Reception Class News 04/10/24

Reception Class, we have had another fun filled week of laughter and learning.
Let's share a snapshot of some of the things we have been doing...

Understanding the World: This week in RE, we continued exploring the concept of how we are all different and special. Building on last week's lesson, we discussed the importance of our names and how each one is unique to our families. We finally completed our child size image of God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Clever Cub joined our session and asked if we ever felt worried. We talked about some of the worries we have and listened to a story from Clever Cub based on Matthew 6:25, where Jesus teaches about not worrying and putting our trust in God. We then created a "Worry Box," drawing pictures of our worries and offering them to God..

We have also been exploring the Christian tradition of celebrating Harvest. We've been learning about how Harvest is celebrated in different ways, such as decorating schools and churches, singing songs, saying prayers, and donating food to people in need. To support this tradition, we have reached out to the school community through emails to parents and a website post, asking for donations of food and toiletries. We have already received some generous contributions, and we want to extend a huge thank you for your kindness and support so far! Your generosity will make a big difference to those in need.

Expressive Arts and Design: This week in music, we had lots of fun starting the session by listening to Happy Birthday by Stevie Wonder, which made us laugh because we had two birthdays in class! We discussed what we enjoy doing on our birthdays, like eating cake, opening presents, and spending time with family. The song made us feel like we were celebrating, and we danced along with excitement. We then continued our learning about keeping the beat, experimenting with different ways of clapping and marching to both fast and slow beats. We also introduced a new song, Five Little Ducks, and enjoyed singing along and doing the actions.

Personal, Social, and Emotional Development: In our HeartSmart session, we learned to express different feelings and emotions. We began by singing If You're Happy and You Know It and then explored other emotions like sad, grumpy, excited, scared, and proud. We sang these emotions with matching actions, such as stomping for anger or hugging ourselves to show love. We learned that emotions come from our hearts, and it's important to let good feelings stay and let bad ones out. As Boris reminded us, "How we feel starts in our hearts." We also connected this with the Bible verse from Psalm 100:1, "Shout for joy to the Lord, all the earth."

Mathematical Development: This week, we continued learning to count to 5 using the counting principles we've developed over the past few weeks. We discovered that counting is sometimes tricky when objects are in irregular arrangements. We found that we could count more accurately when we lined up the objects and touched each one as we counted. Using the five-frame, we represented numbers with real objects, pictures, and numerals (1, 2, 3, 4, and 5), reinforcing our understanding.

Literacy Development: In literacy this week, we continued with 'The Something' and 'Dan and the Red Ball.' We worked on retelling the stories, focusing on the opening scenes. As part of this, we sang the story song, used a storyboard, and drew different items and objects to help us remember the sequence of events and key words. Each day, we wrote a few sentences using our story plan to aid us, concentrating on using capital letters, finger spaces, neat handwriting, and full stops at the end of our sentences.

Physical Development: This week, in PE with Coach James, we continued our focus on invasion games. We practiced running at different speeds, dodging, and moving with awareness of others around us. The class showed great team spirit and fairness while playing, ensuring we followed the rules and supported each other.

Have a lovely weekend
Mrs Ward