In literacy this week the children have been read a story about Aliens coming to earth to destroy it! They have worked really hard to write to the Aliens to scare them into not visiting Earth! The children have done well and lucky no Aliens have turned up!

In maths we have been using Aliens to practise our subtraction. The children dressed up as Aliens and we counted them and then sent some back to their spaceship! The children loved it and some started to write their own number sentences!

For RE this week we looked at the story of Feeding the five thousand. They were amazed that 5 loaves of bread and 2 fish multiplied to feed the crowd of five thousand people. The children also had a chance to taste different types of bread, such as: Poppadoms, Pitta bread, Baguette, Crumpets and Potato Farls! They also got to touch a trout, they were using some great describing words to explain how it felt, like slimely, cold, slippery and scalely!

Hello and welcome back, we hope you all had a lovely relaxing Christmas and spent time catching up with friends and family.

The children have settled back in well this week and we have had some amazing learning done by them. The first week back certainly started off with a blast as we launched our Space topic. All the children seem to be really engaged and the whole early years team are really impressed with the children’s knowledge of space already!

The children’s achievement was also celebrated this week with Year R going to the Golden Key celebration assembly. Each week one member from each class will be nominated to win the Golden Key. Children are rewarded the Golden Key by showing good learning behaviours and using the gifts that God gave them to achieve something  amazing. Children will also have the opportunity to win Showstopper writing, this is awarded to someone who has shown they have tried hard and used their phonics to write. Finally, Marvelous Mathematician will also be award once a month to a child from each class who shown us some brilliant number or shape work. We look forward to celebrating these achievements with the rest of the school!

On Thursday we had an outdoor afternoon where we looked for signs of Spring. Children had to be detectives and let us know if there were more signs of Winter or Spring. There were a few mixed views, and some really good explanations of why the children thought it was Winter/Spring. We will continue to talk about the four seasons and keep our eyes peeled for the signs of Spring!

Some useful information and reminders:

• 29th January: Pizza Express visit for Seahorses class.
• 5th February: Pizza Express visit for Starfish class. Letters to follow in January. We will require some adult helpers!
• Tuesday 12th February 10.00 am Liturgy.
• Half term: 18th – 22nd February.

In the last 2 weeks we have stepped up the festiveness! Year R have made some lovely crafts and keepsakes for Christmas 2018.

Last week we also had Christmas jumper day, we saw some amazing jumpers, ones that lit up, cool Santa Claus’ and even a full elf costume!

The children had an early Christmas lunch, as on Tuesday the whole school sat down for a traditional Christmas dinner with Christmas carols – a huge thank you to the ladies in the kitchen who made it!

A little Christmas treat arrived for the children in the form of a Pantomime. Treehouse theatre company gave us a brilliant performance of Robin hood. The children thoroughly enjoyed watching and joining in!

Remember it is an inset day on Friday 21st December and the start of the Christmas holidays. We hope you all have a lovely Christmas and enjoy your time off to catch up on family time and sleep! We look forward to seeing you all refreshed in the New Year.

Merry Christmas from the Early Years Team.

The Nativity:
Last week reception partook in their very first Nativity at school, all went well despite a technical hitch! The children looked lovely in their costumes and all the staff in early years are so proud of them.

Advent:
Year R also had their second outing on a trip to the Church where they watched an Advent service and sung some songs. They also looked at Advent in worship and made their very own class wreath, exploring the meaning of the candles.

STEM day:
On Friday we had a whole school STEM (science, technology, engineering and maths) day. In early years we thought about the materials that would be best for building Jesus’ stable. Which would be strongest and most waterproof? We put cardboard and sugar cubes in water to see what would happen and tested plastic film to see if it kept things dry. We then all had a go at building using a range of materials in the classroom: junk, lego, sugar cubes, paper straws and plastic straws and rolled up paper tubes. We had a great time finding out!!

It has been a busy week full of new experiences for Year R.

Year R had their first school trip to the library on Wednesday. Although it was a long walk we made it there and back! The lovely ladies at the library showed us around the children’s floor and told us about the exciting activities that they have on Saturdays, like Lego club and board game mornings! They then read us some of their favourite stories, they were very funny!

