Red - Reception
Summer 1 Newsletter
Welcome back to Red Class! We can't believe we are now coming into the Summer Term! This term our theme will be 'On the Farm' as you'll probably have seen from the farm shop in our outdoor area. We're looking forward to a lovely term!
Literacy and Maths
This term in English our key texts will be 'Eco Girl' and 'The Gigantic Turnip'. We will follow and write instructions and information texts, and use stories to begin to write in role. Alongside this, we'll be taking part in a range of drama activities and continue to develop our phonics skills to support us in writing.
In maths, we are beginning to learn about and understand numbers to 20. We will look at the composition of numbers and grouping and sharing. We'll be looking some more at 2D and 3D shapes and finding links between them. For example, what 2D shapes we can find within a 3D shape or how we can manipulate shapes to make new ones.
Communication and Language: We will continue to develop our communication skills including making comments and asking questions to clarify what we have heard, learning and using lots of new vocabulary, and use appropriate detail when describing events. We are also beginning to understand humour, for example in nonsense rhymes and jokes - so if you hear a great one, we'd love you to share it with the class during our Friday show and tell time!
Phonics: The children will be focusing on phase 3 and 4 using the Essential Letters and Sounds scheme. We will be teaching phonics lessons 5 times a week and learning how to do shared reading each week with our reading partner. We will be practising reading and spelling more harder to read and spell words.
The wider curriculum
Understanding the world: This term we will be learning about people around us and their role in society. We will begin to understand the monarchy and be able to name key people in the royal family. We will continue to develop an understanding that the way people lived in the past is not the same as the way we live now. We will also explore similarities and differences between life in this country and other countries around the world. We will continue to explore the natural world in our outdoor learning sessions on Thursdays.
Expressive Arts and Design: This half term, we will develop our scissor skills and look more at how we can join materials together to create a model or picture. We will watch and talk about dance and performance art, to understand how it can make us feel. Our music this term will be 'Down there under the sea' and 'It's oh so quiet'
Personal, Social and Emotional Development: Our topic for PSED this half term is 'relationships'. We will talk about what it means to be lonely, what makes a good friend and how we can care for the different people in our lives.
Additional information
PE days – Tuesday and Friday. Please can children come to school wearing their PE kits on these days. Children will need their outdoor kit (trainers and joggers in the colder months). This should be unbranded white t-shirt, black joggers/shorts in the summer months. This half term they will be learning dance and ball skills.
Forest sessions – Our outdoor learning sessions will continue to be every Thursday. Children should come to school wearing weather appropriate clothing including a pair of wellies that can stay at school. Even as the weather warms up, the children still need to wear long sleeves and trousers/leggings to protect them from scratches and bugs that might be in the grass!
Class bear – We will continue to send home Ruby with a different child each Friday. Please return Ruby the bear on Tuesdays ready to share our adventures with the class. The children love to hear what she has been up to each week!
Reading – children will be reading every day and can change their books every Friday. Please ensure book bags are in school daily with reading records updated with a comment to let us know when they have read at home. Our library day is on Fridays and children can exchange their book for a new one each week if they have returned their library book.
Homework will be sent home every Monday and will be due in on Fridays. Homework will consist of alternate phonics and maths activities and each child will receive a homework book to complete their work in.
If you have any queries throughout the year, please come and see us.
Best wishes,
The Reception team.
Mrs Langley, Mrs Eeckelaers, Mrs Bradley and Mrs Grant.
Superhero Celebration
We've had a fabulous Superhero party in Red class today! It was so lovely to see the children in all their wonderful outfits and they've been total stars. We've seen their 'super' dance moves and worked on some teamwork skills, a spot of hulk smashing and have been blown away with the children's artistic skills as they created their own 'supertatos'! We played pass the parcel and superhero charades and enjoyed a glorious afternoon in the forest school area. We celebrated the end of term with a fire circle and cooked popcorn on the fire. What a 'super' day! Have a look at the gallery to see some photos from the day.
Spring 2 Newsletter
Welcome back Red Class! This term our focus will be on Superheroes and we think we're going to have lots of fun!
