Reception

The end of the year.......

A bit of a cliche, but it really does feel like this year has absolutely flown by. We've had a fabulous year with your children and have thoroughly enjoyed having them in our class. They've really applied themselves to school life, have given their very best and have been a lot of fun on the way (and were fabulous munchkins last night!). We look forward to seeing them all grown up in Year 1 and listening to them comment on how small and cute the new reception class are!

Thank very much for your support as parents and carers over the year. We really do appreciate the time you've given us either helping in the classroom, on our school trip, at PTA events, keeping on top of Tapestry and all the other things you do to support your children through their first year at school. Thank you very much for the generous and cards and gifts. We especially love reading the messages in the cards. 

So, we wish you and your families a relaxing and sunny summer and we look forward to seeing you around school in September.

Our very best wishes,

from Mrs Edwards, Mrs Whitewood and all of the YR team. 

Friday 15th July

 

Dear Parents,

The end of the year draws ever closer........ The children have continued to work really hard during all class activities and are still showing lots of enthusiasm for everything!  

 

In maths we have been looking at data - collecting it, using pictograms to display the data and interpreting it. As part of our Moving On topic we've been reflecting on the many different things we've done over the year and how we have all changed and grown up (a bit!). And of course, we're doing lots of singing practise for the show. 

 

On Monday please send in all costumes for The Wizard of Oz in a named bag.  Please also send in a separate named bag on Monday so we can start to gather the children's school work for coming home. 

 

Early next week will be the last time we put anything on Tapestry as we will be downloading your child's file to send to you.  We will put some strategies as to help support your child with any writing they want to do over the summer. They are all becoming much more independent at this and it would fantastic to keep it going. If you have any class library book at home please return it on Monday. Please keep orange tricky word books at home. 

 

Next Friday we will have a little party in the classroom with a few games. We will also be baking cakes to have at the party and making extras to share with our Y6 buddies.

 

Have a lovely weekend and we look forward to seeing you at the show on Thursday.

 

Mrs Edwards and Mrs Whitewood

Friday 7th July

It was lovely to see so many of you at our open evening last night. We hope you enjoyed seeing the classroom and your children's super hard work. It's great to see how much they have achieved and got through since they started with us. 

We have come to the end of our topic Big Wide World. Thank you for the postcards which keep arriving, even though the topic is ending we will still enjoy reading them and displaying them on our world map poster. 

Our new mini topic is Moving On, and celebrates the children’s successes throughout their Reception year. It explores how they have grown and changed and supports them with the changes to come as they move into Year 1.

Please could you start to send costumes in over next week. They need to be in a named plastic bag with handles so it can go on their pegs. As a reminder - grey shorts, house t shirt and stripy or brightly coloured long socks or tights (we have some pink / peach 7-8yrs tights if anyone would like to borrow a pair) and school shoes. 

Orange tricky word books can now be kept at home to practise over the summer, whenever you get a moment. 

Have a lovely weekend.

Mrs Edwards and Mrs Whitewood

30th June

The weeks seem to be flying by! This week we have enjoyed Sports' Day, pizza making and a very interesting Act of Worship about our link school in Tanzania.

In maths we have been recapping number bonds for 10 and doubles facts. Please continue to revise these at home. 

In phonics we are practising reading and writing tricky words and longer words including for eg, balloon, dresses, portrait and paints - a great achievement for children who are still 4 and 5!  All these words can be worked out using the sounds taught in phonics.

As part of our Big Wide World topic we made pizzas today. We found Italy on a map and all decided we would try a topping we hadn't had before.

Transition to Year 1 - the children have already spent some time in Class 1 with Mrs Clare and next week the whole school has a transition morning on Thursday to spend a bit of time getting to know their new classroom and teachers. We also look forward to seeing you on Thursday at our Open Evening.

Hope you have a lovely weekend.

Mrs Edwards and Mrs Whitewood

Friday 23rd June 

It’s been another busy week in Reception. We have continued to focus on our topic of Big Wide World. Thank you for all of the children’s wonderful homework. We have put some of them up in the classroom and will continue to add more over the next week. The children have had the opportunity to look at Google Earth and find different places around the world. We will have that available next week too, in case any of the children want to look again. 

In maths we have looked at capacity and all had a go at measuring with different sized containers. We have also been revisiting our number bonds to 10 as well as all the ways to make other numbers. 

Forest school this week was lovely and cool in the shade under the trees. The children had a wonderful time making music and drumming using different natural materials. 

Wizard of Oz - summer production 20^th July

As part of this year's show YR has the pleasure of being the munchkins of the lollipop guild.

For this the children will need to wear their house t-shirt, grey school shorts and stripey knee length socks (or mis-matched brightly coloured knee length socks or tights).

If you do not have grey shorts we do not expect you to go out and buy a pair. Please see if you can borrow a pair from classmates or we can check our second hand supplies.

Costumes should not be sent in to school just yet but we wanted to give you plenty of notice to source the items.

STEM (Science, Technology, Enginering and Maths)

As part of our whole school STEM day we have been doing lots of maths activities and a couple of science experiments.

In maths Mr Rowland took our class on a 2D shape walk. We then practised number bonds to 10 by making dominoes and only laying dominoes next to each other that made 10.

This afternoon we have been rescuing dinosaurs from ice blocks. The quickest way turned out to be smashing the ice block or putting it in water. The slowest ways were leaving the ice blocks in the sun and surprisingly putting it in the microwave! We also made balancing dragonflies by folding the wings and adding paperclips to help with balance. 

A reminder to please remember to read your child’s e book at home this week. 

Don’t forget to look at Tapestry as well to see photos of your child and their work too. 

Please make sure your child has a water bottle and a school cap with them every day, as it is so hot at the moment. 

For homework this week, please could you practise quick recall of all numbers bonds to 10. It is an essential maths skill and by the end of YR all children should be able to do this.

Here are some links to help with this:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/topics/zcdpf82

This episode of number blocks is helpful for practising number bonds to 10: 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b08q3zx7

A number bonds cards set, including matching ice cream related images, each totalling 10. A very visual way to teach the concept of number bonds. Print the sheet and cut them out and the children can make pairs that total 10. 

We hope you have a lovely weekend. 

