Number stay and learn
It was great to see so many of you at our second Stay and Learn this week. We hope you enjoyed watching your child take part in some fantastic maths learning! We’d love to hear your feedback.
There are 4 more Stay and Learns this year – find the dates here.
For those of you who were unable to attend, please find attached the PowerPoint shared at the meeting.
World Nursery Rhyme Week
This week has been World Nursery Rhyme week. We have had a great week celebrating our favourite Nursery Rhymes and have focused on a range of different nursery rhymes and we have been singing them (even more!) at carpet times.
Help at home: Sing your favourite Nursery Rhyme and send a video of you singing it for us to share in class.
Odd Socks
On Monday, we wore odd socks to signify our differences and share the message that we are all different in some way. We discussed how important it is to celebrate our differences and respect everyone.
Phonics
This week, we focused on the new GPCs (Grapheme-phoneme correspondence) v, w, x, y.
We’ve also learnt the tricky words; and, has, his, her. Tricky words are words that should be read by sight. We start by identifying which part of the word is ‘tricky’.
Please continue to revisit this week’s sounds, by using the learn at home sheets. Thank you.
Poetry Basket
Children love listening to and joining in with poems each week. We learn a new poem every Monday and recite it together throughout the week.
Saying the poems out loud helps us focus on sounds, rhythm and rhyme, which supports our early reading skills. We’ve noticed that some poems have a fast and lively beat, while others are slow and gentle.
Shoes
Before I jump into my bed,
Before I dim the light,
I put my shoes together,
So they can talk all night.
I’m sure they would be lonesome,
If I tossed one here or there,
So I put my shoes together,
For they are a friendly pair.
Reminder
Next Tuesday is our Maths Stay & Learn session for parents. Once the children are settled on the carpet, we’ll invite you into the classroom to watch a short maths session. After that, there’ll be a variety of maths challenges for you to enjoy with your child. To finish the session, I’ll deliver a short presentation all about maths in Reception. We look forward to seeing you there!
Mrs. Kendrew, Mrs. Rippon, Miss. Feldman, Mrs. Linton and Mrs. Cairnes
Potion Commotion
We’ve had so much fun with our book of the week Potion Commotion, we enjoyed hearing about Betty, making her own potion and saving the town from the hungry dragon.
Our classroom challenges included finding ingredients from in the garden to add to a potion and to make a trap to catch a dragon.
“I put sticky tap at the end so he will get stuck inside.”
“I’m going to trap him inside this big tub, we could put a biscuit in to make him come in.”
Maths
This week, we’ve been engaging in activities that highlight the purpose of counting – finding out how many objects there are altogether. We’ve reinforced our understanding of cardinality, recognising that the last number we say when counting represents the total number of objects in the set.
A key focus has been deepening our understanding of the number 5 as a quantity. We’ve been linking the number to familiar representations, such as the five fingers on one hand. The children are also beginning to explore different ways to represent numbers up to 5, using both their fingers and the Hungarian number pattern (die frame).
Help at home: Draw a hand on a piece of paper and collect 5 objects.
Reminders
- Odd Socks Day – Monday 10 November
Children are invited to wear odd socks to school today, marking the fact we’re all different in some way. - Children in Need: non-uniform day – Friday 14 November
Mrs. Kendrew, Mrs. Rippon, Miss. Feldman, Mrs. Linton and Mrs. Cairnes
Do you have a child due to start primary school in 2026?
A video and FAQ’s are available for more support and guidance with applications.
Light and dark!
Autumn 2-Light and Dark
Welcome back! We hope you’ve had a lovely half term and are feeling well rested. This half term our overall theme is Light and Dark.
We’ll be using the following focus books to help us with our learning
See you all in the morning for some fun challenges and some learning about St James.
Training day – Arty Ideas
We thought you’d enjoy hearing a little about what went on during our recent teacher training day! Part of the day was dedicated to developing our art knowledge and skills with our resident art teacher, Mrs Boulton.
Teachers got hands-on with paints, pastels and even soap! There was plenty of colour, laughter, and even a bit of friendly competition as we experimented with new techniques and ideas for upcoming art lessons.
The rest of the day focussed on other important areas too, including maths and inclusion. It was a full, productive day – and we left feeling ready and excited for the next half-term!
Leaf Man
It has been another fun filled week in reception, our focus book has been Leaf Man by Elois Ehlert.
In the book autumn has come, the wind is blowing and Leaf Man is on the move. No one is sure where he is going, but ‘A Leaf Man’s got to go where the wind blows.’ Our word of the week was ‘seasons’ we have talked about the four seasons winter, spring, summer and autumn. We have really enjoyed learning about the season of autumn, when the leaves fall from the trees, when some small animals like hedgehogs are looking for food to store and some animals begin to hibernate like a door mouse.
