Crabtree Infants' Reception

Spring 2 week 2

2012-03-02T16:33:00.002Z

This week the children have been learning all about information books. We know that information book have a contents page, index and photographs.

The children have also learnt about Fairtrade. This years theme is 'take a step' and the children have thought of the different steps they can take to help farmers, such as buying Fairtrade bananas/coffee/tea instead of non-Fairtrade products.

We have set up our Role Play area this week too and the children have decided to turn it into an aeroplane. Each child has been in the aeroplane and have taken on different roles within the role play area.

Next week we are going to further our learning on information books by making a group information book on transport.

The children are going to use their observational skills and look carefully at the diffrent types of transport and have a go at painting them. The children will need to choose the correct colours and the correct size of paintbrush they need to use.

In maths the children are going to learn to count in 2's using different resources to help them see the pattern of odd and even numbers.

As there are a lot of children that like to show and tell, we have set up a new colour group system. Each week a different colour group will have an oppourtunity to bring things in to show that are related to our learning. Our topic this half term is on travlling, but please do look on here to see what we are doing each week.

Here is our show and tell timetable:

W/c 05/03/12	Orange group
W/c 12/03/12	Blue group
W/c 19/03/12	Red group
W/c 26/03/12	Yellow group
W/c 17/04/12	Green group

The lunchtime careres have asked us to remind all parents to please make sure that they include spoons and drinks in the childrens packed lunch boxes. At lunchtime the children are encouraged to eat everything in their packed lunch boxes, so please only put in the amount of food that you would expect your child to eat.

This week the children took part in a 'Drama Llarmas' session. We listened to a story and then had a go at acting it out. The children had great fun, here are some photographs.

We hope you have a lovely weekend.

Spring 2

2012-02-24T16:17:00.001Z

Once again the children have done really well settling back into school.This week we have made our own talking dictionaries using the names of the letters.All the children have contributed to the dictionaries.

This week we also had Rob and Roly come in to speak to us in assembly.
They are going to travel to the North Pole to raise money for charity. They explained to us about all the equipment they need to take with them, the animals they may see and why the North Pole is very cold.

This term our topic is about Travelling.
We are going to learn about all the different ways of travelling and the different modes of transport which we can use, such as walking, driving a car, flying in an aeroplane or crossing the sea on a boat.

Next week is the start of Fairtrade Fortnight. The children are going to learn what Fairtrade means and how we can help the Fairtrade farmers.
Please can the children bring in any empty packets / or anything that is Fairtrade (with the symbol) which we are going to display in the classroom.

We are also going to find out about information books and how we can tell the difference between them and story books, such as; photographs, contents page and/or an index page.

We are going to set up our new role play area as an aeroplane. The children are going to take ownership of the aeroplane and help us to think of props and resources for it.
Over the next 2 weeks in Maths we are going to be recording the traffic we see going past the school on Crabtree Lane. The children will be using the tallying technique and practising how to record accurately. We will use the information we collect to explore the different ways we can show the information by making a class graph. The children will also be learning about 2D shape. We will be naming the shapes and describing the shapes by talking about the number of sides and corners as well as other properties.

We hope you have a lovely weekend.

2012-02-10T16:36:00.001Z

Look at all the fun we have had in the snow this week!

This week we have been assessing the children's progress in their learning over the past term and a half. We will continue to assess all the childen in the first week after half term. We are really pleased with the progress they have made. Well done to everybody. You can help your children further by listening to them read their books to you and reading a variety of books to them, encourage them to look for key words in the text. Look for numbers and letters in the environment. Think of rhyming words. Encourage them to label a photo of an acitivity that you do together or to write a sentence about it. Play games like 'I spy' and number games. Sing nursery and number rhymes.Next half term our topic will be travelling. The children will learn all about different modes of transport, they will make maps, learn about road safety, find out about how people used to travel in the past and make hot air balloons!20th February is the start of Fairtrade Fortnight. There will be a variety of activities promoting the fairtrade ideal. Hope you all have a great half term holiday - please share with us any 'magic moments' that your child has and we will include it in their Learning Journal. See you on the 20th February.

Week 5

2012-02-03T15:53:00.001Z

This weeek the children have used the book 'The Rainbow fish' to help them with their learning. We have developed our learning on feelings and have thought about the emotions that the Rainbow may have felt during the story. Then we used our phonics skills to write an emotion bubble. We have also had a go at acting out the story and sequenced the story using pictures from the book. We have learnt about the primary colours and created secondary colours by mixing them. We learned that we can make different shades of the same colour. We will cut out 'scale' shapes from the pieces of paper and create a giant Rainbow fish.In PE have we have been moving around like different sea creatures and thought about the speed at which they move. We are going to carry on with these movements and use them to create a dance.In ChIL the children have been outside... yes OUTSIDE in the cold weather exploring the ice. They have been trying to break it up by chipping away at the blocks using the sand tools.

We hope the children have fun at the disco!Have a good weekend.

Week 4

2012-01-27T16:10:00.000Z

We have been celebrating Chinese New Year and the children have been trying lots of new activities - making stir fry, writing mind maps about how Chinese New Year is celebrated, making Chinese dragons, writing Ducks and Robins in Chinese writing and playing in the Chinese take away. As part of our Bird watch fortnight we have been making an owl collage using different materials.

