Autumn 2
Autumn 2 2022
Our EYFS children have been working extremely hard since starting school in September. They have been enjoying daily phonic sessions through our Song of Sound scheme, literacy and math sessions through Power Maths, along with learning through their interests in their choosing time.
In Reception we are very lucky that we can take our learning both indoors and outdoors. The children have loved exploring and sharing adventures in the classroom, the outside area, the hall in P.E lessons, the art classroom and also the forest area.
With the children enjoying daily phonics they are beginning to apply these skills in other areas. Writing in a variety of ways such as labels, letters, short words and even having a go at super sentences. It is fantastic to see their enthusiasm to write. Reception are also off to a flying start with their reading. Segmenting and blending new words that they come across, recognising tricky words and beginning to build up fluency. We have introduced the hashtag on tapestry #readingrecord and have enjoyed seeing all our children reading at home.
We have also introduced #Oracy, to share wonderful examples of the children applying the key vocabulary learned during the week.
Along with all these new skills, the children have also learnt to make new friends, solve conflicts and have all grown in confidence and independence.
We have introduced a new #ParentNoticeBoard through Tapestry to share any good articles, research and strategies to support awareness of child development. We hope you have found these resources useful.
This half term we are kicking off our learning with the topics of
'Smells, Spells, Lotions and Potions' and 'Let's Celebrate.' Through these hooks the children will have the opportunity to explore meaningful celebrations for themselves and the wider community and world. These include Halloween, Bon Fire Night, Diwali, Remembrance Day and Christmas. Through focusing on meaningful experiences the children will have the opportunity to develop their awareness of similarities between celebrations, the opportunity to build up vocabulary to share experiences and also develop a sense of historical events and why they are celebrated.
We will be exploring key texts such as:
Please click on the title of each story to view an interactive version of the story.
Please continue to practise your Songs of Sounds phonic song to reinforce your knowledge of letter sounds
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=48uf9I6P2xQ&safe=true
PE sessions to be held every Friday morning (please bring in a labelled PE uniform to be kept on the school grounds till PE session and then taken home after each session for washing - as per government guidance). Please also remember to celebrate the children's independent attempts at getting changed.
Learning logs will be handed out every Friday to be returned the following week with completed work by very latest Thursday.
Autumn 2
PSED & C&L
This half term our topic will be 'Smells, Spells, Potions and Lotions / Let's Celebrate'
We will be thinking about celebrations we share as a family and those that are experienced within the wider community. We use Tapestry to share experiences from home and use our language to communicate confidently using our Oracy strategies:
- Listening to the children who are speaking
- Projecting our voices to speak clearly
- Speaking in clear sentences
- Using vocabulary to express our ideas
- Looking at our audience when we are speaking
- Making sure our hands and fingers are away from our mouths to promote clarity
Phonics
This half term the children will be exposed to a range of phonemes (the way sounds are pronounced) and their corresponding graphemes (the way the sound is written). They will have the opportunity to form the graphemes and apply the phonemes to read a range of words. We will be also be learning how to spot the phonemes in words and how to use sound buttons to blend the sounds together to form words.
We will also be learning different strategies to support to read words (blending and segmenting words).
Click here for a video link to the Song Of Sounds
The Song of Sounds powerpoint has been added to a separate folder above.
Reading
Reading is promoted through application of phonics. We are also promoting reading for pleasure through our reading corner. Each week we have the opportunity to explore a core book to develop the children's vocabulary and imagination. We send home reading books and reading records so you can enjoy reading together at home. Each child will also to read to an adult at least twice a week in school. During this half term we will also be taking the children in small groups to our school library. This will be a fantastic way to develop reading for pleasure and also extending children's vocabulary.
Please use the #readingrecord to add a note on Tapestry about your child's reading progress.
Writing
The children will continue to learn how to form letters as part of their Phonics lessons. They will also practise writing words using the graphemes they have learned so far, especially those linked to the focus text of the week, for example the characters in 'Room on the Broom:' cat, dog, frog
There will always be free access to pens and paper throughout our setting and children will be encouraged to make marks, draw and write throughout the day. We will also have dedicated fine motor activities to help develop the muscles needed to write such as exploring playdough, pincers and small resources.
Maths
At Silver End Academy we follow the Power Maths scheme of work. This half term we will be learning about 2 D and 3D shapes. We will also find 1 more / 1 less than numbers within 5. We will be exploring number bonds to 5, introducing the concept of part-whole model: If 5 is the whole, 3 and 2 are the parts, or 4 and 1. The children will also have the opportunity to develop their vocabulary to describe the position of objects. They will look at items from different viewpoints and describe their position using the vocabulary: in, on, below, under, up, down, across, between.
Understanding of the World
We will continue to explore the natural world around us and learn about seasonal changes, especially those that take place between Autumn and Winter, and changing states of matter, for example water to ice on frosty days, or soft salt dough to hard, dried salt dough. Through the topics of Diwali and Christmas, we will learn that people have different beliefs and celebrate special times in different ways. Through the focus texts that we will explore this half term, we will learn about the past through settings, characters and events encountered in books read in class and storytelling.
Physical Development
The children are taught PE by a dedicated Sports Coach. Our PE sessions are held every Friday morning. Please ensure that your child brings in their PE kit into school every Monday, it will be sent home each Friday to be washed.
We also have a range of fine motor activities in the classroom and the children are encouraged to use gross motor movements whilst playing outside in the garden.
Our Code of Conduct: As a class we developed a bank of rules for us all to follow
- We share with our friends
- We will help to tidy up
- We use kind hands and feet
- We listen to each other
- We use our manners
Phonic News
Please continue to practise your songs of sounds phonic song to reinforce your knowledge of letter sounds
Please find attached some links to phonic games that your child can explore to develop their awareness of and discrimination of sounds.