It’s been a lovely week here in St Stephen’s Early Years. The children are settling well, beginning to work as a team and are becoming familiar with their daily routines. This week we read the story, ‘Mouse Paint’ by Ellen Stoll Walsh and the children learnt how to mix primary colours to make secondary colours. There were opportunities’ during choosing time to have a go at some colour mixing.

In Phonics this week we learnt the sounds t, i, n and p. The formation rhymes for this week’s sounds are below:

t – Down the tower, across the tower

i – Down the body and dot for the head

n – Down Nicky and over the net

p – Down the plait and over the pirate’s face

In our Relationships and Health lesson this week we have been discussing all the things which make us special. We have been looking at the many ways we are similar and also celebrating the ways we are unique. The children really enjoyed their circle time and were keen to share their thoughts.

During R.E this week we have been learning about how Christian’s believe the world began and  the children have been thinking about different beginnings, such as a new day or the beginning of a story. Next week, we will thinking about how wonderful the natural world is. The children will have the opportunity in class to draw and paint pictures of natural things that ‘wow’ them such as a beautiful beach or tall mountains.

Please send in your photos

Each Year group at St Stephen’s has a bible verse and a word to reflect our vision statement. In Reception our word is, JOY. We would like to explore this with the children and to do this we would like you to discuss with your child what brings them joy in their life and then send in a photo to reflect this. We will then discuss and display these photos in class. Examples of photos to bring in could be: spending time with a special person such as a grandparent, spending time at a familiar place of worship, a special family celebration or an activity that you do as a family such as puzzles on a Sunday. Please bring these photos in as soon as possible.

Our class poem

Each half term each class at St Stephen’s has a poem to learn. Our first poem is by Alan Ahlberg our class author. It is called, ‘When I was a little child’ and it is a poem about being little. The children have listened to and talked about the poem. We will focus on learning just the first verse (in bold ).

Important reminders

We are finding lots of jumpers and cardigans that have not been named. Please make sure that you do name all of your child’s uniform this weekend including their water bottle.

Please can the children all have a rain proof coat or jacket with them daily.

We hope everyone has a lovely restful weekend.

Miss Billington and Ms Johnson

Well done to all of the children for completing their first full week in Reception. You may notice that they are more tired than usual and will require a little more rest this weekend.

This week the children have done a fabulous job getting to know us, finding their way around the Early Years and beginning to learn their new routines. They had their first P.E. lesson with Sam, their first music lesson with Ms Rachel and their first Gymnastics session with Fiona and Sharon. They also had a library session with Mrs Pereira. The children will take home their first library book next Monday. We are so impressed with how well they are adjusting to life at St Stephen’s.

This week we have been busy painting self-portraits to display in class. The children have enjoyed looking in a mirror and describing themselves. We also agreed some simple class rules to make our classrooms safe and enjoyable places to be. The children enjoyed playing some games and singing some songs to learn and remember each other’s names. We have been discussing our feelings and what the children can do if they are feeling sad or angry including, telling an adult, taking deep breaths, having a drink of water, looking at a book in the reading corner or having a snuggle with a class soft toy.

We have also begun our daily Phonics lessons and introduced the sounds m, a, s and d. Thank you to everyone who attended our Phonics presentation this week. We have posted the Phonics presentation on our class page for you to refer to. There is also a link to a video to aid you with the pronunciation of each sound and a short guide on sound blending.

In our Religious Education lesson (R.E.) this week we began our first unit, ‘Who made the wonderful world?’ The children listened to the story ‘Dogger’ by Shirley Hughes and the children shared with the class things that are precious to them and why.

In our Relationship and Health Education lesson this week we began our first unit, ‘All about me.’ The children thought about some of their favourite things and shared them with the class. We considered how there are things that are the same about us and things that are different. The children were introduced to Harold our giraffe that helps us learn during these lessons.

We sometimes notice that during the 2^nd and 3^rd week of school some of the children will get a little more tired, possibly teary and definitely more aware that Reception is a full time thing now. Please try not to worry. We will let you know if any of the children are upset when in school and find that this stage is short lived. Please do let us know if you have any big concerns though as we are more than happy to chat.

Homework

We have sent home a task for you to complete with your child and return by Thursday 21^st September in your child’s homework folder. It is about your family’s heritage. We will spend time over the coming week’s exploring each child’s heritage and family traditions during our snack time discussions.

We hope you all have a lovely weekend.

Miss Billington, Ms Johnson and Mrs Alicja