We have also been learning about ordinal numbers and everything we have done since has been in order - either 1st, 2nd, 3rd , 4th or 5th!Next week our focus will be the story of The Rainbow Fish. We will be exploring different feelings, colour mixing and sequencing the events in the story.In maths we will be learning about sharing. Have a good weekend and see you on Monday.

Spring 1 Week 3

2012-01-20T16:03:00.003Z

This week has been the start of our Birdwatch Fortnight.

The children have taken part in many activities. They went on a walk and used the tallying technique to count the birds thay saw. They created a winter scene using sponge painting to create the trees. They also used their observation skills to paint pictures of birds. A big thank-you to Mrs Petevinos and Mrs Schlick for coming into school on Monday and Tuesday to make Bird cakes with the children. In ChIL the children have continued to make sounds with the pots, pans, lids and shakers, used the big bricks to create a ship, a stage, a farm and so much more! They have manipulated the playdough to make nests, eggs and used cutters to make animals.

Next week we are going to carry on some of our birdwatch activities in ChIL and will be collaging pictures of owls. In our other activities the children are going to learn about 'Chinese New Year' (Monday 23rd January). The children are going to learn the story of the Chinese New Year and how a race with 12 animals decided the Chinese calendar. We will be learning about ordinal numbers and will be making our own stir fry and eating it with Chop Sticks!!

Spring 1 week 2

2012-01-13T15:06:00.000Z

This week the children have been using the book 'Dear Zoo'. They have made their own version by choosing an animal and writing a reason why they had to send it back. The children are working hard on using their phonics to help them write words.

The children have also learned how to look after a pet.

In maths the children have continued to use their problem solving skills to describe and identify different animals and have been using unifix cubes when taking away.

Thank you very much for the pots and pans. As you can see the children (and grown ups) have had lots of fun making different noises - Sorry Mrs Carter!

Next week the children are going to carry on practising their taking away skills in maths.

We start Bird Watch Fortnight next week and for this the children are going to learn how to tally to help them count the birds they see when we go out for a walk around the school. In the classroom the children are going to help to make a display about Bird Watch Fortnight and are going to learn the technique of sponge painting to create the background to the display.

At the beginning of the week the children will be making bird food cakes to attract the birds for our bird watch walk.

In our other adult directed activity the children will be using the story of 'Owl Babies' when learning about a range of emotions.

We hope you have a lovely weekend.

Spring Term!!!

2012-01-06T14:49:00.005Z

The children have done really well settling back into school.

We hope you all had a lovely Christmas and Happy New Year to you all.

This week we have kick started our learning on animals.

We have learnt about the different characteristics of animals and used the story of 'Percy the Park Keeper - One snowy day" to help us.

We also have practised our problem solving skills by sorting different animals and justifed

how we have sorted them.

This week we learnt all about winter when we went on a winter walk.

Next week we are carrying on the theme of animals and we are going to make our own version of the book "Dear Zoo".

The children will also be carrying on their problem solving skills using different animals.

As you may have noticed we are developing our outside musical curriculum. We are looking for any spare pots or pans to hang up outside. If you have any spare that you no longer need we would be very grateful. We are also looking for empty 'Robinsons' fruit juice bottles' to create some shakers.

We are also looking for tractor tyres. If you know anybody that would be able to donate a tractor tyre please let us know.

Next week we are going to be starting PE again. Please can you ensure your child's PE kit is in school and named.

Have a good weekend.

End Of Term!

2011-12-16T10:48:00.001Z

Wasn't the Christmas play AMAZING!!

The children were all able to remember their lines, the dances, singing, using props and act all at the same time.
We also had our Christmas party.
A big thank-you to you all for your contriubutions and to all the parents who helped at the party.

The children have also been really busy in ChIL completing lots of Christmas activities such as writing cards, making lists, wrapping presents and delivering presents as well as painting Christmas pictures, and making lanterns.

Next term we are going to be focussing our learning on animals. The children are going to discuss animals and talk about the characteristics of different animals, sort animals in different ways and go on a winter walk around the school.

We just want to say a BIG thank-you to all the parents for the Christmas gifts.

We are all very grateful for your kind presents.

We hope you all have a lovely Christmas.

2011-12-08T07:58:00.001Z

This week we have really got into the Christmas mood. The children have been using Santa's workshop to make, wrap up and deliver Christmas presents in time for Christmas. They have been making repeating patterns on Christmas stockings, made paper chains and lanterns, used paint to print with different objects to create a Christmas picture and made even more Christmas cards!

We have also been busy practising for the Christmas play this week and the children have done really well remembering their lines.

Next week we will be performing our Christmas play (10:15 on Wednesday and 9:15 on Thursday). The children's Christmas party will be on Thursday afternoon (many thanks to
Mrs Spittal, Mrs Threlfall and Mrs Ward for organising it) and the Christmas lunch will be Friday lunchtime.

To help us with our role play area we would be very grateful if you could bring in any spare/unwanted blank Christmas cards or wrapping paper for the children to use.

Please can all children bring in an empty named carrier bag to bring their Christmas work home.
If the children have Christmas cards to deliver to their friends, they can be posted in the Christmas post box in the library. Please check they are clearly named with the child's class.

