Dear Parents/Carers,

Welcome back! We’ve had an amazing Autumn Term. The children have settled in really well and are comfortable and happy with the routines and expectations.

Unit of Inquiry

Our Unit of Inquiry this half term is How We Organise Ourselves. Journeys take us to many different places and keep us connected to people. We will be looking at what journeys are, the journeys we’ve taken and the modes of transportation used to get us there.

Communication, language and literacy

The children will be continuing to develop their speaking and listening skills through our Friday Show and Tell which will be themed. This will give an opportunity for your child to bring in something from home that links to our Unit of Inquiry. We will be focussing on using full sentences in presenting our special object and in our play. The children have begun to develop their blending and sounding out and will be practicing reading simple regular words as well as high frequency words.

Again, your child has a reading book and diary in their book bag. Please hear your child read their book and talk with them about what is happening in the story every night. Encourage them to point at the word that they’re reading and use their letter sounds to sound out unknown words. When you have heard them read please write a comment in their reading diary to tell me what they did well and anything that your child found hard. Reading books will be changed on Mondays and Fridays. Please make sure that your child brings their book to school every day so that we can share their book with them. Our library day is Friday, when your child will bring home a book for you to share together (these will not always be books that they will be able to read yet), these will be changed every 2 weeks.

Problem solving, reasoning and numeracy

The children will be learning to do simple addition and relating subtraction to taking away. We will be encouraging the use of mathematical language and talk through ideas to solve practical problems. We have a daily interactive bar chart showing how they came to school and will be exploring shape, space and measurements. They are continuing to learn lots of different numbers songs and we are encouraging them to use numbers in their play.

P.E

Reception class have P.E. on a Monday afternoon with Theo Lake. They also have a dance session with Abi Rosser on a Tuesday afternoon. Please make sure that your child has the appropriate kit with them. They should bring their P.E. kits on a Monday and we will send them home at the end of the week if they need washing.

Dates for your diary

• Parents Evenings – 07.02.12 & 08.02.12
• World Book Day – 01.03.12
• Class Assembly – 09.03.12 (2:45)
• Shakespeare Performance – 22.03.12

Thanks again for all your support. We’ve had a lovely autumn and we’re really looking forward to this exciting spring term. If you have any questions or queries please don’t hesitate to ask one of the reception class team.

Many thanks

Paz Martinez                Sandra Bull
Reception Teacher        Reception Class Teaching Assistant