Friday 20th October

Wow- we have made it to half term!! Your children have been amazing. We are really enjoying teaching them. We hope you all have a lovely restful holiday so that your children come back refreshed and ready to learn. 

This week the children sang 'Big Red Combine Harvester' in the Harvest Festival assemblies. We hope you enjoyed it. They did brilliantly. Thank you for all the donations to FEED.



On Thursday the children had their nasal flu vaccinations. They were very brave. Apparently it just tickled a bit!

The Festival of Diwali was on Thursday 19th October. The children learnt about Diwali and watched these super clips. In the first one you see a little girls preparing for Diwali. The second shows us how she celebrates Diwali. The third clip is the story of Rama and Sita. Your child may like to watch them again.


Diwali- cbeebies clips


The children made Diva lamps using clay. They will decorate them after half term.

In phonics we have focused on the sounds: p,i and n.the children have used their phoneme fingers to sound out these simple words:
p: p-i-n, p-a-t, p-a-n, p-o-p
i: i-n-, p-i-n, t-i-p, l-i-p
n: n-i-p, n-o-t, n-e-t, 



In maths this week we have re-enforced everything the children have learnt this half term. The children should be able to name the shapes circle, semi-circle, triangle, square and rectangle and describe their properties. They should have a solid understanding of the numbers 1 to 4. They should be able to count out 4 objects accurately and make 3 and 4 in different ways. They should be able to say what is 1 more and 1 less than each of these numbers.  We have done lots of counting this week on and back to 20 starting from any number. The children have been finding 1 more and 1 less for numbers up to 20. They have been learning about subitising, which is having the ability to instantaneously recognise the number of objects in a small group without the need to count them. Dice pattern recognition is one example of this. The children have also compared two groups saying which has fewer or more.




The children have been fabulous at extending their learning in Maths during ChIL this week.

The children have enjoyed using the mud kitchen this week. They have also explored Autumn art- making leaf rubbings, and Autumn installations with leaves.  They have made some rockets and background (rolling marbles in paint) for the Harpenden Building Society window display advertising the Crabtree Firework Display. They enjoyed making a den under a table.

Things to do with your child....
Encourage your child to recognise numbers in the environment and count everything! Sing number rhymes and look at number books.
Play I spy with a focus on the letter sounds your child has learnt so far: s,a,t,p,i,n. Encourage your child to use their phoneme fingers to sound out simple words and use their blending arm to blend them back together.
Identify rhyming words when reading with your child and see if they can think of any other words in the same rhyming string.
Play games using a dice such as ladybirds, snakes and ladders etc to help your child with subitising, adding and counting on.






Reminders...

Thank you to all of you who have ordered your Christmas cards- we have already made over £300 for the school. Don't forget the deadline for the Christmas Card orders is today Friday 20th October. Go to https://www.apfsorders.co.uk/ . There were a few technical issues last weekend but the site is now working properly.


After half term the children will be wool winding. If you have any spare wool in Autumn colours we would be very grateful if you could donate it. As always we are grateful to receive junk modelling boxes and tubes and some fresh Autumn leaves, conkers etc would also be useful for the children's Autumn art installations. Thank you in advance. 

Have a wonderful restful half term break. We look forward to seeing you next half term.
The Year R Team

Friday 13th October

Thank you to those of you who attended parents consultations this week. We hope you found it useful. We look forward to meeting the rest of you next week. Please remember that our door is always open if you have any concerns or worries about your child.



The children have all come home with a reading book this week. Please remember to look at the title and blurb (if there is any) and then look through the book with your child discussing and identifying the pictures. Highlight any key words in the book and see if your child can identify these words being repeated throughout the book. Then ask your child to read the book. Ask them to point at the words as they read. Some of the words are worked out from the pictures but when your child has a good knowledge of sounds encourage them to look carefully at the first sound of that word and make the connection. Some children have books with words that need to be sounded out and blended back together. This is not possible for many key words. Your child will only have a book where sounding and blending are required if your child already knows many of their sounds. It is important that your child reads their book more than once. They are given the opportunity to change their reading book during 5 minute warning at the end of ChIL before tidy up time. It is their responsibility to change their book. It would help if you can remind them in the morning if they need to change their book. If they keep failing to change their book you can always send them in at the end of the day!  If your child is in After School Club and your child failed to change their reading book during school time, there is a box of each colour in the library where it can be changed.

