Author: Mrs Wood

What a busy final week we’ve had in Reception! We’re so proud of all the Reception children for their FANTASTIC singing. Thank you to everyone who came to watch. We hope you enjoyed!

Literacy 
This week, we’ve been learning about The Christmas Story. We used actions to help us remember the story. Click here to watch us.
We also wrote a sentence about a picture from The Christmas Story.
Poetry Picnic
We love learning new poems in Reception! Switch the kettle on, click here and enjoy having a cup of tea – cheers!

Christmas party
This morning, it was PARTY time! We had lots of fun playing party games and showing off our best dance moves. After all that dancing, we enjoyed eating some party food with our friends.

Finally, we hope you have a happy and healthy break. Enjoy spending some quality time with friends and family. Merry Christmas and a happy new year from all of the Reception Team!

See you in 2024!

This week, we’ve had lots of fun getting into the Christmas spirit. We’ve been busy doing lots of chilli challenges in the areas of provision.

Santa’s elves enjoyed decorating the role-play area ready for Christmas.

We used our fine motor skills to make Christmas trees in the playdough area.

We used our segmenting skills to write letters to Santa.

We practised our cutting skills when making paper chains at the finger gym table.

We used our subitising skills in the maths area.
Phonics help at home
Your child should have a phase 2 tricky word mat in their bookbags. Please practise reading these at home over the Christmas holidays.

Next half term, we’ll be starting phase 3. In this phase, the children will continue to learn more digraphs (two letters making one sound) and they’ll be introduced to some trigraphs (three letters making one sound).

Don’t forget to attend our Phase 3 phonics stay and learn session on Tuesday 16 January.
This is an opportunity for you watch a phase 3 phonics lesson and see your child’s progress. 

Literacy
We’ve been reading the The Jolly Christmas Postman. We enjoyed looking at all the different things inside the envelopes. This morning, some of the children went to post their postcards. Make sure you look out for them in the post!
Poetry Picnic
Click here to watch this week’s poem.

PE
For our final gymnastic session, we decided to practise our jumping skills.
Next half-term, PE will be on a Tuesday.  Please make sure your child comes to school wearing their PE kit suitable for outdoor PE.

Christmas events happening next week…
Reception, Y1 & Y2 will present their Christmas production, ‘Lights Camel Action’.
There will be two performances:
Tuesday 19 December – 2.15pm – 3.00pm
Wednesday 20 December – 2.15pm – 3.00pm

Friday 22 December – Non-uniform day and Christmas party

Finally…
Thank you to all of the parents and carers who came to the learning journey drop in sessions. We hope you enjoyed looking through your child’s books. We are super proud of the progress the children have made this half-term. Keep up the good learning, Reception!

Phonics
This week, we recapped all of the phase 2 phonemes. We also practiced reading words with ‘s’ at the end.

Help at home: Can your child read the following words?

ships, bags, cats, pots, cups, pins, digs

We’ve learnt all of the phase 2 tricky words. Tricky words can be challenging because we can’t sound them out – we just have to know them by sight.

Help at home: Have fun finding tricky words around your house.
How to play:

• Write the phase 2 tricky words on pieces on paper.
• Stick them up around your house.
• How many can you find? Don’t forget to read them!
• You could race someone at home.

Poetry Picnic
Each week, we learn a new poem. We recite the poem each day. Click here to watch this week’s poem.

Owl babies
This week, we’ve been reading Owl Babies by Martin Waddell.
We drew a picture of our favourite part and retold the story using words and actions.
Click on the links below to watch some of us.
Video 1
Video 2
Video 3

Stamps!
Next week, we’ll be learning all about what happens to our post when reading the story ‘The Jolly Christmas Postman’. To enhance your child’s learning experience, we will be writing and then posting a postcard home.

If you would like your child’s postcard to be posted through the Royal Mail please provide a stamp in a named envelope by Thursday 14 December.

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas…
This morning, we got to decorate the school Christmas tree in the hall. We had so much fun!
Reminder!
Don’t forget to attend a learning journey drop in next week! We look forward to sharing your child’s books.