Mrs Whitewood and Mrs Edwards

Friday 16th June

Welcome back to the last half term in Reception! The children had an exciting start back to the week to conclude our animal safari topic with a visit from two vet nurses and Teddy the terrier. They have had a lot of fun bandaging their own toys across the week. (If they have not yet had a chance, they can bring a toy in on Monday to have a go.) 

We then begin our new topic of Big Wide World. We read Penguin on Holiday and then wrote a postcard as if we were Penguin or Crab from the story. The children have had the chance to make their own maps. After looking at pictures, the children chose one to show where they would like to visit around the world and explain why. 

In maths we have started looking at heavy and light. The children sorted objects into heavy and light. Then we looked at scales and used them to help us sort the objects from lightest to heaviest. The children had fun weighing ingredients to help make play dough. Then they looked at different parcels for posting and compared them for weight and size. 

In PE we have already started practising for sports day and learning how to race. We also focused on good sportsmanship skills. 

As part of this term's "Big Wide World" topic we would like to invite family members into our class to talk about their heritage. We want to support the children in understanding that the United Kingdom is a multi-ethnic society, and the people who live in the UK have many different cultural backgrounds. We want to celebrate the diverse cultures that make up our class, school and community. Please send an email to the office if you or another family member would like to come in and when you are available (most days would be ok apart from Monday and Thursday afternoons). Thank you in advance. 

A reminder to please remember to read your child’s e book at home this week and practise some of the tricky words in their orange book. 

Don’t forget to look at Tapestry as well to see photos of your child and their work too. 

Have a wonderful weekend and enjoy the sunshine. 

Mrs Edwards and Mrs Whitewood

Friday 26th May

What a wonderful end to this half term with a visit from the Wiggly Wild Show. The children really enjoyed it and there are some photos on Tapestry. 

This term has flown by and our topic next term is Big Wide World. We will learn about our global community and explore how living things, communities and climates differ around the world. Over the holidays please could your child tell us about a journey they have made (it could be going on holiday, a day trip to Hever Castle, a visit to Grandparents or even to the supermarket).

• Where did you go?
• How many different forms of transport did you use?
• What did you see along the way?

Your child could show this by drawing a picture, maybe adding a sentence, perhaps include photographs, a map or tickets. Maybe draw a map and add some labels. It only needs to be one A4 sheet and can be brought into school or uploaded onto Tapestry. 

 

In addition to this, over half term or throughout next term, please could you or your child or a friend/relative send a post card to the school from a destination you/they have been to. We will read these together and put them all up on a world map as they arrive next term. The children do not have to write this post card although they can if they like!

 

The School Address is: Reception Class, Chiddingstone CofE Primary School, Chiddingstone, Edenbridge, Kent, TN8 7AH

  

Have a wonderful half term and we look forward to seeing you all in Term 6.

 

Mrs Whitewood and Mrs Edwards

Friday 19th May

Dear Parents,

Thank you very much for coming to our Act of Worship yesterday. We hope you enjoyed it. We were all very proud of the class. It's quite daunting standing in front of a large audience and speaking on your own so it was lovely to see everyone rise to the occasion and more importantly enjoy themselves with a bit of singing and dancing at the end! We feel like they've come a long way since September. We will put some photos on Tapestry.

This week in maths we have been halving and sharing. Any practise you can do at home is always beneficial. Start off by sharing between 2 to make the link with halving. Maybe with a pizza or an apple or some sweets!

In phonics we've been reading and writing words ending in -ing, -ed and -est (eg waiting, jumped, strongest).

Due to spending time practising for our AoW we haven't spent as much time on reading books this week. So, if you could make sure you find the time over the weekend to read and talk about this week's book on the E-Collins library with your child that would be much appreciated. 

Thank you again for your support at Forest School, in the classroom and supporting our learning at home.

To round off our Animal Safari topic, next Friday we look forward to a visit from the Wiggly Wild Show for a live educational creepy crawly bug show and animal handling session.

We hope you have a lovely weekend.

Kind Regards

Jo Edwards and Vicky Whitewood.

Friday 12th May
 

We have had another wonderful 4 day week in reception. We hope everyone had a brilliant 3 day weekend whether you were celebrating the coronation or going away. There were lots of lovely local events and it was great to see so many of you at Hever, the Chiddingstone Nursery colour run and Chiddingstone’s street party.

This week we have been learning about doubling in maths. We read ‘Double the ducks’ and then the children doubled numbers using cubes. They have practised doubling on their fingers, then they progressed to doubling on five frames and ten frames.

In phonics we have been focusing on longer words and compound words.

The children have been doing some wonderful work for our Animal Safari topic. They looked at endangered animals and picked out some of their characteristics. We listened to ‘Carnival of the Animals’ and then tried moving like different animals. The children all had the opportunity to make animal masks this week.

They did some more fantastic writing about what they did at Forest school; this week the focus was snails!

In RE the children looked at the messages that Jewish people can learn from the story of Jonah.

We look forwards to seeing parents and carers who can make it at our Class Act of Worship on Thursday 18^th May in the village hall. We will aim to start at around 9am and it should last no longer than half an hour. 

In your child's bag they should have their words to learn for our AoW on Thursday next week. It is on a green piece of card. We would really appreciate it if you could take them time to help them learn these words off by heart. If your child has mislaid their card please could you let us know ASAP via Tapestry and we could resend. 

Please remember to read your child’s reading book on the Big Cat E library and write about how they got on in their yellow reading records.

Have a wonderful weekend, see you next week.

Mrs Whitewood and Mrs Edwards

Friday 5th May

Despite being a shorter week we have still managed to fit in plenty and the children are making great progress, particularly in our reading groups and writing independently. If your child is keen to write at home please support them with sounding out words using the sound mat, finger spaces, capital letters and full stops. 

In maths this week we have been practising counting to and from 20. In phonics we have been reading words with consonant clusters eg string, scrap, squelch, splat.

Thank you for your all the help and support whether at home or in school and Forest School. We are very grateful to all the visiting pets (and owners) who have been very well behaved and much enjoyed by the children.  

We enjoyed a lovely coronation lunch today and we talked about the coronation and what it all means and made our own crowns. The children looked super dressed in red, white and blue.

After lunch the children had an art lesson with Mrs Clare from Y1 and practised drawing animals like a scientist or zoologist would before the days of photographs and videos. 

We hope you enjoy the bank holiday weekend and we look forward to another short week next week!

Best wishes Mrs Edwards and Mrs Whitewood.

