Hello!

We have been back together for two weeks now and the children have done amazingly settling back into routines and displaying beautiful behaviour. We have been impressed with the lovely manners we have seen and how the children are getting on with their friends, being kind and helpful.

In phonics, we have started our new groups. The children are working at a level to suit their ability and to help them develop their confidence in reading and writing. They have all had a brilliant week in their new groups and are working really hard. You will receive an email with links to the sounds your child has been learning/reviewing this week. In addition, you will receive some reading material which is what they have been reading in school. Please take time to let your child show off to you what they can do! Please continue to practise speedy sounds at home and formation of letters.

In maths, we have been continuing our work on the understanding of the number 10. The children have been learning about number bonds to 10 by playing skittles, knocking some over to see how many are left. If you have skittles at home (or something else that could be knocked over) then it would be great to reinforce this concept asking questions like ‘How many have you knocked over? How many are left?’ This helps to embed the numbers that go together to make 10. We have also been using the ten frames to help us understand subtraction. We have been learning about 3D shapes and their properties. We have looked at cube, cuboid, cone, pyramid, sphere and cylinder. We have been testing out the shapes with some shape challenges: Which are best for rolling? Which are best for building towers? Which shapes can be made using the construction straws? To help your child further their understanding of 3D shape, you could go on a shape hunt at home and look for 3D shapes. Cereal boxes, balls, Pringles tubes, party hats…

Next week in maths we will be learning how to compare and measure length and height. We will be investigating making pairs and thinking about odd and even numbers. We will also be exploring the concept of time, thinking about days of the week and also about how long things take.

We have been doing a Talk 4 Writing unit this week about The Little Red Hen. The children have been talking lots about the story: the characters, the setting, what happens, feelings of characters. They have learnt the story and are able to retell it using the story language and actions. They may want to retell the story to you at home! We have also created story maps to help us retell the story. Next week we will be continuing our work on The Little Red Hen and the children will be writing parts of the story using key words and their phonic knowledge. We will also move onto innovating the story. This is where we change parts of the story to make it our own.

Have a lovely weekend and let’s hope this warmer drier weather continues.

The Reception Team