Reception
Welcome to Reception!
Reception 2023-2024
RR
Mrs Rowley
RFS
Mrs Ferdinand and Mrs Smith
Our topics
Autumn Term
Starting School
Autumn
Celebrations
Spring Term
Winter
Once Upon A Time...
Spring
Summer Term
In My Little Garden
Under the Sea
Summer Holidays
Reception News
Friday April 19th
The children have all returned from their Easter break refreshed and ready to learn!
This week we have introduced the trigraphs 'ear' and 'ure'. They have taken home a Fluency Book to practise these graphemes at home.
We have started our new topic 'In My Little Garden' where we are focussing on what we can see and grow in the garden. We will also be learning about life-cycles too!
In Literacy this week the children were writing about all the exciting things that they did in the holidays.
In Maths the children were learning about the names and properties of 3D shapes - cube, cuboid, sphere, cylinder and cone. Perhaps they could find some of these shapes at home this weekend.
In PSED we discussed why too much screen time is not good for us. We talked about how we can limit the time we spend on screens and we talked about how too much time on screens can make us feel.
In Deal we have introduced our new book focus 'What the Ladybird Heard' by Julia Donaldson. Our role -play area is now a farmhouse kitchen!
Finally, a reminder that the children can come to school in their PE kit on Mondays from next week which they will stay in all day.
Have a lovely weekend!
The Reception Team
Friday March 22nd
The children all look fantastic in their masked ball costumes today! I am sure they will have a lovely day!
This week we have introduced the new trigraph 'air' and the children have been practising writing sentences using all the digraphs and trigraphs we have learnt previously using the game Sentence Maker as a focus.
In Maths we have continued to practise doubles.
In Understanding the World we have introduced some new ipad apps to the children and they will be able to access these independently next week.
This week is Neurodiversity Week and the children attended a special assembly where we discussed how we celebrate diversity in school.
Finally, we have been discussing the signs of spring which will hopefully be on its way soon!
Hope you have a lovely weekend!
The Reception Team
Friday March 15th
Happy Red Nose day!
The children look great in their red clothes today!
This week we have been learning a new word, 'trigraph', which is 3 graphemes together that make one phoneme. We have introduced the grapheme 'igh' and the children have taken home the book 'Night' to consolidate this.
We have also introduced a new phonic game 'Roll a Silly Sentence.' The children loved laughing at the silly sentences that we wrote!
In maths, we have been learning about 1 less within 10 using the song 'Ten in the Bed' as a focus.
We have had a new globe in class too and we have used this to identify where we live in the world and where we have been on holiday.
We have also been sharing our thoughts on acts of kindness and how we can be kind to others in our lives.
Finally, a reminder about our Masked Ball next Friday when the children can come to school dressed as a king, queen, princess, prince or knight.
Have a lovely weekend!
The Reception Team
Friday March 8th
This week we have introduced the grapheme 'er' and the children have taken home the Fluency Book 'The Princess and the Archer' to consolidate this.
In Maths, we have been subitising and identifying which dominoes have more than 9 dots and less than 9 dots. We then moved onto deciding which dominoes have more or less than 10 dots.
Last week we designed our own Nibbles monsters and this week we made them out of salt dough. The children then decorated them using their original designs. They look fantastic and are on display in our classrooms!
The children all looked amazing in their costumes for World Book Day! They had lots of fun talking about their characters and shared a book session with another class.
The children also enjoyed making gingerbread bears this week as part of the whole school DT project.
As part of our 'Once Upon a Time' topic we will be holding a Masked Ball on Friday March 22nd! This will be an exciting opportunity for the children to come into school dressed as a king, queen, prince, princess or knight on that day!
Finally, the children have made something special for a special day on Sunday! Don't forget to look in your child's book bag!
Have a lovely weekend!
The Reception Team
Friday March 1st
We have continued to explore our 'Once upon a Time' topic this week and the children have learnt lots of new vocabulary. We have been learning the new grapheme 'oa' and the children have taken home the Fluency Book 'The Princess and the Toad' to consolidate this.
In Maths, we have been learning how to order the days of the week through the focus book 'Jasper's Beanstalk' and we have been singing our Days of the Week song too.
We have continued with our Deal activities by creating a 'Wanted' poster for Nibbles, the book-eating monster, who we think is causing chaos in Once Upon a Time Land! We have designed our own monsters and drawn and labelled them too.
Our 'Golden Book' this week is Little Red Riding Hood and the children have enjoyed retelling the story using finger puppets.
We also enjoyed an assembly this week focussing on how to respect our environment.
Finally, a reminder to sign up for parents' evening next week if you haven't already done so.
