Week Ending 29/09/23
Date: 24th Sep 2023 @ 4:36pm
Happy Friday! Another week have flown by and we have had so much fun learning through the story of The Little Red Hen. We have been learning lots about the journey of bread from wheat in the field to the loaf of bread on our kitchen tables. This led us to thinking about this time of year and celebrating the Harvest Festival. We have been thinking about the food grown on the land and of all the good things God gives us. This makes us want to share with others who are not so fortunate which links to our school Christian value of love and sharing this love with others.
Dates for the Diary
- Harvest Service – Tuesday 10thOctober 2pm. We will need adults to help us walk down to church at 1:30pm, please let the office know if you are able to help. Thank you.
- Stay and Play - Wednesday 8th November 2:30pm. In Reception we do not have books, instead we use Tapestry to update you on your child's progress each week through observations. Therefore, we are inviting you in to spend some time in your child's classroom and enjoy some time choosing to learn where they do each day. This will then finish at normal time (3:20pm).
- Imagine That Trip – Thursday 9th November. Please see this week’s email with further details. If you have any questions then please do not hesitate to ask. We will need parent volunteers so please let us know if you’d like to join us for the day!
Little Wandle – Phonics
This week we learnt four new sounds G, O, C and K using the new Little Wandle grapheme cards and phrases. We have also learnt our first 'Tricky Word' IS. ‘Tricky words’ are words that cannot easily be decoded (‘sounded out’ and read). This is because some of the sounds in the words are spelled in an unusual way. It is important for children to be able to read these words as they are among the most common words in English. When we introduce a new tricky word we tell the children which part of the word is tricky. For example, the tricky part in 'IS' is the /s/ because it makes the sound /z/. This is very different to the 's' in the word 'sat' for example. Tricky words must be learnt by heart as they make up such a large amount of the sentences in the books that we will be reading this term. We will be introducing a new tricky word next week so please continue to read the blog to keep up-to-date with what your child has been learning in school. I have attached a Little Wandle Parent Guide which contains all the tricky words for this term and some terminology.
Reading Practice Sessions
Next week we will introduce the children to the Reading Practice Sessions of Little Wandle. These consist of three timetabled sessions each week and are taught in small groups up to 6 children. Each group will read the same book three times because we want to develop fluency The more children see words, the more they begin to read them automatically without having to sound them out.
Session 1 – DECODING (sounding out the words).
Session 2 – PROSODY (reading with expression) – encouraging our children to read like writers.
Session 3 – COMPREHENSION (checking understanding of what has been read through questioning).
To start with, we have purchased six of each book from the Little Wandle library which means your child will share their Reading Teaching Session with five other children. That same book will then be sent home on a Friday for children to continue to read at home. ALL SIX books will need to be returned on time the following FRIDAY for another group to use and take home. It is VITAL these are returned in good condition and on time to not affect learning of another group. We will be keeping a log book and parents will be asked to contribute to a replacement if they are not returned.
We will continue to use the Reading Records to note your child’s assigned books. It is important to us that the record is easy for families to complete so please leave a short comment in the record to let us know your child has read the books. PLEASE CAN YOU ENSURE YOU BRING YOUR COLOURED PLASTIC WALLETS IN EACH DAY IN YOUR CHILD'S BOOK BAG.
Reading at Home. PLEASE READ!
To begin with your child will be bringing home a Little Wandle Reading Book. We understand that all children learn at different rates, therefore these decodable books have been carefully matched to your child’s current reading level. Some children may be bringing home a wordless book or a book containing the taught sounds S, A, T, P, I, N, M, D. When listening to them read the book, please remember to give them lots of praise – celebrate their success and where necessary their perseverance!
Wordess books are just as important as decodable books! The purpose of wordless books is to:
- Help children establish book behaviours (how to hold a book and use holding fingers to turn the page)
- Develop language
- Encourage oral blending. E.g. playing games such as I Spy.
It is vitally important that children are confident to orally blend independently before moving on to decodable books with taught sounds in. The quicker they learn this skill the quicker they will move on to reading decodable books. If you need support helping your child to orally blend then please speak to me. We are doing additional blending sessions to ensure your child makes accelerated progress in this area. Every six weeks your child will be completing a half termly phonics assessment. I will be reporting their progress in their reading records so please ensure their coloured reading folder is in their book bags each day. Thank you.
Supporting phonics at home
For further information on how to support your child with phonics, please visit the Little Wandle Letters and Sounds website: https://www.littlewandlelettersandsounds.org.uk/resources/for-parents/
It is really important that you pronounce the sounds correctly at home if you are supporting your child. Please see videos on the link provided.
Terminology
Phoneme - how we say the sound
Grapheme - how we write the sound
CVC words - consonant-vowel-consonant words such as hat, pig, dot etc.
If you have any questions regarding phonics, please speak to me. Thank you for your continued support!
In Maths we have been begun our numbers journey and explored the numbers 1, 2 and 3. We met the Numberblocks 1, 2 and 3 and focussed on subitising these numbers. This means teaching the children to recognise 1, 2 or 3 items in a pile without counting. For example, can your child instantly recognise that there are three chairs around a table or do they need to count them? This is easily practised by playing lots of dice games where your child can subitise the dots on the dice. Noughts and crosses is a great game to practise subitising and a good way to practise the skill at home. To stretch your child, begin to go beyond using dice (the same pattern) by arranging objects in different ways. For instance, if you dropped three coins on a board (could be paper/a chopping board or anything!) can they start to reason that there is 3 altogether because 'there is two on this side and one on that side so 2 and 1 makes 3'. If you see your child subitising at home (saying how many without counting) then upload your observation to Tapestry. We love showing you what your child can do at school but we also like to see your child using their learning at home. Think about moments that make you say ‘WOW!’
On Monday, the children came into the classroom and found crumbs that lead to the bakery role play. We found a letter asking for help from the Little Red Hen. We learnt about different types of bread and learnt how to plait by baking some salt dough for the bakery role play area.
On Tuesday, we read the first two pages of our story and completed some initial sound and blending activities using the animals from The Little Red Hen. We also started some hand print hen pictures. Jack the dog taught us all about Noah's Ark in RE. We then tried to build our own ark in the construction area!
On Wednesday, we had our big school photos taken in the hall. The children all looked so smart! In your child's book bag, you will find a preview of your child's individual/sibling photo and all the details you need to order. We then did some bean bag throwing and catching with Mr Elton on the MUGA. Hopefully balance bikes can be up and running again next week.
On Thursday, we predicted what might happen next in the story. In the afternoon, we went on our conker walk where we looked for the signs of Autumn and seasonal changes. Thank you to all of our parent helpers! Pictures can be found on Tapestry later today.
On Friday, in music we continued to find the pulse of different songs and clap along. We also learnt the song Five Little Ducks and performed it to each other. We also introduced the children to some Harvest songs that we will be performing with the rest of KS1 in our Harvest Celebration on Tuesday 10th October. We hope you can join us!
Congratulations to our Star of the Week, Polly!
Our Mystery Reader was Jude’s Dad! Thank you for coming to share your story with us!
Please speak me if you would like to be Mystery Reader and we can put you in the diary. There are no more dates for this term so thank you to all of our volunteers! We have plenty of dates for the Spring term so please let me know and I can organise a slot for you.
Thank you for all your support. Have a wonderful weekend!
Miss Selwyn