28^th April

Dear Parents

We have had a lovely week this week listening to the children's Show and Tell about pets or favourite animals. It's lovely to see how confident they are when sharing information in front of the rest of the class and how excited they are about doing this.  Thank you very much for taking the time to bring in pets or upload information on to Tapestry - the children do enjoy it!

Maths

In maths this week we have been practising counting forwards and backwards from 0 to 10 and working on 1 more and 1 less. Any support you can give your child at home is always very helpful. At this stage they should be fluent in counting both forwards and backwards.

Phonics

We are focusing this week on reading:

• CVCC words (consonant vowel consonant consonant) eg  hunt cost melt milk

• CCVC words (consonant consonant vowel consonant) eg frog swim drum plug

Please continue to practise tricky words using the orange books. We do learn a new tricky word every day so the list does build up! Please also continue to support your child with reading by using the Collins E-library. 

Topic

We've been learning quite a lot this week about different classes of animals - mammals, reptiles, amphibians, birds, insects and fish. This is a fun song to help with this: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PHYi4fqeEdw

We've also been finding out about what animals eat and whether this makes them a carnivore, herbivore or an ominivore.

Work Out Wednesday and Funky Fit Friday

We now regularly join in with this with the rest of school enthusiastically led by Mrs Golds. Reception Class are doing themselves proud and joining in with great enthusiasm and really trying hard to follow the moves!

Show and Tell

Please check the earlier email for allocated dates this week.

Coronation Bunting

Please check your child's bag for whole school homework to be completed over the weekend to make coronation bunting. 

Thank you for your continued support.  We hope you enjoy the bank holiday weekend and look forward to seeing the children back in school on Tuesday.

Best wishes

Mrs Edwards and Mrs Whitewood

21st April 2023

Welcome back to another exciting term in Reception. We have started our new topic ‘Animal Safari’. The children have started thinking about what they already know about different animals and what they would like to find out. During Children’s Choice they have enjoyed pretending to be dogs and participating in a dog agility course. We looked at San Diego Zoo’s animal cameras using the iPads and saw lots of different animals interacting in their enclosures, such as hippos, elephants, tigers, pandas and polar bears. We also made our own version of Dear Zoo and the children are really improving in writing independently and drawing with care. 

In maths we have started to think about adding by counting on, so if we add 5 and 2, we could start from five and count on two more.

Don't forget to check the date for your child's Show and Tell about a pet and how to look after them or a favourite animal. Photos and videos uploaded on to Tapestry are very welcome or a picture and/or writing. As mentioned previously, well behaved pets are also welcome with a responsible adult!

Date for your diary: We would like to invite you to our Reception Class Act of Worship on Thursday 18th May at approx 9.00 in the hall. More information to follow. 

Have a lovely weekend.

Mrs Edwards and Mrs Whitewood

Friday 31st March

Well done everyone for getting through another super term! It has been busy and we have really enjoyed our topic. We were so proud of the children in the Easter Service, they sang confidently and did the actions perfectly. They looked terrific in their Easter Bonnets and Boots and it was clear that a lot of time had gone into them. A big hello to those stuck a home with chicken pox etc - we missed you today!

Our topic for Term 5 is Animal Safari and we will be learning about the animals that live around the world, how to look after animals and the importance of caring for our local and global environments.

We have put some resources on our web page to help you support your child at home with phonics. We will be having a big focus next term on independent writing so quick recall of all the sounds we have covered is extremely helpful, particularly the digraphs and trigraphs. If your child is having trouble remembering them, just focus on a couple at a time. The orange tricky word books should now contain all the tricky words we have covered so far this year. Again, just focus on a few at a time. 

Holiday homework - practise tidying up and being helpful around the house. We'll be checking in at the start of the term to see how this went!

If you have not had a chance to catch up on Tapestry recently please do so over the holidays. If you want to upload a photo of anything interesting you do over the holiday, or something relating to our new topic, please do. 

Have a wonderful Easter Holidays and we look forward to seeing you next term...let's hope the rain and wind goes and Spring has finally sprung!

Mrs Edwards,  Mrs Whitewood and the rest of the YR team.

Support with phonics at home

Please find below some useful links / documents to help you support your child with phonics at home. 

How we say our sounds in YR

https://www.littlewandlelettersandsounds.org.uk/resources/for-parents/

Friday 24th March

Well done Reception Class at Funky Fit Friday today! 

The children really enjoyed their first Funk Fit Friday with Mrs Golds and the rest of the school and joined in with some enthusiastic dance moves - a particular favourite appeared to be Mashed Potato Time! There are a few photos on Tapestry. 

 

Phonics  

In phonics this week we have been practising reading and writing words with "s" and "es" on the end such as coats, chairs, boxes, wishes. 

 

Maths

In maths we have been working with 2D shapes, looking for shapes within shapes and creating picture using shapes. 

 

Ready Steady Grow

The children did some beautiful drawings of fruit and vegetables using pastels in our Ready Steady Grow topic. Some of the details they included looked very advanced. 

Please could you send in boxes, tubes, lids next week for making a small tractor as part of our topic. This will also fit in nicely with 3D shapes which we will be looking at in maths next week. 

 

We have enjoyed catching up with you at parents consultations this week and look forward to seeing others next Wednesday.  Next week is the Easter Bonnet/boot parade and Easter Service. This is always a lovely end of term event and hopefully we will see many of you there. As part of the Easter service our class will be singing a song. 

 

Have a lovely weekend.

Mrs Edwards and Mrs Whitewood

17th March

We've had a lovely week in YR - particularly when the sun comes out. The children are very excited about Mother's Day and have made lots of promises about making breakfast in bed, doing the washing up and helping out. We look forward to hearing all about it next week!

Ready Steady Grow

We read the story of Handa’s Surprise this week, which the children loved. They all had the opportunity to try some of the exotic fruits from the story too. During the last week of term we will be making tractors out of junk modelling. Please could you start to gather SMALL boxes, tubes and bottles top, plastic lids for this. No need to send in next week but please save for Monday 27th.

Maths

In maths this week we have been working on capacity (the amount of space in a container). We have been using the language full, nearly full, half full (or half empty!), nearly empty and empty. The children have been demonstrating their understanding by filling and emptying containers and describing what they can see. We have also been comparing the capacity of different sized and shaped containers. Please continue to explore this at home whenever the opportunity arises - perhaps at bathtime, pouring out drinks, washing up or putting toys away in boxes. 