Don't forget that school finishes at 2:00pm on Friday.

In the book bags next week there will be a magic moment sheet. This is for you and your child to fill in over the Christmas holidays for your child to share with the rest of the class when we come back to school in January. Please fill in with a special moment such as Christmas day or New Years day etc... These special sheets will be placed into the children's learning journals as a memory.

We look forward to seeing you at the performances next week.

Have a lovely weekend

Christmas!

2011-12-02T14:43:00.001Z

What a fun week we have had.

This week we have really got into our Christmas theme.

Our classrooms have changed into a Christmas setting!

This week we have made Christmas cards and have written the inserts for them. We have also read and listened to different versions of the Christmas story. The children have been rehearsing for our Christmas play and have been practising the songs.

The children have also been doing some Christmas activities in ChIL. Here is a picture of our new role play area which is now Santa's Workshop! The children have had great fun wrapping presents to deliver.

In maths we have been learning how to find the number one or two more or less than a given number.

Next week we are going to be taking part in lots of different Christmas activities; making paper chains, colouring Christmas pictures, writing letters to Santa using our phonics to help us sound out words, finger and sponge painting Christmas pictures, winding ribbon around stars and decorating their own Christmas stockings with repeating patterns!

In the book bags is the home school liaison book and a covering letter explaining how best to use it. This book is to stay in the book bags as a method of communication between home and school.

Please can we have all of the children's costume for the Christmas play in by Friday 9th at the latest

We hope to see you all tomorrow at the Christmas Fare.

Have a good weekend.

Week 4

2011-11-24T13:58:00.001Z

This week we have taken part in three adult directed activities.

We have selected the resources we needed to join to our sewing to create Humpty Dumpty; learned the story of 'Little Lumpty' and used different props to role play the story and we have been learning to use the words 'past', 'present' and 'future' when talking about our lives.

The children have also painted their Diwali lamps in bright metallic colours.

We have also started learning the songs for our Christmas play.

In Maths the children have been learning about numbers 1 more or 1 less than a given number.

In phonics the children have re-capped the sounds they have learnt and have practised their sounding out and blending.

Next week we are going to start our Christmas theme. The children will make Christmas cards and write the inserts for them and carry on with their learning of the songs and we will start practising for the Christmas play.

Please do not forget we are not in school in tomorrow.

Have a lovely long weekend!

Week 3

2011-11-18T16:44:00.000Z

As our theme this week was Humpy Dumpty the children have made their own puppets and had a go at acting out the rhyme and challenged themselves by changing the end to the story.

The children have learned a new joining technique. They sewed egg shaped binca onto a piece of card, next week they will be adding detail.

You may have noticed that outside the Robins door is a new willow wigwam. The children have helped to create this construction by planting and weaving the willow.

In Maths the children have been learning about addition. We have completed different practical activities for the children to understand that the end number is always bigger when we add and that we are finding the total by joining two groups.

The children have carried on recognising key words in literacy and practacing sounding out simple words and blending the sounds back together. They are working on recognising I, can, the, am, big, a, dad, mum, to and go.

Next week we are going to carry on with the Humpy Dumpty theme. The children are going to collage their sewing pictures and make the egg shaped binca into Humpty Dumpty himself.

The children will also be learning about the story of 'Little Lumpty' and will have a go at acting out the story by using different props.

Also we will learn about and discuss the events in their lives when they were little. The children will learn to recognise what changes have happened in their lives since they were born.

In maths we are going to be using a numberline and different resources to help us recognise which numbers are one more and one less than a particular number.
There is a number formation sheet that has been put into every bookbag, please help your child to form their numbers correctly.

Thank you to all those who dontated money to 'Children in Need'. The children all had Pudsey ears and decorated them with spots!

Have a lovely weekend!

Week 2

2011-11-11T15:47:00.005Z

This week we have been carried on our firework theme and the children have used the joining techniques they learned last week to create some firework models out of junk. The children have also had a go at using their sounding out skills to write some firework noises.

As it has been Diwali (The festival of light) the children have learned about the Diwali festival and have made Diva lamps out of clay.

We have also practised our number formation by writing numbers in the sand, on the playground with chalk and on paper.

We will be sending out a number formation sheet to have a go at home.

Here are some photographs of our week

Next week we are going to be learning about Humpty Dumpty.

We are going to make finger puppets to help us re-tell the story and we will explore the different construction kits to find out what will make the strongest wall. The children are also going to help us to build a wigwam out of willow. The children will learn a new joining technique and sew Humpty Dumpty onto a piece of card.

It is really important your child brings their bookbag with their book in it every day to school. The children are reading regularly and will need to change their books.

We are still working on the home-school liason book for reception as we want to ensure they are right before we send them home.

We look forward to seeing you all next week at Parent Consultations next week.

Have a lovely weekend!

Autmn 2 week 1

2011-11-04T15:33:00.014Z

Here are some photographs of us in ChIL this week

This week the children have been really busy!

We have started our theme on fireworks. The children have taken part in different firework themed activities. They have learned and sequenced the story of Guy Fawkes, used musical instruments to make firework sounds, learned how to stay safe around fireworks and explored different joining techniques.The children will use these to make 3D fireworks out of junk next week.

