Reception

Welcome to Reception at Ashton Gate

We are very excited to welcome the children back to Term 2 after the half term holiday. We hope they all had a lovely break. This term, we will be exploring celebrations like Bonfire Night and Diwali, going on a park trip, looking at the books Kitchen Disco and Goldilocks and the Three Bears and of course getting ready for our Nativity plays. The children will be learning new sounds and practising blending and segmenting them so that they can read and write words. In mathematics the children will look at repeating patterns and explore in depth the numbers 0-10 – ordering, recognising, carefully counting, representing and finding one more or less than a given number.

Preview Learning Term 1/Half Term:

We are looking at rhyme and alliteration - maybe you could read your child a rhyming story and notice the words that rhyme. Enjoying stories together and having fun is so important! You could make up a silly sentence with your child using the initial sound of their name - Ben balances bananas on his back, or Sarah sings silly songs, for example.

We will be looking at orally blending and segmenting and trying to get the children to hear and say all the sounds in a simple word. We call this 'robot talk'. We might say, "Can you see the c-a-t?" and see if they can put the sounds together to make 'cat'. We will see if they can talk like robots too: how would a robot say dog? You could play simple games with your child to support this: I spy a c-u-p, for example, or can you get your c-oa-t? These skills will be the foundation for reading and help them to blend sounds together on paper to make words and also to spell them in their writing. 

Can you encourage your child to notice numbers in their environment? Perhaps on doors as you walk down a road, or on signs and in shops. You could talk about what these numbers mean - what is 3? You could find three leaves and clap 3 times, for example. You could get your child to count how many cups or plates are needed at dinner time. This encourages children to have a really solid understanding of what each number really means and forms the basis for their developing mathematics skills. 

Please do read the Newsletter below, it contains some very useful dates, including when your child's Christmas Performance will take place, which is very exciting!

The Reception team would like to say a massive, heartfelt thank you to all the families who came to the working party at the weekend and helped transform the outdoor area for the children. Everyone put in such an effort: painting, sweeping, gardening, decorating CDs for a fairy garden, attaching recycled planters to the fence and creating amazing mud kitchen and stage areas from pallets! We really appreciate everything that you did and you all earned your tea and cake. The children are extremely excited by their new additions and are already enjoying playing with them. It has been brilliant for the children to see what can be achieved when we work together as a community. We plan to hold another of these events in the Spring - so watch this space!

We would like to thank all the parents who made donations of paint, plants, guttering, bunting and all kinds of lovely things. We were also lucky enough to be supported by donations from the PTA, Wickes and Riverside Garden Centre. These kind donations made the transformation possible and we are all very grateful.  

If you would be interested in getting involved in something like this and are able to give up any of your time to maintain the planting and painting, or to use your skills to work on a specific area please do get in touch with Cath Sands (cath.sands@Bristol-schools.uk). There is no need to wait until our next event in the Spring. We would welcome you to come in either as a one off or regularly and to either work on your own after school or to work alongside the children, so that they can join in too. All help will be very much appreciated. 

Reception Staff

EYFS Lead: Mrs Cath Sands

Ladybird Class:  Mr Riley  (Class teacher)

                         Mrs Douglas

Butterfly Class: Mrs Gilbert (M,T,W) and Mrs Houghton (W, Th, F) (Class teachers)

                           Miss Ward.

Caterpillar Class: Mrs Sowden (Class teacher)

                             Mrs Forsythe

Bumblebee Class: Miss Carter (Class teacher)

                               Mrs Poynter