Literacy and Maths
This term in English our key stories will be Superworm and Supertato, as well as a non fiction text, Yucky worms. We will look at lots of other non-fiction texts alongside this and have a go at writing our own information texts. We are also going to have a go at creating our own comic strips and begin to look at poetry. There will be lots of drama and we are looking forward to seeing the children act out their own superhero stories!
In maths, we will start by looking at measure including length, height and time. We will explore more about numbers 9 and 10 and think about how we can add together groups to make 10. We will begin to learn about number bonds to 10 which will be so useful for our learning throughout school! We will finally look at 3D shapes and patterns.
Communication and Language: We will continue to develop our communication skills including holding 2 way conversations with our teachers and each other. We will develop a familiarity with new knowledge and vocabulary when listening to and talking about non-fiction books. We are working on using talk to help us solve problems, connect ideas together and articulate our thoughts in well-formed sentences. We are also beginning to understand humour, for example in nonsense rhymes and jokes - so if you hear a great one, we'd love you to share it with the class during our Friday show and tell time!
Phonics: The children will be focusing on phase 3 and 4 using the Essential Letters and Sounds scheme. We will be teaching phonics lessons 5 times a week and learning how to do shared reading each week with our reading partner. We will be practising reading and spelling more harder to read and spell words.
The wider curriculum
Understanding the world: This term we will be learning about people in the community to help us, as well as understanding how the way people lived in the past is different to the way we live now. We will look at our local area and the natural world during our Forest school sessions.
Expressive Arts and Design: This half term, we will develop our scissor skills and look more at how we can join materials together to create a model or picture. We will watch and talk about dance and performance art, to understand how it can make us feel.
Our music this term will be Up and Down and 5 fine bumblebees, where we will learn about pitch.
Personal, Social and Emotional Development: Our topic for PSED this half term is 'healthy me'. We will talk about managing our own self-care needs, for example getting dressed. We will learn about the different factors that support our overall wellbeing, such as sleep, diet, hand washing, teeth cleaning and exercise.
Additional information
PE days – Tuesday and Friday. Please can children come to school wearing their PE kits on these days. Children will need their outdoor kit (trainers and joggers in the colder months). This should be unbranded white t-shirt, black joggers/shorts in the summer months. This half term they will be learning dance and will begin their first games unit, putting into practice the fundamental skills they have been developing so far.
Forest school – Our forest school session will continue to be every Thursday. Children should come to school wearing weather appropriate clothing including a pair of wellies that can stay at school.
Class bear – We will continue to send home Ruby with a different child each Friday. Please return Ruby the bear on Tuesdays ready to share our adventures with the class. The children love to hear what she has been up to each week!
Reading – children will be reading every day and can change their books every Friday. Please ensure book bags are in school daily with reading records updated with a comment to let us know when they have read at home. Our library day is on Fridays and children can exchange their book for a new one each week if they have returned their library book.
Homework will be sent home every Monday and will be due in on Fridays. Homework will consist of alternate phonics and maths activities and each child will receive a homework book to complete their work in.
If you have any queries throughout the year, please come and see us.
Best wishes,
The Reception team.
Mrs Eeckelaers, Mrs Langley, Mrs Bradley and Mrs Grant.
Forest School
What a fabulous few weeks we've had down at forest school!
We've some some extremely cold afternoons and some less so - we've found it interesting to notice how the grass sounds different as we make our way across the field - sometimes crunchy, sometimes squelchy!
We've explored painting with chalk by grating it and mixing with water, had a go at building our own Stockport landmarks using what we could find in the forest and created our own giant map of Stockport using them.
Last week we sat together for a fire and cooked chapattis which we enjoyed tasting. We loved the fire! We all had a go at making a spark using the flints. Have a look at our gallery for some photos.
Spring 1 Newsletter
Welcome back after Christmas. We can't believe the children have already completed a term in school! This half term our topic is Fairytales and we have some wonderful learning planned for the class!