Next week we are going to carry on the firework theme. The children will be making models of fireworks and using their phonic knowledge to write the sound of firework.

The children will also learn about Diwali festival of light and will have a go at making Diva lamps out of clay.

In Maths the children will be learning about 3D shapes and in literacy we will carry on introducing phase 2 key words in our key word sentence.

Please can you make sure your child brings a named coat to school as it is getting colder.

See you all at the firework display on Saturday night.

Half term!!

2011-10-21T16:03:00.011+01:00

All the children have had a wonderful first term at Crabtree and have settled into school amazingly well and have embraced the learning ethos at Crabtree Infants'.

Thank you to all of you that came to the assembly this morning we thought the children did very well in their first Celebration assembly.

This week our theme was Autumn. We have taken part in 4 different activities to help our learning.

The children have explored mixing colour paints and using the colours to sponge paint an Autumn tree, cut the vegetables to make a soup (which was very yummy!), created 3D hedgehogs using salt dough and went on an Autumn walk to help listen and recreate the sounds of Autumn.

Here are some photographs of our week.

After half term our topic is going to be Fireworks! The children will be taking part in a series of different activities including; learning and sequencing the Guy Fawkes story, learning joining techniques to make a rocket out of Junk modelling, creating firework sounds using musical instruments, creating firework pictures on the computer and moving to firework music and creating firework pictures on the computers.

To allow every child to make their own junk model firework please can you bring in any cardboard tubes such as kitchen/toilet tubes.

We hope you have a lovely half term!

Alice In Wonderland

2011-10-14T13:40:00.013+01:00

Book Week!

All the children have had great fun this week. We have all taken part in different activities around our 'Alice in Wonderland' theme.

On Tuesday we were visitied by a librarian and she told us all about how she looks after books in Harpenden library. Later on in the week we learnt how to use books carefully by holding them the right way round and how to share them with friends in a careful and polite way.

During the week we took part in a series of Maths lessons.

We compared the size of different characters using the terms 'bigger and 'smaller'.

The children helped to measure out the ingredients to make Jam tarts. They used the weighing scales to help make sure the ingredients were not to 'heavy' or 'light' but 'balanced'.

We made patterns by using the different suits of the cards. The children challenged themselves to use 3 suits in their patterns. e.g heart, spade, diamond, heart, spade, diamond....

The children practiced using positional language when describing where the Doormouse was at the Mad Hatters Tea party! Such as inbetween, in, on, next to, beside, over, under, through...

On Friday all the children have dressed up as characters from 'Alice in Wonderland' and were invited along to the Mad Hatters Tea Party!

Next week we will be learning about Autumn and Harvest.

The children will be learning how to colour mix paint and sponge an Autumn tree, make 3D hedgehogs using salt dough, making soup out of harvest vegetables and going on an Autumn walk to listen to the sounds of Autumn.

We hope you have a lovely weekend!

Week 5

2011-10-06T13:29:00.015+01:00

This week in Maths we have been learning to count securely. The children have been using counters and other objects to help them securely count a given number by touching each counter as they say the number slowly.

If you would like to help your child please practice counting objects one at a time.

In literacy we have been learning and re-capping the sounds 's', 'a' and 't'. The children have learnt the sounds and actions and have had a go at sorting out different objects which start with the SAT sounds.

The actions for these sounds are:

s - moving your hand like a snake and saying sssssss
a - walking your fingers up your arm, like marching ants and saying a, a, a, a

t - slowly moving your head from side to side (like watching a tennis match) and saying t, t, t,

We have also had some special visitors this week. Mrs. Bird, the secretary and Mr. Robertson, the caretaker came and spoke to us about their roles in the school and how they help us. The children were very keen to find out how they help us and others in the school.

This week we also went on an Autumn walk to look for all the signs of Autumn. We collected lots of the signs in litte bags. The children found conkers and conker shells, leaves of all different colours, pine cones....

Next week is 'Book Week'. The theme for this week is Alice in Wonderland! In Reception we are going to read the story on Monday and we are going to be visited by a librarian on Tuesday morning. Friday is dress up day and all the children (and staff) are to dress up as a character from 'Alice in Wonderland'. The children are also going to watch the DVD and take part in a child only Mad Hatter Tea Party on Friday afternoon.

In Maths we are going to be taking part in activities based on the story. The children are going to compare and order the characters fom the story, make repeating patterns out of number cards, measure the ingredients to make jam tarts and learn to use positional language to help lay a table for the Mad Hatters Tea Party.

In Literacy, we are going to re-tell the story of Alice in Wonderland and learn about the different types of books there are and what we use them for we are also going to have a go at writing a label for the characters.

Please can the children bring in one of their favourite books, to share with the class. (A post-it note in the inside of the book with their name on it may be useful so we can return the books to the correct child).

In the book bags there have been Banardos badges for the children to design. If your child has designed their badge the date for the assembly is Wednesday 19th October.

In the book bags today you will find, information on how to help your child at home on literacy. The set includes:

Phase two key words - some can be sounded out e.g. can, others are tricky words which the children just have to learn e.g. the.
Laminated name card - please encourage your children to form the letters of their name correctly by starting at the red dot, copying over the lines, dots and then to write it themselves. which they can use to help form the letters in their names correctly - we have done it in school so the children will be able to help you!
A sheet showing the actions that we teach to go with each letter sound.
A letter formation sheet to show the correct letter formation of all letters - left/right handed.
Reading with your child sheet.
Magic moment - if you would like to contribute to your child's Learning Journal by recording any magic times that your child has, birth of a new sibling, ride a bike, please complete the enclosed sheet - feel free to adapt it if necessary.