Phonics

In phonics this week we have been practising reading and writing words with -ing on the end and compound words such as farm/yard, roof/top. We 'chunk' long words into two parts to help to read them.  Please continue to practise the tricky words in the orange books and tick if you think your child is confident reading a particular word. Please send the books back in by Wednesday. 

Easter Song

Below is a link to our Easter Song. It would be great if you could help your child with the words. We are singing the first three verses and at a slightly slower pace!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vogfkxGa8jI

Please could you empty your child's bag of hats and gloves and anything they don't need in school. It's much easier for them to fit them in their trays if they are not too full. Please could you also relabel snack boxes and water bottles.

Have a lovely weekend.

Mrs Edwards and Mrs Whitewood

10^th March 

Ready Steady Grow

Another busy week in Reception! On Tuesday we had a topic filled afternoon which began with looking at dried food such as pasta, pearl barley, rice, popcorn kernels, pumpkin seeds and sunflower seeds. We then made our own instruments using the dried food and the children could choose from a yogurt pot or part of a kitchen roll tube.

Thank you very much to Max's parents for bringing in three lambs this week. The children had a wonderful time stroking them and the lambs seemed very keen to try to come inside our classroom! The class really enjoyed their close encounter and having the chance to bottle feed the lambs. 

The children put their writing to good use this week when designing a seed packet to send to the giant at the top of the beanstalk. They do really well when they put their mind to it - thinking carefully about what they want to write and then sounding out each word eg, "get a pot", "put soil in pot", "put seed in pot", " worter it" (they would sound out "water" as "worter" and that is what we would expect), "put in the sun".

Phonics

In phonics this week we have been practising reading words with two or more digraphs or trigraphs (eg sh-ar-p, sh-ow-er, t-or-ch). See if your child can spot any digraphs or trigraphs when you are sharing any story books over the weekend. 

Maths

In maths we have been measuring the length of objects using a variety of standard and non standard measures. On Thursday we used rulers made with 2cm squares. At home you could practise this with your child using all sorts of items eg How many bricks long is my knife? How many lego pieces long is my book? Remind your child to line up the lego or whatever they are using with the start of the object they are measuring and to count carefully, and the type of brick (if lego) needs to be the same length for uniformity. Can they compare 2 different objects eg the knife is longer than the book. Please share any examples of this on Tapestry. This is optional but we do love to see how the class are practising their learning at home. 

Reading at home

Please do use the Collins elibrary. We would recommend treating this as "homework" to be done during the day and keeping it separate from sharing lovely picture books at bedtime.

Please remember to send in spare clothes with your child and make sure they are in a plastic bag so we can put any wet clothes in there. If your child has an accident, please do replace the clothes the following day. Any clothes that are borrowed from our classroom, please return them when washed, thank you. 

Have a lovely weekend.

Mrs Edwards and Mrs Whitewood

Snow Day!

Well, what a surprise to see so much snow so this morning.

If you are able to support your child in some school activities today then there are some suggestions below. We do appreciate that many of you may also be working yourselves so these activities are optional.

Happy Birthday Jonty! How lovely to have your birthday on a snow day!

Maths

This week we are measuring length and height using different non standard ways of measuring. Yesterday the children used cut out feet to measure different items around the classroom. The children brought these home and could use these to measure different things around the house. How many feet tall or long is your kitchen table, the tv, a bed, teddy, etc? Can you build a snowman and measure how tall it is using the feet? Is it taller than you?

Can you think of something else to use to measure height or length? Perhaps lego bricks or a line of cars or pencils. Let us know how you get on through Tapestry. 

Phonics

Have a look at the attached picture and see if you can work out which words have any of the digraphs / trigraphs we have learnt. Maybe make a list.

Write a sentence and draw a picture about what you like doing on a snow day. Remember to sound out and use finger spaces. 

Reading book - reread some of the recent books put on the Collins website. Look at the questions, talk about the story and how you know what's happening in the story. 

Topic: Ready Steady Grow

Thinking back to our trip to the farm last week (so glad it wasn't this week!) - have a look around the kitchen and see how many different foods you can find that come from cows. Where else does the food in your house come from? And then maybe make a hot chocolate to keep warm.

If you have any more time, here are some cutting activities and pencil control activities with a farm theme your children may enjoy. 

Friday 3rd March

We have come to the end of a rather hectic week with our trip to Bore Place on Wednesday and World Book Day on Thursday. The children have taken these new experiences in their stride, joined in with great enthusiasm and happily adapted to different routines. Today, the children all produced a great piece of writing about the trip to Bore Place. 

Maths

This week in maths we have been copying, continuing and creating different patterns. The children have got to know these as ABC patterns eg red, yellow, blue, red, yellow, blue. Today we also tried out AABC patterns eg red, red, yellow, blue, red, red, yellow blue. Please practise these are home - you could do it with things you find in the garden or out on a walk or using different toys (it doesn't have to be done by colour but could be leaf, leaf, stick, acorn etc). Let us know how your child gets on through Tapestry. The importance of understanding patterns in maths cannot be overstated. Recognising patterns helps children to make connections and predictions. It also helps them to understand the relationships between numbers and number concepts.

Tricky Word Books

Please continue to practise these at home, even the words your child is more confident with as they sometimes forget. We have had a few orange books missing this week - could they all be returned by Wednesday so we can go through the words in school and add new ones where necessary. Thank you!

Funky Fit

Next Wednesday we will join in with the rest of the school for a bit of keep fit and exercise to music with Mrs Golds. 

Have a lovely weekend.

Mrs Edwards and Mrs Whitewood

Friday 23^rd February 

The children have made a great start to Term 4 and are getting into the swing of our new topic Ready Steady Grow. We have read the story of the gigantic turnip and thought about how we could help the old man and old woman to get the turnip out of the ground. The children really enjoyed looking at photographs of different aspects of farming and they then were able to look at books about farming and animals. 

 

In phonics we have been recapping some of the digraphs and trigraphs from last term. Please go over these with your child as it really helps with their confidence in both reading and writing if they can quickly recognise all the sounds we have covered so far in YR. In maths we have been practising adding numbers together and in  particular numbers bonds for 10. Again, any opportunity you get to practise this is always useful. 

