Home Learning

Home learning has now moved to the 'Home Learning' section on the CHILDREN yellow book link on the website homepage. 

Home Learning for This Week - 18th-22nd May

This is below in PDF form that can be printed or you can read in full below that. All the PowerPoints and activity sheet links are at the end of the home learning information for this week below. Don't forget to post to the class blog so we can see what you have been up to!

Reception Home Learning 18^th – 22^nd May

Over the week:

• 10-15 minutes reading each day – children reading to you and you reading stories to them and talking about what they/you have read
• 20-30 minutes of phonics each day (see below)
• 20-30 minutes of maths each day (see below)
• Writing  ideas  - if the children could do 2-3 a week that would be great (see below)
• Topic ideas for our interest ‘minibeasts’ – Look at the PowerPoint (below) with your child and 2 or 3 things a week is more than enough but daily if you wish. This week it is bees! (see below)
• Fitness time each day – JumpStart Jonny / Joe Wickes or just time playing outside or going for a walk/bike ride/scooter ride.

Remember to do what you can and that a play based approach will work best. Do not expect the children to sit for too long and whatever you can do is appreciated.

WRITING IDEAS

It would be great if the children could have a go at doing some writing 2-3 times a week. Please use lined paper or draw lines (about 15mm apart) to encourage neat writing. Not essential though, we would rather they wrote on plain paper than not write at all! Please do not do the writing for your child; it is not about them copying your writing but rather having a go at it themselves. It is perfectly fine for them to have a go at spelling words using the sounds they know, do not expect them to spell all words correctly. Please encourage correct spellings of the tricky words. Please remind them to try starting each sentence with a capital letter and finish with a full stop. All children are different so just let them write as much as they like. For some 1-2 sentences will be enough and take a while. If your child does this easily and quickly then you could push them to do more! Children find writing easier when they want to write about something and it interests them. Therefore, we have put some suggestions below but if your child would rather write about what they have been doing or something that interests them then that is great too!

The children might like to:

- Write about a minibeast they like or this week’s chosen one. Research about it and write some facts about it. We have linked a writing sheet below with space for a picture and some lines to write on that you can use if you wish.

- Write about a story they have read - a minibeast one, if you have one?

- Write a story about a minibeast.

-  Write a thank you letter to someone.

Whatever they write about we would love to see their writing (and pictures!) so please upload some photos on their blog so we can see their writing.

Note – We know getting the children to write is not always easy! This for us is the often the hardest area to work with children on in school. It is hard work for children to learn to write independently (and for the teacher teaching them!) and children will often try to avoid it, as they know how hard it is too! Please do not feel you are alone if your child is not too keen on writing, we promise you, you are not the only one! Please do what you can and if you need any advice or support e-mail us via the school admin e-mail -admin@harrowgatehillpri.darlington.sch.uk and we will do our best to help. Remember to praise lots and you could always do writing in stages with mini rewards (like some free time) between each bit they do.

PHONICS

There are new Phonics lessons on YouTube from the Department of Education. There are lessons each day for Reception. These can be accessed at:    https://wandleenglishhub.org.uk/lettersandsounds

Alternatively, you could follow our daily timetable. See the home learning for April 27th information that explains this in more detail.

If your child can read all of the tricky words on sight by themselves then you could always introduce the Phase 4 tricky words for them to start learning a couple at a time. We have previously sent flashcards you can download or they are in the home learning on the class pages of the website.

Phase 4 Tricky Words – said, have, like, so, do, some, come, little, there, were, one, what, when, out

MATHS

Each day try to do the following:

• Practise rote counting to 30 (or beyond if they can!)
• Practise recognising 0-20 by using the flashcards in the learning pack and some of the ideas we gave you
• Ask the children ‘one more’ and ‘one less’ questions using numbers to 20. For example – ‘What is one more than 8?’ ‘What is one less than 5?’ When they can do this with numbers 1-10 then try 11-20. If they struggle they could use a numberline (write 0-10 / 20 along a piece of paper) so they can find the numbers and work out what is ‘one more’ (next number along) and what is ‘one less’ (number before).

