EYFS – Newsletter – 04//07/25

We had an extinction level event in Reception this week! As we have spent a lot of this week’s topic sessions discussing what may have caused the dinosaurs to go extinct over 65 million years ago we explored the popular theory of a devastating meteor strike. We looked at books and videos explaining the wide-reaching effects that a huge impact like this would have had for life on earth and we took a closer look at some impact craters on Google Earth. However, nothing is quite as immersive as SEEING what effects such meteor crashes might have on a landscape so we took to the outdoors with a tray of flour (to represent the land) and water (to represent the oceans). Upon dropping small pebbles and stones we were able to see first-hand how craters form on the landscape. But as our ‘meteors’ increased in size each impact was more and more devastating with huge clouds of dust scattering debris far and wide. The children loved getting to explore the effects of meteor impacts on a small scale and we had a lot of fun getting good and messy!

Our dinosaurs topic has been a lot of fun and the children have continued to be inspired to explore the topics and concepts we’ve discussed during our learning time. After a session where we saw how the Tyrannosaurus made it’s nests with plants, many children set off to make their own mini dinosaur egg nests in the playground. There was much imaginative play this week making use of our large foam shapes as pterosaur wings. We also had lots of fun spurting and blowing paints to give the effect of lava erupting from volcanoes. We spent time on Friday thinking about how volcanoes erupt and what chemical changes are going on to create lava flows. This led on to a discussion about changing states and what things melt and/or solidify at different temperatures.    

Phonics has seen us looking at ‘three letter adjacent consonants’ in words. This requires the children to listen carefully to the different sounds in these more complex spellings to use effectively words such as ‘splash’ and ‘spring’ in their writing. We read a story all about a ‘Spring Club’ with the characters taking part in a holiday club full lots of activities including ‘Streetpump Club’  which required the children to read different words and give them an action (actions such as ‘chest thump’ and ‘starspring’). Well done to all the children for making such great efforts – you are all ready to wow the Year 1 teachers next week with your phonics prowess!

Maths sessions this week have found the children using their wealth of number skills to solve different types of problems. There has been number sentences to solve and sort into whether the answer is less or more than 10; there has been a challenge to complete a loop of numbers using prompts of ‘one more’ or ‘one less’ than a given number; and there has been a story-based problem to calculate how many legs are on different boats after reading the tale of ‘Mr Gumpy’s Outing’. The children have grown so much in their knowledge of and confidence with number this past year and they are ready to continue to impress everyone in Year 1 now!

NEXT WEEK – On Monday the children across school will be meeting their new teachers and spending the week in their new classrooms. The Reception children will find out their new teachers in a special assembly on Monday morning and then going to spend time with either Mrs Koopman in Class 1 or Miss Devine in Class 2. The children have already had several opportunities to meet these teachers and will have a fantastic time becoming the Year 1 children they are already showing us that they are!

DROP OFF and PICK UP will remain the same, at the Reception doors just as it has been all year. From September this will move to the large playground gate down the hill where the new teachers will be there to greet you all on the first day back. However during this Transition Week nothing changes in terms of drop off or pick up. 

Have a lovely weekend

The Reception Team

KEY DATES FOR YOUR DIARY:

Wednesday 16th July – Reception end-of-year Celebration (2pm)  – parents and carers welcome in Reception.

Friday 18th July – Last day of Summer 2 term

DATES FROM KS1 FOR SEPTEMBER:

Thursday 4th Sept – KS1 – Meet the teacher – 3.25pm-3.50pm