Reception Class News 16:09:22

Our first full week!

Well done Reception class, we have completed our first full week of learning.

Whilst we may have had a few tired faces today, we have still manage to pack in a lot of fun.
Let's share what we have been doing this week...

Physical Development

In our first PE session, we warmed up our bodies by playing a noughts and crosses game. In teams of three we took turns to see if we could be the first team to complete a row of three using our coloured ban bags.After our warm up we lined up at four sides of a square to one another and crossed over when instructed trying to avoid others in our way by dodging. We discovered that to do this skill well we needed to move carefully and in control of our speed. As we became more confident we became quicker at transferring our weight from one foot to the other so to pass on a different side, dodging left and right.

We have really enjoyed our introduction to invasion games and played a game of north, east, south and west where we competed in four groups to cross over to the opposite side of the square to pass a ball to their team. We had to work together to ensure each line didn't come to a stop.
Our final game was called sharks and minnows, where we applied our dodging skills to get past the shark in the centre of the square. If he caught us we turned to seaweed and had to help the shark catch more minnows. No wonder we needed a cool drink and time for our bodies to rest!

Literacy Development

In our literacy development we have begun our daily Read Write Ink phonics sessions. This week we have practiced reading and writing the sounds: m, a, s, d and t. Fred our phonics frog has joined us each day, sadly he can only talk in sounds so luckily we were able to help him blend those sounds into words. I think he really appreciated our help and is utterly amazed how speedy we have become at this!

We have also continued to reread our class story Mr Gumpy's outing and created a story map to help retell the story using the story language and Makaton actions. Once confident with our story telling we independently made our own story maps. They look fabulous and show how well we know the story.

Personal, Social and Emotional Development and Mental Wellbeing

This week we have been introduced to Boris the Robot in our Heartsmart session. We discovered that Boris was built from scrap, old gears and cogs and unwanted bits and bobs. Boris lives with a family who helped to build him and love him very much. Boris is very special because he is a robot with a heart. We will be learning with Boris over the coming weeks how to love ourselves and others.

Mathematical Development

This week our mathematical learning focus has been counting forwards and backwards to three, linking our counting skills with concrete objects and then pictorial representations. This allowed us to focus on 1:1 matching so that we didn't count to quickly so we could make the link between an object and the number. We understood that the last number spoken was also the total number of objects we could see. Over the week we have used and understood mathematical language: count, backwards, forwards, how many, in total and altogether. In our maths journal we have been able to reflect on our learning and independently demonstrate our understanding of three by showing different ways to make three with objects and picture.

Understanding the World

We have joined in worship each day in class to familiarise ourselves with the cultural practices that form part of our Christian school worship. We have joined in discussions about the creation story found at the beginning of the bible and reflected on the things we are thankful for.

Today was a very exciting day as we joined our Year 6 buddies as they led the whole school. I think the whole school were amazed how well we sat and joined in and our year 6 buddies are especially excited to be joining us and leading our new starters welcome service at Church next week.

Expressive Arts and Design

This week we had our first music lesson and what fun it was!
We started the session by listening to Celebration by Kool and the Gang. We loved listening to this song and found that it made us want to move our bodies and dance, some of us even clapped along, keeping the rhythm and beat. Then for the next part of our lesson we played a game where we listened to a piece of music and we had to find the beat. We did this in different ways, including; clapping, tapping, marching, jumping and hopping.

During the last part of our lesson we learnt the words and actions to 'Pat a Cake' we had great fun changing the name and first initial to our own names.

Have a great weekend reception class
See you all Tuesday
Mrs Ward and Mrs Wainwright