Reception M & W 2024 - 2025

Reception Newsletter Autumn 1 2024

Welcome/ Welcome back! We hope you all had a wonderful summer and are ready for the start/return to school! We look forward to working collaboratively to support your child/children to learn, develop and achieve both socially and academically this year. 

This year the Reception staff are; 

Miss Millington (EYFS coordinator) and Mrs Landell (ReceptionM)

Miss Woodcock and Miss Ward (ReceptionW)

When beginning in Reception a key priority is for us to support children to become independent, confident and resilient learners. We consciously spend the first few weeks building positive relationships and creating a fun and safe space that the children both enjoy and feel comfortable in. Our EYFS environment (both Nursery and Reception) is largely organised through the use of the Rainbow challenge; each area in the room is associated with a colour from the rainbow and the children are encouraged to independently explore and take ownership of their own learning by working towards reaching a full rainbow by the end of the week. This is something that our children from Nursery will be confident with! 

The areas include:

Construction area - Blue 

Creative area - Purple 

Maths area - Yellow

Writing area - Red 

Reading area - Green 

Roleplay area - White 

Fine- motor area - Orange  

If they complete the Rainbow they are rewarded with a sticker at the end of the week. 

This half term our topic is called Amazing Me and My community!

During this half term, we will spend a great deal of time talking about our similarities and differences. We will be finding out just how Amazing and unique we all are. We will be talking to the children about the Amazing skills they already possess and what they need to do to make their Amazing skills into SUPER powers! We will also be finding out about real SUPER heroes (People Who Help Us) such as- doctors, nurses, fire-fighters, police officers, vets, dentists, lollipop people, life guards and last but not least- parents and teachers!

We believe that our family histories need to be celebrated and shared with others, so during this half term we will be talking to the children about themselves and their families. To make this learning opportunity successful we need your help, talk to your children about you – what you do, where you come from, let them know about your history, cultural and religious background. I am sure you will be surprised by how interested they are. This will link well with our Investigation topic ‘People who help us’! We would love for parents to come in and talk to the children about their profession whether it be well known (doctor, teacher, firefighter, police officer) or not, so if you would be happy to do so please make this known to staff!

Literacy  

In our literacy lessons the children will have the following focus texts in Autumn 1; 'Ruby's worry' by Tom Percival and 'Super Duper you' by Sophy Henn. Children will have lots of opportunities to work on their literacy skills through a focus on these texts and be encouraged to apply their phonics to complete work around them. 

Maths 

In maths we follow the 'Maths No Problem' scheme and the overview for this term can be seen in the files below. 

Phonics 

Phonics is Phonics is a way of teaching children how to read and write. It helps children hear, identify and use different sounds that distinguish one word from another in the English language. 

At Ashbury Meadow Primary we use the Little Wandle letters and sounds programme to deliver our phonics. Children will have phonics 5 times a week and a minimum of 3 x reading sessions a week to allow them to practise their application of what they have learnt. They will also have access to the same reading book at home and we ask that you please support them with this. 

In their phonics lesson this half term they will learn the following; 

Physical development and PE

Children have the opportunity to exercise and improve their physical development on a daily basis in EYFS both indoors and outdoors during our continous provision and prime time sessions. But each week on a Wednesday they have a PE lesson with City in the community. We ask that they please wear suitable footwear on this day. 

A few quick reminders

Homework – Once the children have settled and routine is well underway homework will be sent home. We appreciate  home life can be chaotic but it really is important that children are supported to reinforce and extend their learning in the home. On Friday’s your child will be sent home with a book for enjoyment that they have chosen for you to read to/with them. They will also be allocated an e-book (online) that they have been reading in their ‘reading practice’ groups in school (as mentioned above) - this is for them to try and read to you,  and to answer questions on to show their understanding. Each child also has a homework book, this will outline their weekly homework and we ask that any written homework please be completed in the book so that we can review their efforts each week when it's returned. The weekly deadline for homework to be returned to school is on a Thursday Morning at drop off which will give us enough time to change their books and mark their homework ready for the new work to be sent home on a Friday! 

Drop off and pick up- Please enter by the Myrtle Street entrance and walk your child up onto the EYFS playground where you will see a class teacher stood ready to welcome them into the classroom. From the week commencing 12th September, the school day will be from 8.40am to 3.10pm. 

Attendance and Punctuality – if your child is not in school on time or off school altogether, they miss out on so much learning – please make sure your child is in school, on time, every day, the gates close at 8:55! 

Outdoor play- please make sure your child has suitable clothing, a waterproof coat, wellingtons, sunhat, gloves, etc.  We go outside everyday come rain or shine! 

Please remember to put names in all clothes, shoes, bags, lunch boxes, etc.

Tapestry  - The online learning journey

At Ashbury Meadow we use the online learning journey called Tapestry. This will be something that you can use at home and see what your child has been learning about in school and to access homework and learning. You will be able to upload homework and observations of your child for the class teacher so it is important that any ‘log on’ issues are sorted ASAP. If your child was in Nursery at Ashbury- your log on details will be the same. If you are new to the school- details will come in due course. 

Useful websites

The school website: 

https://www.ashburymeadow.co.uk/class/reception-m-b 

E book access: 

Online Learning Journal: 

https://tapestryjournal.com/

Oral health: 

https://www.dentalhealthcareeoe.nhs.uk/services/oral-health-improvement/early-years