Have a lovely weekend!
The Reception Team
Friday February 23rd
This week we have started our new exciting topic 'Once Upon a Time.' The children have loved dressing up in our castle role-play area and are learning lots of new vocabulary linked to castles and their features.
We have begun our new Deal focus where we received an interesting scroll from the King of Once Upon a Time kingdom asking for us to be detectives and find some clues! Our golden book this week was Goldilocks and the 3 Bears.
In phonics, we have been learning the grapheme 'or' and we have been reading the Fluency Book 'Ship in the Port.'
In maths, we have been exploring length and ordering ribbons and wool in order of length. We have also been continuing to practise doubles.
In Understanding the World, we have continued to celebrate Lunar New Year. The children really enjoyed tasting the noodles and prawn crackers this week too!
We would like to take the children out for a school trip at some time. However, we would need a number of parents to support with this. If you are able to support on any school trip please could you email your class teacher.
Have a great weekend!
The Reception Team
Friday February 9th
This week the children have been learning the 'ai' grapheme and have taken the Fluency Book 'Snail in the Rain' to practice this at home.
We have been writing about what you need to be to be a good friend which links to our Deal focus book.
After half term we will be starting a new Deal focus book which we hope will engage the children and encourage more independent writing.
We have changed our role play house into one which celebrates Lunar New Year and we have been learning about how this is celebrated all over the world.
The children looked fantastic in their own clothes for 'Express Yourself' Day on Wednesday as part of Children's Mental Health Week. We talked about how we are all unique and we should respect each other and our choices. We had a special assembly from Stockport Inclusion Service where we listened to the story 'Ruby's Worry.'
In maths we have been learning doubles to 20.
The children also enjoyed creating a soundscape with tuned perscussion instruments to accompany the story of 'Lost and Found'.
Finally, we hope you enjoy looking at the new photos of all the playing and learning in spring 1.
Have a lovely half term!
The Reception Team
Friday February 2nd
This week we have introduced the new grapheme 'ur' and the children have taken the Fluency Book 'Black Cat' home to embed this.
We have been writing lists of what we would need to take to the South Pole as part of our Deal focus. We have been continuing with our regular handwriting practice focussing on 'curly caterpillar' letters such as c,a,o,d,g,q. We have noticed a huge improvement in handwriting as a result.
In maths, we have been looking at compostion of 6,7 and 8 using a 10 frame.
We have also been programming the beebots this week and we have been working out how to make them move towards an object.
It is National Story-telling Week this week and the children enjoyed listening to a lovely sensory story by Mrs Smith yesterday.
Finally, the children have loved dressing up for Number Day today! They have raised lots of money for the NSPCC and have also enjoyed lots of exciting maths activities with jelly beans too!
Have a lovely weekend!
The Reception Team
Friday January 26th
This week we have introduced the grapheme 'ee' and the children have taken home the Fluency Book 'Green Frog' to practise. Please continue to practise previous Fluency Books as this will give your child more confidence when reading in school.
We have started to attend Celebration Assemblies on Friday mornings where we celebrate our successes in school. Some children have started to bring home Headteacher Awards already!
We had a special assembly by Mrs Kaur this week too where we learning all about how to keep safe online.
We have continued to use the book 'Lost and Found' as a focus and the children have loved learning all about the South Pole and how we can get there. They even created an obstacle course in the outdoor learning area that took them from school to the South Pole!
In maths, we have been learning about mass and weight and have been finding out which eggs are the lightest and heaviest using scales.
The children have created winter collages this week too using a variety of coloured paper. We will display them in our classrooms.
Finally, this weekend is the RSPB big bird watch. Perhaps you could see how many different birds you can spot in your garden or the park!
Have a good weekend!
The Reception Team
Friday January 19th
This week the children have been learning a new grapheme 'ow' as in cow, owl and brown.
They took home a new Fluency Book 'Brown Owl' to practice this grapheme. Please continue to read previous Fluency Books as this will develop your child's confidence and fluency when reading.
In PSHE, we have been learning about what to do if we get seperated when we are out and about with our grown ups. We watched 'Blue Gets Lost' and talked about what to do if we get lost.
It was amazing on Tuesday to wake up to the wonderful snow. We had been hoping we would get some. We all put on our waterproofs and wellies and had fun in the snow before it melted!
In maths, we have been learning about one more than and one less than to 5.
We have continued our DEAL sessions and we have been talking and writing about what penguins need and we have been debating whether the boy in our story should keep the penguin or take it back to the South Pole.
We are all penguin experts now!
Finally, as part of World Religion Day we have been learning about different religions around the world.
Have a lovely weekend!
