EYFS

Who's been eating my porridge?

..Everybody! After reading about Goldilocks and the 3 bears, we made some porridge. We all tried it and some of us thought it was "Just right!"

This week we have been learning about the Cinderella story. We have made fairy wands to make wishes with, magic potions, decorated crowns with loose parts and built some brilliant castles.

See how many traditional tales your child can remember.

Welcome to the Spring Term!

This half term our topic is “Traditional Tales". We will be exploring traditional tales and fairy stories, thinking about the settings and characters in them and having a go at telling them ourselves. We will be doing lots of exciting play-based learning such as making porridge, baking gingerbread men, creating fairy wishes and potions, building fairytale castles and making bridges for the 3 Billy Goats to cross over. Keep an eye on our class pages for photographs.

FS2 children are all writing independently and we would love it if you could encourage them at home. Small pieces of independent writing are much more valuable than longer pieces where an adult has had to help. You could try writing labels for things, shopping lists, greeting cards or write a sentence from a book or nursery rhyme. At school we ask children to just 'have a go' at spelling words they don't know; they can use their phonics knowledge from RWI, it doesn't matter if words aren't spelt exactly right, as long as they can tell you what it says. We do try to insist on correct letter formation and finger spaces at all times though.

Nursery children and FS2 children continue to do Read Write Inc, daily. Nursery children are listening to stories, singing nursery rhymes, learning about the RWI characters, developing their fine motor skills and playing words games. FS2 children are learning new 'special friends' sounds (ee, ay, ow etc.) through reading and writing activities. We work slowly through each book ensuring all children have a thorough understanding of the sounds and words we are teaching that week and that they can write them as well as read them. Please make sure you practise their RWI and class reading book at least 3 times each week and sign their reading record accordingly. All FS2 children need a school book bag to keep school books safe and in good condition.

Friday afternoon is our PE session. In line with the rest of the school, we ask that you send your child to school in their PE kits. (Joggers and school jumpers/hoodies can be worn) However, as self-care is an important part of the EYFS curriculum we do encourage children to be independent so please allow your child to dress themselves as much as possible including recognising their own items, putting on their own coat and having a go at the zips and buttons! Children also need to be able to take off and put on their own shoes. If this is something they struggle with, please practise at home.

Please only bring essential items into school. Children need a school book-bag, their own ready filled water bottle (water only!) and a lunch bag/box if they are having packed lunch. Again, please make sure they are all named. You can put spare clothes in their book bag if you are worried about toilet accidents.

We know that the return to school can be unsettling for some children but we can assure you all, once inside the children are all happy and content – any tears or hesitance are just for you! Unless you need to speak with a member of staff, please stick to a short goodbye and allow them to walk up to the gate by themselves. It’s the best way to reassure them that they are safe, great for developing their independence and prevents a bottleneck. After school, please wait a short distance away from the fenced area and we will send the children to you when we see you.

If you have any concerns or would like to talk the Foundation Stage Staff, please feel free to come and speak to us at the end of the day.
Thank you,
The Foundation Stage Team

This week, we have been learning about space travel. We have had a lot of fun playing with the small world space toys, and we built our own space rockets too!

This week, we spotted some great paired play. Often, infant children play alone or alongside others and this in itself is a great skill. Group play is also common, especially outside or during role play. But, it is particularly nice to see children play collaboratively with a partner, especially one who might not normally be in their close circle of friends.

FS2 Reading Books

Well done to all the FS2 children, and their grown-ups!, for great practising of their new reading books. We can really tell when the children have read their books regularly, particularly the sound blending books.

We understand how satisfying it is to see the clear progress children make when they are reading the sound blending books but it is often more difficult to recognise progress when children are 'reading' their books with no words. Please don't overlook the importance of these though, oral storytelling for children is vital as it enhances their creativity, improves their communication and language skills and provides an essential foundation for reading and early writing. This means that when we come to writing simple phrases or stories, children are more familiar with the structure and conventions of the English language.