 

Tricky Word Books

Your child will have brought home an orange book with some tricky words to practise reading (they are "tricky" as if you sound them out and then try to blend the sounds, you will get a word that does not sound right. They are words that need to be recognised by sight.) Please practise the words that your child is not yet confident at reading. There may be one or two lists in the book depending on their level of confidence. Please feel free to tick if you are still practising or if you feel they can read a word confidently. Please return the books to school by Wednesday. 

 

Bore Place Wednesday 1st March

We are very much looking forward to our trip on Wednesday. Drop off and pick up will be as a normal school day.

Please could the children bring their water bottle and a snack in their school bags as usual. Snacks and water bottles should be clearly labelled School bags will be left in the classroom.  A packed lunch will be provided by school. 

All children MUST bring a named carrier bag with a named pair of named wellies in it. Please dress your child appropriately for a day out on a farm - warm clothes that can get a bit muddy and a waterproof coat and a red school cap. At the moment the weather forecast is looking dry for next week but please check the night before. If rain is forecast, or it has been raining beforehand, waterproof trousers might also be needed. 

 

As always please look at Tapestry for more information about what we have done this week and please do add any observations from home if you would like us to see them. Feel free to also comment on the pictures we post as this is all part of the dialogue we have with you all.

 

We hope you have a lovely weekend.

 

Kind Regards,

Jo Edwards and Vicky Whitewood

Friday 10th February

Well done everyone for making it to half term. It has been a busy term, with quite a few coughs and colds etc but the children have been very resilient and joined in everything with great enthusiasm. We have all really enjoyed our Long Ago topic (a new one for all of us in YR). Thank you for all your support with Show and Tell and in particular to all the Grandparents who have come into our class to talk to the children about what life was like 'long ago'! The children, and all the staff, have really enjoyed it and we have all learnt a lot. 

We have had a busy day today upcycling t-shirts (thank you for sending them in). We very very fortunate to have our Y6 buddies helping out. They are always very patient and supportive and we couldn't have done it without them. 

Please use the Collins e-library to practise reading with your child over the holiday. If you are having any problems accessing the books please email the office to let us know.

Next term's topic: Ready Steady Grow

Our topic next term is Ready Steady Grow. This project teaches children about food and farming and explores a variety of themes, including where food comes from, what plants and animals need to grow and survive and what constitutes a healthy lifestyle. We're looking forward to our trip on March 1^st and we are very grateful for all the offers of support. 

Thank you also for those of you who have signed up to volunteer next term in class. It will be lovely to have you in. Each day will be different but we know the children will love having you in.

We hope that you all have a good half term and we look forward to seeing you next term.

Mrs Edwards and Mrs Whitewood

Friday 3rd February 

Dear Parents and Carers, 

We have had yet another lovely week in Reception. 

The children thoroughly enjoyed PE again this week, learning to hold some stretches, crossing the midline, using our hips to do bottom walking and moving like crabs. 

We have been really lucky to have more grandparents come in and visit us this week for our topic Long Ago; Jojo’s grandma, Rose’s granny, Betty’s granny and Archie G’s granny. We heard lots of wonderful details about their lives and the differences and similarities with our own. We also looked at non fiction books and found out how they differ from story books. 

In maths we have been comparing quantities of the same item, then comparing quantities of different sized items, identifying how many of something there is by looking (subtilising) and recording numbers up to 10 on ten frames. 

In phonics we have been starting to learn how to sound out longer words, such as laptop, sunset and lemon. They are trickier, but the children have been learning to break them into chunks, e.g. for laptop, they would sound out lap and then top. 

We have had some lovely new play equipment out this week, which the class has been using for some very creative and physical play outdoors. 

We look forward to show and tell from the following children next week:

Week beginning Monday 6th Feb

Mon: Oliver and Raffy

Tue: Ralph and Robyn

Wed: Rose and Tabitha

Thurs: Tatty and Hughie

Fri: Zoe and Xander

As part of our Long Ago topic we have been talking about things we like to do with our families and how we celebrate different occasions. As an optional homework we would like the children to tell us about a favourite meal or food they like to eat on special occasions, such as birthdays or celebrations. The children could upload a photo onto Tapestry of a favourite family dinner or a special meal their family has shared. Maybe they could draw and label their favourite meal if they choose. This could also be uploaded onto Tapestry.

Have a lovely weekend, 

Mrs Edwards and Mrs Whitewood 

Friday 27th Jan

Dear Parents

We have really enjoyed Show and Tell and it has been wonderful to see the children’s confidence grow when presenting this week. The children have loved sharing information about their Grandparents and we have been delighted to have Xander's Grandma and Florentia's Grandad coming in to visit us. We have a few more booked in for next week but please let us know if anyone else would like to come in.

We look forward to show and tell from the following children next week:

Week beginning Monday 30th Jan

Mon: Hattie and Herbie

Tue: Isaac and Ivar

Wed: Jojo and Jonty

Thurs: Lilly and Lucy

Fri: Margot and Max

In maths this week we have been practising addition. Any support you can give at home to reinforce this would be beneficial. We have been adding by combining two groups (1 child has 3 sweets and another has 4 sweets. How many altogether? Perhaps you could play a board game with 2 dice). We have also been doing addition by counting on. For example, build a tower of 3 bricks and then add on 2 more. How may do you have? Can you work this out by starting with 3 and counting on 2?

On Tuesday the children really enjoyed making cards for someone in their families; and in PE, the children were really challenged with the movements they had to make but they really rose to the occasion, especially moving along on their knees, whilst holding a ball out in front of them!

Please make sure your child has spare clothes in their bag in case of any accidents. Could you return any items borrowed from school as our stocks are virtually non existent. Please re label all snack boxes and water bottles. 

Have a lovely weekend.

Best wishes

Mrs Edwards and Mrs Whitewood

Friday 20th January

It's been a rather chilly week here in Reception but the children are getting pretty good at putting on their coats and hats and gloves. Zips are still tricky but we help with these, however, if you want to practise at home then please do! As usual, make sure everything is correctly and clearly labelled and anything that goes missing should be returned. 

 

Thank you for all of the lovely special memories photos and writing you sent in. We have enjoyed looking at them as a class and it has been lovely to share them. As you know we will be continuing our topic work over the next few weeks with 3 weeks of Show and Tell about Grandparents. We have a couple of Grandparents booked in already to come and visit the class and share a story or experiences. Please do get in touch if any of your child's grandparents would like to join us. Don't forget to check which day is your child's turn for Show and Tell. 