The Reception Team
Friday January 12th
Happy New Year!
The children have had an exciting first week back in school.
We have started our current topic 'One Snowy Night'. We have transformed our Christmas House into a Winter House. We have been singing songs, reading stories and listening to poems about winter too.
The children have been looking at a new Fluency Book - 'It Is Winter'.
This week we have introduced a new phoneme 'oo' as in the words good, wood, hood, look, book etc.
We have also introduced our new Deal focus - 'Lost and Found' by Oliver Jeffers. It is a lovely book and we will be using this as a focus for lots of different activities over the next few weeks.
Please could you remember to bring wellies and waterproof trousers for Nature School as we go every week on Tuesdays.
Finally, a reminder that our link speech therapist from Speech Leap will be delivering a parent session from 2.30 - 3.00 on Thursday 18th January. This is an opportunity to find out how to support your child's speech and language development at home.
Have a lovely weekend!
The Reception Team
Friday December 22nd
The children have had a lovely final week in school before Christmas, culminating in a super Christmas party yesterday and a very special visit from Santa!
We hope you enjoy the Christmas card and calendar that we sent home earlier in the week.
We have uploaded lots of photos of playing and learning in autumn 2 onto the website. Please take some time over the holidays to share them with your child and to ask them about their learning.
Thankyou so much for your very generous gifts to all the staff!
We have thoroughly enjoyed teaching the children this term and have loved watching the progress they have made.
Have a very enjoyable and restful Christmas and New Year!
The Reception Team
Friday December 15th
Thankyou all for attending our performance of 'A Time-Travelling Christmas' this morning. The children were fantastic! They have been rehearsing for several weeks and everyone did their part amazingly!
I was certainly very proud of them all, particularly as they have only been in school for one term!
We have been learning the grapheme 'ar' this week and the children have taken home the Fluency Book 'Zoom' to consolidate their knowledge of the 'oo' grapheme.
In Maths we have been participating in track games both inside and out. We have also introduced a new Ready, Steady, Write game with a Christmas focus.
We have collected the Home Readers in this week and will be sending them out again after Christmas.
Please can you return any Monster Phonics books or Home Readers next week. We will also be collecting in library books on Monday.
Finally, a reminder that if you have any good quality books that you no longer need we would be very grateful to have them for our new Reading Sheds.
Have a lovely weekend!
The Reception Team
Friday 8th December
This week the children have been learning the new grapheme 'oo' and have taken the Fluency Book 'The Chip Shop' home to consolidate the graphemes 'ch','sh', 'th' and 'ng' that they learnt last week.
In Maths, they have been doing a shape hunt outside to see if they can spot any 4 sided shapes.
In Understanding the World, they had a lovely winter walk around school to look for the signs of winter on a very frosty morning.
We hope you have enjoyed attending the winter Reading Mornings and you were able to share a book or two with your child.
We were very lucky to enjoy a performance of Jack and the Beanstalk by the Peoplescape Theatre Company this week too.This was kindly funded by the PTA. The children loved the performance and the actors said our children were a fantastic audience!
Finally, we look forward to seeing you at our Reception performance next Friday at 9.30 am.
Have a great weekend!
The Reception Team
Friday December 1st
This week the children have been learning some new consonant digraphs - ch,sh,th,and ng. We have been reading our new Fluency Book 'The Big Quiz' too!
The children have loved learning in our Christmas House and we will be starting our Advent calendars today too!
We have continued to practise our Christmas songs and rehearsals for 'A Time Travelling Christmas' are going well. We have lots of costumes. We will let you know if we would like you to provide anything for your child.
We have been lucky to have had some lovely frosty mornings this week and the children have taken this opportunity to learn about reversible change and ice melting.
Finally, we look forward to seeing you at our winter reading morning on Monday 4th December and Friday 8th December at 8.40. This is a lovely opportunity for you to share the books that we love to read in class.
Have a lovely weekend!
The Reception Team
Friday 24th November
This week the children have continued to learn some more Phase 3 graphemes - y,z,zz,qu. They have taken a new Fluency Book home too to consolidate the graphemes learnt from the previous week.
We have participated in the DT days which are days set aside for each year group to complete a DT project. We have been looking at parks and designing and making our own parks for a squirrel. Through this project we have been exploring different ways of joining materials.
In Maths, we have continued to focus on 4 and 5 and the children have been subitising with these numbers.
We have been using the book 'Stickman' by Julia Donaldson as a focus for our DEAL sessions and the children have been successfully writing 'I see...' sentences about his journey. We have also challenged the children to write descriptive language about what they can see in the book.
We have begun our rehearsals on stage for our forthcoming Christmas production 'A Time-travelling Christmas' which we will be performing on Friday December 15th at 9.30.