As well as our first school trip we have been busy practising for our Nativity. We are learning lots of new songs and get to perform on stage. Letters have been sent out for grown ups to get tickets to watch our performance as well as notifying the role that their child will be playing. Please ensure that you are bringing in costumes so they are in school and ready for our performance on Wednesday 5th December.

Dear Parents                                                                                                                           19.11.18

Next week we will be learning…

Maths: In maths next week we will be learning about more and fewer. Children will be able to select the group which has more/fewer items in it. At home you could support this learning by sharing out toys and getting the children to find which group has more /fewer toys in.

Literacy: In literacy next week we will be thinking about how to enrich our spoken language by introducing new vocabulary and exploring new words and meanings. With this in mind we will be sending home some ‘talk homework’ on a separate letter. This is designed to support our learning in school and enable the children to spend quality time with you at home talking and exploring new words. This week we will be using the Christmas story as a vehicle to explore new words. Each week we will be sending home a ‘top tip for talking’. Please see below for this weeks tip. Talking and exploring new words is so important at this stage in their development. Enjoy the talking!

Phonics: Next week we will be learning the letters h, b, f and l and learning to read the high frequency words no, to, the and go. Perhaps you could write the words on the fridge or around the house and see if they can read the words as they pass during the day?

Other events….

• We had a lovely visit to the chapel at Oaklands School last week. A big thank you to the school and Miss Keogh, the Chaplin, for letting us come and compare the symbols of worship we use in class with those in the chapel.
• On Friday 9^th we had a special assembly with the rest of the school where we looked at all the work that has been going on relating to remembrance. The children had worked with Mrs Pearson to make a cross out of purple poppies which commemorated the animals who lost their lives in the first World War.

Some useful information and reminders!

• Phonics meeting: 30 on Tuesday 20^th November.
• Please continue to bring in the costumes and ticket slips for the Nativity. It is also important that your child has lots of opportunity to practise their lines (if they have any!) so please support them at home.
• Parents evening is coming soon! We look forward to seeing you all on the evenings of either 27^th or 28^th You will be asked to sign up electronically for a session in due course.
• Reminder that there will be a whole school INSET day on Friday 30^th

Top tip for talking!

Younger children might find it difficult to tell you about their day at school. To support them, try giving choices like “did you paint a picture or play on the swings?” or ask “tell me one good thing that happened today”. You could say one good thing about your day too, just to get the conversation going.

The Early Years team

Dear Parents                                                                                                  08.11.18

What a busy week we had last week! The children were very busy with their learning and are really showing us their progress with writing small words and hearing initial and other sounds in words. Use the letter cards to make small words for the children to further develop these skills. We have been talking about Remembrance and on Friday we will sing a song and show the rest of the school some art work we have done in relation to the animals who helped us during World War 1. We hope you will spend some time on Sunday thinking about the 100 years since the end of the war.

Next week we will be learning…

Maths: In maths next week we will be looking at measuring things. We will be ordering different items by length and using the mathematical language of long, short, tall etc. Have a go at measuring things at home. How many pencils long is the table? Can they estimate before they find out? Which item is longest, and which shortest?

Literacy: In literacy this week we will learn how to write sentences. We will be looking at some dragon words and how these can be used in our writing. Some children will be sent home with Dragon words this week, please talk to them about how they can’t use their sounds to read the words but need to learn them by sight.

Phonics: Next week we will be learning the letters ck, e, u, and r  and learning to read the high frequency words to, get, got , the, put and and. Perhaps you could write the words on the fridge or around the house and see if they can read the words as they pass during the day?

Other events….

• Miss Ingleby has now left Starfish class after finishing her placement. The children have really enjoyed having her with us and we wish her well in whatever lies ahead!

Some useful information and reminders!