Have a happy and healthy weekend.

 

This week, we’ve been reading the book How to catch a star by Oliver Jeffers. We worked together to sequence the story and talked about what happened at the beginning, middle and end.
The boy in the story tried so many different was to catch a star. We used our imaginations to think about how we would catch a star.

Emir – I would use a big ladder and put it next to a tree.
Teddy – I would use a rocket.
Hana – I would use a hot air balloon.
Emilia – I would use a rocket.
Oscar – I would use a trampoline.

Yesterday, we talked about star constellations. We had a go at drawing our own.
Art
This week, we explored impressionism by looking at Claude Monet’s series of impressionist oil paintings of the Houses of Parliament. Mrs Boulton asked Reception…

What is an artist?

Rowan – An artist can cut paper and do a painting.
Xara-Mae – They make pictures.
Rayaan – If you paint for a queen.
Edie – They make a masterpiece.
Benjamin – They cut paper with scissors.

We used two forms of printing to create our own versions.
Maths
We developed our understanding of the composition of numbers by investigating the composition of 3, 4 and 5. We consolidated our understanding of a whole being made up of smaller parts by using cubes to compose and de-compose numbers. We also introduced the  part–part–whole model to the children.
We played a star game to help us understand the parts of 3, 4 and 5.
How many children are holding a star? (part)
How many children are not holding a star? (part)
How many are there altogether? (whole)

We watched the Numberblocks Stampoline video and had a go at printing our own Stampoline patterns of 4.

Help at home: Draw, paint or create your own Stampoline patterns at home.

Poetry Picnic
This week’s is called Mice by Rose Fyleman.
We talked about how poems can sometimes have rhyming words in them. Help at home: Can your child tell you the rhyming words in this week’s poem?
Living and Learning
Our Living and Learning was I can talk about my feelings. Some children happily shared their feelings with others. 

Rowan – I like waking up. I feel happy.
Rayaan – My heart feels very nice when my cousins come but I feel shy.
Sam – Sometimes when I come into school I feel sad. When I’m here, I feel happy.

Christmas is coming!
We’ve been practising our Christmas songs for our Christmas performance. We can’t wait for you to come and watch us sing on Tuesday 19 and Wednesday 21 December.

Reminders
– Learning journey drop in’s – Don’t forget to sign up!
Tuesday 12 and Thursday 14 December  at 8.45 – 9.15am or 3.15 – 3.45pm
– The cold weather is here! Please make sure your child comes to school wearing a suitable coat.

This week, we explored making shadows. We used torches to explore what happened to the shadows when we moved the light source closer and then further away from the model. We had lots of fun creating our own shadow puppets in the creative area. Some children explored making shadows of their models in the construction area.
In Literacy, our focus story was Night Monkey, Day Monkey by Julia Donaldson. For our writing activity, we drew and labelled pictures of things we see and do during the day and at night time .
Our word of the week was nocturnal.

A hedgehog used to live in my garden.
I saw a fox when walking home.
I have seen bats before!

Help at home: Draw a picture of a nocturnal animals and label it.

In maths, we introduced the children to  composition by focusing on the preliminary skills: the concept of ‘wholes’ and ‘parts’. We investigated composition using own bodies and familiar toys. For example, we looked at  Mr. Potato Head and talked about the smaller part that make Mr. Potato Head a whole. We also sand ‘Heads, shoulders, knees and toes’ and thought about our body parts. We used this stem sentence My […] is a part of me and the whole of me is [name] to explain our parts.

Help at home: Look at the pictures. Can you see the parts?

We also had a go at composing and de-composing Numberblocks up to 5 using cubes.

Reminders

• Library books must be returned every Monday. If you have one of our library books at home, please return it.
• Please make sure your child’s reading record is in their book bag every day in case we need to write in them on a different day.
• Learning Journey Drop In’s
  Tuesday 12  & Thursday 14 December 8.45 – 9.15am or 3.15 – 3.45pm
  A sign-up letter will be sent out shortly.