CHALLENGES FOR THIS WEEK – CAN YOU COMPLETE THEM ALL?

If you would like to do more maths then you could try any of the following:

We have  a bee halving activity that can be printed out below.

White Rose Maths has produced a daily video of maths ideas for each day this week. This is based around the theme of the book 'Superworm’ this week.

www.whiterosemaths.com/homelearning/early-years

There are also maths lessons available from ‘The Oak Academy’ an on-line school that has been set up with the support of the Department for Education. There are a number of maths lessons for reception each week.

www.thenational.academy

Top Marks (www.topmarks.co.uk)  has lots of maths games to practise key skills. Try some of the following:

Counting Games

Ladybird Spots

Teddy Numbers

Helicopter rescue

Caterpillar Count

1 more / 1 less

Chopper squad

Ordering

Caterpillar ordering

Addition and Subtraction

Addition to 10

Museum of 10

Minus Machine

Addition and Subtraction ladder

Maths can be practised lots through play activities so encourage your child to count, find more/less, add and subtract items when they are playing.

TOPIC

This week our minibeast is bees!

• What can you find out about bees?

• Look at the PowerPoint (below) to find out more. about bees

• Watch this video about bees https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B2jfMHWYTDk

• Do you have any bee stories at home? You can look on YouTube for some if you don’t.

The Beeman by Laurie Krebs and Valeria Cis https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KYaIlK7jm9s

The Flight of the Honey Bee by Raymond Huber https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6l9gbVlM-9A

• Can you find any bees in your garden? Look at them closely and draw/write about them. Can you label

the different parts of the bee?

Can you make your own bee themed art? Here are some ideas to inspire you.

Home Learning for This Week - 11th-15th May

This is below in PDF form that can be printed or you can read in full below that. All the PowerPoints and activity sheet links are at the end of the home learning information for this week below. Don't forget to post to the class blog so we can see what you have been up to!

Reception Home Learning 11^th – 15^th May

Over the week:

• 10-15 minutes reading each day – children reading to you and you reading stories to them and talking about what they/you have read
• 20-30 minutes of phonics each day (see below)
• 20-30 minutes of maths each day (see below)
• Writing  ideas  - if the children could do 2-3 a week that would be great (see below)
• Topic ideas for our interest ‘minibeasts’ – Look at the PowerPoint (below) with your child and 2 or 3 things a week is more than enough but daily if you wish. This week it is ladybirds! (see below)
• Fitness time each day – JumpStart Jonny / Joe Wickes or just time playing outside or going for a walk/bike ride/scooter ride.

Remember to do what you can and that a play based approach will work best. Don’t expect the children to sit for too long and whatever you can do is appreciated.

WRITING IDEAS

It would be great if the children could have a go at doing some writing 2-3 times a week. Please use lined paper or draw lines (about 15mm apart) to encourage neat writing. Not essential though, we would rather they wrote on plain paper than not write at all! Please do not do the writing for your child, it is not about them copying your writing but rather having a go at it themselves. It is perfectly fine for them to have a go at spelling words using the sounds they know, do not expect them to spell all words correctly. Please encourage correct spellings of the tricky words. Please remind them to try starting each sentence with a capital letter and finish with a full stop. All children are different so just let them write as much as they like. For some 1-2 sentences will be enough and take a while. If your child does this easily and quickly then you could push them to do more! Children find writing easier when they want to write about something and it interests them. Therefore we have put some suggestions below but if your child would rather write about what they have been doing or something that interests them then that’s great too!

The children might like to:

-  Use the ladybird pencil-control sheets (below)

- Write about a minibeast they like or this week’s chosen one. Research about it and write some facts about it. We have provided a writing sheet (below) with space for a picture and some lines to write on that you can use.

- Write about a story they have read - a minibeast one, if you have one?

- Write a letter to a school friend.

-  Write about their house and/or garden.

Whatever they write about we would love to see their writing (and pictures!) so please upload some photos on their blog so we can see their writing.