Oral storytelling has been highlighted in the recently published Early Writing Framework as being fundamental to developing children's writing skills; stating that children must "first speak in sentences before writing them".

As, an example for those who might be struggling for where to start: For a page with a picture of a dog, instead of just saying "The dog" Try saying "This is my dog, his name is Bingo". You can be as creative as you wish, one of our children was able to add storytelling language such as "once upon a time" and "suddenly" to their storytelling!

As always, if you need any support or clarification, please ask a member of the team.

Remembrance in The FSU

Over the last week, the foundation stage children have been learning about the importance of Remembrance Day. We watched a lovely CBeebies animation, made loose part pictures of poppies and decorated poppy biscuits.

Along with the rest of the school, we painted poppies on stones. On Tuesday, we walked to the community gardens where we had a small service of remembrance, observed 2 minutes silence and placed our poppies in the flowerbeds for the community to appreciate.

Autumn Term 2

Welcome back to the second term!

We hope by now you have had the opportunity to speak to one of the members of the FSU team either during FS2 parents evening or on the playground. If there is ever anything you want to know please ask one of us before or after school. Please also keep an eye on our class page on the school website (You will find this under: children – class pages – EYFS) for information about what we have been doing or how to help your child.

This is always a very busy term in school; we learn about Bonfire night, Diwali, Remembrance, Children in Need and of course all of the usual Christmas celebrations.

Our topic is travel and transport. We will be learning about different types of transport, journeys and travel – including space travel!

We still like to get outside as much as possible so please ensure children bring a coat that they can fasten themselves (Please practice this at home if they need it) and gloves and hats when required. This is a good time to remind you to check that everything is named please! Because we take our shoes off to come inside, wellies are not usually required.

FSU 2024-2025

This week we have looked at butterfly life cycles, we have a new desk to write on which has been very popular! we have enjoyed playing outside in the sunshine and recapped pancake day with some messy play!

BBC Bitesize - What is Lent?

Friday:

In school today, we would be learning about Lent. You can follow the link above to watch a short film about Lent and there are some other activities on the page too.

Nowadays, instead of giving something up, lots of people try to do something nice for 40 days - have a think what you could do. Maybe you could make your bed, stack the dishwasher, read your reading book. If you have a good idea, draw a picture or write about it and share it with us at school next week.

Have you shared your skipping skills with your grown-ups yet? If you have a skipping rope, today is a perfect day to get outside and practise. Remember to hold the rope like a penguin, swoosh it over your head and then jump over it!

FS2 Children. Please can you practise your number bonds to 5 - that's the 2 numbers that make 5 when added together. You should be able to recall them quickly. You can practise by finding 5 objects (coins, cubes etc.) and asking your grown up to cover some up. Then, tell your grown-up how many they are hiding by looking at the ones you can see. You could even try it with number bonds to 10 if you fancy a challenge!

Have a lovely weeekend!

World Book Day:

If you haven't done it already, have a go at drawing the front cover of your favourite book - it will be great to share them all in class next week!

Share your favourite book with a grown-up, sibling or friend - can you have a go at "reading" it from memory? FS2 children, I think you can have a go at reading most of the words yourself too!

There are lots of RWI activities for FS2 children to do on yesterday's post - remember, "take care work" is always required when we are writing.

The Very Hungry Caterpillar animated story

Good Morning FSU,

If you would like something to do at home here are some challenges:

1. We have been reading the story of "The Very Hungry Caterpillar". (You can watch the animation using the link above) Then, see if you can make a loose-part caterpillar from different things around the house or in the garden; maybe stones, pasta, coins, fruit pieces etc. You could try to make a repeating pattern! Draw your caterpillar and write about it if you can.

2. Thursday is World Book Day. Can you draw the front cover of your favourite storybook? If you can, write the title and the author/illustrator too. Bring your picture in to school and be ready to tell your friends why it is your favourite book.

