Reception w/b 4th November
Date: 8th Nov 2024 @ 5:22pm
It has been an absolute pleasure to welcome Reception back to school this week, eager to ‘dive in’ to a new half term of fun, learning and exciting enhancements. Mrs McAree and I have thoroughly enjoyed observing children so enthused by enhancements in the classroom during our first week of Autumn 2.
Firstly, I must express sincere thanks for all of your support over the half term break. From Monday’s phonics lesson, it was immediately clear to see that so many children have been working hard, practising the sounds and blending opportunities that had been sent home on the final Thursday. This really helped the children to ‘hit the ground running’ so we are so very grateful. After a Monday phonics recap as a whole class, we were ready to launch our new phonics group teaching on Tuesday. This approach proves so valuable for all children as it allows us to tailor our phonics teaching even more closely to individual needs and, due to small group sizes, the children benefit from even more support. The children have been most excited to work with new adults in new spaces – they feel very grown up! In addition to myself and Mrs McAree, children will be working with: Mrs Marshfield (Year 4 teaching assistant) and Mrs Griffiths (Year 1 teaching assistant). This means that each group may be working on different sounds each week. I shall therefore update you with the sounds of the week for your child via the ‘How to Help at Home’ document.
This week, we launched our new topic – superheroes! Please see our topic web for more information. We started the week by exploring some items: a mask, a cape, a backpack, a map, a pen and a magnifying glass. We wondered who may use these items and why. We discussed what we already know about superheroes. We then looked at an illustration of a girl rescuing a cat, sneaking up on a villain, lifting up her dad and reading lots of books. After discovering that her name was Juniper Jupiter, we asked: What super powers does she have? How do you know? Do you think people know that Juniper Jupiter is a superhero? Why? If you were a superhero, what super powers would you have? Then, it was at last time to read our new focus text: Juniper Jupiter by Lizzy Stewart. We especially enjoyed the moment when Juniper Jupiter realised that her dog, Peanut, would be the perfect sidekick. Later in the week, we explored vocabulary in the book, including: kind, brave, sneaky, smart, lonely, sidekick, checklist, poster, audition, daunted and sulk. Goodness me, there were some tricky words in this story! We enjoyed the challenge of defining these words and practising using them in sentences, including within the provision. Finally, we have had a look at our new story map. Next week, we shall learn to use Makaton signs to retell the story in a ‘Talk For Writing’ style.
Our literacy adult-led task has focused on writing a checklist, just like Juniper Jupiter. This week, we have been writing our own checklists of superhero equipment. Children have recorded either whole words (e.g. map), some sounds they can hear in the words (e.g. ‘ma’ or ‘mp’) or initial sounds (e.g. m). We have been so impressed with the Fred Talk and the letter formation skills applied in this task. Well done Reception writers!
Within our NCETM Mastering Number sessions, we have been comparing sets of objects using the language of ‘more than’ and ‘fewer than’. ‘Fewer than’ is used rather than ‘less than’ because the focus is on countable things. Language has been a key focus, using the stem sentence _________ has more/fewer than ________ . E.g. Counting Croc has fewer buttons than Fred.
On Monday we began our ‘First PE’ unit. To warm up, we played ‘Moving Me’, a game to encourage the children to move in a variety of ways. We practised moving into large spaces and freezing when we heard the signal as we walked around as ‘happy me’, ‘grumpy me’, ‘sad me’, ‘funny me’, ‘small me’, ‘big me’. We then played a game of ‘sticky body parts. Children ‘stuck’ different parts of their body to their spot as they were called out e.g. foot, hands, head, elbow, knee, tummy. We then practised travelling around and over our spots in a variety of different ways – this involved lots of balance and coordination skills! Finally, we played a game of ‘drive your car’ with our spots, using them as steering wheels, parking spots and roundabouts. At the end of the lesson, lots of children said that they were feeling a bit sweaty and warm. We talked about how hard they had worked as they exercised!
Much of our learning this week has been inspired by Bonfire Night. We learnt that Bonfire Night is celebrated on the 5th of November each year…‘Remember, remember the 5th of November’. We shared photographs of Bonfire Night celebrations, discussing our own experiences and traditions, such as using sparklers or eating toffee apples. Firefighter Fred helped us to learn our Bonfire Night safety rules, which I hear lots of children were keen to share at home! The safety tips included: wearing gloves when holding a sparkler; never running around with a sparkler; putting the sparkler in a bucket of water/sand when finished; only using sparklers with the permission and supervision of a grown-up; never touching a firework; staying well away whilst a grown-up lights the firework; never touching a bonfire; not standing too close to a bonfire and making sure to walk near the bonfire, not run. The children suggested many of these rules themselves. The children enjoyed using a variety of techniques to create firework artwork, including: printing with a snipped cardboard tube, printing with forks, blowing paint with straws and drawing with chalk. Other enhancements have included: making Bonfire Night posters, using playdough to make fireworks, creating firework rockets with 2D shapes and exploring the fire station small world area. On Friday, we were very lucky to manage to sneak into the Forest School area for an afternoon session. We used sticks to build our own ‘bonfires’, standing one stick in the middle and leaning the others against it to create the perfect shape. We then used leaves to represent ‘flames’, another opportunity to talk about the colours of autumn.
On Thursday morning, we very much enjoyed our walk to church for our first class visit. Reverend Sandi’s service focused on baptism, as we learnt that Georgia’s sister will soon be baptised! Reverend Sandi talked to us about Godparents, making promises, using a special oil to make the sign of a cross on the forehead, the candle, the prayers, and pouring the water over the head as Reverend Sandi says “I baptise you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.” We all then had a turn of baptising the ‘babies’ in church. Finally, we all enjoyed juice and a biscuit!
Almost unbelievably, the first week of Autumn 2 brings with it some Nativity songs! Our RE time involved an introduction to the Nativity; we will explore this in more detail over the coming weeks. Next week, we shall think about the parts that children are going to play in our performance. It would be useful to have a chat about this at home; how would your child feel about saying a line on the stage? Please feel welcome to get in touch to share how your child would feel about saying a line in our performance.
What a wonderful first week it has been! I hope that you are all able to stay cosy this weekend as temperatures begin to drop, and that you enjoy a restful couple of days after a busy week.
With many thanks for your continued support,
Miss Witham
