions or concerns please speak to a member of the team.

Outdoor Classroom Day - We had great fun! We worked with Year 6 to measure distances, we created large scale art work for our displays and we were mini beast hunters.

18.5.17 Mrs Bentley came to talk to FS about the Bees in her allotment. She made us honey cake, brought some frames from the hives and let the children dress up as bee keepers. Thank you Mrs Bentley, the children really enjoyed your visit.

Mega Maths! Practical, fun and child-initiated maths activities this week.

4.5.17 - Super shape work - This week the children in Foundation Stage have been on shape hunts, looked at the properties of 2D and 3D shapes, used shapes to build, construct and in their art work as well as making their own shapes using straws and sticks.

Outdoor fun!

27.4.16 We have been busy planting our own beans to see if we can grow a beanstalk like Jack. Ask the children can they tell you what is needed to help the beans to grow? The children will be carefully observing them over the coming weeks.

We have been learning about St George's Day and shared the story of St George defeating the dragon. The children enjoyed dressing up and retelling the story.

To celebrate 'Maths week' in Foundation Stage we have been completing a range of different activities.

We love Maths in FS. The children choosing a range of maths activities during continuous provision. Great turn taking, problem solving and high levels of engagement and perseverance.

Making gingerbread and talking about the changes we observed as we mixed the ingredients together.

Fun in Foundation Stage during 'Book Week'. We do love to dress up but it doesn't stop us doing all of the things we love!

Our Gingerbread Investigation. We started our work by discussing why the Gingerbread Man stopped running when he got to the water. 'He can't swim' suggested Nilah 'He will get soggy if he's wet' said Nyah 'He was scared' said Thormi. We wondered about the effect of different liquids on the gingerbread. We used our numeracy in life skills to carefully measure the same amount of each liquid, with children identifying when we reached 100ml. We used the same containers for each liquid and poured each liquid at the same time. We used the timer to measure how long the liquid soaked into the Gingerbread for and then after 15 minutes we observed some of the changes. Come and look in our floor book to see what we found!

We visited Mr Tumnus' house and did some writing about Narnia.

Parachute fun with Kyle!

Fine motor activities in Nursery

Spring 2

Ways to support learning at home.

Read regularly. If your child is in Nursery or Reception, share stories and encourage them to talk about what they have heard, retell the sequence of the story and discuss the events.
If your child is in Reception please encourage them to read their reading book for a few minutes every night. Little and often helps the children become more confident, develop good reading habits and support application of their phonics skills and knowledge.
Help the children complete home work activities often this is 'talk' based but will give the children confidence to share their knowledge during group and whole class discussions.
Talk to the children about their day and their learning. What have they been doing? What have they enjoyed and why? If your child has a real interest in a particular topic please let a member of the team know and we may incorporate this into our learning at school. The children are more engaged when they are motivated and interested by their learning.
Ensure that your child has a pair of black pumps that fit them for our PE sessions in the hall.

Learning this half term.

This half term we will be continuing our work on Narnia, thinking about the characters and ways we can describe them. We will use our imagination and begin to think about where the wardrobe might take us. The children will use their talk 4 writing skills to support the retelling of some 'Traditional Tales' including 'The Gingerbread Man', 'Goldilocks and the Three Bears and 'Little Red Riding Hood'. The Reception children are being encouraged to apply their phonic knowledge when writing and will be generating their own sentences when writing. In phonics the children will continue to learn new sounds from phase 3 of the Letters and sounds document and practise writing the corresponding graphemes.

In Maths the children will be comparing sizes and exploring capacity and volume. The Reception children will be consolidating their knowledge of money and thinking about halving and doubling. the nursery children will begin to combine two amounts and find the total and count on from different numbers.

The children will be thinking scientifically and carrying out different investigations looking at materials and the effect of different liquids on Gingerbread. They will be talking about what make a 'fair test'.

The children will be using a range of technology to support their research of different topics and they will using the computer to complete a simple program.

As part of our P4C work the children will be considering questions such as 'was Goldilocks right to go into the Three Bears house?' and 'Why did the Gingerbread Man run away?'. The children will also thing about characters they would like to meet any why.

The children will be learning about Lent and how Easter is celebrated and begin to think about new life.

Mandy Griffin our school nurse came to talk to the children about her job and how she helps us. She explained to the children all about the importance of washing their hands. Can they tell you about her visit?

Pancake Day! The children used their numeracy skills to weigh and measure the ingredients, they worked hard to mix the batter and then enjoyed tasting the pancakes with different toppings.

Fun in the Doctors surgery and Baby clinic! The children have enjoyed pretending to be doctors and nurses, looking after the dolls and, the staff and each other.

16.2.17 We loved our trip to St George's Hall for 'The Narnia Experience'. The children were amazing, they recalled so much of the story and they were so excited to meet Mr Tumnus, Mrs Beaver and even The White Witch!

Friday 3rd February - NSPCC Number Day. We had a great day in Foundation Stage today. The children came to school wearing numbers and also made their own number labels working hard on their numeral formation. The children had lots of fun completing a range of maths activities. They are really developing their counting and numeral recognition skills. Well done to everyone!!

Ice Investigations.

The children had a dilemma today. They wanted to play with their favourite figures but unfortunately Sleeping Beauty and Spiderman had been frozen. The children had to use their scientific knowledge to help free the figures. They had great ideas about melting the ice and what they would need. Some suggested water and Mrs Evans reported that the children were really sensible and talked carefully about the safest way to use the hot water.

The children used the water, salt, food colouring and flour in their investigation and made their predictions about which would melt the ice the quickest.