3. FS2 children, please make sure you have read all your books at least once. Try to read each sentence a second time without using Fred talk. Read your Red words then turn each card over and have a go at writing the word - remember, you can't sound Red words out easily so try to picture what the word looks like in your mind. There are lots of links to RWI games and lessons on our class page - scroll down to find them.

If you are up for a super challenge, Mrs Murten would like you to use each Red word in a sentence. Remember to use take care handrwiting, a capital letter and a full stop! Challenge accepted?

4. It's going to be a lovely sunny day - go outside and do lots of playing! Maybe try to do something you find tricky like riding your bike or scooter, catching a ball or doing a special bounce on your trampoline!

We had a skipping workshop on Tuesday

It was great fun. We learnt how to hold the skipping rope, how to turn it, jump correctly and time our jumps. At the end of the workshop everybody had made great progress and we all had a fabulous time!

Monday 24^th February 2025

Dear Parents,

Welcome back to term 4.

Our topic this term is called “Come Outside”. It’s a very seasonal topic; we hope to be spotting lots of signs of spring and learning all about new life and how things grow. We will be naming animals and their young and observing life cycles of butterflies, plants, frogs and hens.

Easter is a lovely time in school; we will be looking at Lent and pancake day, why Christians celebrate Easter and we will have an Easter service in the Church.

We will spend as much time outside as we can and are keeping our fingers crossed for lots of nice weather! Please continue to dress your child appropriately for outdoor play.

FS2 Children should all be practicing their reading books regularly – little and often is the key! If you would like to do any extra work at home we recommend looking for words in the environment such as shop signs or packaging, writing little sentences, shopping lists or labels. Playing number games is great for maths practice as is any type of counting. We also encourage questioning such as “how many do we need?” “how many more?” “How many is that altogether?”

If you need any help or ideas please feel free to speak to one of the team before or after school.

Just a reminder that children should be coming in through the FSU gate by themselves. The gate will be closed when the second bell rings at 8.50. If you arrive late you will need to go to the main entrance and register at the office.

Thank you,

The Foundation Stage Team:

Mrs Forrest (Class Teacher)

Mrs Murten

Miss Brason

Thank you to all the FS2 parents who came along to our class assembly on Monday.

We hope you got an idea of how we learn; the activities we do and why we do them, how much we pack in to our school day and how much fun we have!

We have had lots more fun with our traditional tales topic. The children have made gingerbread men and helped to secure the classroom with a "river" in case he tried to run away! We have used a variety of construction to build fairy-tale castles and houses for the 3 little pigs. The children have learnt so much about traditional tales and the FS2 have done some fabulous writing too!

Our school partake in a programme called "Resilience Reaps Rewards".

It is a methodology designed to improve cognitive function, promote happier and more productive classroom environments and enable children to become more resilient both inside and outside of school. In the FSU some of the methods we use include a "2 minute disco" to celebrate completing our daily challenge and some guided relaxation to help with self regulation and well being.

RED WORDS

Red words are what the RWI phonics scheme call words that children cannot decode by sounding out; they just need to learn to recognise them by sight. They will have some word cards in their reading packet so please practise them as often as you can. There are some video lessons below that might help too.

RWI Home-learning videos for FS2 (Reception) Children
RED words 2 - words the children need to know by sight

RWI Home-learning videos for FS2 (Reception) Children
RED words 1 - words the children need to know by sight

DOUGH DISCO!

Mrs Murten has started dough disco with the children. It's a series of exercises, with a ball of dough, designed to help strengthen fingers and improve fine motor skills. This helps with all kinds of physical processes such as cutting, fastening things, construction and writing! You can help at home by encouraging independence when children are dressing themselves, opening bottles and packets, fastening their seat belts and anything else that you might think they can't do - let them have a go!