Finally, we look forward to seeing you at our Christmas Fair tomorrow at 2pm.
Have a great weekend!
The Reception Team
Friday 17th November
This week we have been learning the phonemes j, w, v, x and reading the fluency book 'Up the Hill.' We have enjoyed exploring circles and triangles within our environment and talking about their mathematical properties. We have continued to learn about the festival of Diwali. We have written simple sentences about this in our books and created Rangoli patterns in our outdoor classroom.
This week was World Nursery Rhyme Week. We have been sharing nursery rhymes in our class and on Friday as a special treat, Mrs Smith brought in Music Mouse. The children really enjoyed playing instruments and singing along with Music Mouse. They were fantastic at guessing the rhymes from Music Mouse's clues.
We hope you have a wonderful weekend!
The Reception Team
Friday November 10th
This week the children have been learning the graphemes - l,f,ll,ff,and ss. They have also been reading the new Fluency Book 'Mum's Hat'.
In DEAL (Drama, Engagement, Active, Learning) the children have been using the book 'Stickman' by Julia Donaldson as a focus and they have been drawing and labelling maps.
In Maths, we have been learning about 'one more' after reading the story of the Gingerbread Man.
The children have loved playing in our Diwali house in our role-play area. We have been learning about the story of Rama and Sita and how Diwali is celebrated around the world. The children have also been making Diva lamps out of clay which they will bring home when they are dry.
Outside, the children have been looking at reversible change with ice balloons and what happens when they melt.
We have been discussing poppies and Remembrance Sunday. We hope you enjoy looking at the poppies on the trees at the front of school.
Finally, we had a special visitor this week. She is an oral health promoter and she came to talk to us all about how to keep our teeth strong and healthy!
Have a great weekend!
The Reception Team
Friday November 3rd
This week the children have been learning two new graphemes - h and b. They have taken home the Fluency Book 'On and In' to reinforce the graphemes and high frequency words learnt before half - term.We have been segementing CVC words and we have shown them how to write 'I see....' sentences through modelled writing sessions. It would be great if you could encourage your child to do some writing at home. They can then bring it to school to show us what they have done at home. It doesn't matter what it looks like - its all writing to us!
In Maths, the children have been weighing objects both inside and out using our scales. They have been seeing what is heavy and light and seeing if they can make the scales balance. We have also been looking at numbers 1,2 & 3, focussing on 1 to 1 correspondence and conservation of number.
The children have loved sharing their family photographs with their friends and sharing their memories. We will be keeping these photographs in school all year so please bring some in next week if you haven't already done so.
Finally, we have been talking about how to stay safe on Bonfire Night during our PSED lessons.
Have a great weekend!
The Reception Team
Friday October 20th
We hope you all enjoyed visiting our classrooms this week as part of Look at our Learning. Many parents have commented how useful and insightful it is to see what their child enjoys doing in school.
This week we have introduced three new phonemes/graphemes - e,u,r and we have been reading and writing CVC words containing these phonemes/graphemes. We have also enjoyed a new Fluency Book - Cat and Dog.
We hope the children enjoyed taking their new Monster Phonics/reading activities home this week. These are selected individually to support your child's reading. After half-term please return the Monster Phonics book on Monday 30th October. The new Monster Phonics books will be given out on Friday November 3rd and every Friday going forward after that.
The children have been given a new Writing book and a new Maths book too this week which we will keep in school. They have been writing CVC words in their Writing books and have been creating repeating patterns in their Maths books.
We all enjoyed our first Harvest Assembly in the hall this week too and the children sang our Harvest songs really well.
After half-term we would like to create a My Family book for each class. This book will contain photographs of our children and their families which we will keep in school and use as a focus for discussions. Please could you send into school 3 photographs of your child and their family at a special time or celebration or holiday that your child can talk about. We will put these photographs in our My Family book which we will keep in school all year. Please do not send any precious or irreplaceable photographs!
Finally, we look forward to seeing you at Parents Evening the week beginning 30th October.
Have a great half-term holiday!
The Reception Team
Monster Phonics Books/Reading Activities
The children are becoming really good at identifying the phonemes and graphemes that we have been learning in school. From next Monday (October 16th) we will be sending home either an individual Monster Phonics book or a reading activity to support your child's phonic knowledge.
Please look out for either a Monster Phonics book or a reading activity in your child's book bag.
The Reception Team
Friday October 13th
This week we have continued to learn more graphemes - o,c,k,ck. We regularly recap all our previous graphemes and use them to make CVC ( consonant,vowel,consonant) words such as tin, pan, cot, map etc. This is something you could practice at home using the graphemes we have been sending home in their word pocket. Try to encourage your child to blend these together as this will help them to read our Monster Phonics books when we send them home. You could also try to make sentences using the CEW (common exception words) that we are sending home too.
