Category: Reception – St Adrian

19.01.24

Hello and welcome to another week.
There is lots to share, as we are always busy learning, creating and playing. We began the week by planting a tree on the playing fields. We chose ‘the best’ two trees and planted them with care. We talked about what the tree will need, how big it will grow, etc. Everybody took part and placed a little bit if soil into the hole.

Outside was great fun this week as we had to free lots of polar animals. They were all stuck in the ice. The children were banging and pushing and breaking the ice and eventually all of the animals were safe and sound 🙂

In Little Wandle we’ve learnt 4 new digraphs:

The children are reading words with the new digraph and even learning how to spell and write some of them. This week we’ve spelled words like torn, book, foot, march.
We also learnt 3 new tricky words. They are already in your child’s orange books ready for you to practise at home. The new tricky words are ‘was’, ‘they’ and ‘you’.

In Maths we introduced the concept of zero. The children already had some practical understanding of ‘nothing there’, ‘none’ or ‘all gone’, therefore they learnt that the number name ‘zero’ and the numeral 0 can be used to represent this idea. We were also thinking about numbers to 5 (including zero) and learnt how to instantly recognise of up to five objects (subitise number 0-5).

In RE we began a new topic Local Church Community – Celebrating. We talked about our own experiences and feelings about celebrations; we wondered why people celebrate and how they feel when they celebrate.
Thank you to those of you who shared pictures of their own celebrations.

Dates to remember:
Inset day – Monday 29.01.24
February half term – 19th – 23rd February

Have a lovely weekend.
Looking forward seeing you all next week.
Mrs Solakova

12.01.23

Happy New Year and welcome back everyone.
Hope you’ve had a restful holiday and are ready for another busy term!
We loved sharing christmas stories and experiences during circle time. Some children even heard Santa coming down the chimney :). Lucky!

This week we dedicated to Epiphany and talked a lot about the three kings and how they gifted baby Jesus with very special gifts. We created beautiful crowns using different shaped gems:

On the writing table the children were practicing their digraphs and trigraphs by writing messages to friends and family.

We also dressed up as kings and prepared special gifts for Jesus. It was a long journey 🙂

In Little Wandle this week we learnt the first four of phase 3 sounds. You will find more information about phase 3 sounds in your child’s pink folder.

I also added some information about phase 3 tricky words and how we learn them at school.

In Maths we talked about shapes with 4 sides and their properties. We used mathematical language for describing the shapes: ‘sides’, ‘straight’ and ‘corners’. We also made shapes by combining different sizes of squares and rectangles. Starting from this week the children will have a maths activity to take home. Once completed please bring it to school, or if you prefer you can upload a photo of it on Tapestry.

Please take your time to look at our new home learning grid (you will find a paper copy in your child’s orange book too).

Have a lovely weekend.
Looking forward seeing you all on Monday.
Mrs Solakova

21.12.23

Welcome to our last blog of 2023!
It is hard to believe that we have completed a full term of school. It has been such a pleasure to get to know everyone.
This week we enjoyed a lovely Grandparents tea morning and we even went again on the stage to perform our favourite songs from ‘A Miracle in town’.

We also baked delicious cookies and made an exceptional hot chocolate with cream on top! We had lots of fun guessing our KKs and receiving our presents.

Thank you very much for your generosity this Christmas and thank you for your massive support this term. The amazing progress the children have made is really showing your dedication and effort.

And Finally….
Finally, it is goodbye to 2023. A very important year for all of you who have had a child start ‘big school’.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.
I hope you have a wonderful time over the break.

See you in 2024!
Mrs Solakova

15.12.23

Congratulations to all children for a brilliant performance! What a treat it was to watch them perform so amazingly, singing songs and acting. All the hard work has paid off and I am sure you will all agree that they were absolutely smashing! Well done EYFS!!!

Friday was another fun day. Christmas jumper day was definitely a hit and the children really enjoyed the special meal. The dining hall looked amazing and you could hear a lovely festive music :). What a treat!

And finally … We’ve had a special visitor. Someone who came all the way from North pole. Can you guess?
Well done…it is Santa. The children were very kind to him. They gave him some milk and cookies and patiently waited for they turn to see him.

Dates to remember:
Grandparents Christmas Carols and Tea – Monday 18.12.23 at 09:30 am
Term finishes 13:30 on Thursday 21st December
Spring term starts on Monday 8th January 2024

Have a lovely weekend.
Looking forward seeing you all next week.
Mrs Solakova

08.12.23

Hello children, parents and carers,
this week we dedicated to practice for our Nativity on Wednesday, preparing props and learning how to use the microphone. The children are very, very excited to show you everything they learned in the last couple of weeks.

