Chinese New Year celebrations

Today reception had a joint day with pre-school. All the children got to make some cookies, a concertina dragon, a Chinese lantern and contribute towards a big piece of art that we will put up on a display in school. We took lots of photos today and some of these will be available to see tomorrow morning in the classroom. We will be sending children home with all of their creations tomorrow along with a fortune that the children have written. 

On Friday we will be having some special visitors coming in to reception to show us some Chinese food and talk about life in a house that celebrates Chinese new year.

There are still places available for parents evening. The sign-up sheets are stuck up on the window outside the reception door. 

Reception team 

Joint day with Pre-school

Hello everyone, 

To help us celebrate Chinese New Year we will be having a joint day with Pre-school this Wednesday. This will take place over the whole day and all the children will have the opportunity to do 4 different jobs:

1. Making cookies - these will be put into red envelopes along with the fortunes that we wrote.

2. Chinese lanterns

3. Chinese concertina dragons - you may have seen some of these on the Chinese New Year display in the classroom. 

4. Chinese big art - this will help to form a display for our work. 

We will also be taking lots  of pictures throughout the day to show you on the following days. 

Thank you to everyone that has brought in some new facts about China, these were gratefully received. Please keep them coming! 

Reception team

Chinese New Year!

Hello everyone,

We've got a very busy week coming up. This is the last week we'll be focusing on the Chinese New Year and we've got lots of exciting things to do. 

In Literacy we'll be looking at recipes and having a go at writing some of our own. Obviously that means we'll be doing some cooking in the kitchen and tasting. In maths we are looking at problem solving in different contexts this week. To start you off try and solve this problem:

The farmer’s cows have 5 spots. Some spots are brown and some are orange. How many brown and orange spots could this cow have?

We're also having a joint day with Pre-school where we will be doing a whole variety of activities (more information to follow). On Friday it will be Chinese New Year - see if any children can remember what year we'll be entering... On Friday we will be having a small taste of some traditional Chinese foods - again, more information to follow. 

Finally, all children should now have a complete set of sounds in their sound pots. Please continue to go through these with your children. If you need any help or ideas as to what else can be done please feel free to come and chat to us! 

Reception team

China Challenge...

We have been looking at the country of China in more detail this week. We have seen where China is on a map and discussed how we might get there and how long it might take. We've also spoken about some of the traditions that China holds.

My challenge for you is to see if your children can find out something new about China. You could do this by looking at books or magazines, searching the internet (adults supervise) or just talking about China. I've written some possible questions to answer below. Please bring in your answer to a question on a Wow! Moment. All children will get the chance to share their discovery with the class.  

1. What does the Chinese flag look like?

2. How many people live in China?

3. What is the Great Wall of China?

4. How do you say/write 'hello' in Chinese?

5. How similar is daily life in China compared to England?

Good Luck! 

POWSA Meeting

The next POWSA meeting will be held at the Poet Laureate on Tuesday 28th January at 7.45pm. All welcome.

A new week!

Hello everyone,

Hopefully you will have all read the letter that went home on Friday regarding receptions trip to the beach on 5th February. If anyone is available to help with the trip please come and tell one of us. The more the merrier. 

Also, whilst we are grateful for all the 2l bottles we have received so far, we still need more! Our target is 1500 and so far we have about 100. Still a ways to go. Thank you as well to parents that brought in some materials for junk modelling; any more would be welcome. 

This week we will be building upon the Chinese New Year story with finding out about China. If you get the chance to look at a world map please do so. We'll be thinking about how far away China is and some of the different lifestyles that exist there. The website below is good for letting children see how one place can be light and another dark. 

http://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/sunearth.html

We will also be looking at some traditions and customs that take place in China. This week children will get the opportunity to write fortunes that will go into a fortune cookie as well as explore Chinese numbers. In maths we are looking at capacity, more specifically how we might order capacities from smallest to largest. We'll be thinking about how containers can be shaped differently but still have the same capacity. 