Note – We know getting the children to write is not always easy! This for us is the often the hardest area to work with children on in school. It is hard work for children to learn to write independently (and for the teacher teaching them!) and children will often try to avoid it, as they know how hard it is too! Please don’t feel you are alone if your child is not too keen on writing, we promise you, you are not the only one! Please do what you can and if you need any advice or support e-mail us via the school admin e-mail -admin@harrowgatehillpri.darlington.sch.uk and we will do our best to help. Remember to praise lots and you could always do writing in stages with mini rewards (like some free time) between each bit they do.

PHONICS

There are new Phonics lessons on YouTube from the Department of Education. There are lessons each day for Reception. These can be accessed at:    https://wandleenglishhub.org.uk/lettersandsounds

Or you could follow our daily timetable. See the home learning for April 27th information that explains this in more detail.

If your child can read all of the tricky words on sight by themselves then you could always introduce the Phase 4 tricky words for them to start learning a couple at a time. We have previously sent flashcards you can download or they are in the home learning on the class pages of the website.

Phase 4 Tricky Words – said, have, like, so, do, some, come, little, there, were, one, what, when, out

MATHS

Each day try to do the following:

• Practise rote counting to 30 (or beyond if they can!)
• Practise recognising 0-20 by using the flashcards in the learning pack and some of the ideas we gave you
• Ask the children ‘one more’ and ‘one less’ questions using numbers to 20. For example – ‘What is one more than 8?’ ‘What is one less than 5?’ When they can do this with numbers 1-10 then try 11-20. If they struggle they could use a numberline (write 0-10 / 20 along a piece of paper) so they can find the numbers and work out what is ‘one more’ (next number along) and what is ‘one less’ (number before).

CHALLENGES FOR THIS WEEK – CAN YOU COMPLETE THEM ALL?

If you would like to do more maths then you could try any of the following:

Try the ladybird odd/even colouring activity (below)

White Rose Maths has produced a daily video of maths ideas for each day this week. This is based around the theme of the book ‘The Very Busy Spider’ this week.

www.whiterosemaths.com/homelearning/early-years

There are also maths lessons available from ‘The Oak Academy’ an on-line school that has been set up with the support of the Department for Education. There are a number of maths lessons for reception each week.

www.thenational.academy

Top Marks (www.topmarks.co.uk)  has lots of maths games to practise key skills. Try some of the following:

Counting Games

Ladybird Spots

Teddy Numbers

Helicopter rescue

Caterpillar Count

1 more / 1 less

Chopper squad

Ordering

Caterpillar ordering

Addition and Subtraction

Addition to 10

Museum of 10

Minus Machine

Addition and Subtraction ladder

Maths can be practised lots through play activities so encourage your child to count, find more/less, add and subtract items when they are playing.

TOPIC

This week’s minibeast is ladybirds!

• What do you already know about ladybirds?
• What can you find out about ladybirds? Look at the PowerPoint (below) to find out about them.
• Watch this video about ladybirds - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KPUazqh63kE
• Complete the cut and stick life-cycle (below)
• Do you have any ladybird stories at home? You can look on YouTube for some if you don’t (What the Ladybird Heard, What the Ladybird Heard Next!, The Bad-tempered Ladybird)
• Can you find any ladybirds in your garden?
•   Can you make some ladybird themed art? Here are some examples to inspire you!
• 

Home Learning for This Week - 4th-8th May

This is below in PDF form that can be printed or you can read in full below that. Don't forget to post to the class blog so we can see what you have been up to!

We have also added a PowerPoint about the VE Day 75th Anniversary this coming Friday and some activities you may like to try linked to learning about VE day. These are available should you wish to use with your child to help them understand why we are remembering this important day.

Reception Home Learning 4^th – 8^th May

Over the week:

• 10-15 minutes reading each day – children reading to you and you reading stories to them and talking about what they/you have read
• 20-30 minutes of phonics each day (see below)
• 20-30 minutes of maths each day (see below)
• Writing  ideas  - if the children could do 2-3 a week that would be great (see below)
• Topic ideas for our new interest ‘minibeasts’ – Look at the powerpoint with your child and 2 or 3 things a week is more than enough but daily if you wish. This week its caterpillars and butterflies! (see below)
• Fitness time each day – JumpStart Jonny / Joe Wickes or just time playing outside or going for a walk/bike ride/scooter ride.

