Welcome to Reception!

Welcome to our class webpage where you can find out about our amazing learning journey. You will find information about our activities, examples of our work and comments from us! Please visit often to see our learning journey develop.

Miss Byrne would like to welcome you to our fabulous Reception class and introduce you to our wonderful team!

Our classroom is always busy and full of stimulating resources and activities that our teachers have planned for us.  It is so much fun investigating the different areas of our classroom; we can be pirates digging in the sand for treasure one day and we can be on a spaceship to the moon the next.  We play to learn!

We are fortunate to have a lovely outdoor area where our children can express themselves physically and investigate our natural world.  There are opportunities for the children to explore their immediate environment by digging for mini-beasts, making mud pies or participating in water play.  The children are encouraged to discover new things and they are provided with plenty of opportunities to talk about what they have found.  As a result of this, our children begin to develop the key skills that they need in order to be competent and capable explorers and learners.  These opportunities also support development in our prime areas; communication and language, physical development and personal, social and emotional development. 

Alongside these fabulous play opportunities, the children in Reception are starting to become fabulous readers and writers through learning phonics.  We spend some time each day learning phonics and we use our phonetic knowledge when we are playing to help us read and write as we go.  We send out ‘Super Sounds’ homework each Friday and we encourage parents to support their child with this.

We also dedicate special time to mathematics and the children love going to Magic Maths Island each day. Each child has an individual maths target and our maths sessions are tailored around these.  We love to explore the mathematical concepts of shape, space and measures through lots of exciting real life experiences such as baking, water and sand play. Children are encouraged to explore the similarities and differences in the shapes and amounts that they see and find in the world around them. We have so much fun doing lots of active maths activities such as counting as we jump, hop or clap and enjoy lots of engaging small group activities to promote mathematical development as we play.  We love to give the children maths challenges!

Miss Byrne's favourite poem:

Just Playing

When I'm building in the block area,

Please don't say I'm "just playing."

For you see, I'm learning as I play,

About balances and shapes.

Who knows, I may be an architect someday.

When I'm getting all dressed up,

Setting the table, caring for the babies,

Don't get the idea I'm "just playing."

For you see, I'm learning as I play;

I may be a mother or father someday.

When you see me up to my elbows in paint

Or standing at an easel,

Or moulding and shaping clay,

Please don't let me hear you say, "He is just playing."

For you see, I'm learning as I play.

I'm expressing myself and being creative.

I may be an artist or an inventor someday.

When you see me sitting in a chair

"Reading" to an imaginary audience,

Please don't laugh and think I'm "just playing.'

For you see, I'm learning as I play.

I may be a teacher someday.

When you see me combing the bushes for bugs,

Or packing my pockets with choice things I find,

Don't pass it off as "just play.'

For you see, I'm learning as I play.

I may be a scientist someday.

When you see me engrossed in a puzzle

Or some "plaything' at my school,

Please don't feel the time is wasted in 'play.'

For you see, I'm learning as I play.

I'm learning to solve problems and concentrate.

I may be in business someday.

When you see me cooking or tasting foods,

Please don't think that because I enjoy it,

It is 'just play.'

I'm learning to follow direction and see differences.

I may be a cook someday.

When you see me learning to skip, hop,

Run and move my body,

Please don't say I'm "just playing."

For you see, I'm learning as I play.

I'm learning how my body works.

I may be a doctor, nurse or athlete someday.

When you ask me what I've done at school today,

And I say, "I just played',

Please don't misunderstand me.

For you see, I'm learning as I play.

I'm learning to enjoy and be successful in my work.

I'm preparing for tomorrow.

Today, I am a child and my work is play.

-  Anita Wadley

Reception took part in "Healthy Eating Week". We enjoyed tasting lots of different fruit and vegetables including kiwi, plum, carrot and green beans.

 We listened to a wonderful story called Kitchen Disco. The children did some fantastic character description work. They chose their own fruit or vegetable and then described what it would do at the disco!

The children even made their own cafe in the garden and helped to serve healthy snacks to their friends. 

Miss Newall helped us to open the coconut, it was very hard to open. We had to use a hammer and screwdriver to break it open!

Reception also explored the effect that exercise has on their body and did lots of physical challenges.

Please take a look at our wonderful photographs. 

Today reception found a new friend, meet Jeff!!

We enjoyed finding out lots of facts about Jeff

Did you know....

• spiders can have between 0-12 eyes
• There are over 37,000 types of spiders
• A female spider is bigger than a male spider
• Spiders have no ears or nose

Have a look at some of our wonderful pictures and writing all about Jeff.

Reception have enjoyed listening to the traditional tale "The Three Billy Goats Gruff". The children enjoyed acting out and retelling the story and especially liked to pretend to be the big bad troll!!

We have done some fabulous writing which re tells the story and even sequenced the story in order including the beginning, middle and end.

Please take a look at the wonderful work we have been doing. 

This half term in PE, we have been working on travelling in different ways and using different parts of our body to move. The children have enjoyed exploring movement and have also been developing their balance and coordination. 

We  love using the equipment and we know how to setup and  how to use it correctly and safely.

Please take a look at our wonderful photographs. 

We have been exploring the traditional tale of Goldilocks and the Three Bears. The children enjoyed a lovely breakfast with their own bears from home and we even tried some yummy porridge!

Reception have been working very hard to retell the story using actions and have chosen their favourite character to describe using adjectives within their sentences.

Keep a look out for our next traditional tale!

We had a lovely time celebrating St George's Day, the children enjoyed listening to the story of St George and then re-enacted the story and slayed the dragon!

Last week we received a very special delivery, 10 little eggs arrived in a special box called an incubator. We didn't know what was inside and had to keep watch to find out!

On Friday we arrived to find  little chicks were starting to hatch out of their eggs! It was very exciting watching them peck at the eggs to get out. 

During this week we have been looking after the chicks by giving them food, keeping them warm and making sure they had a nice clean bed. 

We have enjoyed caring for the chicks and have learnt lots about them.

Please take a look at our wonderful chick pictures.

"That was the best party ever Miss!"

The children suggested that to have a party, they needed party food so we decided to take a trip to Tesco. The children decided what food they wanted and even worked to a budget. 

Take a look at us in Tesco!

Reception have started to learn about the celebration of Easter. The start of Easter is Shrove Tuesday and marks the beginning of Lent.

We explored the ingredients that are needed to make pancakes and then made our own batter. Miss Newall then cooked the pancakes using the frying pan.

We had a choice of 4 toppings to go our pancakes- jam, lemon juice, chocolate sauce and syrup. They were all very delicious! 

The children then went away and made their own lists and drawings of the different ingredients that we used.