Once Upon a Time

I hope you have enjoyed a restful break. Let’s hope for lots of fine weather now so the children can make the most of our wonderful outdoor area, especially the enchanted forest and the mud kitchen!

Last half term flew by in a flurry of map making, famous land marks around the world and dinosaur facts, phonics, writing and maths activities plus lots of fantastic art work. The children are justifiably proud of their achievements and loved sharing their Learning Journey folders with you recently.

For this half term we will be focusing on traditional tales. We will revisit lots of old favourites such as ‘Jack and the Beanstalk’ and ‘The Gingerbread Man’. We will practise our writing skills by re-telling our favourite stories and trying to come up with our own versions too. We will be learning some new poems as well as planning and creating a collage of a fairy tale character.

In phonics the class are progressing well with most children growing in confidence to read and write an increasing number of Phase 3 ‘special friends’.

Remember daily reading practise at home will really benefit your child’s development!

In maths we will keep practising numeral formation, learn number bonds to 10, count in twos and fives and solve problems using our developing knowledge of maths.

In Understanding the World we will learn about the life cycle of a bean and will all plant a sunflower to bring home to nurture. We will be thinking about how to stay healthy; exercise, a varied diet and good hygiene.

Mrs Koranteng

People Who Help Us/Superheroes

I hope you all had a lovely Christmas holiday and are feeling refreshed and ready for a new year! Mrs Kemp, Mrs Martin and I would like to say thank you for all the thoughtful cards and gifts.

Ash Class had a fun and very busy autumn term which was packed with learning.

The children have been working hard in phonics and as well as recognising all Phase 2 phonemes (the sounds made by the letters of the alphabet) many are becoming very competent at reading and writing the Phase 3 ‘special friends’ (when 2 letters come together to make a new sound e.g. s and h together are ‘sh’). This is something we will continue to practise each day as part of our Read, Write, Inc. programme.

The class are getting really good at numeral recognition and have been learning about the properties of 2d shapes.

We had an exciting Space Day and were amazed to discover a crashed U.F.O. next to our mud kitchen. The children wrote reports for the Space Agency. The class learned about the Nativity Story and talked about how we and others celebrate Christmas. Did you enjoy our Nativity performance?

This half term we will be learning about People Who Help Us and then Superheroes. We will be using non-fiction books to find out about different occupations and then our focus books will be ‘Superworm’ and ‘Supertato’. We are planning to design and make some emergency vehicles and will have a special Superhero Day!

Space and Teddy Bears

Ash Class have settled into Rucstall Primary School beautifully. We spent last half term getting to know each other and learning about classroom routines and rules.

The children are continuing their phonics programme and already know lots of the phase 2 phonemes (the sounds made by the letters of the alphabet).  Next week the children will be introduced to the Paw Patrol certificates that they can earn, for learning the Year R high frequency words. Please help your child practise these at home.

The class have been working on numeral recognition and careful counting. This will continue, along with our focus number of the week.

During the first few weeks of this half term we will be learning about Space. Our focus books will be ‘Whatever Next?’, ‘On the Moon’ and ‘Beegu’. We are planning to make some junk model rockets, do some space themed dancing and enjoy a special Space Day!  

Later in the half term our topic will be Teddy Bears and we have lots of fun activities planned. We will also be learning about the Nativity story and designing and making a Christmas stocking.

Starting school is such a big and exciting step for children and their families. Mrs Kemp, Mrs Morgan, Miss Alyward and I are really looking forward to seeing you all and have been busy getting Ash Class ready for you to play and learn in. We can’t wait to find out all about you and for you to get to know us!

In the first few weeks the children will be learning about school and classroom routines. Together we will be exploring Ash Class’s learning environment, both inside and out and finding out about Rucstall’s Values. We will practise kindness and good manners.

Our two main books for this topic are “Red Rockets and Rainbow Jelly” and “My World, Your World”. We will be celebrating our similarities and differences.

The class will quickly start our phonics programme which is the basis for learning to read and write. We will also be practising our counting as well as shape and number recognition skills. In Understanding the World we will be thinking about our bodies, our families and learning about different celebrations, in particular Diwali.

Mrs Koranteng