Now that your child has a school reading scheme book please could you return the fiction/non-fiction books that your child borrowed from the box we were putting outside each morning as soon as you have finished with them.


In phonics this week we have started to focus on individual letter sounds. This week the children learnt the sounds s,a,t,
s: s-i-t, s-u-n, s-o-ck,
a: a-n-t, m-a-n, c-a-n, S-a-m
t: t-e-n, t-o-p, t-i-p

See the link below which tells you how to say the sounds (in things to do at home). The children start by looking at words beginning with that sound and then learn to sound out and blend words that start with that sound. In the case of vowels the words we sound out may have the new sound in the middle.  See if your child can show you what we mean by phoneme fingers and the blending arm.

We have had lots of fun reading the number books your children have brought into school. We haven't got through them all yet but will continue reading them next week and return them as soon as they are all read. During book week the children had the opportunity to visit the school library.

In maths this week we have been  focusing on the number 4 and the shapes square and rectangle. We asked the children what is the same and different about a square and a rectangle. The square is in fact a type of rectangle. The children rotated around 5 activities over the week.

• Counting 4 objects accurately. The children were introduced to the numicon piece that represents number 4. They then had to have a go at making 4 in different ways using a variety of Numicon shapes. They had a go at recording this on paper.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
• The children counted out 4 objects into their tray, they checked their friends also had 4 in their tray and then they swapped one object. They were asked how many objects they had now. They then explored how they could make 4 in different ways.

• Using a number frame the children counted 4. Placing 4 counters of the same colour on their grid. They then used 2 colours to count out 4 in different ways. We discussed that 3 +1 = 4,      2 +2 =4, 1 +3=4. They made different patterns 2 counters to represent 4.

• The children named a square and rectangle and discussed their properties. They counted the sides and corners. They then used rods to make squares and rectangles of different sizes.

• The children counted 4 using a range of patterns eg. dice patterns, 2d 4 sided shapes, unifix in a row of 4, the numeral 4. The children then found as many sets of 4 as they could.

The children have had lots of fun learning through their play in ChIL

What you can do with your child...

• Please listen to your child read.
• Next week the children will be working on forming their name correctly. Encourage them to practise writing their name with a capital letter at the start and lower case for the rest of the name. A good way to do this is to trace over their name that you have written using a light felt tip pen.
• Recap the numbers 1,2,3,4 and circle, semi-circle, triangle, square and rectangle. Look for these numbers and shapes in the environment.
• Check that your child knows the sounds s,a,t. Ask them to demonstrate how to use their phoneme fingers to sound out simple CVC (consonant, vowel, consonant) words and blend them together.
• Continue to identify rhyming strings in books when you read to your child.
• Make up alliterative silly sentences e.g. Crocodiles can't catch crying cats.   

Useful link to make sure that you are saying the sounds correctly:

• articulation of phonemes
• Parent guidance for letter sounds
• Jolly phonics songs to go with Phase 2 sounds

Reminders for next week...

Parents and carers are invited to the Harvest Festival which will be on Wednesday 18th October at 9.15am and repeated at 2.45pm. Please see the bulletins for a list of items requested by the food bank this year.

If you haven't already done so we would be grateful if you could cover your child's progress book with a plastic cover or place it in a plastic wallet. Please make sure that this book is in your child's folder at all times.

Parent consultations for some parents. Monday am - Ducks. Thursday am -Robins

Next week the children will be making rockets as part of our learning on fireworks. Please could you send in any spare toilet rolls or tubes.

The children have come home with their Christmas card designs today. These have already be scanned by APFS and orders can now be made online by going to www.apfsorders.co.uk and inputting your child's surname and unique code.  

There is no show and tell next week. Only one week to go before the half term break. The children have done so well!!!

The Year R team.