Reception
Spring Term
Friday 7th February 2025
Dear Parents and Carers,
What a fantastic week we have had in Reception! The children have been absolutely fabulous – full of enthusiasm, curiosity and a wonderful eagerness to try new things. They have been embracing new challenges with confidence, showing resilience and creativity in their learning. One of the most exciting topics of conversation continues to be the mysterious sightings of goblin evidence. There has been lots of detective work as the children try to uncover many clues. It is lovely to see them so excited!
Reception Reward
To celebrate the children’s fantastic efforts and for getting to 10 on our class reward chart, we will be having a special treat day next Friday! The children have chosen to have a dress-up day, so next Friday (14th February), your child is welcome to come to school in their own clothes. We look forward to seeing them in their fancy outfits next week!
Maths
This week we have been learning about the number 13. The children have been exploring its position on the number line and discussing how it fits into our counting sequence. We have also been looking closely at the place value of number 13, understanding that it is made of one 10 and 3 ones. This has helped us to deepen our understanding of how numbers are built and how they relate to each other.
We have also continued to practise recalling doubles. The children should now be getting quicker and more confident with reciting their doubles to 5. Can your child tell you all the doubles to 5?
Phonics
This week we have learnt the ‘oo’ – short sound (as in book) and ‘oo’ long sound (as is moon). The children have had a go at applying these sounds to their writing. They are encouraged to use their fingers to decode (sound out) the word before writing this down.
We have also learnt the tricky words: be and was. These are words that cannot be sounded out and they must be recognised by sight. As always, the phonics play online resource is available for your child to use to reinforce their learning at home. There are also lots of engaging activities shared both online and in previous newsletters if you wanted to have a more active approach to learning these words with your child. The children enjoy listening to the following songs to help them retain their phase 2 and 3 tricky words:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TvMyssfAUx0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R087lYrRpgY
Reading and Assessments
Due to the February progress assessments taking place, the Reception team have not listened to your child read this week. We will continue to listen to readers next week.
Assessments play a vital role in understanding your child’s progress, strengths and areas of improvement. They provide valuable insights into their development and help us tailor our teaching approach to best support their individual needs. This week we have assessed your child’s ability to recognise the phonics sounds as well as their ability to recall the tricky words taught so far. We have sent these home in your child’s book bag to give you a good indicator to their progress and areas they can continue to work on with you at home. If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to speak with one of the team.
Handwriting
We have taught the children the monster zig zag letters z, v, w and x this week. Can your child show you how to correctly form these letters? We are so amazed with how well they continue to remember the correct formation and apply these to their writing!
Writing
The children continue to make great progress with their writing. We have been writing more in phonics sessions and in a session we call inkwasters. Inkwaster sessions are sessions where we show the children a picture on the large interactive whiteboard and we model writing any words which jump into our heads. In the next session the children write what they see. This enables the children to have good models for writing but it also allows them to have a go themselves. We are NOT focusing on accuracy of spelling in these sessions but giving the children the confidence to say a word slowly and record the sounds that they can hear. When we model we do model accuracy but focus on the parts they can do independently, introducing other aspects of spelling through modelling but with no expectation that they use these e.g. silent letters, suffixes like ly, ing etc. All we want for the children at this point is that they are happy to have a go and show resilience and a ‘can do’ attitude. So far, so good. We have been impressed with the children’s willingness to try and not be concerned about accuracy. We would never want to put the children off believing they are writers (which they are) by worrying them about spelling accuracy. This focus comes later.
Tapestry
We are currently in the process of writing children’s Tapestry reviews for the spring 1 half term. This will give you an indication of your child’s progress during ILT, as well as your child’s writing attainment and their next steps to prepare them for the final half of their Reception year. We will aim to have these posted on the platform by Sunday 23rd February at the latest. Please make sure you read it as is it supporting you to enable your child to make the most progress possible.
If you have any queries or things to celebrate, then please do not hesitate to email us. You can reach us at the following email address: reception@newlaithes.co.uk
Kind regards,
The Reception Team
Elizabeth, Ella, Justine, Natalie, Sophie and Halima