Remember to do what you can and that a play based approach will work best. Don’t expect the children to sit for too long and whatever you can do is appreciated.

WRITING IDEAS

It would be great if the children could have a go at doing some writing 2-3 times a week. Please use lined paper or draw lines (about 15mm apart) to encourage neat writing. Not essential though, we would rather they wrote on plain paper than not write at all! Please do not do the writing for your child, it is not about them copying your writing but rather having a go at it themselves. It is perfectly fine for them to have a go at spelling words using the sounds they know, do not expect them to spell all words correctly. Please encourage correct spellings of the tricky words. Please remind them to try starting each sentence with a capital letter and finish with a full stop. All children are different so just let them write as much as they like. For some 1-2 sentences will be enough and take a while. If your child does this easily and quickly then you could push them to do more! Children find writing easier when they want to write about something and it interests them. Therefore we have put some suggestions below but if your child would rather write about what they have been doing or something that interests them then that’s great too!

The children might like to:

-  Write about what they have been doing.

- Write about a minibeast they like or this week’s chosen one. Research about it and write some sentences about it.

- Write about a story they have read - a minibeast one if you have one?

- Write about a favourite television programme or character.

- Write about what they would like to be when they grow up.

Whatever they write about we would love to see their writing (and pictures!) so please upload some photos on their blog so we can see their writing.

Note – We know getting the children to write is not always easy! This for us is the often the hardest area to work with children on in school. It is hard work for children to learn to write independently (and for the teacher teaching them!) and children will often try to avoid it, as they know how hard it is too! Please don’t feel you are alone if your child is not too keen on writing, we promise you, you are not the only one! Please do what you can and if you need any advice or support e-mail us via the school admin e-mail -admin@harrowgatehillpri.darlington.sch.uk and we will do our best to help. Remember to praise lots and you could always do writing in stages with mini rewards (like some free time) between each bit they do.

PHONICS

There are new Phonics lessons on Youtube from the Department of Education. There are lessons each day for Reception. These can be accessed at:

https://wandleenglishhub.org.uk/lettersandsounds

Or you could follow our daily timetable. See the home learning for April 27th information that explains this in more detail.

TOPIC

                               This week have a think about Caterpillars and Butterflies!

-What can you find out about caterpillars and butterflies?

-Look at the powerpoint below with your child to find out more about caterpillars and buterflies.

-Watch this video about caterpillars https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QYbMScXPEV0

-Do you have any caterpillar or butterfly stories at home? You can look on YouTube for some if you don’t - The Hungry Caterpillar, The Crunching Munching Caterpillar are both good stories.

-Can you find any caterpillars or butterflies in your garden? Look at them closely and draw/write about them. Can you label the different parts of the caterpillar?

-Look at the life cycle of a butterfly https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O1S8WzwLPlM. Then draw and label your own lifecycle. If you wish, you can print off and use the lifecycle cut and stick sheet below to help you – can you label each part of the life-cycle?

Can you make your own caterpillar? Have a look around the house and see what materials you can find to make a caterpillar. Here are some ideas…

There are some caterpillar and butterfly activity sheets below that can be downloaded and printed at home for the children to complete

Home Learning for This Week - 27th April - 1st May

This is below in PDF form that can be printed or you can read in full below that. Don't forget to post to the class blog so we can see what you have been up to! 

Home Learning for This Week - 27th April - 1st May

Hello everyone! Here are some ideas for things to do this week:

Over the week:

• 10-15 minutes reading each day – children reading to you and you reading stories to them and talking about what they/you have read
• 20-30 minutes of phonics each day
• 20-30 minutes of maths each day
• Writing  ideas  - if the children could do 2-3 a week that would be great
• Topic ideas for our new interest ‘minibeasts’ – Look at the powerpoint with our child and 2 or 3 things a week is more than enough but daily if you wish. This week its snails!
• Fitness time each day – JumpStart Jonny / Joe Wickes or just time playing outside or going for a walk/bike ride/scooter ride.

