Reception class news 21:01:22

Reception class, you have made me very proud this week of your great learning attitudes. There have been moments where we have found some areas of our learning tricky, but I have loved how you have persevered and practiced to master some of our learning concepts.

Let's share what we have been doing...

Creative Arts and Design

In our music session we focussed on lullabies. We thought that a lullaby is a song that we sing to a baby to help them to go to sleep. We listened to a lullaby from South Africa called Thula Baba by Hiabalela Ensemble. We really liked the song and said it made us feel happy. We said that we could hear a xylophone as well as maracas and a drum, we learnt that the drum had a special name; a djembe drum. We decided that it would be difficult to get to sleep whilst listening to this lullaby as it was quite loud, we spoke about how we normally sing lullabies quietly. However, we learnt that in South Africa mothers would normally always carry their babies wrapped closely to their heart and would have swayed slowly whilst singing this song, we all stood up and slowly swayed to the music which helped us to understand how a baby would be rocked to sleep. To end our session we enjoyed learning a traditional lullaby; rock a bye baby.

We were very excited to begin our DT project this week and started by looking at pictures of different styles of houses: farmhouse, bungalow, semi detached and detached homes to chose which one we would like to construct. After sorting through our junk modelling resources we managed to find the size and shape of box needed to create the main body of the house. Using masking tape and glue we then began to add the roof structure and roof tiles. Once constructed we then painted them and added the windows and doors for detail. we are very pleased with them, they look great.

Mathematical Development

Our focus for learning this week was counting to 10 using the ten frame to scaffold our counting. We began with our starter session, where we checked that we could count to 8 accurately and represent this in a 10 frame, ensuring that we filled up the top row first and then added the remaining counters on the bottom row. this allowed us to see that 8 was made up of 5 and 3. After listening to a story about birthday buttons, we played a guessing game to determine how many buttons were in a box. To check we focused on one-to-one correspondence and cardinality, that the last number we said was the total. We then created some lovely button birthday cards.

In our discover session, we explored different containers of objects where we checked out counting by counting the objects out of the container and back in again to see if the amount was the same. Using the ten frame we represented the containers that showed nine, again filling the top row of our frame and then the bottom row. this allowed us to see that 9 is made up of five and four.

Thinking together, we looked at different ten frames and discussed the similarities and differences and concluded that it doesn't matter how a frame is positioned it will still hold the same number of counters to represent a given number. using our number frames to represent numbers we discussed how if we always fill up our top row first and it has five counters we don't always have to begin counting at 1, we could begin at 5 (subitise) and count on.

In our challenge activity we looked at identifying odd ones out in groups of objects by counting accurately and representing in a large ten frame on the carpet for our friends to check our accuracy. This gave us the opportunity to consolidate our counting on skills by starting counting from a recognised number point rather than at 1.

To consolidate our learning in our journal work we counted out objects 9 and 10 objects from a larger amount, using different methods to help us count efficiently. This had been our trickiest learning in maths so far, but I am proud Reception of how hard you have worked this week to master this concept. You are marvellous mathematicians!

Literacy Development

In our daily phonics sessions we have continued to recap known sounds and explored new sounds in listening, reading and writing activities. 

Building upon our talk for writing work last week, we have continued to develop our story language,  using intonation and actions to retell the story of the Gingerbread man. We then explored the different symbols and drawings to represent characters and events in the story from the class story map and then confidently had a go at creating our own story map, recalling the main events of the story.  

Communication and Language Development
We have continued to share and enjoy our class story 'Hansel and Gretel' by Michael Morpurgo,  exploring new vocabulary and plot twists! We have reached the part of the story where the children have followed the talking magpie to the gingerbread cottage in the woods. Gretel's suspicions about the jolly old lady have proved right and the children are now trapped by the wicked witch Belladona. We were horrified when she said she was going to eat them roasted with buttered parsnips, boiled beetroot, gravy and lots of pepper and parsley! Thankful, and much to our relief , Gretel has a plan. We can't wait until Monday to hear what it is. 

Physical Development
This week we continued with our gymnastics topic in our PE session. We all remembered how to sit like gymnasts and think we look very smart! We started our lesson by warming up with a game of Follow The Leader, we made one long line and copied off the the person in front of us; we jogged, jumped, walked with large strides and walked like gymnasts.

Then we practiced our rocking and rolling to recap what we learnt last week, we did some dish rocks on our back and front and learnt how to do a log roll from our front to back. after which we then split into two groups to learn some new skills; in the first group we started to learn how to perform a teddy bear roll, this was tricky and we think it will take some practice! In the second group we used the beam to practice our balancing, we walked slowly across, using our arms for balance and jumped off when we reached the end. We are really looking forward to continuing to practice these new gymnastics skills and to learning some new things too.

Personal, Social and Emotional Development

In our Heartsmart session we learnt about ways that people show how they are feeling and to notice when others are upset or need help. We looked at different pictures of people and looked at their facial expressions to decide how they felt; we saw faces that looked happy, sad, grumpy, bored, upset and angry. We talked about how it is ok to feel sad or angry, but it's important not to stay that way and to maybe even ask for help so that we can feel happy again.

We discussed what we can do if we notice somebody is upset? And decided that we can – help them, look after them and show them love, give them a hug or a kiss. We also said that we can ask them if they are ok or if they need help. Finally we enjoyed drawing our own facial expressions onto different blank faces, we chose lots of different ones including happy, sad, tired, shocked and angry. Boris says "Noticing how others feel is a great way to show you care."

This links to Luke 6:13 "Do for others just what you want them to do for you"

Understanding the World Development

This week we continued with our unit of work exploring the concept of the Kingdom of God. Reflecting back on last weeks discussion about what makes a good king and the qualities they might have we played 'If I were a king or queen for a day.' We set up our throne area with a crown to wear and took turns to discuss what we would do. I think we have some extremely thoughtful and helpful kings and queens amongst us. Next week we will explore how and why Jesus was treated like a king in the Palm Sunday story.

Have a lovely weekend
Mrs Ward and Mrs Wainwright