Literacy and Maths
In English, we will be focussing on the fairy tales of The Three Little Pigs and The Gingerbread Man. We will get to know the stories well before we read and create some alternative versions such as The Three Little Wolves and the Big Bad Pig, and The Runaway Chapatti. Alongside these stories, we will be exploring lots of other fairy tales, reading them in our reading area and performing them on our stage or acting them out in our fabulous castle role play created by Mrs Bradley.
In Maths, we will be getting even more confident with our number to 5 before learning about the numbers 6, 7 and 8. We will also be developing our understanding of mass and capacity and use the language of heavier, lighter, more and less to compare items. We will learn to use scales and to try to make them balance.
Communication and language: This half-term we will be focusing on developing our confidence at talking and holding a two way conversation with an adult or friend. We will learn to retell a simple story that we have heard a lot, some as exact repetition and some in our own words. We will develop our understanding of 'why' and 'when' questions and be able to answer these about our learning.
Phonics: The children will be focusing on phase 3 and 4 using the Essential Letters and Sounds scheme. We will be teaching phonics lessons 5 times a week and learning how to do shared reading each week with our reading partner. We will be practising reading and spelling more harder to read and spell words.
The wider curriculum
Understanding the world: Throughout this topic we will look at maps and why they are important. We will look at our local area and the natural world during our Forest school sessions, particularly focusing on the changing seasons. We will also be sorting and describing materials by their properties and investigating what happens when we heat and cool materials.
Expressive Arts and Design: This half term, we will be investigating bridges and learning how to make them extra strong to hold the three Billy Goats Gruff. We will take part in baking, recognise the equipment and explain how the ingredients change. We will learn how to use a pair of scissors correctly to cut along wavy and zing zag lines carefully.
Mr Derbyshire will be leading our music this half term focusing on the Cuckoo Polka.
Personal, Social and Emotional Development: We will be looking at our dreams and goals and how we can set ourselves a target to achieve and work towards it. We will also develop our knowledge of the different factors that support our overall health and wellbeing including sleep, diet, washing hands, cleaning teeth, exercise and stranger danger.
Additional information
PE days – Tuesday and Friday. Please can children come to school wearing their PE kits on these days. Children will need their outdoor kit (trainers and joggers in the colder months). This should be unbranded white t-shirt, black joggers/shorts in the summer months. This half term they will be learning dance and continuing their fundamentals of PE units learning basic skills of throwing, catching, kicking, aiming etc.
Forest school – Our forest school session will continue to be every Thursday. Children should come to school wearing weather appropriate clothing including a pair of wellies that can stay at school.
Class bear – We will continue to send home Ruby with a different child each Friday. Please return Ruby the bear on Tuesdays ready to share our adventures with the class. The children love to hear what she has been up to each week!
Reading – children will be reading every day and can change their books every Friday. Please ensure book bags are in school daily with reading records updated with a comment to let us know when they have read at home. Our library day is on Fridays and children can exchange their book for a new one each week if they have returned their library book.
Homework will be sent home every Monday and will be due in on Fridays. Homework will consist of alternate phonics and maths activities and each child will receive a homework book to complete their work in.
If you have any queries throughout the year, please come and see us.
Best wishes,
The Reception team.
Mrs Langley, Mrs Bradley and Mrs Grant.
Christmas Craft morning
Thank you so much for joining us for our Christmas Craft Morning. We had a fabulous time and hope you did too! The children used lots of fine motor and creative skills to make some wonderful decorations for Christmas. Well done everyone.
Check out the photo gallery for lots of photos of what we got up to!
Autumn 2 Newsletter
This half-term our topic is Celebrations. We are going to be learning all about different celebrations around the world and each week we will focus on a different celebration. We will also be taking part in the Nativity performance in December.
Literacy and Maths
In English, we will be focusing on the engaging and entertaining stories Wow said the Owl and Owl babies, and we will be finding out more about nocturnal animals and colours. Then we will be learning about Dear Father Christmas and The Grinch, where we will be focusing on how to recognise and write a letter to Father Christmas.
In Maths, we will be learning more about 2D shapes and numbers 1-5 where we will focus on subitising and the composition of the numbers 1-5.