We have started our traditional tales topic by looking at the story of Goldilocks and the 3 Bears, and others.

We read the story lots of times and provide opportunities for children to retell it through lots of different activities.

Welcome to The Spring Term! (Sadly just the name, not the weather!)

Our outdoor area is now complete. We will be putting the play equipment back later on in the week. It is a smaller area than we had previously but we will be utilizing the playground and field as often as we can. Children can come into school through the FSU gate now. Unless you need to speak with a member of staff, please allow them to walk up to the gate by themselves. It’s great for developing their independence and prevents a bottleneck. After school please wait a short distance away from the fenced area and we will send the children to you when we see you.

Nursery children and FS2 children continue to do Read Write Inc, daily. Nursery children are listening to stories, singing nursery rhymes, learning about the RWI characters, developing their fine motor skills and playing words games. FS2 children are learning new 'special friends' sounds (ee, ay, ow etc.) through reading and writing activities. We work slowly through each book ensuring all children have a thorough understanding of the sounds and words we are teaching that week and that they can write them as well as read them. Please make sure you practise their RWI and class reading book at least 3 times each week and sign their reading record accordingly. All FS2 children need a school book bag to keep school books safe and in good condition.

Wednesday afternoon is our PE session. In line with the rest of the school, we ask that you send your child to school in their PE kits. (Joggers and school jumpers/hoodies can be worn) However, as self-care is an important part of the EYFS curriculum we do encourage children to be independent so please allow your child to dress themselves as much as possible including recognizing their own items, putting on their own coat and having a go at the zips and buttons! Children also need to be able to take off and put on their own shoes. If this is something they struggle with, please practise at home.

Please only bring essential items into school. Children need a school book-bag, their own ready filled water bottle and a lunch bag/box if they are having packed lunch. Again, please make sure they are all named. You can put spare clothes in their book bag if you are worried about toilet accidents.

If you have any concerns or would like to talk the Foundation Stage Staff, please feel free to come and speak to us at the end of the day.

Thank you,

The Foundation Stage Team:

Mrs Forrest (Class Teacher)
Mrs Murten
Miss Brason

The last few weeks of the Autumn term are always full of madness!

We have had a super couple of weeks making Christmas crafts, watching performances, performing ourselves, enjoying Christmas Dinner and Christmas Party day and wearing our Christmas jumpers and party clothes! Thank you to all our parents for supporting us in providing these opportunities for your children.

It was lovely that so many of you came to watch the FS2/KS1 Nativity. I am sure you will agree that the Reception children performed brilliantly!

FS2 had a fabulous time at the Pantomime on Tuesday!

"Oh no we didn't, Oh yes we did!) We were brilliantly behaved on the coach and in the theatre and really enjoyed joining in with all the pantomime banter. Isabella even got chosen to go up on the stage - she was fabulous!

Our inspiration this week was the storybook "Oi get off our train".

The children have enjoyed playing collaboratively building elaborate train tracks and making vehicles from different media. You can also see how we start to introduce writing for a purpose - The children are beginning to label their work independently :)

Everybody loves a snow day at school!

It's been a busy couple of weeks!

We have been learning about Remembrance day, Bonfire Night and Diwali. As well as stories and teacher led listening times, we remember things by immersing ourselves in them. We have activities for the children to enjoy and this helps them to recount their learning and use new vocabulary.

We believe it is really important for our young children to be aware of Remembrance day. We talk about the sacrifice of soldiers today and in the past and how lucky we are to be living in a country at peace. We always ensure that our lessons are age appropriate; we use the storybook "Where the Poppies now grow" and show this gentle animation. You might like to take a look at it together and see what your child can remember.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/cbeebies/watch/poppies

We enjoyed learning about Harvest last term.

We explored Autumn, different fruits and vegetables, played with the farm and made our own carrot soup - Everybody had a try!

Monday 4^th November

Dear Parents,

Welcome back to the second term!

