Class 1

Spring 2023 information:

Class 1 Information Pages Spring 2023

Personal, Social and Emotional Development

Circle time: activities will support the children with learning how to express their emotions, share their opinions and consider how others maybe feeling. We will follow the PSHE scheme  “We Eat Elephants”, we will also continue to focus on our animal learning behaviours.

Cooperative activities: Reception children will be learning how to change for PE, visiting the village hall and taking part in Forest School activities, in addition to Fun Fit daily physical learning and using balance bikes. In addition, they will learn through cutting and crushing herbs and leaves, using a dropper, folding paper, using the play area (bee farm) and digging and weeding the allotment.  We also have a new sandpit in the outdoor area for the children to learn how to co-operate together.

Communication & Language

Topic activities this term these will develop the children’s vocabulary as they talk about their Easter holidays.  The children will read and learn about Jack and the Beanstalk, The Hungry Caterpillar, The Frog Prince and Minibeast poems. They will name and describe what they see from hearing stories, poems or music and participating in activities, visits or investigations. They will be encouraged to choose and use words with care to show understanding of factual information gained from direct experiences.

“Show and Tell” sessions will encourage the children to share their ideas with a weekly theme linked to "Growing and Minibeasts”. Sessions will discuss new beginnings of starting school and the local change in season as we move through into Summer.

Physical

Forest School – weekly sessions on Wednesday Afternoon will be led by Mrs Blunt, who is a trained Early Years and Forest School practitioner.  These sessions are vital for developing and refining the children’s large and fine motor movements, and crucial for the development of the neural system. The children need to wear the correct clothing to keep dry and warm, and this will be sent home after every session for cleaning.

PE. – weekly sessions using our scheme of work, “Get Set 4 PE”.  We will have our whole school sports day on  Thursday, 26th May in the afternoon.

Fun Fit & High Five: our Classroom Assistant Mrs McFarlane is trained to lead these schemes which have been designed by physiotherapists to support the physical development of young children and to avoid children moving into more formal schooling with unidentified physical needs which will impact on their future progress.

Mathematics

The White Rose Scheme for mathematics is used and the Reception units covered throughout the term helping to build understanding and confidence in number, shape and space and counting.

Literacy

Reading and Phonics

Phonics: The children have daily phonics teaching matched to their phonics knowledge as they progress through the phases of Letters and Sounds.  Our scheme will be changing this term to "Success for All" phonics. In sessions they learn how to recognise, read and write individual letters names and sounds and the common letter patterns. Activities include games, IT and the use of whiteboard and pens.

Reading: reading books are carefully matched to the phases in phonics and books are shared in class and sent home for regular reading practise. We use a variety of reading schemes to match individual  learning styles and strengths.

Stories : A love of books and reading is encouraged in Reception by reading stories to the children,  having a weekly library choosing session and termly visits from a storyteller.

We are always trying to promote a love of reading.  We regularly visit the mobile library so the children can choose exciting new books to read in school:

Our popular storyteller Steve Manning will visit this term to tell stories to the children.

Writing: our writing is linked to our topic focus.  Our writing area will also have resources linked to our topic focus to encourage independent writing, in particular links with local Farmer Ford's fields and animals. and writing about Winter.

Writing: our writing is linked to our topic focus.  This term will focus on saying and writing sentences.  Our writing area will also have resources linked to our growing and minibeast focus to encourage independent writing.

Knowledge & Understanding of the world

This half-term our topic focus is “growing and minibeasts”.  We will identify the seasonal changes we can see in Spring/Summer and exploring the local farming area.

Walks & Visits: We will be going on walks around the village to explore the rural landscape, and observe changes at two local small holdings and on  Farmer Ford’s farm.  We hope to arrange a visit to the Quince Honey Farm this term to link with our topic.

Investigations: We will find out about lifecycles in animals and insects.

Computing : our topic work will be supported by the use of laptops and tablets to help the children capture images of the local areas and also for access to RM Easi-maths and Monster Phonics, and the IWB for on-line activities and video clips.  Purple Mash computing tasks will be set linked with our stories.

Expressive Arts & Design

Sketching and drawing: this term the children in reception use sketch books to record what they see from walks, visits and during investigations and by drawing herbs using watercolours.  The children will learn about the artist Victoria Horkan.

Role Play : This half term we will be supporting imaginative play with our small world bee farm and lifecycle models.

Music: we will be listening to the music "the flight of the bumble bee".