Welcome to Reception!

Mrs Chinn, Mrs Richards, Mrs Cooke and Mrs May

News from Reception

Our topic this half term is ‘Marvellous Me’. 

This week we will learning about our ‘Super School.’ We will look through the windows at our other classes and see what they are learning. We will also peep in the staffroom through the fire door to see where the teachers have their lunch! We have been spotting 2D, flat shapes in our environment and beginning to learn their names. As we are so clever, we tried to spot harder shapes too, such as, pentagons (5 sided shapes) and hexagons (6 sided shapes). Please continue to look for shapes (circle , square, triangle, rectangle) at home. Ask the children how they know that is the shape (e.g how many sides does it have?).

Your child will continue the Read Write Inc phonics lessons. New letters will be arriving in pockets this week. We are learning to recognise, sound and write them.

We would like to tell you how proud we are of the children at lunch time. We have noticed some beautiful manners and less food is being dropped on the floor too! Well done, everyone!

Next week we will be learning about ‘Our Church’. We hope to see some pictures of the inside of the church. We will learn the story of Creation from God’s special book, The Bible. It would be great if your child could bring in a natural object they can find over next weekend or on their journey to school (leaf, conker etc) that we could use for our lessons next week.

Reading books changed: Mondays and Thursdays

Library Books changed: Wednesdays

Sound cards added: Fridays

REMINDERS: PE uniform to be worn MONDAYS and FRIDAYS only please.

Mrs Chinn

Useful Phonics information:

Pronunciation can be found here. Copy and paste the link. https://www.oxfordowl.co.uk/for-home/reading-owl/find-a-book/read-write-inc-phonics--1/phonics-pure-sounds-video 

Read, Write Inc (Phonics)  

Read Write Inc., developed by Ruth Miskin, provides a structured and systematic approach to teaching literacy. It is used by more than a quarter of the UK's primary schools and is designed to create fluent readers, confident speakers and willing writers.

Each Read Write Inc. programme meets the higher expectations of the new curriculum and uses effective assessment to accelerate every child's progress.

Read Write Inc - Our Phonics Scheme

The Government strongly recommend the use of synthetic phonics when teaching early literacy skills to children. Synthetic phonics is simply the ability to convert a letter or letter group into sounds that are then blended together into a word.

Here at the St Mary’s Catholic Primary School, we are using the Read Write Inc (RWI) programme to get children off to a flying start with their English. RWI is a method of learning based upon letter sounds and phonics, and we use it to aid children in their reading and writing.

Reading opens the door to learning. A child who reads a lot will become a good reader. A good reader will be able to read more challenging material. A child who can read more challenging material is a child who will learn. The more a child learns, the more he or she will want to find out.

The children are assessed regularly and grouped according to their ability. They will work with a RWI trained teacher or teaching assistant.

Our Read Write Inc 'Reading Leader' is Mrs Evans (Literacy Co-ordinator)

Reading

When using RWI to read the children will:

• Learn 44 sounds and the corresponding letter/letter groups using simple prompts

• Learn to read words using sound blending (Fred talk)

• Read lively stories featuring words they have learnt to sound out

• Show that they comprehend the stories by answering 'Find It' and 'Prove It'

  Writing

  When using RWI to write the children will:

• Learn to write the letter/letter groups which represent the 44 sounds

• Learn to write words by saying the sounds and graphemes (Fred fingers)

  Talking

• When using RWI the children will also work in pairs:

• To answer questions

• To take turns talking and listening to each other

• To give positive praise to each other

  Blending

  Help your child learn to read words by sounding-blending (Fred talk) eg. c-a-t = cat, sh-o-p = shop. Children learn to read words by blending the letter-sounds togerther to make a word.

   

• Help your child to say the pure sounds ('m' not 'muh', 's' not 'suh' etc.) as quickly as they can, and then blend the sounds together to say the whole word. Click the link to hear the true sounds. https://www.oxfordowl.co.uk/for-home/reading-owl/find-a-book/read-write-inc-phonics--1/phonics-pure-sounds-video

   

• Finally, don't worry if your child is struggling at first with their sounds and words, they will get there in their own time. If you have time (we know it is very precious!), we would urge you to try and read stories to your child before they go to bed. This will help develop a wider vocabulary which makes a vast difference to their quality of writing but it will also encourage them to enjoy a good story.

I hope you find this information useful.

Best wishes, Mrs Chinn

Teeth

This year we are talking about our bodies as part of our 'Ten Ten' Catholic Life curriculum. We will be singing songs and talking about how we can keep our bodies healthy with healthy food choices, enough sleep, exercise and by looking after our teeth.

Here are some website you may wish to explore with information  about NHS dentists, how to clean your teeth and ideas for encouraging your child to clean their teeth.

https://www.nhs.uk/live-well/healthy-body/take-care-of-your-teeth-and-gums/

https://www.deltadentalia.com/a-healthy-life/dental-health/tooth-brushing-app-for-kids/

All the toothpaste manufacturers (e.g. Colgate. Oral B, Aqua fresh) have websites with information and ideas too.

Harry and the Dinosaurs say "Raahh!" by Ian Whybrow is a great story to read about visiting the dentist and what fun it can be.

Some examples of work completed in YR.

Today we released our class butterflies but one or two came back and landed on YR to say bye bye.

We had an amazing day today dressing up for the World Book Day and thankyou - the children looked amazing! We hope you enjoy receiving your copy of some of their work today.

Follow the link below to enjoy stories to share on the World Book Day site!

https://www.worldbookday.com/share-a-story-corner/