This week, we celebrated Nursery Rhyme Week. In Literacy, we read Each Peach, Pear Plum by Allan Ahlberg and Janet Ahlberg. When reading the story, we played ‘I Spy’. We used prepositional language to describe where the characters were hiding, for example, Baby Bunting is under the bridge.
After reading the book, we looked for nursery rhyme characters hiding around our classroom. We drew a picture of one of the characters and wrote a sentence. For example, I spy Humpty Dumpty.

This week’s chilli challenges were all linked to nursery rhymes. Take a look at some in action…

We helped build a wall for Humpty Dumpty.

We played Busy Bus in the maths area.

The playdough area spelt delicious! Lots of bakers making cakes and cupcakes.

We used our fine motor skills to catch and order the numbered fish.

We had fun making up our own number stories with the 5 Little Speckled Frogs.
How many frogs are sat on the logs?
How many are in the pond?
How many altogether?

We used  pastels to draw twinkling stars.

We used our fine motor skills to catch spiders at the finger gym table.

We created our own our clocks for the mouse.

Help at home: Practise singing some nursery rhymes at home. You could send us a video of your favourite!

Poetry Picnic
This week, we decided to learn a new version of Row, row, row your boat. We had lots of fun thinking of our own actions!

Phonics
This week, we learnt four more graphemes: v, w, x, y. The children are really enjoying their daily phonics sessions and are becoming super readers!

Help at home: Practise reading these tricky words. You could play a tricky word hunt at home.
Writing process
In phonics, we’ve started to write captions, e.g. a red sock.
To help us with the process, we follow six simple steps.

Think about what we want to write.

Say it out loud.

Count the words.

Segment each word on our phoneme fingers.

Write each word.

Check our writing makes sense.

Help at home: Write a caption about this picture.
Maths
This week, we’ve been comparing the number of objects in two sets by matching them 1:1. When comparing, we noticed that some sets had more than, fewer than and an equal number. On Tuesday, the Three Bears needed our help to make sure they had packed an equal number of things for their picnic.
Help at home: Set the table. Do you have the right amount? Is it equal?

Stay and learn
Thank you to all of the parents and carers who attended to the maths stay & learn session on Wednesday. It was lovely to see so many of you! The next stay & learn is our a Phase 3 Phonics session in January.

Have a happy and healthy weekend.

Yesterday, we had anti-bullying day at school. We all came in odd socks to show that everyone is different and unique.

We spoke about what bullying means and looked at the JLT’s definition of bullying and what we can do to stop it.

We made a kindness heart and talked about kindness.

What is kindness?

Xara-Mae – You are kind to people.
Rowan – You play with friends.
Zara – If you give someone a hug.
Dawud – Not bullying people.
Bryher – You scooter together.
Harry – You’re kind to everyone.
Teddy – Sharing toys.
Laila – Saying sorry.

This week, we’ve been busy learning about Bonfire Night, Diwali and Remembrance Day.

On Tuesday, we discussed why we celebrate Bonfire Night and how we celebrated.

We set the fire and look up to the sky.
We eat special food.
You can get candyfloss  and doughnuts.
We put sticks in a field and make a bonfire.
We have lots of fireworks!

On Wednesday, we read Binny’s Diwali and talked about some of the key things used to celebrate Diwali. We also talked about other celebrations and festivals with the same or similar activities/decorations. Yesterday, we listened to a story called Flo of the Somme and talked about the importance of Remembrance Day.

Here’s some of the chilli challenges we did to support our learning…

We used different materials to create rocket fireworks.

 

 

 

 

 

 

We made Diya Lamps at the playdough table.

 

 

 

 

 

 

We used chalk to draw Rangoli patterns.

 

 

 

 

 

 

We drew some amazing Mehendi patterns.

 

 

 

 

 

 

We used an app on the iPads to draw pictures of poppies.