Remember to do what you can and that a play based approach will work best. Don’t expect the children to sit for too long and whatever you can do is appreciated.

WRITING IDEAS

It would be great if the children could have a go at doing some writing 2-3 times a week. Please use lined paper or draw lines (about 15mm apart) to encourage neat writing. Not essential though, we would rather they wrote on plain paper than not write at all! Please do not do the writing for your child, it is not about them copying your writing but rather having a go at it themselves. It is perfectly fine for them to have a go at spelling words using the sounds they know, do not expect them to spell all words correctly. Please encourage correct spellings of the tricky words. Please remind them to try starting each sentence with a capital letter and finish with a full stop. All children are different so just let them write as much as they like. For some 1-2 sentences will be enough and take a while. If your child does this easily and quickly then you could push them to do more! Children find writing easier when they want to write about something and it interests them. Therefore we have put some suggestions below but if your child would rather write about what they have been doing or something that interests them then that’s great too!

The children might like to:

-  Write about what they have been doing.

- Write about a minibeast they like or this week’s chosen one. Research about it and write some sentences about it.

- Write about a story they have read (a minibeast one if you have one?) or Miss Chapman’s snail story she is going to read this week on the school Facebook page,

- Write a letter to a family member or friend.

- Write about a pet they have or a pet they would like.

Whatever they write about we would love to see their writing (and pictures!) so please upload some photos on their blog so we can see their writing.

PHONICS

There are new Phonics lessons on Youtube from the Department of Education. There are lessons each day for Reception. These can be accessed at:

https://wandleenglishhub.org.uk/lettersandsounds

Or you could follow our daily timetable. See last week’s home learning information that explains this in more detail.

If your child can read all of the tricky words on sight by themselves then you could always introduce the Phase 4 tricky words for them to start learning a couple at a time.

Phase 4 Tricky Words – said, have, like, so, do, some, come, little, there, were, one, what, when, out

We have a set of flashcards for you to download and print if you can.

MATHS

Each day try and do the following:

• Practise rote counting to 30 (or beyond if they can!)
• Practise recognising 0-20 by using the flashcards in the learning pack and some of the ideas we gave you
• Ask the children ‘one more’ and ‘one less’ questions using numbers to 20. For example – ‘What is one more than 8?’ ‘What is one less than 5?’ When they can do this with numbers 1-10 then try 11-20. If they struggle they could use a numberline (write 0-10 / 20 along a piece of paper) so they can find the numbers and work out what is ‘one more’ (next number along) and what is ‘one less’ (number before).

CHALLENGES FOR THIS WEEK – CAN YOU COMPLETE THEM ALL?

If you would like to do more maths then you could try any of the following:

White Rose Maths has produced a daily video for each day this week around the theme of the book  ‘The Night Pirates’, if you don’t have the book at home there are various readings of it on Youtube.

www.whiterosemaths.com

There are maths lessons available from ‘The Oak Academy’ an on-line school which has been set up with the support of the Department for Education. There are a number of maths lessons for reception each week.

www.thenational.academy

Top Marks (www.topmarks.co.uk)  has lots of maths games to practise key skills. Try some of the following:

Counting Games

Ladybird Spots

Tedy Numbers

Helicopter rescue

Caterpillar Count

1 more / 1 less

Chopper squad

Ordering

Caterpillar ordering

Addition and Subtraction

Addition to 10

Museum of 10

Minus Machine

Addition and Subtraction ladder

Maths can be practised lots through play activities so encourage your child to count, find more/less, add and subtract items when they are playing.

TOPIC

This week have a think about snails!

• -What can you find out about snails?
• -Look the snail powerpoint (below) with your child to find out all about them.
• -Watch this video about snails - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pLCtVGB1mFw
• -Do you have any snail stories at home? You can look on YouTube for some if you don’t (The Snail and the Whale, The Little Snail, Norman the Slug with the Silly Shell, etc)
• -Can you find any snails in your garden? It might need to rain first. Look at them closely and draw/write about them. Can you label the different parts of the snail?