Dont forget there is a reading workshop with Mrs. Baillie- Lane on Monday at 9:15am.

Please feel free to come along.

We hope you have a lovely weekend!

Week 4

2011-09-29T14:17:00.011+01:00

The children have done so well with their first full week at school!
We have been very busy in Chil this week, we have; used the pedalos, danced with pom poms, dressed up as animals, played in the home corner, made constructions out of junk modelling, built with the mobilo construction and much much more.....!

This week we also had a drama workshop. All the children took part in a jungle adventure and had to use their role play, dancing and singing skills on their adventure. All the children had lots of fun!

In Maths we have been learning to recognise numbers to 10 and the children have practised how to form them correctly. Here is a link to an online game called 'Count with Lecky' which we have been using in our Maths lessons. http://www.crickweb.co.uk/Early-Years.html

In Literacy we have learning all about rhyme and alliteration. We have been trying to identify rhyme and name other words that rhyme with certain sounds such as; at (bat, hat, mat), ee (bee, tree, knee), ill (Jill, hill, mill)...etc

Next week in Maths we are going to be ordering numbers to 10 and beyond and we will be learning how to count objects securely by counting each object separately.

In Literacy will we write key word sentences with the adult modelling how to write a sentence, including where to start on the page, using a capital letter and full stops and using finger spaces. The children will also be introduced to phonics and we will continue to introduce and recap sounds.

Thank you so much for all the support at our Tea Party on Wednesday and a BIG thank-you to the PA who served the tea and biscuits.

Please can we have your 'ages and stages' highlighted A3 sheets which are in the front of the Learning Journals from nursery. We will only need them for a short time and will give them back to you.

We hope you have noticed what a fantastic job Mrs Ormsden and the children have done with the flower beds. Please do not sit or stand, or allow your children to sit, stand or dig in the flower beds.

We hope you have a restful weekend!

Week 3

2011-09-23T15:45:00.003+01:00

We have had another busy week and some of the children are really tired!

The children are now really good at finding their colour groups and starting their Finger Strong activities independently. They have practiced threading, moulding playdough, colouring and cutting a lion's mane!

In maths we have been learning about adding and taking away up to 10 by singing rhymes such as 10 fat sausages, 10 green bottles and 10 in a bed.

In literacy we have been thinking about using our listening skills to hear sounds, to make sounds with different parts of our bodies, e.g. clapping, clicking fingers, etc and listening for and making lists of rhyming words.

In ChIL the children have been pretending to be pirates, using diggers in the sand, playing with sea creatures in the water, chalking on the playground, playing in the home role play, buying toys from the shop and lots more.

No wonder they are tired out!!

Thank you very much to everyone who came to our curriculum meetings. We hope they were useful. The powerpoint presentation is on the website for those of you who couldn't make it. If you have any further questions please ask us.

Next week the children will be in school all day! There may be lots of tears (and that's just from the adults!)

In literacy we will be learning more about rhymes and beginning to introduce the letter sounds and linked actions.

In maths we will be practicing recognising, writing and ordering numbers up to 5 or 10 or beyond.

Our topic for this half term is All About Me. The children will be using different media to draw a picture of themselves and will walk around the school to get to know their local environment.

Please remember the parents tea party on Wednesday at 2.30 in the hall. The PA have kindly volunteered to make tea and coffee for us and you are all very welcome to come and meet other reception parents.

Have a lovely weekend!

Week Two

2011-09-16T15:32:00.005+01:00

The children have been amazing this week!

They have been having lots of fun, playing pirates, building junk models, chalking, gardening, drawing, painting, playing number games, looking at books and comics and so much more!

They have coped so well with the new routines, finding their colour groups for finger strong activities, beginning to remember their carpet spaces and as for lunch WOW!

They were amazing!

Next week we will begin to think about Autumn if you are out and about this weekend and see any leaves, conkers, etc for us to use in our display please bring them in.

Just a few reminders:

If your child is having a packed lunch they need two bottles each day. One for lunch time which can be juice, squash, etc and one for the classroom which should be water.

Please remember not to include nuts of any kind in their packed lunch as we have children with severe nut allergies.

School newsletters and other leaflets usually come out on a Friday so please check the book bags.

Next Week

Monday - All children come in the morning. Group A stay for lunch, Group B go home at 12

Tuesday - All children come in the morning. Group B stay for lunch, Group a go home at 12

Wednesday, Thursday and Friday -All children come in the morning and stay for lunch and leave at 1.30pm

The doors open at 8.55 and are closed at 9

Dates for your diary:

Our Curriculum meeting is on Wednesday or Friday at 9.15 - 10

Have a great Weekend - see you on Monday!

Welcome

2011-09-09T11:44:00.005+01:00

Welcome to the first blog of the year!

Wow! What an amazing first week.

The children have all settled really well. They have accessed all areas of reception and have already learnt so much!

We have been reciting number rhymes, talking about adding and taking away and sharing our favourite stories with the children.

