Welcome
to
Reception!
Welcome to our Reception Class Page.
Here at King Street, we are an Early Years Foundation Stage Unit which means that Pre-School children and Reception children share the 'Learning Landscape', our large indoor and outdoor space, in all weathers.
Children are grouped into small 'Family Groups' led by a Key Person. Reception are split into two Family Groups - Miss Whitfield's Purple Group and Miss Starkie's Green Group. (You may hear your children talking about purple group and green group!)
We start and end each session with shared and focused time where we learn together as a group or class. The rest of the time we access our learning landscape where all of our staff use their skills and knowledge of individual children to move learning on through play. We encourage Reception children to complete activities within different areas of the setting such as writing using their phonic knowledge and number skill activities. Through play, they are often learning, developing and embedding new skills without realising!
We encourage a love of reading at King Street. We take Reception children to a library session at Spennymoor Library every Monday afternoon. We hold whole-setting reading sessions led by staff in the setting or sometimes visitors. Please see below for more information about Phonics and Reading.
Thank you
Miss Whitfield
Phonics and Reading
Children are taught to read using phonics, which is all about teaching the sounds that make up words. Children are taught letter sounds in Reception. This involves thinking about what sound a word starts with, saying the sound out loud and then recognising how that sound is represented by a letter.
The aim is for children to be able to see a letter and then say the sound it represents out loud.
Children then need to go from saying the individual sounds of each letter, to being able to blend the sounds and say the whole word.
Children are taught sounds such as ‘s’ ‘a’ ‘t’ ‘p’ 'i' and ‘n’ in the beginning and start to be able to blend these sounds together to make words such as ‘sat’.
We use the Bug Club programme to teach phonics. The children learn 2-3 new sounds each week giving time to consolidate their learning and use their new sounds to blend.
In Reception, children are given a school reading book, which is linked to their phonic ability, to read at home as well as a book to share for pleasure.
Every child also has a reading record/diary. This helps us to find out how your child is getting on with their reading book at home. Please remember to complete this. Even the date and a signature is useful as we then know that your child has read at home.
Each child is allocated a specific day for reading. This enables us to spend quality time sharing reading and tracking reading progress in school. If your child reads other books at home you are able to record this in their reading record too.
Along with their reading book, children will be given tasks on Tapestry to complete and a handwriting sheet linked to the sound taught. Please practise these with your child.
Some simple steps to help your child learn to read through Phonics
- Please use your child’s Book Bag and Reading Record every week. This is a great way for teachers and parents to communicate about what children have read. The Reading Record can tell you whether your child has enjoyed a particular book and shows problems or successes he or she has had, either at home or at school.
- Encourage your child to ‘sound out’ unfamiliar words and then blend the sounds together from left to right rather than looking at the pictures to guess.
- Word games like ‘I-spy’ can also be an enjoyable way of teaching children about sounds and letters.
Online Safety for Reception
Please find below Activity Sheet 1 and Activity Sheet 2 linked to Online Safety.
Each activity should take 15 minutes and will enable you to support your child with online safety at home.
Welly Wednesdays!
Every Wednesday our key groups go off to explore the outdoors and learn new skills. Welly Wednesdays will take place for Reception every Wednesday, whatever the weather!
Your child will need suitable clothing (listed below) as Welly Wednesdays will take place at the Forest. We would like children to come to school dressed in their old clothes on a Wednesday. Please ensure all items are labelled with your child's name.
- Wellies (Can be left at school if needed in a name labelled bag),
- Waterproof trousers or puddle suit
- Old jogging bottoms/trousers/leggings,
- Old T-Shirt or long sleeved top
- Old jacket/hoodie
- Spare socks
Please make sure your child is wearing clothes that you don't mind getting dirty as it can often be quite muddy at the forest!
PE
In Reception we are active every day. We have weekly PE lessons. These do not require children to get changed into a PE kit.