        Check out the work of Henri Matisse. It might not look like it but this is his interpretation of a snail. Can you make a snail picture using collage?

There are lots of other snail pictures you could make at home. Here are some examples:

Weekly Home Learning  20-24^th April   

Thank you for everything you have been doing to continue to support your child’s learning at home. The following are some things to help you out this week. Please remember this is home learning and not home schooling! Do as much as you can but there is no pressure to do everything as everyone’s home circumstances are different and please remember whatever you can do we appreciate this and it will benefit your child. There is a lot to read this week as we are setting the new home learning up, from next week it will be shorter as you won’t need all the explanations -  so apologies if this takes while to read through!

If you have any questions about the home learning or would like to show us what your child is doing then please use the class blog section of the website, we can then reply to you using the comments on the blog posts. If you need help with home learning you can also e-mail any questions to admin@harrowgatehillpri.darlington.sch.uk.

We have put all of the home learning for the coming week into a pdf document that you can print if you find it easier or it is in full below:

Weekly Home Learning 20-24th April

We have put some ideas below to help you do some learning each day this week:

• 10-15 minutes reading each day – children reading to you and you reading stories to them and talking about what they/you have read
• 20-30 minutes of phonics each day
• 20-30 minutes of maths each day
• Writing  ideas  - if the children could do 2-3 a week that would be great
• Topic ideas for our new interest ‘minibeasts’ - 2 or 3 a week is more than enough but daily if you wish.
• Fitness time each day – JumpStart Jonny / Joe Wickes or just time playing outside or going for a walk/bike ride/scooter ride.

Please also don’t forget that much of what we do in Reception is play and children are continually learning when playing. We would expect a large amount of their day will be doing just that! The recommended time for reception children to be active is three hours a day so please encourage children to play with all their toys both inside and outside. If they have siblings to play with or when playing with adults it is an ideal time to practise turn taking and playing nicely. If you have any board games these are ideal for practising these skills, it’s also an important opportunity to learn that losing isn’t so bad and that we can’t always win! Please remember to keep talking with children as they play. Joining in with their play if you have time would be very beneficial as it will give plenty of opportunity to talk with your child which is really important.

If you have any questions about home learning or would like to post pictures of what the children are doing please use the class blog which we e-mailed about last week. We will use the comments to reply. To be the first to comment on any blog post you just click on the title. To add further comments click on ‘comments’.

PHONICS

We have put together a weekly timetable to follow if you wish.

Phase 2  – s a t p I n m d g o c k ck e u r h b f ff l ll ss

Phase 3 – j v w x y z zz qu ch sh th ai ee igh oa o oar or ur ow oi ear air  ure er

Tricky words – I to no go the he she we me be my are all her you they was

Revising Sounds - Miss Chapman and Mrs Aitken have videos to help the children practise the above sounds. They can be found on the school Facebook page or in the home learning section of the website in the ‘video centre’.

Reading sentences – Please either type these on a computer, handwrite on paper, if it’s nice write with a paintbrush and water outside or with chalks if you have some. Please use a capital letter at the start of the sentence and a full stop at the end, lower case for all other letters please. If they struggle to find the digraphs (two letters, one sound) in words you can put sound buttons on. Put a dot under single sound and a line under the digraphs. 

Dictating sentences – These are a chance for the children to write a sentence by themselves. Read the sentence to them. Get them to repeat it back a few times (so they can remember it), they could do in different voices (speak, sing, whisper, shout, squeak it….). Once they know what they need to write they can have a go. Please let them try themselves rather than just copy the sentence. They may need a couple of reminders of which word comes next. Remind them to start with a capital letter and to put the full stop at the end. Draw lines for the children to write on if possible and encourage them to use their neatest handwriting.

If your child struggles with the above games and tasks you will just need to give them more help, that is fine.