 

On Thursday next week in class we will be thinking about how our families are special and unique. We will be talking about who is special to us in our families. It would be really helpful if you could talk to your child beforehand about who is special / important in their lives and we will be drawing a simple family tree to illustrate this. 

 

This morning in class the children did fantastic writing about Forest School. They are very much in the early stages of writing and if you would like to support them at home please do not correct their spelling or write words out for them to copy as they can have a go using their phonic knowledge. So for example if they wrote "rais" for race we would be very pleased as they have sounded out and heard the "ai" sound in the middle and a "s" at the end. Similarly, if they wrote "heep" for heap that would be great. Other examples would be "tighm" for time (using the igh trigraph). It's all about having a go and building confidence. 

As always please keep looking at Tapestry as it has lots of updates of what we have been learning about in school. We also welcome uploads from home if there is something your child is particularly proud of. 

 

Have a lovely weekend

Mrs Edwards and Mrs Whitewood

Friday 6th January 2023

We hope that you all had a healthy and restful Christmas and a Happy New Year! It has been lovely to welcome the children back and they have settled well into school. Thank you very much for the lovely cards and gifts you gave to all of the YR team for Christmas. They were very much appreciated and enjoyed.  

As you will have seen on Tapestry, our topic this term is Long Ago. This a new topic for us and the children (and adults!) have really engaged with it already.  Please continue to look at Tapestry regularly to see what we have been up to. If your child has anything special that you would like to share with us eg an interesting place you have visited, something you/they are particularly proud of, a family event, please do feel free to upload to Tapestry so we can talk about it with your child. It does not have to be shared with the whole class, but if your child wanted to then they could tell us all about it. 

We will do Show and Tell later on this term, related to our topic – more details to follow.  

Please check labels on everything that comes into school – particularly forest school kit as well as snacks and drinks. The helpers of the day give out the snacks and it is quite tricky if they are not labelled. 

A new reading book has been uploaded onto the Collins website (we have only read this once in school) so please reread at home and talk about the story. 

Have a restful weekend. 

Mrs Edwards and Mrs Whitewood 

Friday 16th December

Well me made it! And as I write this I am feeling excited about the upcoming holiday but also sad as it means my time with this rather wonderful bunch of little people has come to an end. I really have so enjoyed teaching them since September, it is always a privilege to be with children at the start of their school journey. I look forward to watching how they continue to thrive as the year progresses and I have promised them that I will pop down from time to time to say hi and read stories.

It has been a slightly frustrating, although beautiful week. This extremely cold weather has meant we have been unable to play outside, but the class have coped well and we have been busy doing festive crafts and playing inside. We continued with phonics and maths and the children have really progressed so well in these areas. 

Reading books

We haven't added a new reading book this week as we haven't had the opportunity to carry out our reading groups due to the snow, absences and end of term fun! Over the holiday you will still have access to the all the book on the e-collins website and we would recommend rereading some of these for fluency and to practise blending. 

There was some lost property which I have photographed and will put on Tapestry, please reclaim in the new year and remember to name everything and please check names are still in place/clear to read, especially coats, snack boxes/bottles and gloves/hats/scarves.

Frustratingly, the present the staff have given to the children only arrived this afternoon so it will need to be given in January, but I will put it on Tapestry so you can show your children and a teacher will explain it further in the New Year.

Happy Christmas! Happy Holidays and see you in 2023!

Mrs Cheshire and Mrs Edwards

Monday 12th December 

This must be the most snow the children in our class have seen! We hope you have some fun with it today. Can you build a snowman bigger than yourself? Can you make a pile of 10 snowballs? Can you make some snow bricks and build an igloo? Upload a photo on Tapestry and we can share these when we're back in school.

When you're finished outside and need to warm up here are some activities we were going to be doing in school today:

Phonics - tricky words

You can listen to this song to help learn some of our tricky words: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TvMyssfAUx0

Choose a few of the words your child finds difficult to remember, write the words on pieces of paper and stick on doors around the house. You're not allowed through the door until you've read the word (is, I, the, as, and, has, his, her, go, no, to, into, of, she, we, me, he, be). Or make 2 sets of words and play matching pairs or snap.

Maths- positional language

Today we were going to have a combined maths and PE lesson. Read / watch the story "The Greatest Gymnast Of All"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iqKuujwCbn4

Discuss all the positional language used in the book. Can you copy any of the moves in the book? Can you jump on a mat and off a mat? Can you go inside a hoop, outside a hoop, under and over a hoop? Can you jump forwards and backwards? Can you stretch up high and crouch down low? Can your hands and feet be near, together and far apart? maybe you could make a teddy do all these moves?

Christmas Activities

Hopefully we'll be back in school tomorrow. Other activities we were going to do in school today that you could do at home include making a Christmas decoration, a snowman picture and some Christmas baking.

Hope you all stay warm and have a fun day.

The YR team

Friday 9th December

I'm sure you all agree that Reception class excelled in their first school Nativity. We were so proud of them. They sang so confidently and seemed to be enjoying being a part of it all. They all sat so well during rehearsals and the final show. Thank you so much for coming to support them, they were so excited to see you all. We hope you enjoyed it. 

We have had a week of 2 halves, lots of final rehearsals at the beginning and back to regular routine at the end of the week. We have continued with phonics, revising all sounds previously learnt. Please do go over the sounds with the children, especially recently learnt digraphs ch, sh, qu, ng, nk, th. 

In maths we continued with 2D shapes, identifying them in pictures and counting them. 

In RE we continued to look at the Nativity and learnt that Christians believe it is Jesus' birthday. We thought about how we celebrate our birthdays and similarities to Christmas (cake, decorations, cards, presents.)

Our class christmas tree is up! Look on Tapestry to see it in all of it's (sticky) glory!

Christmas Jumper Day and lunch on Thursday.

Not much more to say except have a lovely weekend and stay warm! One more week to go...

Mrs Cheshire and Mrs Edwards

Friday 3rd December

We have been very busy with Nativity rehearsals which are going well as well as keeping up with our phonics, maths and topic.  Today in RE we started to look at the Bible Nativity story and thought about why Christians believe that Jesus was a special baby and we read the story. 

In Children's choice the children had great fun making magic wands (linking to Cinderella.) They also made a red postbox - if your child wants to bring in Christmas cards for the class they can put them in this post box and we will distribute them out at the end of term.