Please Note:

On Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday

Group A will come in the morning and Group B will come in the afternoon.

On Thursday all children will attend school in the morning

Group A will stay for lunch, please collect them at 1.30
Group B will go home at 12 noon

On Friday all children will attend school in the morning

Group B will stay for lunch, please collect them at 1.30
Group A will go home at 12 noon

Next week the book bag boxes and the water bottle tray will still be outside, please encourage your children to use the boxes independently.

When we open the doors at 8.55/12.45 the children will be able to come in and hang up their coats by themselves and then come to the carpet area, we are encouraging them to be organised and independent.

Next week we will be reciting number rhymes up to 10 and learning about 1 more and 1 less.

In literacy we will be learning about sounds in the environment and rhyming words.

We hope you have a great weekend and look forward to seing you all bright and breezy on Monday!

Goodbye

2011-07-30T11:48:00.000+01:00

This is a strange time of year.

On one hand we are all looking forward to the summer holidays but on the other we are really sad as we have to say goodbye to the wonderful Ducks and Robins. We also say goodbye to the children who are leaving Crabtree. We wish them both lots of happiness and good times in their new schools.

The last two days were really busy (as always). The leavers assembly was wonderful, you could see by how well our children sat that they were as interested as the grown ups in everything that the year children had to sing and say to us. Good luck in the juniors year two!

We spent some of our time cleaning up and sorting out the reception unit - the children were really helpful especially when it came to moving all of the old sand from the sand pit to the area next to the path - anyone looking in will notice that the rough area is now beautifully covered in bark and now looks much more inviting!

Our talent show was lovely too. The children confidently shared jokes, dances, karate moves, drumming, poems, songs and lots more with us and we all had a lovely time.

We would all like to thank you for the very genreous gifts that you gave us at the end of term - you are very kind. Obviously the gifts are greatly appreciated but the books with the children's contributions and the cards and letters are so very special. One child wrote 'Thank you for making me happy' what more can any teacher ask for?

So as this is the final blog for this year we would like to say thank you to all of the children and parents in reception 2010/2011 and to wish you all a fantastic summer holiday. We look forward to seeing the new Woodpeckers and Kingfishers in September - remember that children in all year groups are allowed to hug past teachers!

Teddy Bears Picnic!!

2011-07-22T16:55:00.002+01:00

Here are some photographs from our Teddy Bear's Picnic!

Thank you to all those who came to our picnic, we hope you enjoyed our songs.

Next week we only have two days at school.

We will be watching the Year 2 leavers assembly and we will have our very last celebration assembly as Reception!

(Don't forget we finish at 2:00pm on Tuesday)

2011-07-15T16:21:00.002+01:00

Look at the fun we had at Bekonscot!

Thank you so much to all the parents that helped.

On Tuesday at 2:00pm it is our Teddy Bear's Picnic!

This week we are going to be writing invitations to the picnic and writing labels for our Teddy Bears so they do not become lost! We are also going to be making cakes and sandwiches for the picnic.

(Please provide your child with a savoury snack)

At the Picnic we will play some circle games, eat our sandwiches and cakes and sing you some Teddy Bear songs!

(Parents of junior children please feel free to come and go)

We look forward to seeing you at the Picnic

Please remember to bring your Teddy and a Picnic blanket!

Bekonscot!

2011-07-08T15:55:00.005+01:00

Look what we did when it was hot!

This week we have been making story maps! We made our own story maps (a sequence of pictures) for the story of 'Rosie's Walk'. All the children were able to re-tell the stories using actions and the story map to help them. Here are photographs of our story maps!

Ducks Robins

The children then had a go at making up their own version of the story and changed the characters and the obstacles in the story.

Next week we are going to write our stories using our story maps to help us!

On Monday we are going to Bekonscot Model Village.

http://www.bekonscot.co.uk/

The children are going to look around the village, have a train ride and sketch some of the houses in the Village.

Remember to bring a packed lunch in a named plastic carrier bag with 2 screw top bottles of drink, wear school uniform, comfortable shoes and a waterproof coat!

Next week in Maths we are going to be practicing our addition skills using money, to help us to recognise different coins. We are also going to be recognising and naming 3D shapes and their properties, such as the number of sides/corners they have and if the sides are flat or curved.

Sports Day!

2011-07-01T16:12:00.003+01:00

We had SO much fun on our Sports Day!

We all took part in different activities and cheered on all our friends. Here are some photographs of us.

This week we were focussing on 'The Very Hungry Caterpillar'. The children had great fun learning about the life cycle of the butterfly and we all acted out the sequence of the cycle. We have painted our own symmetrical butterflies using different objects to print with. The children wrote their own versions of the story and changed the food they ate and what they were going to turn into! We learnt lots of interesting facts about butterflies and caterpillars and made our own fact files.

Next week we are going to be learning all about 'Rosie's Walk' by Pat Hutchings. The children are going to learn the story by acting and using a story map. (Writing the story in pictures) We are then going to change the characters and other parts of the story and write our own versions of the story.

The children's new classes have been put on the Newsletter.

Robins are going to be Kingfishers with Miss Bucus

Ducks are going to be Woodpeckers with Miss Vela

Hope to see you tomorrow at the summer fair! (11:30 - 2:30)

2011-06-23T16:30:00.004+01:00

What a busy week!