To extend the children if they want to do more or they are finding everything in the above grid very easy you could give them pictures or words containing Phase 3 digraphs and they can make their own sentences up.

There are lots of phonics games on the following websites that the children can also play to practise reading and writing words. Choose Phase 3 games and if they do really well with those they could try some Phase 4 games.

www.letters-and-sounds.com

www.phonicsplay.co.uk

MATHS

Each day try and do the following

• Practise rote counting to 30 (or beyond if they can!)
• Practise recognising 0-20 by using the flashcards in the learning pack and some of the ideas we gave you
• Ask the children ‘one more’ and ‘one less’ questions using numbers to 20. For example – ‘What is one more than 8?’ ‘What is one less than 5?’ When they can do this with numbers 1-10 then try 11-20. If they struggle they could use a numberline (write 0-10 / 20 along a piece of paper) so they can find the numbers and work out what is ‘one more’ (next number along) and what is ‘one less’ (number before).

White Rose Maths has produced a daily video for each day this week around the theme of the book  ‘Supertato’, if you don’t have the book at home there are various readings of it on Youtube and we have used it recently with the children so they will know it. These give ideas for parents and carers that you can do with the children. Some activities require equipment, don’t worry if you don’t have this and do not go out just to buy. Just have a go at the activities you can.

www.whiterosemaths.com

The government also announced some new on-line learning which will have maths lessons for reception children. We have not yet been able to preview this but this week’s reception focus is numbers to 10.

www.thenational.academy

Maths can be practised lots through play activities so encourage your child to count, find more/less, add and subtract items when they are playing.

WRITING IDEAS

It would be great if the children could have a go at doing some writing 2-3 times a week. Please use lined paper or draw lines (about 15mm apart) to encourage neat writing. Not essential though, we would rather they wrote on plain paper than not write at all! Please do not do the writing for your child, it is not about them copying your writing but rather having a go at it themselves. It is perfectly fine for them to have a go at spelling words using the sounds they know, do not expect them to spell all words correctly. Please encourage correct spellings of the tricky words. Please remind them to try starting each sentence with a capital letter and finish with a full stop. All children are different so just let them write as much as they like. For some 1-2 sentences will be enough and take a while. If your child does this easily and quickly then you could push them to do more! Children find writing easier when they want to write about something and it interests them. Therefore we have put some suggestions below but if your child would rather write about what they have been doing or something that interests them then that’s great too!

The children might like to:

- Write about what they have been doing in the Easter break.

- Write about a minibeasts they like. Research about it and write some sentences about it.

- Write about a favourite toy.

- Write about someone in their family.

Whatever they write about we’d love to see their writing (and pictures!) so please upload some photos on their blog so we can see their writing.

TOPIC

Our new topic at school was going to be ‘minibeasts’ – finding out all about the insects and little creatures that live in our natural world.

This week have a think about spiders!  

• What can you find out about spiders?
• Watch this video about Spiders https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WUx2qqPUyOI
• Do you have any spider stories at home? You can look on you tube for various spider stories if you don’t (The Very Busy Spider, Aargh Spider, Incy Wincey Spider etc)
• Can you find any spiders or spiders webs in your garden?
• Can you make some spider art. Here are some ideas but there are lots more on pinterest.

7th April

Hi everyone! I hope you have enjoyed the last couple of days, we have had some lovely weather! I hope you managed to spend some time in the garden. I did.. but I forgot to put my suncream on, so I'm now sat in my living room with a face the same colour as a tomato! 

Mrs Wilkinson has been in touch and has sent me a video of when we were all together in school a few months ago. I have posted the video below for you to all have a watch. She also said that she will be recording more videos of her telling stories, so ask your grown ups to keep checking the Harrowgate Hill Facebook page! 

love Miss Taylor x

1st April

Hi everyone! I hope you are all keeping yourselves busy at home, helping your grown ups and doing some home learning. If you are running out of ideas, here are a few links that might support you: 

White Rose Maths are doing daily a 'Maths Party' on You Tube for each year group. We use their resources in school so they would be worth watching. Click on the link to their web page and there is a link to their home learning resources.

www.whiterosemaths.com

Click on Home Learning > Early Years

The National Literacy Trust have produced a 'Family Zone' on their website with ideas and links to other activities.

https://literacytrust.org.uk/family-zone/

Another idea is to think of something you would like to find out more about and do a mini-project about it. You could read about your interest, look up facts on the internet and then draw and write about it. I would love to see your

mini-project work when I see you next! What will you learn about?

pirates?      dinosaurs?      robots?      castles?        different countries?      the jungle?      the sea?