Communication and language: This half-term we will be focusing on sharing our ideas and talking about ways to solve a problem. We will be exploring how important it is to listen carefully to each other. We will be looking at what a good listener does (gives full attention, eye contact etc) and how listening to others can help us in our learning both inside and outside the classroom.
Phonics: The children have completed their phase 2 phonics sounds and will be moving into phase 3, which focusses on digraphs (two letters that make one sound). The children will be using their knowledge of digraphs in their reading and writing.
Understanding the world: Throughout this topic we will look at, discuss and celebrate the similarities and differences between celebrations in different cultures and religions. We will look at the history and stories of all the different celebrations in our topic. We will continue to look at the different seasons by exploring Autumn in our Forest School activities. We will talk a lot about animals who hibernate and how we can help.
Expressive Arts and Design: Our main focus in our creative work this half term is learning how to mould and manipulate different materials to create something new. We will be using clay to design and create our own Diwali lamps and we will also be using the junk modelling (cardboard boxes, yoghurt pots etc) to create our own firework rockets. We are going to be learning lots of songs and dances for our Christmas Nativity too!
Personal, Social and Emotional Development: We will be looking at how to become effective learners by breaking down each characteristic of learning in the EYFS development matters. Can we ask lots of questions like Mr Nosey? Can we challenge ourselves in our learning like Mr Brave?
PE days – Tuesday and Friday. Please can children come to school wearing their PE kits on these days. Children will need their outdoor kit (trainers and joggers in the colder months). This should be unbranded white t-shirt, black joggers/shorts in the summer months.
Forest school – Our forest school session will be every Thursday. Children should come to school wearing weather appropriate clothing including a pair of wellies that can stay at school.
Class bear – We will continue to send Ruby home with a different child each Friday. Please return Ruby the bear on Tuesdays ready to share our adventures with the class.
Homework will be sent home every Monday and will be due in on Fridays. Homework will consist of alternate phonics and maths activities and each child will receive a homework book to complete their work in.
If you have any queries throughout the year, please come and see us.
Best wishes,
The Reception team.
Mrs Parker, Mrs Bradley and Mrs Grant.
Dates for your diary
Friday 15th November Children in Need - children to bring £1 and wear their own clothes.
5th December - Reception and KS1 Nativity Show.
Thursday 14th December Christmas jumper and Christmas dinner day
Thursday 19th December - end of the autumn term
Friday 20th December Inset day (school closed to children)
Autumn 1 Newsletter
Welcome to Red Class
Literacy and Maths
In English, we will be focusing on the engaging and entertaining stories Hickory Dickory Dog and Dear Mother Goose, alongside these stories we will be exploring lots of nursery rhymes and performing and singing them.
In Maths, we will be learning about matching up objects, exploring a range of patterns, including repeating patterns and numbers 1-3. We will learn about the composition of numbers 1-3 and how to subitise them.
Communication and language: This half-term we will be focusing on getting to know each other as part of our topic 'all about me'. We will be finding out more about each other by sharing our all about me boxes with the rest of the class whilst working on our communication and language.
Phonics: The children will be focusing on phase 2 sounds using the Essential Letters and Sounds scheme. We will be teaching phonics lessons 5 times a week and learning how to do shared reading each week with our reading partner.
The wider curriculum
Understanding the world: Throughout this topic we will look at our past and present and our families. We will look at our local area and the natural world during our Forest school sessions.
Expressive Arts and Design: We will be making junk modelling using boxes, egg cartons and bottles to make nursery rhyme designs such as The Wheels on the Bus models. We will learn how to hold a pair of scissors correctly and practise lots of new skills using a range of materials and malleable items.
Personal, Social and Emotional Development: We will be looking at how to being me in the world.
Additional information
PE days – Tuesday and Friday. Please can children come to school wearing their PE kits on these days. Children will need their outdoor kit (trainers and joggers in the colder months). This should be unbranded white t-shirt, black joggers/shorts in the summer months.
Forest school – Our forest school session will be every Thursday. Children should come to school wearing weather appropriate clothing including a pair of wellies that can stay at school.