We hope by now you have had the opportunity to speak to one of the members of the FSU team either during parents evening (FS2 only) or on the playground. If there is ever anything you want to know please ask one of us before or after school. Please also keep an eye on our class page on the schools website (Signpost: children – class pages – EYFS) for information about what we have been doing or how to help your child.

We have had new children’s toilets installed and our extension is well under way so we hope to be using that, and our outdoor area, in the New Year.

This is always a very busy term in school; we learn about Bonfire night, Diwali, Remembrance, Children in Need and of course all of the usual Christmas celebrations.

Our topic is travel and transport. We will be learning about different types of transport, journeys and travel – including space travel!

FS2 Children now have reading books. We cannot stress enough the importance of regular practice – it really does make such a difference! If you are not sure how to help your child or you need some tips or ideas please ask. We subscribe to the RWI learning platform and I regularly post links to virtual lessons and “Fred Games” on our class page so please have a go at those.

Thank you,

The Foundation Stage Team:

Mrs Forrest (Class Teacher)

Mrs Murten

Miss Brason

Any Questions?

As we near the end of our first term, we hope that you and your child are feeling happy and settled in our Foundation Stage Unit.

Reception parents will have a short parent consultation next week and we have managed to chat with most parents by the gate at some point this term but if you do have any questions, comments or worries please speak to any of us before or after school.

As part of our "All About Me" topic, children have been creating houses and homes from different types of media.

We also looked at what our bodies were like on the inside and have had lots of fun with skeletons!

We have been learning to name different body parts.

The dollies needed some plasters on them then we drew around Isabella and all had a go at labelling the different parts of the body. Some children even had a go at writing their own labels!

We are enjoying exploring our Foundation Unit.

Children have been busy being creative, drawing, mark-making, learning about numbers, building, working as a team and playing outside. We are encouraging our FS2 children to challenge themselves a bit more and try things they might not always choose; some of our boys were able to draw a picture of their vehicle model and had a go at labelling it!

Reception Baseline Assessment (RBA)
We spend the first few weeks of term assessing all of our children so that we can personalise their learning to meet their individual needs. Children in Reception (FS2) also take part in the government RBA. This is a National scheme that all schools participate in. More information can be found by following this link.

One Week in...all the children are settling in beautifully. There are still a few tears but honestly, it's more for your benefit and usually stops before the children even get their coats off! If you are worried or unsure about anything, please come and speak to one of us before or after school.

Thank you for helping us with the morning routine and arriving promptly at the end of the day I think it has helped to ease the congestion and makes it a bit less chaotic for the children.

Just a few reminders: please label all clothes (including coats and shoes) and make sure your children recognise them. We try to encourage independence at school. You can really help us at home by encouraging children to put their own clothes on, fasten their coats and shoes and carry their own things into school. It really does help us during transition times - practising with one child at home is much easier than us trying to teach 20 of them at hometime!

Please send spare clothes for toilet accidents and remind your children to tell a teacher if they have had an accident or need some help. We try to keep an eye on everybody and give lots of reminders but we can't help if we don't know or see that it's needed.

We update our class page regularly so please keep checking back to receive any information and see what we have been up to!

Mrs Forrest

The Foundation Stage Team would like to say A HUGE thankyou to the parents and children for all of the gifts, cards and kind words that were shared with us at the end of last term. xxx

We had a fabulous time when we went to see "The Tiger Who Came To Tea" at Lincoln theatre.

The children were so well behaved and we loved the tiger ears that Mrs Reeson found for us!

We had lots of fun during our "water play" days.

It was lovely for the children enjoy the super weather and have fun with their friends!

We all had a great time on sports day!

The children tried their best and were great sports.

Finally, our tadpoles have changed!

We currently have 2 froglets and 2 tiny frogs. We will be sending them to their new home very soon but are loving watching them in the meantime.