To support our phonics in Children's Choice we played this fun game called Balloon Phonics. We did the initial sound balloons. I will attach to the webpage in case you want to have a go at home.

Thank you for coming to the maths presentation this week. We hope you found it useful. We will put up the powerpoint we used on Tapestry. Our work on 2D shapes has continued through the week. Do have a look around your home for 2D shapes. The children have learnt the terms: side, corner, straight and curved and we have been looking at squares, rectangles, triangles and circles.  As always, this is on Tapestry.

Nativity Costumes

Please make sure these are in school on Monday in a named carrier bag. We look forward to seeing many of at the performance on Wednesday at 2pm.

Toys in School

Please could you encourage your child to leave toys from home at home.  There is no more show and tell this term.

Hope to see lots of you at the Christmas fair tomorrow

Mrs Cheshire and Mrs Edwards

Friday 25th November

Another fab week in Year R. The children continue to make amazing progress in their phonics work, enjoying reading groups and our whole class sessions. We hope that you are impressed with their reading when using the eCollins library. Tricky words are still proving quite tricky so please do support your child with this at home, perhaps have a couple of the words stuck around the house. As these words can't be phonetically sounded out they need to be able to read them by sight. Tricky words covered so far are: is, I, the, put, pull, full, as, has, his, her, go, no, to, into

We sadly said goodbye to Tilly today, she will be missed and we wish her all the best with her move to New Zealand.

Show and Tell

Thank you for all the lovely books brought in for Show and Tell.  The children have really enjoyed sharing their favourite books and we've enjoyed reading them.

There will be no more Show and Tell this term as we have a few other Christmassy things to fit in! 

Pantomime

On Monday afternoon we have a visiting theatre company coming in to school to perform a pantomime of Jack and The Beanstalk in the school hall for YR, 1 and 2. 

Nativity Costumes

Please could these be brought into school by Monday 5^th December at the very latest. 

Well done for teaching the children to put on their coats, there was so much more independence with that this week which saved us all lots of time! ...next steps zips!

Have a lovely weekend.

Mrs Cheshire and Mrs Edwards

Friday 18th November

There was great excitement today for the disco! Thank you to the class reps for organising what looked to be a very fun afternoon for the children. 

We have had a great week in school with lots of number work and super writing. Children are really getting the hang of writing their names, do please support this at home, they are so proud when they can do it!

It was a very wet start to the week but thankfully dried out and the children have had fun with potion making. See Tapestry for more updates about the week. We have started practising our songs for the Christmas Nativity and the children have been learning them so well.

It was lovely to see many of you on Wednesday for parents evening and we look forward to seeing the rest of you next week.

Show and Tell week beginning 21^st November (favourite book from home)

Monday: Amelie and Lilly

Tuesday:  Hattie and Betty

Wednesday: Clementine and Jojo

Thursday: Archie G and Raffy

Friday: Florentia and Emily

Reading Books

Your child has been allocated a book on the E-collins book library. This is the book they have been reading in class in our reading groups this week. Please use the yellow reading diary to let us know how they get on at home with the book. Books will be allocated on Thursdays or Fridays after we have read them in class during the week. As mentioned previously, we aim to read the book 3 times in school over the week, focusing on decoding, prosody (reading with expression) and comprehension. 

Coats

As it is getting colder and we encourage the children to wear coats at playtime, please could you teach your child how to put their coat on by themselves. The arms in first, over the head trick works well, I think Chidd Nursery do it that way. Thankyou

Have a lovely weekend

Mrs Cheshire and Mrs Edwards

Friday 11th November

Today we spent the morning thinking about Remembrance Day and joined the whole school for a special Act of Worship and 1 minute silence. Pics will be put on Tapestry. This is obviously an emotive and complex topic so it was pitched at an appropriate level and with sensitivity. Your child may come home with comments and questions. We watched Poppies on CBeebies which is a beautiful animation explaining about the significance of today for younger children. I recommend you watch it if you haven't before. The children loved it and we had some good discussions.

Maths

We have been thinking about time, learning the Days of the Week and Months of the Year. I will attach two of the singing resources we have used. Perhaps you can sing them with your child.

Show and Tell week beginning 14^th November (favourite book from home)

Monday: Annie and Tilly

Tuesday:  Herbie and Tabitha

Wednesday: Ivar and Jonty

Thursday: Archie B and Oliver

Friday: Margot and Xander

Show and Tell week beginning 21^st November (favourite book from home)

Monday: Amelie and Lilly

Tuesday:  Hattie and Betty

Wednesday: Clementine and Jojo

Thursday: Archie G and Raffy

Friday: Florentia and Emily

Reading Books

Your child has been allocated a book on the E-collins book library. This is the book they have been reading in class in our reading groups this week. Please use the yellow reading diary to let us know how they get on at home with the book. Books will be allocated on Thursdays or Fridays after we have read them in class during the week. As mentioned previously, we aim to read the book 3 times in school over the week, focusing on decoding, prosody (reading with expression) and comprehension. 

PE

This term we are doing PE in the hall and the children take off their socks and shoes to do PE. Whilst the weather is still fairly mild it would be helpful if children could wear socks rather than tights underneath their tracksuits. 

Forest School

Please could FS kit be put in a separate bag / carrier bag to school 

Tapestry

A lot of the learning that goes on in school is shared on Tapestry. We would recommend that you take a look at this on a regular basis so you can support your child at home. It's also very useful for end of the day discussions with your child when they can't remember anything about what they did at school! We always enjoy reading your comments too.

Have a lovely weekend.

Mrs Cheshire and Mrs Edwards

Friday 21st October

Well, we've made it to the end of term, more or less in one piece! It's hard to believe that the children have only been in school for one term. They have settled in so well, taken many different experiences in their stride, have become increasingly independent and have been an absolute pleasure to get to know. They are no doubt very tired so we hope you all have a very relaxing half term and some quality time together!

14th October

We have had a great week in Reception and today we went to our first whole school Celebration Act of Worship. The children sat very well through it and enjoyed being part of the service. At these services 3 children from the class will get a certificate, either a Head Teacher's Award or Star of the Week. 

Literacy meeting Tuesday 18^th October 2.45pm

We look forward to seeing those of you that can make it at our phonics/reading meeting on Tuesday in our classroom at 2.45 with Mrs Edwards and the school's literacy lead Kate Haysom. 