Remember to keep practising your phonic sounds and numbers each day, as well as reading. There are videos of Mrs Aitken and Miss Chapman on the Home Learning section and on the school's Facebook page to help you practise your phonic sounds. 

MATHS CHALLENGES

- Can you recognise all the numbers 0-20?

- Can you say '1 more' than numbers 0-20?

- Can you say 'one less' than numbers 0-20?

- Can you add two sets of objects together and write the number sentence (i.e.1+2=3)?

- Can you get some objects, take some away & find out how many left? Can you write the number sentence (i.e.3-2=1)?

- Can you double 1,2,3,4 and 5?

- Can you share some objects between members of your family? (i.e. 6 apples between 3 people - how many each?)

Don't forget to keep active too, Joe Wicks, Jumpstart Jonny and Cosmic Yoga are all on You Tube and worth looking at.

Finally, remember to keep being good for your grown-ups and help at home as much as you can. A huge thank you to grown ups, for everything you are doing with your Arctic Fox, just do as much as you can but above all just enjoy spending time playing and talking with them. Look after each other and stay safe.

I look forward to seeing you soon! 

love Miss Taylor x

26th March 

Hi everyone, I hope you are all well and being good for your grown ups at home! It has been a very long week without you all. I have been keeping myself busy by doing some work for school and doing work around the house. I have been keeping active by running each day and taking part in the Joe Wicks P.E.  Have you had a go at that too? 

I can't wait to see you all again!

Miss Taylor x

P.S. Head over to Icicles page.. Mrs Aitken has a new addition to her family! I wonder if we can persuade her to bring Buddy to meet us all when we get back to school! 

Hi everyone! 

School has been super quiet without you all today! Mrs Wilkinson and I have missed you! 

If you have play-doh at home or are able to make some using the recipe in the Home Learning pack, 'Spread the Happiness' are doing a Dough Disco Party every day on their You Tube channel at 9.30am and 1pm for you to join in with. 

They also have a list of 100 things to do Indoors - see how many you can tick off whilst you're at home! 

Keeping active is super important, especially when we are indoors for a significant amount of time. Exercise can have a huge positive impact on our mental health and so I will be taking part in Joe Wicks' 'P.E. with Joe' and I hope you do too! 

See if you can count how many of each exercise you do with Joe. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rz0go1pTda8 

I will be in touch soon,

Stay safe,

Miss Taylor xx

It's Christmas!

We have been extremely busy over the festive period in Reception. We decorated our class Christmas Tree, made crowns to wear during our Christmas Lunch, took part in the Early Years Christmas Concert, decorated cakes for our stall at the Christmas Fayre, partied for a WHOLE DAY(!!) and went to the Hullabaloo Theatre. 

We have had an amazing first term.

Merry Christmas x

We talked about how we celebrated Bonfire Night in School. We all had lots of different stories to tell! Some of us made paintings and pictures of fireworks using different materials in the Art Area. 

We celebrated the Diwali Festival in our first Autumn half term at school. We read the story of Rama and Sita as a class, made Diva Pots using clay with Miss Taylor and were able to create our own Rangoli Patterns.

We have been extremely busy throughout Autumn Term, getting to know each other and getting to grips with the different areas of our indoor and outdoor classroom. Here are photographs of just some of our learning. 

Welcome to Arctic Foxes' Class Page! 

Class Teacher: Miss Taylor

Teaching Assistant: Mrs Wilkinson 

We have really enjoyed our first week at School, settling in, making new friends and exploring the areas of the classroom. 

Photos of our learning are coming soon!