Reception's blog

This week in our maths lessons, we have been learning about shape. We have been naming 2 dimensional (flat shapes) and have been finding out about their properties in lots of fun ways. Have a look at some of our photographs.

“Triangles with 3 sides.” - Teddy           

We have had a wonderful walk through the woodland today. The children loved putting on their fancy wellies! It was like a fashion show as we compared colours, patterns and sparkles. We went out to look for signs of Autumn as part of our scientific inquiry. The children were able to spot conkers, acorns, oak leaves, berries, toadstools and leaves of all different colours. We talked about why the branches are bare and we saw leaves falling from the trees.

 We looked at the sky through a telescope.

Last week, Mr Taylor came in to visit Class 1 and taught us all about the planets in the solar system. Mr Taylor has a very exciting job. He goes all over the world observing the sky at night to look for new planets. He showed us photographs of his travels and the giant telescopes that he has used to look through. He answered lots of difficult questions too. Thank you Mr Taylor.

Monday was our first Stay and Play session to welcome our new children who will be starting at The Meadows in September. They all seemed very happy to come and meet their new classmates and explore their new learning environment. It made Mrs Fowler and myself realise just how big our current reception children have got and how much they have grown and blossomed. We will be having another Teddy Bears' Picnic this year. It will be at Talk Talk Park on Friday 13th July at . 2 o'clock. Can all of the children bring a favourite teddy please. All snacks and drinks will be provided.

As part of our transition activities in Class 1 and 2, we had a lovely musical afternoon. We played some warm up games to warm our muscles and voices ready for an afternoon of singing. We played a body percussion game in which we had to sing about bananas. Then we introduced and changed the pitch. After that we exercised our vocal skills with a silly tongue twister! We then represented animal sounds and movements using pitch, tempo and volume.

We were very excited last Friday as we had another parent visitor come in to our class. This time it was Henry's dad, Mr Hinton. He came to talk to us about his job as a dental technician. He talked to us about how to care for our teeth by brushing twice a day, morning and night. We discussed healthy foods for our teeth too. We had lots of questions about the false teeth that Mr Hinton showed us!

We have had a lovely morning in Class 1. Koome's dad came in to talk to us all about Kenya as this is where he grew up. We learned all about the climates and range of landscapes in Kenya. We learned about how culture and language is different in different regions of Kenya. It was especially interesting to look at the range of schools in Kenya and how it is similar and different to education here in Britain. Our favourite part  was the amazing stories and experiences from childhood that Koome's dad told us about. It was very different to how children play today!

The children who have attended language club have loved learning languages, in particular French. It has been good for me too as I was a little rusty, but it is true that it all comes back to you as you use it again!

The children have learned how to say hello, goodbye, please and thank you in French as well as ordering our favourite French food on French cafe day. We listened to and translated the story of "Little Red Riding Hood". The children were able to act out parts of the story in French too!