The children have had sooo much fun learning about Australia.

They have sung some Australian songs, heard an Australian Folk Tale, found out what Boomerangs were made for and designed their own, learnt what some Aboriginal signs mean, made their own hats, practiced using Aboriginal art techniques and learnt how to play cricket!

We also learnt an Aboriginal dance from a porfessional dancer.

Thank you to all those who turned up to our picnic, we hope you enjoyed our singing and dancing.

Here are some pictures of us during the week.

Next week we are going to be learning about 'The Very Hungry Caterpillar'. The children are going to make up their own versions of the story and find out some interesting facts about caterpillars and butterflies.

In maths we are going to be sorting the food from the story, counting in 2's, 5's and 10's and making our own symmetrical butterfly pictures.

We hope you have a lovely long weekend.

2011-06-10T14:21:00.002+01:00

A BIG well done to all the children in their water assembly this morning. They were brilliant!

In fact they did so well that each class had 3, yes 3 apples!!!

Here are some photographs.

On Monday it is Green Day - please can everyone add something green to their uniform.

This year we are thinking about the environment and why it is important to look after it.

The children are going to take part in a scavenger hunt around the school grounds, they will collect different natural objects and then share their findings with each other.

We are going to make a flower pot out of recycled materials and plant a bean seed.

We will also be looking closely at trees, we will sketch them and use the bark to make rubbings.

In Maths we are going to be extending our addition skills by putting the biggest number in our head and then counting on. we will also be thinking about doubling and halving numbers.

In Literacy we are going to be concentrating on our key words and how to write super sentences.

On Friday afternoon we will be practicing for sports day, so please make sure that your children have a pair of trainers or plimsolls that fit!

Have a lovely weekend.

Half Term!

2011-05-26T15:32:00.003+01:00

This week we have been doing lots of learning!
In literacy we have been thinking of our own ways to start stories and sequencing the story of 'Mr Gumpy's Outing'.

In Maths we have been learning about subtraction and how the numbers become smaller when we take away.

We have aslo looked at irons and how they worked and how they used to look before electricity. The children were asked to differentitate between past and present.

Here are some photographs from this week.

In the first week back after half term we have our class assembly. We will be doing a lot of practice for our assembly.

Can the children please bring in one cap each as we will be using them in our assembly.

Does anyone have any small plastic bottles with lids that we can use in our Role Play?

Next half term there are lots of fun and exciting things happening. We have Green Day, Sports Day, Cultural Week and our School trip.

We hope you have an enjoyable and fun half term!

2011-05-20T15:53:00.002+01:00

We have had great fun this week learning the story of "Mr Gumpy's Outing". The children have taken on the role of the different characters and acted out the story.

In maths we have experimented with scales and compared the weight of different objects using the key words, 'heavy' and 'light'.

In creative we have learnt how to change the shade of a colour by mixing in small amounts of white paint.

This week we are going to be carrying on our learning using the story of Mr Gumpy. We are going to think of our own ways to start a story (including a setting and a character) and sequence the story too.

In Maths this week we are going to be learning the main concept of subtraction and having a go at some practical subtraction sums.

We are also going to try to differentiate between past and present and find out clothes used to be ironed and put them on a timeline.

We hope you have a good weekend!

Water

2011-05-16T08:14:00.003+01:00

Last week we had lots of fun exploring water.

We learnt how clothes used to be washed; using a washboard to scrub the clothes, how the dolly and poser washed the clothes in the water and how a mangle was used to dry the clothes. The children have had great fun using the artefacts and washing some clothes themselves.

In Literacy we wrote instructions on how to use the artefacts.

We have also conducted a floating and sinking investigation and found out which objects float and sink.

This week we are using the story 'Mr Gumpy's Outing' by John Burningham. We are going to sequence the story and write a character profile on our choosen character.

We are also going to use our investigating skills and find out how many marbles it will take to sink a paper boat.

In creative we are thinking about colour mixing to change the shade of one specific colour by adding a little bit of white paint.

Don't forget to order your photographs.

Sorry due to a problem with blog this week we are unable to load any photos.

Royal Wedding!

2011-04-28T15:32:00.004+01:00

WOW! What a busy and fun 2 days we have had!

We have been creative and made crowns for our 'playground party', been musical and learnt new songs to sing at our party, made a memory mat so we always remember exactly what we were doing at the time of the Royal Wedding and dressed up in red, white and blue for our playground party!

Here are some photographs of us enjoying our party.

This half term we are going to be focusing on water. Next week we are going to learn where we find water: rivers, taps and rain; what we use water for: drinking and washing and the different noises that water can make. We are going to be experimenting with different objects in the water to create sounds and then have a go at writing the sounds we hear. In creative we are going to be making wax resist water pictures using wax crayons and Brusho.

We hope you have a lovely long weekend and enjoy the Wedding!

Next Term!

2011-04-06T13:33:00.003+01:00

A BIG thank-you to all the parents and helpers on our school trip to Mill Green.

We had lots of fun and learnt lots of exciting new things. The Miller told us all about the Mill and how the water wheel turns the cogs to grind the wheat into flour. We used the flour to bake some bread, made shakers with the wheat and made our own badges!