As mentioned, this week in Little Wandle we carried out Autumn 2 assessment and also started revisiting all phase 2 graphemes, digraphs and tricky words. We will only be revisiting until Christmas, so please spend some time going through all tricky words and sounds learnt so far. I am absolutely impressed by how well the children are blending and segmenting CVC and even CVCC. What a massive progress! Well done everybody!

In English we began reading a new book ‘The snowman’. We are bringing the book alive by listening to ‘Walking in the air’ and dancing with streamers, we are creating lovely wintery scenes with the blocks and wrote a step by step guide on how to build a snowman. If we are lucky we might get some real snow 🙂

Next week is going to be a very important one! We are very much looking forward seeing you all on Wednesday 13th December at 10am for a very special performance. We’ve worked very hard and I am sure you will love it!!!
Please be reminded that the deadline for the outfits was 7th December.

Dates to remember:
EYFS Christmas Performance: Wednesday 13.12.23 at 10:00 am
Christmas Jumper Day and Reading morning – Friday 15.12.23
Grandparents Christmas Carols and Tea – Monday 18.12.23 at 09:30 am

Have a lovely weekend.
Looking forward seeing you all next week.
Mrs Solakova

01.12.23

Hello children, parents and carers,
What a busy, busy week. We talked about Advent, practised on stage for the performance, role played the Nativity story and last but not least our brand new Christmas toy shop is now up and running.
Our playdough table turned into bumpy road with Mary and Joseph, wise men and shepherds. The children were singing the Nativity songs while playing and had a great time exploring what’s on the table:

As already mentioned the Christmas shop needed lots of work, from restocking to labelling and decorating. As you can imagine, the children were very helpful. They were busy thinking about how much each toy will cost, where on the shelf the toys should go and what to use to make play money. I think that they did a brilliant job 🙂

Outside the children had a great time exploring the ice and even prepared some rescue animals tubes for next week.

In Little Wandle this week we were learning how to read words with ‘s’ at the end: cat -s, hat -s, bag -s, etc. The children are getting more and more confident blending 4 sounds together. We also learnt 3 new tricky words:

Next week it’s assessment week and we will be busy checking for any gaps. Then we will be revisiting all phase 2 sounds and tricky words until Christmas.

Today we took part in a very special Dressing of the Christmas tree assembly. Well done to Charlie and Emily for being so sensible and helping Mrs Porter to decorate the tree. You did a smashing job 🙂
In class we thought about Advent and how to be more like Jesus during Advent. We wrote our Advent promises and also picked a Special Christmas friend. The chosen name is in your child’s reading record.

Dates to remember:
Parents reading morning: Friday 08.12.23 between 8:40am and 9:00 am
EYFS Christmas Performance: Wednesday 13.12.23 at 10:00 am
Christmas Jumper Day – Friday 15.12.23
Grandparents Christmas Carols and Tea – Monday 18.12.23 at 09:30 am

Have a lovely weekend.
Looking forward seeing all next week.
Mrs Solakova

24.11.23

Hello children, parents and carers,
This week we’ve been busy spreading the Christmas joy and making sure that our room looks festive and all dressed for the coming celebrations . As you can imagine the children took an active part in the preparations. They decorated the Christmas tree independently, making sure everyone had a turn hanging a bauble. I think you will all agree that the tree looks amazing 🙂

Our small world area turned into a Nativity scene and the children are now able to retell the christmas story, make books and role play the Christmas story with their friends.

Our Letters to Santa were such a hit. What a great way to practise blending, segmenting and handwriting… all through play. The children are more and more confident using what they know. I can’t be more proud.

If you are thinking that all we did is playing you are wrong. In Little Wandle we’ve learnt 4 new digraphs and 4 new tricky words – she, he, of, push.

We also read super long sentences like: ‘It is a mess in this bag’. Thank you for your support and making sure that your children read at home too.

In Maths we went on a shape hunt around the school. We looked for shapes carefully and then made a tick box. We discussed how a piece of pizza is almost a triangle and an orange is almost a circle.

Dates to remember:
Dressing of the Christmas tree assembly (parents are welcome): Friday 01.12.23 at 9:05am
Christmas Fayre: Saturday 02.12.23, 12:30 to 3:30pm.
Parents reading morning: Friday 01.12.23 between 8:40am and 9:00am.
EYFS Christmas Performance: Wednesday 13.12.23 at 10:00AM

Have a lovely weekend.
Looking forward seeing all next week.
Mrs Solakova

17.11.23

Hello children, parents and carers,
this is our week in a nutshell 🙂
On Monday we’ve had a special anti – bullying assembly and talked a lot about being kind and respectful towards everyone in school and home. We also discussed how we need to ‘MAKE A NOISE’ and tell someone if we notice other children being unkind. To show everybody that we are all different and unique we came to school wearing odd socks.