Reception team

The display board is up!

Hello everyone,

I can finally say that the winter display is up outside of reception for you to look at. Unfortunately we couldn't fit all the fabulous work on there but we have kept it and it will be going into learning journeys and art folders. 

Thank you to everyone that has brought it any 2l plastic bottles so far. We are still hunting for more so please continue to bring these in. In the summer we will be making a greenhouse out of them! More details to follow. 

On top of the 2l bottles, we would also be very grateful for any recyclable materials. These will be used in junk modelling and creative work.

Reception team

So Far This Week...

Firstly, thank you to all of you that attended the maths/information session on Monday! If you were unable to attend I have printed out the presentation that I gave and I can also give you a handout that includes a few ideas you could use at home that are maths related!

All the information about the term will be on the newsletter that will come home with your child  this Friday. We have a few trips this term so if anyone is available on those days please mention it to us.

We have started our new topic: Chinese New Year and have looked at the story traditionally told. I wonder if any children can remember some of the animals that were in the race and what positions they came. In relation to the story we begun looking at ordinal numbers in maths. 

Today we had a visit from a very special creature. Courtesy of Mrs. Thorpe all the children were able to see and touch a turtle! All the children were very excited about the visit and asked some very good questions. I wonder if any children can tell you anything that they've learnt today about turtles? 

Throughout the rest of  the week we will be writing some descriptions about the different animals that took part in the race as well as matching objects up to various number cards. The children have also been working very hard to make origami butterflies! These look very good and we have hung the first few up in the classroom. 

P.S - Some children will have come home with new sounds in their sound pot. Please try and use these with your children to familiarise them with the new set of sounds we have covered in class. If anyone needs any help with the sounds please come and ask and we'll be happy to help. 

Next week...

Hello everyone,

We begin a new topic next week: Chinese New Year! We're going to be exploring the origins of Chinese New Year and looking at the story traditionally told. I wonder if you could find out which animal year you were born in? 

http://www.chinesenewyears.info/chinese-new-year-calendar.php - you can use this website!

We'll be doing some writing based on the animals that took part in the story. In maths we're going to be looking at ordinal numbers (1st, 2nd, 3rd etc) and written numerals. We're going to be making sure that children are exposed to written numbers as much as possible so any help with this would be welcome. If you do any work with numbers please write it down on a Wow! Moment and bring it in! Wow! Moments continue to be used in children's learning journeys. 

Tomorrow morning there will be a maths session in the hall so please feel free to come and take a seat after drop off. The main focus will be on maths but I will also briefly cover what it is we'll be up to this term. 

Wow! Moments and Home Learning

Hello all,

As we have just started a new term we thought it would be a good idea to start a new Wow! Moment board and Home Learning display board. We have kept all of the items from these boards and put them in the children's learning journeys. Of course we now need your help to fill these display boards up again! Please feel free to bring in any creative pieces of work or work that involves writing! There are some ideas for home learning up on the parent information board! 

We are also in the process of making a set of our new sounds for every child. These will be going into your child's sound pot so we would kindly ask that all children keep these in their book bags over the next week or so! Thank you.

Reception team

A new term...

Hello everyone and welcome to the Spring term! We've got lots of exciting topics to cover and I will cover them more in detail in the parent session next week and the newsletter that will go out at the end of next week. 

This week we are looking at winter. We have already had lots of good discussions where the children have shared their knowledge. We are working hard to get children to notice how the world around them is changing all the time. In literacy we are working together as a class to make a winter poem that will be displayed just outside our classroom (in ICT suite). In maths we are continuing to work on finding one more/less and moving into counting in 2's. 

In phonics we are only learning one new sound to ease back into the swing of things:

ure - as in sure. The action is hold nose as if you were smelling manure and say ure, ure.

P.S - If you have not already done so, could we please ask that you bring in your child's PE kit. Thank you.

Reception team