Here are some photographs of us on our first school trip!

After Easter we have a 2 day week (Wednesday 26th and Thursday 27th).

On these 2 days we will be taking part in activities associated with the Royal Wedding. We are going to be making our own crowns and tiaras using finger paints, making our own bunting for a playground/street party on Thursday afternoon and making our own memory mat to record information about ourselves such as our friends, favourite colour and which class we are in.

We hope you all have a restful Easter Break!

Mill Green Museum!

2011-04-01T16:11:00.005+01:00

This week we had a special treat! Mrs Coates (Gracie’s Mum) came into school on Thursday and taught us some Monkey Music. We all had a go at singing, dancing and playing a drum in different ways - tapping, rolling,scratching adn banging! We made lots of noise and had lots of fun!

Next week we are going to be really busy as it is the last week of term and it’s our school trip! We will be reading the story about The Little Red Hen, discussing the characters and sequencing the events in the story. We are looking forward to our trip to Mill Green Museum (thank you so much to all of the parent helpers who volunteered to come with us.) We will be listening to the miller who will explain all about how to grind wheat, making our own bread and making badges and shakers!

We will be carrying on learning about adding and the number bonds to 5 and 10.

As we investigated with magnets last week we are going to be taking our learning forward by investigating the different materials in our classroom and trying to describe them.

We will learn about Easter and how it is a special time of year to some people and we are going to make some chocolate nests and notice the changes that happen to the ingredients - there may be a treat in the nest!!!

Spring Time!

2011-03-25T16:14:00.005Z

Thank you to everybody who came to watch our assembly.

The children did really well and made us all proud.

This week we have been really busy with rehearsing for our assembly, but have had time to go on a spring walk.

Here are some pictures of the signs of Spring which we found.

Next week we are going to be thinking about Mother's Day and how special our families are. We are also going to be thinking about magnets and investigating which materials are magnetic.

Assembly

2011-03-18T16:03:00.006Z

This week we have been very busy making fruit kebabs, learning how to stay healthy and planting cress seeds.We had great fun laughing at what we wore for Red Nose Day!!

Here are some photographs of us making our fruit kebabs.

Next week we are going to be doing a lot of rehearsing for our assembly on Friday! We will be practising how to use loud voices as well as our acting skills. We have already started to learn a song too! We hope that you are able to come and watch us in our first ever school assembly.

We will also be learning about the seasons, signs of spring in our local environment and in maths we will be learning which numbers are 1 more or 1 less than a given number.

Tadpoles!

2011-03-11T17:13:00.005Z

A big thank-you to everyone who came to our Fair trade Cafe, we raised just over ₤95.

Now we have some Frogspawn in Reception which have already hatched out of the eggs and turned into little Tadpoles. Some of us have looked really closely at them in ChIL and have drawn pictures and added information to them for our Reception Tadpole Diary.

This week we have had good fun acting out the story of The Enormous Turnip and looking closely at vegetables.

Next week in KUW (Knowledge and Understanding of the World) we are going to be planting cress and finding out the best conditions for it to grow. We are also going to find out the best way for us to stay healthy and how it is important to eat, drink water, exercise and sleep to stay healthy as well as thinking about our personal hygiene. At the end of the week we are going to make our own fruit skewers, working really hard on our fine motor control and being really careful when cutting the fruit with the knives.

I'm sure we will love eating them afterwards!

The Enormous Turnip!

2011-03-04T16:12:00.003Z

We had great fun dressing up on World Book Day!

We made a class dictionary and had a book read to us in Polish.

This term we are focussing on Traditional Tales and we are going to be learning the story of 'The Enormous Turnip'. We are going to remember the sequence to help us to act out the story.

We are also going to do observational drawings of different vegetables and make sure we look really closely at all the detail.

As it is our Fairtrade Cafe on Thursday we are going to be learning about Fairtrade and using Fairtrade cotton to make bunting. We look forward to seeing as many of you as possible - bring lots of money!

Half Term

2011-02-17T15:59:00.009Z

This week in Reception we have been very busy! We have cut scales, out of colour mixing swatches for the Rainbow Fish display (using our cutting skills and overlapping skills), made Treasure Maps out of the PE equipment (Creative Development) and have been looking at the changes to our environment (Knowledge and Understanding of the World).

Here are some photographs of our Treasure Maps.

The first week back after half term is World Book Week and we are concentrating on Information books. We are going to be finding out about dictionaries and each class in the school will be making their own one. Don't forget to dress up as something from an information book on Thursday 3rd March.

After half term our main focus is going to be on Traditional Tales. The children will learn some Tradition Tales and use them in all areas of the curriculum in different ways. We even have a trip booked to Mill Green Museum to meet the miller and find out how to make bread, just like in the Little Red Hen!

We hope you have a restful half term!

Teddies and Friends

2011-02-11T10:29:00.000Z

Thank you to all our parent helpers this week. Hope everybody enjoyed the Tea Parties.

Please remember to bring in a Soft Toy on Monday next week for our learning. They will be returned on Friday. It would be really useful if we could get a wide variety of different soft toys to use.

Have a good weekend.

Welcome to the Reception Class Blog

2011-02-09T09:37:00.000Z

Friday 18th February - 9.15 Whole School Assembly, All Parents welcome