• Phonics meeting: 3.30 on Tuesday 20^th November.
• If your child is now 5 and they still would like milk at school, please logon to coolmilk and register. You will now need to pay a small subscription for them to have it.
• Some parents of older children have been asking us about bugclub. This year the school will not be subscribing to bug club. If you wish to access other books for your child please use books from the library or others you may have at home where you can practise segmenting for reading and identifying the high frequency words and letters learnt in the text.
• With the Nativity and Christmas fast approaching we will be sending home a letter about costumes to all children. Please keep an eye out for this! Some children will also have some words to learn. Please help them at home. Thank you.

The Early Years team

Dear Parents

And so a new half term begins!! We hope you all had a restful and enjoyable holiday and a not too scary Halloween!

Next week we will be learning…

Maths: In maths next week we will be thinking about what is one more or one less than a number. We will be using our fingers and other objects to help us and using bigger numbers for the children who are confident to tell us without any support.

Literacy: In literacy this week we will be writing messages in a bottle to a pirate! We will be building on our work last week, thinking about the initial and other sounds in words and recording them. The children have been working really hard to blend sounds to read small words and segmenting them to help them write. If you could support them at home in this by making small words with the letters we are sending home and encouraging them to write any sounds they can hear that would be great. Don’t worry if your child is not yet ready for this! Play eye spy, practise the letter sound cards and enjoy reading together. Thank you.

Phonics: Next week we will be recapping the letters we have learnt so far and teaching the children the tricky words ‘the, no, go ‘ and ‘I’. Please could you practise these with the children at home.

Other events….

On Friday we will be having a History day as a school, looking at Remembrance in the context of World War 1. We will be doing some art work, thinking about the differences in how people lived  then in comparison to us  and learning a song as well as visiting the chapel at Oakland’s school where we will be having some quiet time following our whole school assembly in the morning.

Some useful information and reminders!

• A parents meeting about phonics will take place at30 on Tuesday 20^th November. Please come along so that you can hear how we will be teaching phonics in the coming weeks.
• We will be going to the library on 21^st November. A reminder to return any late paperwork.
• Please return any washed PE kits that are not back at school.

Thank you

The Early Years team

This week we have been very busy guessing / estimating in maths. We have been drawing round our feet and hands, guessing how many multi link cubes will fit in our hand print and then finding our by counting. We had great fun learning! We have also been doing lots of writing, exploring the sounds we could hear and writing them. We have learnt so much in such a short time!

Dear Parents                                                                                                                           29.10.18

The children and staff of St Peters are very sad to see Mrs Light go this week. It will be very strange not to have her in Early Years after such a long time being at the centre of it. She has been a much loved teacher to all those that have been through seahorse class and her vibrancy and enthusiasm will be missed by us all. We wish her well in her next adventure.

Next week we will be learning…

Maths: In maths this week we will be thinking about estimating or ‘guessing’! We will be asking the children to estimate how many of something there is and then counting to find out. Can they find the numeral to match?

Literacy: In literacy this week we will be introducing the children to our new pirate theme by reading stories about pirates and writing labels to go in our role play areas. We will also be focusing on children writing their names. If you could practise this with your child at home that would be great. Remember to encourage using our non-cursive lowercase script.

Phonics: Next week we will be looking at the sounds ‘g,o,c and k’, learning the synthetic sound and the matching grapheme (written letter).

Some useful information!

• A parents meeting about phonics will take place at30 on Tuesday 20^th November. Please come along so that you can hear how we will be teaching phonics in the coming weeks.
• We will be going to the library on 21^st November. We would be really grateful for some parent helpers. There is lots of time to get your DBS check if you would like to support us. Please go and see the office to discuss it with them. Thank you to all those of you who have already returned this paperwork.
• Please remember to return any news orders for photos and Christmas card pictures and orders as soon as possible.
• Please let us know as soon as possible if you have still not received the Tapestry notification. We would really like to move over to this form of communication after half term. Thank you for you cooperation. This will be our last letter in the book bags/via parent mail before they are sent out every week only on the blog or Tapestry.
• The PE kits have been sent home to you. Please return washed PE kits on the first day of the new half term.
• We welcome Miss Deacon to Seahorses after half term. Please help us in making her feel welcome!

Happy half term to you all and we look forward to seeing you all on the 29^th October.

Thank you

The Early Years team