Maths Homework

This week we have been practising careful and accurate counting. Over the weekend please find any opportunities you can with your child to count objects, whether it's the stairs as you walk up them, sweets from the shop or sticks in the garden. If you haven't got enough cups on the table, how many more do you need?

Show and Tell

The class has been really enjoying Show and Tell so far. Next week is the turn of:

Monday – Jonty, Archie B, Oliver

Tuesday – Margot, Xander, Amelie

Wednesday - Clementine, Hattie, Lilly

Thursday – Betty, Jojo, Raffy,

Friday – Archie G, Florentia, Emily

Have a lovely weekend, 1 week until half term!

Mrs Cheshire and Mrs Edwards

Friday 7th October

 We were so proud of the children at their first ever Harvest Service. They sang and did the actions so well and enjoyed the experience. They all sat beautifully, listening to the other classes. The first of many chances to see them performing, thank you to those of you able to come. Well done Reception!

Homework

This week in maths we have been working on patterns - spotting, extending and predicting patterns. Being able to recognise patterns is a key skill in maths. Over the weekend could you support your child to make a pattern using something they've found on a walk or toys in the home. The patterns could be by object (acorn leaf acorn leaf) or by colour (red brick yellow brick red brick yellow brick). Ask your child what comes next, can they extend the pattern? If you would like, you could upload a photo onto Tapestry. You will also see ones we have done in school. We talked about the pattern being 'copied' again and again. For those able to do this easily they could extend to 3 items e.g conker, acorn, leaf, conker, acorn, leaf. Can they arrange the pattern in different ways, zig zag or in a circle (still maintaining the repeating pattern.)

Forest School

Please make sure all items that come into school are labelled. Please could all children come into school wearing trainers or similar and bring wellies in a bag. 

Reading books and yellow reading diaries

Sharing books from our class library will usually be sent home on Mondays and Fridays (you can keep the books at home for a few days). You can also use the yellow reading diary to record how your child has got on with the Collins elibrary book. 

Show and tell:

Thank you those children who have brought in super show and tells this week. Next week we have:

Monday – Rose, Robyn, Ralph

Tuesday – Max, Blake, Isaac

Wednesday - Tatty, Zoe, Lucy

Thursday – Eva, Annie, Tilly

Friday – Herbie, Tabitha, Ivar

We have been busy playing with conkers, acorns, fallen leaves and pine cones as Autumm arrives in our playground. The children have been enjoying this and being creative in their play. They are all getting quite tired so please do encourage early nights and lots of 'down time' so they have the stamina to get through the rest of this term!

Have a super weekend,

Mrs Cheshire and Mrs Edwards

Friday 30th September

We have had a lovely busy week. The children have coped so well with full days but are definitely tired today! Their phonics learning is progressing swiftly and they are beginning to blend letters to make words orally and with phonics cards which is so exciting! On Friday's we recap the week's learning so no new sound today. In maths we have been ordering sizes and today looking at sequencing time. See Tapestry for lots more about what we have been up to.

Harvest

We look forward to seeing those that can make it at the Harvest Festival Service on Wednesday morning. Our class will be a singing a song as part of the service. Please could your child decorate and bring back their Harvest envelopes sent home in bags on Wednesday by Tuesday next week (with donation inside – however big or small!) as well as their non-perishable food item. Thank you for those who have already sent theirs in.

Show and Tell

Next week we will introduce Show and Tell. The children might want to tell us about something interesting they have done at home, or something they are proud of, or maybe show something they have found on a walk. Sometimes we will ask them to find out something related to our current topic or learning and this would be noted on our class website on Friday afternoons. (If you would like them to show something they have done out of school you can put it on Tapestry and we can share it with the class that way, just let your child know that is where it is.) We do not recommend bringing in anything too precious!

Below is a timetable with allocated days. For the next fortnight these are as follows:

Week beginning Monday 3rd October

Monday – Jonty, Archie B, Oliver

Tuesday – Margot, Xander, Amelie

Wednesday - Clementine, Hattie, Lilly

Thursday – Betty, Jojo, Raffy,

Friday – Archie G, Florentia, Emily,

Week beginning Monday 10th October

Monday – Rose, Robyn, Ralph

Tuesday – Max, Blake, Isaac

Wednesday - Tatty, Zoe, Lucy

Thursday – Eva, Annie, Tilly

Friday – Herbie, Tabitha, Ivar

If anyone has any spare conkers please can they bring them in, I don't need many but the squirrels have eaten all of the ones I usually collect! It is for an art lesson and will not be returned so only bring in if they wont be missed. Thank you

The PTA christmas card fundraiser sheet should have come home today in the children's bags. 

Have a lovely weekend.

Mrs Cheshire and Mrs Edwards

Friday September 23rd

It was a rather soggy end to the week so unfortunately the children stayed indoors but they managed well. It has been a very positive week, the children have all done really well coping with lunch at school and we have some excellent eaters! We will keep an eye on those who are less keen but we usually find that in time they manage well. If you have any concerns do let us know. Phonics and maths are going well and the children seem very motivated to be learning. Today we talked about friendship and how to be a good friend to each other.

Today the children have come home with a class 'sharing' book. Throughout the year the children will be able to choose a book from our class selection to take home and enjoy with a parent/carer. This book is not for them to read to you but to be enjoyed together. We will change books twice a week, (probably) on a Tuesday and Friday so please have them in school on those days. We have written the name of the book in their yellow reading journals. Please comment or tick to show it has been read before returning it next week. I would strongly suggest covering this book in sticky back plastic (if you can bare to!) as they get a lot of abuse and don't tend to make it through the year if not! 

On Monday 26^th September we will start PE lessons. Please could the children come to school in their PE kits (school uniform will not be needed).

We will start Forest School the following week on Tuesday 4^th October.

A reminder NO NUTS in snacks please and please clearly name water bottles and all snacks. There are still several unnamed and it makes handing out the snacks quite hard for our helpers. 

Please can children not bring in any toys from home as they can get lost or damaged and cause problems when playing.

Keep looking at Tapestry. Lots to see on there and thank you for your patience with Mrs Cheshire's zoom meetings yesterday, old fashioned phone calls are much more 2022 anyway!! We hope you found the conversations useful. 

Full days next week! 

Have a lovely weekend

Mrs Cheshire and Mrs Edwards