Although it’s been a slightly shorter week, we have managed to pack plenty in! On Tuesday we talked about why we had a day off Monday and recalled what we did for the Jubilee and learnt a little more about the Queen by looking at some photos of her over the years, from when she was a baby right up until this year.
We’ve also had a lovely couple of days looking at all the children’s baby photos and talking about how they have changed and what they can do now that they could not do then. To start this off, we read the book “Once There Were Giants” by Martin Waddell and talked about the girl in the story changing from being the baby to having one of her own and becoming one of “the giants”. All the children have drawn their families, talking about who “the giants” are in their houses and have been trying to label them or write their own names.
In Maths we have been learning about matching and sorting. The children were quite confident matching and most were able to sort objects by colour and some by size, so we have been talking about sorting in other ways, by looking at the similarities and differences between things.
Next week we will start Level 2 Phonics where the children will begin to learn sounds and the letters that represent them. The children will learn four new sounds each week and will come home with sound cards to practice and an information sheet for each sound we learn. This is the next stage in their journey to learning to read and it is really important that they practice their sounds often and continue to work on their oral blending to help them make the best possible progress. We now follow the Twinkl Phonics scheme and I will be arranging some phonics sessions for parents to attend shortly so you can understand how we learn to read in Reception.
Once the children start to learn their sounds we do use an app within school called Teach Your Monster to Read. It is a phonics app that was designed a few years ago by the Usborne Foundation to support children to learn to read and provides a fun and engaging way for children to practice their phonics and reading skills. The children will be set up with an account by me that they can log in to from home and at school so that they can continue from where they left off. Web based play is free any time but the app is usually a one-off fee of £4.99.
At the moment for a limited time the app is FREE on the Apple App Store Google Play and Amazon so if your child has access to a tablet or phone that they could play the game on I would recommend that you download it now whilst it is free.
If you have any queries about anything please feel free to contact me on the class email address beech@crowmoorschool.co.uk but please remember any urgent queries or reporting of absences must be addressed to the office by telephone on 235549 or email admin@crowmoorschool.co.uk
Have a lovely weekend and we will see you Monday morning.
Miss Jones, Mrs Kenny and Mrs Evason