The warmer weather is finally here! Please make sure your children have a named sun hat and water bottles in school everyday (Water only please, we don't allow juice or flavoured water) and we will be reminding them to drink regularly.

Children can bring sun-cream in their book bag. They will need to apply it themselves though, (we will help if necessary) so the all day sun-cream that can be applied before school is preferable.

In the morning, we made some pirate jewellery.

Then, we found a message in a bottle! It was a treasure map from Pirate Pete. We followed the map and found the treasure - it was our snack! So we sat outside and enjoyed a mid-morning picnic.

The First two week's of the new term have flown by!

We have been learning all about boats and having lots of pirate fun!

How is it the last term already?!

Term 6 is upon us. This term we will be learning all about the seaside. Our topic will include some of the children’s favourites such as pirates, fossils and dinosaurs. We will also be learning all about boats, what we can see at the seaside. How to find places on a map or a globe, how to draw treasure maps and what an island is.

We always use high quality texts to support our topic work. This term, some of the stories we are using include ‘The Lighthouse Keeper’s Lunch’, ‘We’re Sailing to Galapagos’ and ‘Mr Gumpy’s Outing’. They are great for learning and also inspire some super writing.

We are hoping for some lovely weather and lots of outdoor play so please remember to bring hats and water bottles every day. Applying an all-day sun cream in the morning is the best way to protect your children but you are welcome to send a bottle with them in their book bag. We don’t apply it but will help children to do it themselves.

We will be holding transition session later this term. We have seen fantastic progress from all our children and they are all ready for the next year group so this should be a really positive experience for them all. If you have questions about transition, or anything else for that matter, please speak to a member of the team at the start of the day.

Kind Regards, The Foundation Stage Team

Mrs Forrest
Mrs Murten
Mis Brason

We try really hard to make our topics inspiring for the children; having caterpillars and tadpoles in the classroom is a fantastic hands-on experience and allows children to recall facts that they have learnt.

Our tadpoles are taking a while to change but our butterflies all emerged from their cocoons last week and after observing them in their net for a couple of days, we were able to release them into the garden on a lovely sunny day. Everybody got the opportunity to hold one - what a super experience!

We are really enjoying our animal topic.

We have designed and made 3D animals using tubes - they turned out fantastically! We have made animal masks, bought toys in the "Zoo shop", washed the muddy animals and enjoyed small world animal play inside and outside.

Whenever the sun shines, we make the most of being outside.

Over the last few weeks, the children have enjoyed outdoor small world, water play, construction and role play. Toasting pretend marshmallows on our "camp fire" was a definite highlight!

Our Nursery children have several number time sessions each week.

In them we might read a story, sing some number rhymes, do some counting or sorting, look at a "maths talk" picture or explore shape and measure. This week they were looking at different shapes and how they might fit together. All of our activities are explorative; it's the best way for our youngest children to learn and it promotes lots of lovely mathematical vocabulary.

We have made it to term 5 – Summer is in sight!

This term we are hoping that the weather is kind and we can spend lots of time playing and exploring outside. Please remember that playing can be a messy business and whilst we try to avoid any unnecessary mess, clothes, socks and shoes may get dirty or scuffed. Please do not send your children in clothing that you are precious about.

Our topic this term is “Animal Kingdoms” We will be exploring pets, farm animals and wild animals and how we take care of them. We will look at different types of animal habitats and how the animals have adapted to live there.

As we near the Summer, we will be looking at our end of year expectations and hoping to see lots more independence and children taking on challenges with increasing maturity. Please help them by encouraging them to try new things, be more independent and “have a go!”

If you notice them meeting any particular milestones at home, we would love to hear about it. Pop a post-it note in their book bag or speak to one of us on the gate and we can include it in their learning journeys.

The Foundation Stage Team

The Foundation Stage Team would like to thank all of those parents who had such positive things to say to the OFSTED inspectors at the end of last term; It is really lovely to feel supported by our families. We hope those of you who came, enjoyed the Easter church service and that you all had a fabulous Easter holiday!

