Thursday 23rd November

This week we have started thinking about our Christmas Play 'It's a Baby'. Our adult directed activities have focused on learning dances for the performance. The children have chosen their parts. The majority will be performing a dance and a few will have a simple line to say. We will be sending these lines home as soon as we can. A request for costumes is your child's book bag today. Please help your child practise. There will be two performances on Tuesday 12th December at 10.45am and Thursday 14th  December at 9.15am.

In maths we have been learning about the number 8. At the start of each activity the children have been thinking about patterns. They had to follow a pattern using clapping and stamping and different speeds. The speeds were represented by a tortoise and a hare. Here is an example of one pattern we followed:

The children have rotated around 4 activities: Activity 1: The children have been using part -part-whole. The children carefully counted out 8 unifix into the whole. They were then asked to split them into 2 parts. The children were then asked questions about the different ways of making 8. We then talked about counting up from the number in one part to make 8. 

 

Activity 2: The children were introduced to a tens frame and counted out 8 counters placing them on the tens frame. The counters are coloured differently on each side. We explored what happened if we turned one counter over. We now have 7 red and 1 yellow counter. The children explored different ways of making 8.

Activity 3: The children used unifix to solve word problems. For example: There was a delivery from the toy shop and 4 toys were delivered. Another box arrived holding the same number of toys. how many are there altogether? Two children come and buy a toy. How many are left? Do we have more or less than we started with? 

Activity 4: The final activity was Ladybird  maths. The children had reversible counters to make different combinations of 8 spots on a ladybird. They were constantly questioned by an adult- how many red counters, how many yellow counters? how many altogether? How many more do you need? etc

In phonics the children have been learning about the phonemes e, u, r,and h. See if your child can use their phoneme fingers or robot arms to sound out these words and their blending arm to blend them back together. They could then have a go at writing some of these words.

e: peg, bed, egg, elf, hen, jet, pen
u:bun, cup, up, run, mud
r: rip, red, rock, rat, run, rug
h:hat, hen, ham, hop, hit


We are teaching the children little rhymes to go with each letter-
e: The elephants stepped on an egg, squish!
u: An alien in underpants under an umbrella.
r: The robot rides on a rocket
h: Harold the helicopter has a hat

We also practised the formation of these letters:
e- is a curly caterpillar letter. Start in the middle, loop and curve.
u- is a ladder letter. Start at the top, down and curve, up, down and flick.
r- is a one armed robot letter. Start at the top, down, bounce back up and over.
h- is a one armed robot letter. Start at the top, down, down, bounce half way up, over and flick.


The children have enjoyed their finger strong activities each day this week.The children completed 5 activities over the week:

• They practised their name- forming the letters correctly
• pencil control patterns,
• tweezers picking up bones and bananas or tweezers picking up little bricks feeding the  tennis ball monsters.
• Threading cards.
• Scissor control.

In ChIL this week The children have bought their snack from the grocer's shop for 8p. Children have explored the mystery maths box. In it they found numbered fishing rods and fish- they have been learning to recognise numbers. Children have been encouraged to write about pictures on the writing table. They have used malleable materials in the creative area as well as junk modelling creating small worlds. They have had the opportunity to continue wax resist patterns as taught last week. Outside the children have been encouraged to tie knots in rope. Play with the corn flour gloop, make obstacle courses and make a giant snakes and ladders on the blank hundred square.

Things to do with your child.....

• Recap the phonemes we have learnt so far asking your child to use their robot arms and phoneme fingers and blending arm. See if they can write any words.
• Talk about the letter formation for this weeks letters
• Play rhyming games
• Play dice games such as snakes and ladders, the ladybird game, 
• Read with your child
• Talk about the number 8. Count 8 ask how many more? Compare amounts- which is more/less/fewer
• Encourage your child to write their name, practise forming the letters correctly. Some children have been sent home with a name sheet to practise on. You can keep these at home. Keep the sheet inside the plastic wallet and ask your child to form their letters using a white board pen on the plastic which can then be rubbed out and reused again and again.

Reminders and pleas......

• No school on Friday 24th November!
• School play dates- Tues 12th December 10.45. Thurs 14th December 9.15
• Please continue to bring in junk modelling materials- especially plastic tubs and pots this week.
• Christmas costumes are due in on Friday December 8th.

