Welcome to Reception at Oldswinford C of E Primary

Where we ‘Believe, achieve and shine brighter together.’

The Reception team:

Mrs Preece (FSLion) and Mrs Terry (FSCrystal) with Mrs Harris, Mrs Hardy, Mrs Rogerson, and Miss Rose.

Foundation Stage 

At Oldswinford C.E. Primary school we believe that the children’s time in Foundation Stage, the Reception class, is one of the most important times in their school life. This lays the foundation for their learning and development for the rest of their education. We work hard to nurture and care for the children and seek to make school an enjoyable and exciting place to be. Children will be able to free-flow through the two rooms and ‘middle area’ throughout most of the day with children from both classes so they can make great friendships.

Curriculum

There are seven main areas of learning which are split into prime areas of :

• Communication and language development
• Physical development
• Personal, social and emotional development

Then we have ;

• Literacy
• Maths
• Understanding the world
• Expressive Arts and design

Each area of learning is implemented through planned, purposeful play. This takes place through a mixture of adult led and child initiated activities. Play is essential to help children relate to others, build their confidence, explore their surroundings, and think critically.

The progress the children make is assessed by 17 Early learning Goals.

What to expect in Reception

We have daily maths and phonics sessions as well as talk for writing and kinetic letters most days. We hope to put on a workshop in the Autumn term to show some of what we do.

The children have two P.E. sessions each week, so please make sure the children have had their earrings removed on those days. These will be on a Tuesday and Thursday. 

All children learn at different rates so we differentiate our experiences so that everyone can learn effectively. Parents/Carers will be sent a dojo link so they can see weekly updates and photos of what the children are currently learning and experiencing. Always helpful when a child replies ‘we just played’, to a question about their day!

Please make sure a water bottle is sent into school each day.

Homework:

We do not set specific homework but there are ways you can support your child’s learning at home which we would always encourage.

• Putting their coats on and fastening them up.
• Going to the toilet and wiping themselves.
• Daily reading. We cannot emphasise the importance of daily reading enough. 
• Counting- children often need a little practice to count accurately moving their finger and saying the number at the same time can be challenging.
• Talking about concepts such as size and weight.
• Writing their name (not all in capital letters!)- we will send home a guide to letter formation.

This half term our focus will be  'In the Garden.......' . We will be looking at different things that we find in the garden. The children will plant their own beans and watch them grow. We will also be developing our garden area and growing flowers and vegetables. We will look at the lifecycle of sunflowers and beans. We will then look at other living things that are in the garden including bugs, caterpillars and worms. We will have some caterpillar visitors in the classroom and the children will watch them turn into butterflies and learn about their lifecycle.

We also have our trip to Sycamore adventure on 27th March.

Phonics

We will continue to practise reading and writing words and sentences using finger spaces, capital letters and full stops.

We will be consolidating the tricky words:- he, she, we, me, be, was, my, you, her, they, all are. 

We will learn the following sounds:- ch, sh, th, ng, ai, ee, igh, oa, oo, oo.

Maths

In maths we will be consolidating our understanding of 1,2,3,4,5,6,7 and 8. We will be learning about length, height and time. We will also be 'Building 9 and 10', please see below for the small steps that are included:-

Length, height and time

Step1- Explore length,

Step 2- Compare length,

Step 3- Explore height,

Step 4- Compare height,

Step 5- Talk about time,

Step 6- Order and sequence time.

Building 9 and 10

Step 1- Find 9 and 10

Step 2- Compare numbers to 10

Step 3- Represent 9 and 10

Step 4- Conceptual subitising to 10

Step 5- 1 more

Step 6- 1 less

Step 7- Composition to 10

Step 8- Bonds to 10 (2 parts)

Step 9- Make arrangements to 10

Step 10- Bonds to 10 (part 3)

Step 11- Doubles to 10 (find a double)

Step 12- Doubles to 10 (make a double)

Step 13- Explore even and odd

RE

Our question for this half term is:-

Why do Christians put a cross in an Easter garden?