Scissors!

Being able to use scissors carefully and safely is a really important skill. We start in the FSU by having scissors freely available for all types of activities. We allow children to explore by snipping away at different materials and different textures. We teach the correct way to hold scissors and how to move the paper when cutting out shapes. If you haven't got any children's scissors at home it's worth getting some and letting your child practise their skills.

Thank you for your donations to Comic Relief this year.

The children enjoyed wearing their red clothes to school and we even found some old red noses to use for water fun!

For World Book Day this year, we invited a real-life author into our school!

Bethany Walker read our class one of her picture books and told us all about why she wrote books and how she worked with her illustrator. It was really interesting. We don't need a special day to celebrate books in the FSU though, we read stories everyday; on our own, with friends or with a grown up and there always books new books to explore and books that support our learning in all areas of the curriculum.

Last week we were so lucky to have had a visiting planetarium.

We went into the inflatable dome, which was extremely dark! and watched a short film about travelling through space and another one about the Earth when dinosaurs were around. The films were projected across the whole of the domed ceiling and, as you can see by our faces, it was super exciting!

We have enjoyed the start of our "Growing" topic.

We have made caterpillar prints, chopped vegetables and made daffodils out of play dough! We have done lots of other fun stuff but sometimes we just don't have the chance to take a photograph!

Dear Parents,

Welcome back to term 4

Our topic this term is called “Come Outside” We hope to be spotting some signs of spring and learning all about new life and how things grow. We will be naming animals and their young and observing life cycles of butterflies, plants, frogs and hens.

Easter is a lovely time in school; we will be looking at why Christians celebrate Easter and will have an Easter service in the Church.

We will spend as much time outside as we can so please continue to dress your child appropriately.

If you need any help or ideas please feel free to speak to one of the team before or after school.

Just a reminder that once the first bell has been rung at 8.47 and your child is in the line, you are welcome to leave. When the second bell rings at 8.50, we will take the children into the Foundation Stage Unit. If you arrive late you will need to go to the main entrance and register at the office.

Thank you,

The Foundation Stage Team:

Mrs Forrest (Class Teacher)

Mrs Murten

Miss Brason

Remember, today (Friday 9th) is the last day of term. We will be on the half term break for a week. Please let us know if your child does anything at home which will help us to assess their progress, especially if it is something that surprises you, something they have never done before or evidence of the new things they are learning at school.

Please also remember to keep reading over the holiday, it is so easy for children to slip behind if they aren't practising regularly.

See you in a week's time!

The Foundation Stage Team

We love it when it snows.

We wrapped up warm and went outside where we had SNOW MUCH FUN!!

Our last week of this topic was spent making houses for the 3 Little Pigs and building bridges for The 3 Billy Goats Gruff!

FS2 parents, please, please keep practising your child's reading books with them. You don't need to read all the books every time but daily practise really is the best way to improve confidence and fluency. A few pages each day is better than slogging through every book at the end of a busy week.

Thank you.

There has been some fantastic building going on this week; we have followed the example of the 3 Little Pigs and made houses out of all sorts of things! outdoor challenges are great for developing big ideas, using our gross motor skills and developing team work.

We are really enjoying our traditional tales topic.

So far, we have made porridge, drawn a story map, built castles and made fairy wands, baked gingerbread and designed bridges. By immersing ourselves in activities and play, we use lots of storytelling language and this enables us to write labels for our buildings, speech bubbles for our characters and have the ideas and confidence to use mark making in all of our play.

It has been great fun playing with the ice this week! Cold weather is not a barrier in the FSU!

All FS2 children are learning to read and write words through our RWI (Read write inc) phonics scheme. We currently have a subscription that allows parents to access interactive teaching videos so I thought it would be really useful to share them with you. They are great for you to see how we teach as they mimic the lessons we do in class and it will be super for the children to use them to do some extra practise at home.