Big thank you to Emily’s mum for coming to school and talking about her profession. It was lovely to hear what she does, helping people all around Europe to understand how food waste is a massive problem and how to limit food waste. She gave us good tips on how to make sure we don’t waste any food in our homes by doing weekly shopping, making sure we check the fridge regularly and only buy what we need.

In Little Wandle this week we’ve learned 1 new grapheme and 2 new digraphs. We are talking more and more about digraphs (2 letters, but 1 sound) and the children are doing so well remembering them.

We also began reading words ending with -s, like cats, hits, maps. Please make sure you check your children’s orange books for new tricky words. This week we’ve learned to, go, into and no.

In Maths we talked about circles and triangles. The children had to explain how they know it’s a triangle and how they know it’s a circle:
It’s a circle because it’s round.
It’s a triangle because it has 3 sides and 3 corners.
On Friday we celebrated World multiplication day’. The children engaged in a wide variety of songs, rhymes, games and activities. In practical activities and through discussion they began to solve problems involving doubling.
2 cakes for little bear and 2 cakes for big bear. How many cakes all together?

Children in need
Thank you for your generous donations. The cakes looked and smelled amazing.

Have a lovely weekend!
Looking forward seeing you all next week.
Mrs Solakova

10.11.23

Hello children, parents and carers,
it was lovely to see so many of you today for our very first reading morning. Your support means a lot to us and we are looking forward seeing you next Friday.

If you think that the rain stopped us from having fun then you are mistaken. We coloured puddles, danced under the rain and painted rainy fireworks :).

In Little Wandle this week we’ve learnt 4 new graphemes and 4 new tricky words (and, his, her, has). You will find the new tricky words in your child’s orange book and letter formation practice sheets in the pink folder.

In Maths we talked about 1 more and 1 less. The children are beginning to understand that as they count each number they say it’s one more than the previous number and that the order of the numbers when counting does not change.

In RE we continued talking about Baptism and this week we reenacted Baptism. We repeated the special words: I Baptise you in the name of the Father and of the son and of the Holy spirit. We talked about the meaning of the candle, shell and water.

Dates to remember:
Odd socks day: Monday 13.11.23
Children in need day: Friday 17.11.23 – Wear spotty or stripy clothes and donate £1.
Parents reading morning: Friday 17.11.23 between 8:40am and 9:00am.

Have a lovely weekend!
Looking forward seeing you all next week!
Mrs Solakova

03.11.23

Welcome back everyone,
I hope you enjoyed your half term week, spending quality time with family and friends. I loved hearing amazing stories about trips to London, pumpkin carving and family meals.
Well, our first day back was very exciting as we went to St Albans Library. We had a special animal hunt around the library, sang nursery rhymes, read a story and borrowed some books. We also had a special certificate and new library cards.

We also learnt how to scan library cards and which buttons to press so we can borrow a book!

I was absolutely impressed by how well the children behaved, putting hands up if they have a question, saying please and thank you, respecting other visitors by being quiet.

We also learnt that you can borrow 30 books in one go!!! What a treat! I hope that you will continue taking your children to the library as this is such a wonderful place for having a family day out, enjoying reading and storytelling!

In Little Wandle this week we began learning Autumn 2 graphemes and digraphs. In your child’s pink folder you will find Autumn 2 grapheme list.

We’ve learnt three new digraphs ss, ff and ll and a new grapheme ‘j’. We are also rapidly beginning to introduce new tricky words. Please help your children to practice the tricky words at home too.

In Maths we were representing, subitising and finding numbers 1, 2, 3. The children were involved in a different adult led and child initiated activities to help and deepen their understanding. We counted ladybirds outside, posted letters into 1, 2 and 3 post boxes and counted 1,2 and 3 on 5 frames.

RE
The children really enjoyed sharing their wonderful Baptism items with the rest of us. It was wonderful seeing tiny dresses, special books and personalised candles. Thank you so much for supporting us!

Reading books
This Wednesday all children came home with a reading practice book. Please make sure you read with your child at least 3 times a week as this will really boost their confidence and fluency. All books must be returned by Tuesday the latest, as new books will go home on the following Wednesday.
Once again thank you for your continued support!

Dates to remember:
Individual and siblings photos: Monday 06.11.23
First reading morning: Friday 10.11.23

Have a lovely weekend!
Looking forward seeing you all next week!
Mrs Solakova