Class Reception Newsletter Spring Term 2021
Dear parents / carers,
Happy New Year to you. We trust you all had a lovely Christmas. Let me say an enormous ‘thank you’ for all the kind presents and cards that we received at the end of term. You were so very generous, thank you very much. We hope you enjoyed the school Christmas video – Reception class were amazing!
Remote Learning
I wrote this newsletter before we went into lockdown but here are a few remote learning reminders for you:
Three live sessions on Teams:
9:00am – 9:30am then a break
10:00 – 10:30 then break time.
11:00 – 11:30
The children are doing very well and I am really proud of them all having a go at answering questions and even reading out loud – it can be daunting.
During the session, I do like to get as many children involved as possible. Please continue to use the ‘hands up’ icon and to keep all microphones on mute unless your child has been asked to answer a question. Then please mute again! I am learning all of this too!
Key Worker children will have full access to the online sessions when they are at school.
Please do look on Teams in the Files section. I post a document each week with a list of suggested afternoon activities that are either stand alone or may consolidate learning from the morning sessions. Please do use the Oxford Owl website to access online ebooks that the children can read. This should ensure that they all continue to make progress with their reading: www.oxfordowl.co.uk
Teacher feedback – during the online sessions, I try to give some constructive feedback to the children as a whole class or individually where possible. The DofE guidance suggests that every child should receive teacher marking/next steps/ feedback at least once a week during lockdown. Therefore, please could parents upload at least one piece of writing and other activities (e.g. photos of models made, walks outside) from their afternoon jobs either onto Teams or Tapestry each week. Some families are already doing this. I will then comment and move their learning on where possible. If you use Tapestry, the work will remain part of their permanent learning journey. The work uploaded does not need to be extra. It could be a photo of their whiteboard or exercise book showing handwriting, number work or phonic sounds and words that they do during the online session.
Topics – we are continuing this term with our topic about transport leading onto a wonderful Space topic. We will be sharing and learning facts about the solar system with a view to writing a non-fiction class book. We will also read a number of fiction texts set in space. We plan to make models of space craft / vehicles so please do not recycle any useful boxes, tubes and foil as we would love to use them at school! Would you mind collecting these bits at home as storing them at school will be tricky! This may need to be a home activity when we learn about space if we are still in lockdown. We will also be learning about the traditions surrounding Chinese New Year.
Teams – there are lots of helpful resources to support learning on Teams – General – Files.
Below is an outline of what I hoped to cover during the half-term. We will endeavour to cover as much as we can.
| Personal, social and emotional development. | Children are confident to try new activities, and say why they like some activities more than others. They adjust their behaviour to different situations, and take changes of routine in their stride. They take account of one another’s ideas about how to organise their activity. |
| Communication and language | Children listen attentively in a range of situations. They use past, present and future forms accurately when talking about events that have happened or are to happen in the future. |
| Physical Development | Children show good control and coordination in large and small movements. Children know the importance for good health of physical exercise, and a healthy diet, and talk about ways to keep healthy and safe. |
| Literacy | Children read and understand simple sentences. They demonstrate understanding when talking with others about what they have read.
They demonstrate understanding when talking with others about what they have read. Children use the phonic knowledge to spell words to write and begin to write sentences. |
| Mathematics | Children count reliably with numbers from 1 to 20, place them in order and say which number is one more or one less than a given number. Children use everyday language to talk about size, weight, capacity, position, distance, time and money to compare quantities and objects and to solve problems. |
| Understanding the World | Children recognise that a range of technology is used in places such as homes and schools.
Children talk about past and present events in their own lives and in the lives of family members. We will also learn about the traditions and storied celebrated during Chinese New Year. |
| Expressive Arts and Design | Children sing songs, make music and dance, and experiment with ways of changing them. They safely use and explore a variety of materials, tools and techniques, experimenting with colour, design, texture, form and function. |
Phonics – we are continuing to follow the Letters and Sounds programme Phases 3 with lots of revision and consolidation of Phase 2:
j, v, w, x, y, z, zz, qu, ch, sh, th/th, ng, ai, ee, igh, oa, oo/oo, ar, or, ur, ow, oi, ear, air, ure, er
We will learn the final single letter phonemes and move onto digraphs – where two letters make up one sound e.g. sh/th/ch/ee/oo and trigraphs – where three letters make one sound – ear/air. We will send these home in their sound books so please make sure they bring this to school in the home folder every day. We will be learning to read and write new tricky words. It would be worth having these up at home my, we, me, he, be, she, are, was, they, you, her, all.
Please find helpful resources for Phase 3 on Teams (General – Files – Meet the Teacher / Useful resources for EYFS)
Reading – all children now have a reading book. DO please hear your child read / discuss the book with them as often as possible and record in their reading record book so that they can continue to make progress – it is noticeable which children read regularly at home. Please use the Oxford Owl website to assist with this while the children are at home.
Again on Teams, please find a list of the 100 High Frequency Words for children to start being familiar with to read then write (Teams – General – Files – Useful resources for EYFS – 100 words). There is also a document to support 1:1 reading at home called Reading Vipers.
Proud Clouds – thank you for all the lovely proud clouds you have sent in informing us of their out of school achievements. The children love sharing them with the rest of the class. Do please continue to send them in. The children could make them and cut them out and even write them for you! There is a copy of the resource on Teams but the children loved to make their own proud clouds for you to write on! You could continue to share do proud clouds at home.
Ways to help at home – read with your child regularly and hear them read – they don’t need to read the whole book but you could ask questions and get them to point to sounds or words. Count with your child and ask them to recognise numbers and shapes while you are out and about. If they want to write, give them a purpose – write a shopping list using their sounds. You could display the tricky words listed earlier to help with recognition.
Thank you all for being so active and supportive with your children at home during the online learning sessions.
We look forward to catching up with you all soon.
Mrs Course and Mrs Berrett.