We have continued to discuss the signs of autumn and have been colour mixing to create autumnal colours.
We have introduced some new autumn focussed maths games to enhance our maths shelves.
The children have been talking to their talk partners about how to keep safe online too!
We have also introduced a new phonics game called Car Park, which is just like Bingo. Whoever has all their cars parked first is the winner and they shout 'Car Park' instead of Bingo! The children have had great fun blending the CVC words using their phonic knowledge - fun and learning at the same time!
You may want to have a game too when you come to a 'Look at our Learning' next Monday or Friday at 8.25am.
Finally, we hope everyone enjoys the first Reception disco tonight!
Have a great weekend!
The Reception Team
Friday October 6th
We hope you enjoyed the first Home Reader that the children brought home on Monday.
This is an opportunity for you to encourage a love of reading through sharing this book at home. Please use the accompanying parents notes to support you while you read with your child.
This week lots of children have been bringing in autumnal objects, which is fantastic. We are using them for our woodland small world display and we have been learning a new song about autumn with Makaton signs.
We have opened our Wildlife Rescue Centre and the children have loved looking after all the animals that are in the Centre.
We have been learning about how to keep safe online this week too and have reminded the children that they must always ask an adult before they go on the internet.
We have continued to follow the NCETM Mastering Number programme. We have been subitising 1,2,& 3.
The children have also enjoyed exploring colour-mixing with paint and printing with different materials.
Finally, we will be holding 'Look at our Learning' sessions on Monday 16th October and Friday 20th October at 8.25am. This is an opportuntiy for you to visit the classroom with your child so that they can show you how we learn in Reception.
Have a great weekend!
The Reception Team
Friday 29th September
We have continued with our daily Monster Phonics sessions this week. We have been learning 'i'and 'n' and the word 'I'. The children will be bringing these graphemes home today in their word packet to practice at home. You could try to see if the children could blend some cvc words using the previous graphemes such as pin, tin, pan, sat,tap and tip. We have been doing this in school.
The children also enjoyed taking home their first Fluency Book on Monday. The Fluency Books are closely aligned to the graphemes we are learning and are designed to develop fluency and confidence. Please read these Fluency Books as often as you can and write in the yellow reading diary whenever your child reads at home. It gives us a good understanding of the progress they are making.
As we say in Reception, we need to - 'practise, practise, practise!'
We have begun to talk about the changing seasons this week. We have been looking for signs of autumn. Please bring to school any signs of autumn - leaves, conkers, acorns, that you might find when you are out and about this weekend.
Finally, a reminder that the PTA are holding a disco for Reception children and parents on Friday October 13th .
The tickets are available now.
Have a lovely weekend!
The Reception Team
Friday September 22nd
We have started our daily Monster Phonics sessions this week and the children have enjoyed singing along to the songs. We have been learning 'satp' and have been blending cvc words (consonant, vowel, consonant) with these phonemes such as sat, pat and tap.
We all enjoyed a trip to our library on Monday to have a look at all the books and to learn how the library system works. We will visit our library every Monday.
The children enjoyed their first visit to the Music Room on Tuesday afternoon and enjoyed playing a variety of instruments.They will be taught weekly by our specialist music teacher Miss Nolan.
Thankyou for bringing in your favourite books. The children have drawn the front cover and written a blurb which are now on display.
We have begun the NCETM Mastering Number programme this week and have focussed on subitising 1,2& 3.
Finally, we have been teaching the children the Makaton sign - good morning everbody. You could ask them to teach you too!
Have a great weekend!
The Reception Team
Friday 15th September
Welcome to the Reception news! We will write an update here every week about what we have been learning in school.
The children have settled in so well. We are really proud of them. They have enjoyed staying for lunch and are making lots of new friends.
We use a visual timetable throughout the day to help the children know what we are doing and when.
Thankyou to all the parents who attended the Curriculum Evening last night. We hope you found it helpful. The Powerpoint is now on the Reception website.
Please don't hesitate to ask if you have any queries about teaching and learning in Reception.
This week we have been carrying out the Reception Baseline Assessement which is statutory.
The children have been learning the first 4 graphemes and phonemes of our Monster Phonics scheme- satp. The children will bring these home in their word envelope next Friday.
We have also enjoyed watching Alphablocks and Numberblocks at snacktime.
Please remember to send your child to school with their favourite named book on Monday. We will be using them to create a new display!
Have a good weekend!
The Reception Team