Please feel free to access the ones you find most suitable for your child and of course, ask any of the team if you have any questions. I will try to post new videos weekly so do keep checking this web page.

Welcome to The Spring Term 2024!

Nursery children and FS2 children continue to do Read Write Inc, daily. Nursery children are listening to stories, singing nursery rhymes, learning about the RWI characters and playing words games. FS2 children are learning new 'special friends' sounds (ee, ay, ow etc.) through reading and writing activities. We work slowly through each book ensuring all children have a thorough understanding of the sounds and words we are teaching that week and that they can write them as well as read them. Please make sure you practise their RWI and class reading book at least 3 times each week and sign their reading record accordingly. All FS2 children need a school book bag to keep school books safe and in good condition.

Wednesday afternoon is our PE session. In line with the rest of the school, we ask that you send your child to school in their PE kits. (Joggers and school jumpers/hoodies can be worn) However, as self-care is an important part of the EYFS curriculum we do encourage children to be independent so please allow your child to dress themselves as much as possible including putting on their own coat and having a go at the zips and buttons! Children also need to be able to take off and put on their own shoes. If this is something they struggle with, please practise at home.

If you have any concerns or would like to talk the Foundation Stage Staff, please feel free to come and speak to us at the end of the day.

Thank you,

The Foundation Stage Team:

Mrs Forrest (Class Teacher)

Mrs Murten

Miss Brason

Christmas was great fun in the FSU.

We learnt about the Nativity story, Advent and the history of the Christingle. We went to the pantomime and enjoyed a visit from a theatre company. The FS2 children were fabulous in their Nativity performance. We all dressed up for Christmas Dinner and enjoyed games and dancing at our class party. The term ended with a beautiful Christingle service in Church. We hope you were able to join us for some of our Christmas festivities and the FSU team wish you all a very merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

We had a beatboxing lesson last week.

After a demonstration, we were shown how to make different sounds with our voices and put them together to make music. It was lots of fun!

Brrr! What a cold few days we have had.

We still like to be outside though so please make sure your child has a warm coat that they can put on by themselves and please practise fastening it so they can be independent when choosing to play outside.

Miss Brason found a hedgehog in our FSU garden last week.

He was clearly lost as it's definitely not a nice quiet place to hibernate! After everyone had the chance for a peek at his little face, we relocated him to somewhere more suitable.

We have been learning about different types of transport this week.

The children have had great fun building boats, trains and monster trucks outside! It is great for their physical development but also encourages team work, cooperation and some wonderful vocabulary. Inside we made a town for our cars to travel around. The children labelled the buildings and even made a fruit box car wash! Remember to ask your children what they have been learning about - they might surprise you with just how much they know and remember.

Covering different events is a really important part of our curriculum.

For young children, it allows them opportunities to learn about how other people celebrate, to talk about their own experiences, make sense of things that are happening now and reflect on events in the past. In the last 2 weeks, we have explored Bonfire night, Remembrance day, Diwali and Children in Need. Activities linked to these events give the children an opportunity to practise new vocabulary and recall what they have been learning about.

Welcome to term 2!

Week ending 20th October. Thank goodness we had a few nice days at the start of this week before the horrendous rain spoilt our play! The children loved being outside and we could see lots of great learning going on...

Week ending 13th October: Lots of mark-making has been happening this week.

Mark-making can be pictures, scribbles, shapes or writing. We encourage all children to see themselves and writers; to assign meaning to the marks they make, and mark-making is the beginning of this process. As children learn to write new sounds, they are encouraged to use them and some FS2 children can now choose the correct initial sound for what they want to write about. It's super to see how quickly they progress!

During Black History Week, The FSU children have been exploring what makes each of us unique.

We have made faces with play dough and loose parts, drawn self portraits, read books that celebrate diversity and talked about what we are good at and what we enjoy.