We have had a very busy term! The children have made so much progress and are always such enthusiastic learners. It was super to have the hen, the owl and falcon visits. We can’t wait to get started with our new learning.  This half term we would like to hear about your customs and routines. Please add photos and a little bit about what you like to do together onto Tapestry. What makes your family special or different and encourage your child to talk about his. For example, in my family we have fish and chips every Thursday, we watch football together on Saturdays and like to walk and talk on long dog walks. Please share with us all the things you celebrate at home and prompt your children to tell us about it. It is an important early learning goal which you are experts at developing!

Many children have now started the next phase of our Read Write Inc Programme. They may come home talking about ‘Ditty Group and the books they are reading. This phase concentrates on applying their phonic knowledge and practising writing letters, words and sentences.

Communication and Language 

Through play, the children listen to each other and take turns in conversation. In our circle times, we always look at how important it is to look and listen when our friends are talking. When speaking and through phonics, the children are working on speaking clearly and expanding their vocabulary. Through acting out stories and learning their lines for the Nativity play for example, the children are gaining lots of confidence. It is lovely to see some children coming up and singing songs to the class or talking about their experiences and sharing news with the class.

This half term, our role play area will be a hospital.  The children will be involved in setting it up and adding the labels. We look forward to seeing them acting and pretending to be doctors or patients. 

The children will be introduced to lots of new vocabulary, read information and be introduced the ‘The Emergency Services’. Through this learning, we will look at how they help us. Children will be given scenarios to discuss and solve as a team. We will talk about what to do in an emergency.  When the Police officers come to visit, the children will prepare questions to ask.

Vocabulary: question, talk, discuss, solve, injury, hurt, crime, law, emergency, siren, medical, patient, staff, prescription.

Literacy

In our Read Write Inc phonics sessions, the children will be learning many more digraphs and trigraphs.  These are sounds with 2 and 3 letters such as ar-start the car, or – shut the door, ear- what can you hear?   Homework will continue to reflect the learning in class. In this half-term, the children will be focusing on reading and writing simple sentences using the sounds they know. These will be encouraged through their play, for example to write hospital or police notes. Such as: ‘He was lost’, ‘She hurt her leg’.

With our focus book: ‘The Gingerbread Man’ the children will retell the story through talk for writing. They will be able to play the roles of the different characters from the story.  After writing lists of characters, describing them and looking at the action words in the story, the children will draw story maps and make a little book with their simple version of the story and illustrations.

Outside, the children can act out the story. By being the gingerbread man, running and coming up to each animal before finally meeting the fox.

Vocabulary: caption label, sentence, digraph, trigraph, prescription, appointment, emergency, capital letter,  

Physical Development

We are moving onto Dance for this half-term. We will focus on the movements of different animals. Using different parts of our body to behave like various animals. Working in pairs and groups, the children will build up movements and sequences to then perform to the class.

At playtimes, we will continue to use the trikes and for the children to carry passengers.  On windy days, we use the ribbons and materials for kites and Jabadao equipment such as the big elastic band where the children can all fit into and move around as a team. 

Vocabulary: pace, spin, turn, rotate, jump, move, direction, travel, strength, muscles, veins, blood, heart, exercise, healthy, unhealthy.

Personal, Social and Emotional Development

Through everything we do, the children are learning to manage their feelings and behaviour, to have a good attitude to learning and to build resilience. We have established our class rules that the children contributed to.

We will continue with our peer massage sessions as a way of children developing ways to self- regulate and calm themselves as well as showing respect and care to their friends.

In our PSHE sessions, we will look at taking on challenges.  Encouraging the children to become more resilient, to persevere and not give up. To see that the most important thing is to hve a go and to see that you can keep going and get a little bit better each time.

Vocabulary: emotions, feelings, coping, describe, happy, excited, nervous, anxious, angry, calm, scared, loved. 

Mathematics

We will move onto ‘Growing 6,7,8’ where will begin to combine amounts and make pairs. The children will recognise and find amounts up to 8.  They will find ways of combining amounts to make numbers up to 8.

Always through play both inside and outside, the children will use rulers, tape measures, trundle wheels and investigate length and height.  They will be encouraged to use the correct mathematical vocabulary as they measure, compare and order things they find. 

To begin learning about time, the children will order and sequence important events of the day and use language such as next, after, soon. Through experiences and stories, they will be able to discuss important events, things they are looking forward to. When planting seeds, we will look at how long they take and change over time.

Vocabulary: number, shape, subitise, compare, different, same, more, less, pair, amount, yesterday, tomorrow, before, after, next, soon, long, short, tall.

Understanding the World

Now that we are in winter, the children will look at the season and when we are outside on our walks and during playtimes.  The children will observe and collect signs of winter. Through discussions, they will be able to compare the changes and we will keep records through photos on our seasonal display board.

Science focussed activities will look at ice, snow, freezing and melting. The children will carry out simple observations, make simple predictions and observations.

As part of learning about the emergency services, we will be having a visit from the Police. In preparation for this, the children will think of questions they would like to ask, think about what they know already and what they want to find out. Through role play and lots of different activities, the children will learn about the different people who help us, their vehicles and their roles.

We will find our about Florence Nightingale as an important historical figure.

Although the Fire Service are no longer available to visit us, they have recommended that we look at their website and use various activities and stories. https://www.cambsfire.gov.uk/community-safety/come-and-play/ . We will learn about what to do in different emergency situations, go on safety walks and fire marshall walks around school looking for fire exits and fire extinguishers.

Vocabulary: cold, ice, frost, frozen, freeze, temperature, winter, hibernation, melt, changing state, medical, fire, ambulance, battenburg, siren, danger, safety, emergency.

Expressive Arts and Design

There will be lots of great opportunities to build different emergency vehicles with the crates and building equipment outside.  Through role play, the children will play in our Norwood Hospital.  They can use the trikes to pretend to go to an emergency and act out different emergency scenarios. 

Our art lessons this half term will focus on painting and mixed media. Finger painting, outdoor painting, collage and art that can be moved using various objects. We will also link this to winter, snow and ice and provide the children with paints and materials to independently create winter scenes. 

Vocabulary: paint, collage, transient, imagination, cold colours.  

Computing

The children will be learning about instructions. Following instructions, giving simple instructions to each other, looking at dressing up instructions. After doing this they will then ‘debug’ instructions put them into the correct order or predict what would happen if instructions are not in the right order.

Vocabulary: instructions, first, then, next, last, finally, after that, follow, predict.

USEFUL WEBSITES

http://www.bbc.co.uk/education/topics/zf44jxs/videos/1

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

https://www.oxfordowl.co.uk/

http://www.crickweb.co.uk/Early-Years.html

http://www.phonicsplay.co.uk/freeIndex.htm

http://www.ruthmiskin.com/en/parents/

Please also visit https://staywise.co.uk/home. You can sign up for free and access an online library full of educational resources and activities from the UK’s leading emergency services and safety-focused organisations making it easy for you to find trusted materials that provide learning opportunities to help keep children safe.