Enjoy the long weekend!
The Year R Team




 

Friday 17th November

In Literacy this week we read the story 'Handa's Surprise'. We discussed the characters and the children were each given a picture from the book. Together we ordered these pictures making a story map to help the children retell the story. The children then acted the story out and told it to their learning partner. See if your child can remember the story and tell it to you.

The children looked at animal patterns and discussed the reason that animals have such a range of patterns. These include various reasons- camouflage, to attract a mate or  to scare other animals. We discussed the animals in 'Handa's Surprise' and the children then created their own animal patterns using the wax and resist technique.

A further activity related to this book was based on healthy eating and living. We talked about healthy foods and how we must eat a healthy balanced diet. We also talked about other important things we should do to stay healthy- sleep, drink water, keep clean and exercise.  We reminded ourselves of the fruit in 'Handa's Surprise'.  The children looked at a range of fruits and then had to wash their hands before making a fruit kebab with 7 pieces of fruit on it, linking in to our number of the week! They then ate their kebab. Some of the children had the chance to make observational drawings of the fruit.



The final Adult directed activity was focused on handwriting. The children worked on their curly caterpillar letters in small groups with an adult. The other children worked on other fine motor activities.This week the children practised the formation of letters e, s and f.
e-start with a loop, then make a curve.
s- make a curve, slope, make a curve back again.
f- make a curve, come all the way down, lift and cross.



In maths the children have learnt about the number 7. They rotated around 4 different activities. Each session we started by counting on and back from different numbers.
Activity 1- The children were given a pretend pizza and had to add 7 of each topping.

Activity 2- The children sat in a circle and played a game. They rolled 2 dice and found the total. If their number was less than 7 they stayed in their place, if it was 7 or more they had to jump up, run around the circle and back to their place. On the second round the children totaled the dice and ran to point at the answer on the number line.
Activity 3: The children were each given a bed and small teddy and some blankets. They had to place the blankets on the toy. For example they were told to give the toy 3 blankets and then 4 more. They were asked how many blankets there were altogether. Then the toy was too warm so they had to take 2 blankets away, they were asked 'how many are left?' etc

Activity 4: The children were each given a car park with 7 spaces drawn out. They had to park the cars in the car park and then 2 drove away, how many were left? The teacher continued to question them, asking them to move cars in and out of the car park.

In phonics this week the children have learnt about the phonemes o, c, k, and ck. When we learn about a vowel we look mainly at words where the vowel is found in the middle (pot, cot, hot, stop) and other words with the vowel at the start (odd,). 'ck' is found at the end or in the middle of words (duck, luck, dock, sock, sick, lick, lock,crackle). 'c' words- cot, cat, cap, can, cop, 'k' words- kit, kick, kip. Ask your child to use their phoneme fingers or robot arms to sound out these words and their blending arm to blend them back together.



ChIL- The children enjoyed exploring this week's maths box- it was full of things to do with measuring. The children have continued to use printing techniques they were taught last week. They enjoyed extending their learning- some children were playing pirates on the climbing frame and started shouting 'walk the plank'. They were asked where their plank was and then created their own using the large building blocks and a plank. Some children were looking for a slurp monster and made some tracks, they had lots of fun trying to work out where it had gone.

The children enjoyed bringing their Teddies in for Children in Need. Thank you for all the donations, I'm sure you'll agree it is a very worthy cause. In assembly the children placed their coins on Pudsey. Here are the children with their teddies:

Things you could do with your child....

• Practise this week's phonics
• Read with your child
• Count out 7 and make 7 in different ways
• Talk about healthy living
• Encourage your child to form the letters correctly in their name
• Play games particularly using dice and dominoes

Reminders and requests...

• Next week is a 4 day week. There is no school on Friday.
• If you have any interesting objects that we could have we would be very grateful. We will be putting them in our special box so that that the children can think of imaginative uses for them. For example: Super large Keys or tiny keys, interesting sticks or stones or just random objects.
• We are always in need of fabric, wool, anything that can be used for junk modelling- boxes, tubes, pots, tubs, newspaper and lids (e.g. from milk cartons). Wrapping paper is also useful. We would also be grateful for rice, lentils, pasta.
• Is there by any chance a parent or grandparent or friend who could play the piano for our Christmas play? We would be very very grateful!

Have a super weekend,
The Year R Team