 

 

 

 

 

 

PE
Today, Reception enjoyed their first gymnastics session.  We focused on moving in a low position. At the end of the session, some children were eager to perform a short sequence of different low movements.
Poetry Picnic
Click here to watch this week’s poem.

Reminders

Odd Socks Day – Monday 13 November
Children are invited to wear odd socks to school today, marking the fact we’re all different in some way.
Maths stay and learn session – Wednesday 15 November
Children in Need: non-uniform day – Friday 17 November

 

In Literacy, we’ve been reading Potion Commotion by Peter Bentley. The book is about a little witch called Betty. She ends up making a big mess when putting just about everything into her cauldron to make a potion. Betty’s potion grows and grows and spreads all over the town! 
Help at home: Talk to your child about the story and see if they can remember what happened at the end.

After reading the story, we thought about what we would put in a magic potion. We drew pictures and labelled our list of ingredients.
Yesterday, we decided to be scientists and make our very own hubble and bubble potion.
Before doing the experiment, we made sensible predictions.

I think it will bubble.
I think it will fizz.
I think it will hit the ceiling!
I think it will overflow.

Click here to watch our bubbling potion.

Maths
This week, we introduced simple addition and subtraction number stories.
For example,
First there were three spiders on the web.
Then, one more spider joined them.
Now, there are four spiders altogether.

Help at home: Collect up to five of your favourite toys. Use these toys to create addition and subtraction stories. Don’t forget to use the words ‘first’, ‘then’ and ‘now’ and your fingers!

What else have we been up to?
The potion chilli challenge was very popular this week!
It’s important children spend lots of time doing fine motor activities to develop their finger muscles ready for writing.

Help at home: Practise your cutting skills.

We’ve been recognising numerals and practising our counting skills at the maths bench.

One-to-one correspondence focuses on the actual counting of objects, and assigning numbers to objects in the correct order, as they are counted. This also helps children to understand that the numbers they are saying hold value.

Creating more potions in the water tray!

Reminders

• Marvellous Maths stay and learn session – Wednesday 15 November
• Please email any ‘WOW’ moments or new interests at home. We love receiving and sharing photos in school.
  moortowneyfs@spherefederation.org
• Please continue to read your child’s e-book daily alongside love of reading books.

Have a wonderful half-term break! I look forward to seeing you all again on Monday 06 November.

This week, we’ve been reading Leaf Man by Lois Ehlert. We looked closely at the illustrations and talked about autumn changes.

What happens in autumn?

It gets cold.
Leaves fall off the trees and they turn different colours.
Halloween happens in autumn.
Leaves are orange, red, yellow and brown.
The wind starts to blow.

Throughout the week, we’ve been drawing story maps, making leaf people and creating some leaf rubbings using autumn colours. Yesterday, we talked about hibernation and why some animals start to hibernate in October and November.
Help at home: Ask your child if they can remember some of the facts we’ve learnt this week.

Hedgehogs
This week, we had lots of fun making hedgehogs and taking photos of them on the iPad.
Maths
This week, we used the language of ‘more than’ and ‘fewer than’ to describe how many objects there are on each set. ‘Fewer than’ is used rather than ‘less than’ because the focus is on countable things.

Help at home: Gary and Barney are still arguing! Can you help them decide who has more and who has fewer?
Use the stem sentence: … has more/fewer _____ than …

What do you notice in this photo?

Phonics
This week and next week we’re recapping all of the phonemes we’ve learnt so far. They’ll be no phonics home learning sheets. Please continue to use all the sheets at home.

Poetry Picnic
Click here to watch this week’s poem.

Here are some more highlights from this week…

Snacks and water
Please make sure your child’s water bottle only contains plain water.

Every day, school will provide a healthy fruit or vegetable. If your child would prefer to bring their own snack, please ensure this contains only fruit and/or vegetables. Snacks from home will stay in the children’s bookbags.

If your child is having grapes for their snack, please ensure that the grapes are cut lengthways.

Reminders
Parent-teacher meetings (Zoom) – Tuesday 24 & Thursday 26 October
Training day – Friday 27 October
Back to school – Monday 06 November