Reception Blog 2022-2023
Summer 2
It's hard to believe that we are at the end of another wonderful year in FS2. The children's confidence, resilience and perseverance has blossomed and we are incredibly proud of everyone. It's been another eventful half term. The children have loved delving into non-fiction books and learning all about coral reefs and sea creatures. They thoroughly enjoyed using Google Earth to explore different places in the world. We even dressed up as pirates and mermaids!
Summer 1
This half term, our topic has been 'down on the farm'. We had a fantastic day out at Hesketh Farm, where we learnt lots of facts about farm animals and how to handle and feed them. Over the half term, we have looked at lots of non-fiction books about farms and farm animals and learnt to recognise the features of these. The children have learnt the story of 'The Three Little Pigs' and have loved retelling this story in the areas of provision, whilst choosing materials to build their own houses for the pigs. We have continued to be impressed with the children's marvellous maths skills; we have become masters at recognising teen numbers and using positional language. We continue to learn in a practical, hands-on way in maths lessons by telling stories and playing lots of games. It's hard to believe there is only one more half term left of this academic year; we will be sure to make it an exciting one!
Spring 2
Reception children have continued to 'wow' us with growing resilience and independence when learning. Our topic this half term has been 'Superheroes' and the children have certainly proved they are 'real life' superheroes in many ways! Of course, we learnt about the amazing, cool superheroes in films and comics, but we also learnt about what it takes for us to be respectful superheroes. The children suggested you are a respectful superhero by saying 'please' and 'thank you'.
Our class text has been 'Supertato' and the children enjoyed retelling this story with the aid of a story map and changing the characters to make up their own stories such as Super Leek and Evil Broccoli! They used the ipads to make their characters come to life, voicing some terrifying "Mwah ha has!" Evil Pea has been causing all sorts of trouble, for instance freezing all the vegetables. The children have enjoyed investigating the best way to melt the ice to set them free. We have also investigated magnets so we can get a stronger lock on the freezer so Evil Pea doesn’t escape again.
We have been learning all about the number bonds to 10 and will keep practising next half term. The children have investigated the number bonds in lots of different ways; Numberblocks have helped us along the way, too! Have a look at our Spring 2 highlights to see all of the wonderful learning opportunities that the children have loved this half term.
Spring 1
We have had another action packed half term in Reception full of fantastic learning. Our topic has been 'Just the Job'. We have been learning all about people who help us. The children have loved being police detectives in our police station role-play area and we were lucky enough to have real life police officers who came to visit and teach us all about their job. One child said, 'I love the siren.' We have also learnt about firefighters, dentists and doctors as well as thinking about what the children might want to be when they grow up. We had a week learning about Chinese New Year and they worked together to make an enormous Chinese dragon which they enjoyed playing with all week. The children continue to amaze us with their intricate models and imaginative play. They have been making lots of hotels, zoos and imaginative worlds, which has sparked interesting conversations and even involved some maths learning! We have introduced rainbow learning challenges this term and this has really encouraged the children to access all areas of provision in the classroom.
Autumn 2
We have had a busy Autumn term in Reception! The children settled so well and are forming some lovely friendships. They are confident to try new things in the classroom and in the quadrangle. We have enjoyed a trip to the theatre to see ‘We’re Going on a Bear Hunt’ and we even had our own bear hunt set up in the quadrangle. The children have been investigating ice and discussing the conditions needed for it to melt. We performed our Nativity for parents and carers, had a Christmas party and had a visit from Santa! We now have presents for the classroom which the children have loved playing with.
Autumn 1
We have had a busy first half of Autumn term in Reception! The children settled so well and are forming some lovely friendships. They are confident to try new things in the classroom and in the quadrangle. They have particularly enjoyed our Autumn work: going on an Autumn walk and looking closely at their Autumn treasures. We have been learning about colour mixing and the children have mixed some lovely Autumn colours (including pumpkin orange and conker brown). They used some of these new colours when creating artwork inspired by the work of Alma Thomas during art week.