Class bear – We will send home Ruby with a different child each Friday. Please return Ruby the bear on Tuesdays ready to share our adventures with the class.
Reading – children will be reading every day and can change their books every Friday. Please ensure book bags are in school daily with reading records updated with a comment to let us know when they have read at home. Our library day is on Fridays and children can exchange their book for a new one each week if they have returned their library book.
Homework will be sent home every Monday and will be due in on Fridays. Homework will consist of alternate phonics and maths activities and each child will receive a homework book to complete their work in.
If you have any queries throughout the year, please come and see us.
Best wishes,
The Reception team.
Mrs Parker, Mrs Bradley and Mrs Grant.
Welcome to Red Class
Hello everyone, we hope you have all had a fantastic summer and are looking forward to starting your school journey in reception. This school year is going to be filled with lots of exciting learning and fun.
Our topic this half-term is ‘All about Me’. Throughout this topic we will be learning our new class routines and rules, as well as exploring our new classroom and outdoor environment. We will be learning all about ourselves and our bodies, senses and changes. We will be encouraging children to discuss their families, houses, religion and heritage.
Literacy and Maths
Once the children have settled in we will begin our more structured whole class lessons.
In literacy, we will be starting off by looking at nursery rhymes and our focus text is a story called ‘Hickory Dickory Dog’ focusing on Poetry and linked to starting school. We will then move on to the comical and engaging ‘Dear Mother Goose’ focusing on writing to entertain. We will be focusing on Phase 2 sounds in our phonics lessons. We will be doing lots of work on hearing initial sounds in words and beginning to blend sounds together in simple words. We will also be learning how to retell different stories to others.
In maths, we are going to be really exploring number formation and number patterns this half-term. Can we count to 10? Can we read the numerals to 10? Can we match a quantity of objects to a numeral? Can we subitise numbers to 5? Do we know the composition of each number? We will also be spending some time exploring and naming different 2D shapes.
The wider curriculum
Understanding the world: We will discuss and celebrate the similarities and differences between all the different pupils in our class. We will be looking at, smelling, feeling and tasting lots of different fruits and vegetables during our Harvest festival.
Expressive Arts and Design: Our main focus in our creative work this half-term is learning how to draw simple representations of people. Our focus artist is Vincent van Gogh. We will be talking about and drawing our families as well as looking closely at ourselves to paint self-portraits. We will be encouraging children to choose appropriate colours when colouring and painting people. It would be great if you could encourage this at home too! Our role-play area this half-term is a home corner.
Personal, Social and Emotional Development: Our main priority this half-term is ensuring that all pupils settle happily into school life. We will be playing lots of ‘getting to know you’ games to help children develop the confidence to speak about themselves and to develop new friendships. We will be introducing children to our important school rules and ensuring that they become familiar with our school routines.
Physical development: Children will have an indoor and outdoor PE session which will focus on special awareness, negotiating space successfully, how to share equipment and take turns. They will practise new skills such as jumping, galloping and sliding.
Additional information
PE days – Tuesday and Friday. Please can children come to school wearing their PE kits on these days. Children will need their outdoor kit (trainers and joggers in the colder months). This should be an unbranded white t-shirt, black joggers/shorts in the summer months.
Forest school – Our forest school session will be every Thursday. Children should come to school wearing weather appropriate clothing, including a pair of wellies that can stay at school.
Class bear – We will be sending home our Red class bear home from week 2. We choose a name as a class and the bear will spend the weekend at someone’s home alongside a book to write and include photos of the fun activities the children had. We look forward to looking at the bear’s adventures as a class.
Reading – children will be reading every day and can change their books every Friday. Please ensure book bags are in school daily with reading records updated with a comment to let us know when they have read at home. Our library day will be on Fridays. Children can exchange their book for a new one each week if they have returned their previous library book.
Homework will be sent home every Monday and will be due in on Fridays. Homework will consist of alternate phonics and maths activities and each child will receive a homework book to complete their work in.
If you have any queries throughout the year, please come and see us.
Best wishes,
The Reception team.
Mrs Parker, Mrs Bradley and Mrs Grant.