Help at home: Go on an autumn hunt and see if you can spot signs of autumn like acorns, pine cones, squirrels conkers and more. Don’t forget to send in some pictures to add to our seasons display.
Poetry Basket
This week our poem was Five Little Pumpkins.
Five little pumpkins sitting on a gate.
The first one said, ‘Oo, it’s getting late.’
The second one said, ‘There are witches in the air.’
The third one said, ‘Well I don’t care.’
The fourth one said, ‘Let’s run, run, run.’
The fifth one said, ‘Let’s have some fun.’
But oooh went the wind, and out went the light,
And five little pumpkins tumbled out of sight.
Phonics
This week the children have recapped all the phonemes (the sound a letter makes) we have covered so far this term. We have focused closely on our blending, the skill that helps us with our reading and our tricky words the, is and I. Keep up the great work everyone!
Maths
In Maths, some of our teddies have been arguing over who has more things. we have used the stem sentence
“… has more than..”
“…has fewer than…”
The activities this week have focused on developing the skill of comparing as children have been encouraged to look carefully and use the language of comparison to describe sets of objects.
‘Fewer than’ is used rather than ‘less than’ because the focus is on countable things.
Have a happy and healthy weekend
Mrs. Kendrew, Mrs. Rippon, Miss. Feldman, Mrs Linton, Mrs Cairnes and Mrs Small
Henri’s Scissors
This week we have been reading Henri’s Scissors by Jeanette Winter.
The story is a biographical children’s book about the famous artist, Henri Matisse. We learned about his life and discovered how, even when he became unwell and could no longer paint, he continued to make beautiful artwork by cutting bold shapes and colours to create collages.
Our word of the week was artist. We talked about different types of art and artists, introducing new vocabulary such as sculptor, sculpture and collage.
Then, we became artists ourselves by creating our own colourful collages – just like Matisse!
We used our language and communication skills to explore and respond to Matisse’s artwork. We looked closely at the colours, shapes and patterns and thought carefully about which pieces we liked and why.
We also discussed questions such as:
- Why do you think the artist painted this?
- Which is your favourite, and why?
Here are some of our thoughtful responses:
I like the green shapes, they look like emeralds.
I can see pink and purple, I like that.
I like the white bit, it is a funny shape.
Phonics
This week, children have been learning the phonemes (the sounds that letters make) h, b, f, and l. They’ve also been practising writing the graphemes (the written letters) for these sounds.
We’ve also learnt a new tricky word: the.
A tricky word is a word that can’t be sounded out using phonics – it’s one they simply have to learn by sight.
The children now know three tricky words: I, is and the
Help at Home: You can support your child’s learning at home by writing these tricky words on pieces of paper or sticky notes and placing them around your house. Keep challenging your child to read them whenever they see them – the more practice, the better! These words need to be recognised instantly, just by looking.
Poetry Basket
Children love listening to and joining in with poems each week. We learn a new poem every Monday and recite it together throughout the week.
Saying the poems out loud helps us focus on sounds, rhythm and rhyme, which supports our early reading skills. We’ve noticed that some poems have a fast and lively beat, while others are slow and gentle.
Maths
In Maths, we’ve been using our subitising skills to identify patterns up to 4.
Subitising means being able to see a small number of objects and know how many there are without counting – for example, recognising that there are three dots just by looking.
We’ve been using our subitising skills playing bingo this week.
Help at home – autumn leaves and conkers.
If you go on a walk this weekend, we’d really appreciate donations of dry leaves to help us with an art project next week. We also need some conkers and acorns to use in our maths learning – see how many you can find! Thank you for your support.
Have a happy and healthy weekend
Mrs. Kendrew, Mrs. Rippon, Miss. Feldman, Mrs Linton, Mrs Cairnes and Mrs Small
Reading: It’s so important!
We hope that you’re enjoying reading your child’s library book with them. We call this a ‘love of reading’ book – to do just that, encourage a love of reading for your child! Reading to and with your child can have a huge positive impact on your child’s education.
This research is a powerful message of the impact you can have when reading to/with your child:
At school, your child reads a physical book four times a week – with a focus on teaching phonics skills. This is then sent home as an eBook. The purpose of the eBook at home is to celebrate your child’s success (in phonics skills). Your child should be able to read most of this book confidently and really feel like a reader.
We’ve chosen to use eBooks at home for many benefits. Allocating eBooks frees up about two hours of teacher or TA time changing books – now spent teaching reading!
Here’s some information on how to access eBooks but if you’re having any problems please speak to your child’s class teacher.
Happy reading!