Little Owl Class Reception

Welcome to Little Owl Class

Little Owl Class is our Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) Reception Class.

Within Little Owl Class we have two ‘nests’: Barn Owls and Tawny Owls.

In Little Owl Class we love to learn and particularly enjoy to explore the outdoors, finding and using natural resources to help us learn new things. We discover through play and use a range of brilliant stories to guide our learning. Our timetable is a combination of child initiated learning and adult led activities. Our wonderful indoor and outdoor learning environment provides endless learning opportunities; we can follow our own interests and access exciting weekly challenges. Adult led learning takes place in small groups or in our ‘nests’.

The EYFS Team

Teachers – Mrs Newton (Barn Owls) & Mrs Edey-Walters (Tawny Owls)

Teaching Assistant – Mrs Daw

Term One

Our Church School Values

LOVE KINDNESS HONESTY FORGIVENESS PERSEVERANCE RESPECT

Our value this term is LOVE.

We will explore love through stories and role play and through discussions in our Class Worship and Talking Time sessions. We will explore what love is and how we show we love someone. We will listen to each other and take time to reflect.

What are we learning about?

This term we are learning about OURSELVES.

We are looking forward to a special first term of fun, friendship and learning.

Week 1: Owl Babies

This week we will be exploring all of the exciting areas in our classroom, playing with our friends and learning our school routine. Fingers crossed for some lovely weather so that we can spend lots of time outside exploring the outdoor area and forest. We will share the story Owl Babies – perfect for Little Owls class! – a brilliant story for settling and reassuring children during their first week at big school.

Week 2 & 3: All About Me

In week 2 we will split into Barn Owl Class and Tawny Owl Class. After getting to know the children in Week 1, Mrs Newton and Mrs Edey-Walters will carefully consider how to split the children into these two groups. (These will be our ‘nest’ groups, but we will still spend the majority of the school day as one big class!) In week 2 we will also begin Read Write Inc daily phonics lessons and the children will come home with phonics flashcards so that they can practise the sounds at home. We will be thinking and talking about what makes us unique and drawing self-portraits.

Week 4 & 5: Our Bodies

We will be learning about our bodies and ways to keep healthy. We will sing ‘Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes’ and a special song about teeth to remind us of the importance of brushing them twice a day.

Week 6 & 7: Our Families

We will be talking about the important people in our lives and how they are related to us. Learning about families will involve looking at photographs, drawing pictures and making our very own family trees.

Phonics – Once the children are settled at school, phonics will take place every morning. The children will be taught Set One Sounds in their nest groups. At the end of each week your child will bring home flashcards of the sounds they have learned. Please assist your child to practise their phonics sounds on a regular basis. We please ask you ensure the flash cards are kept in bookbags. The children will bring home wordless phonics books for them to develop important early reading skills such as using storytelling language, holding and turning the pages of a book correctly, talking about the pictures and predicting what will happen next. Reading records will be issued soon for parents / teachers to note when the child has read. The children will also bring a library book home that they have chosen from our class selection. Library books are stories to share with adults at home, perhaps at bedtime or over the weekend. These are just for enjoyment - they do not need to be recorded in reading records.

Maths - In daily Maths Fluency sessions we will be singing number songs. We will meet each of the Numberblocks one by one and begin to understand the composition of numbers, for example, that 3 can be composed of 1s or of 2 and 1. We will develop the skill of subitising and develop counting skills for numbers that cannot be subitised. In addition to daily Maths Fluency sessions we will explore other mathematical concepts such as shape and pattern in adult-guided groups and independent classroom challenges.

PE - PE will take place on Mondays with Mrs Newton and Mrs Edey-Walters and on Thursdays with the Sports Coach. The PE focus for Term 1 is Fundamentals of Movement. Please ensure that the children wear their PE kits to school on these days.

We will share weekly updates of our learning journey with parents on our Class Dojo Story.

Keep a look out for Little Owls on our School Twitter page too!

What books will we be sharing?