The children looked splendiferous as they entered school today! We really enjoyed becoming word detectives to find out the meaning of new words as well as celebrating the range of words we knew. Some children celebrated words in their home language, others chose words from their favourite sport and some from books, conversation and films! We had words ranging from anatomy to veracious!
To begin the day we joined the rest of the school in the hall for a parade and a story with Mr Reid.
We loved looking at our friends in their outfits and some children were even brave enough to stand up and share their word and definition.
Then we went back to the classroom to take part in lots of word related Explore Time activities. We learned new words from our friends and had a go at writing our own special words on word clouds and in the Reception Garden.
We made words from construction and by catching floating letters in the water tray.
We used playdough to make texture words and shapes and played games and completed puzzles using letters and words.
We want our children and learning community to be excited about words, to celebrate new words learnt and be curious to find out the meaning of new words heard or read. Learning words is really important; the more words your child knows, the more it will help them at school. By working in partnership, the children here at Merry Hill will become skilled word learners. Here are some exciting ideas to try at home.
How you can help at home:
– Cooking – Cooking together involves co-operation, planning, reading, listening and lots of vocabulary – all skills you need to succeed in school, as well as being great skills for life.
https://www.cookuk.co.uk/children-index
– Get crafty – Crafting and/or constructing with your child provides lots of time for talking. Try and listen more than talk, and comment more than question. This website will give you further ideas, but you can do great things with bricks or by cutting up old cereal packets.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/cbeebies/grownups
– Reading and talking – Reading books to your child is a great way to develop your child’s language. Books expose children to more complex language. For children who are learning to read, hearing stories can make them more enjoyable. For confident readers talk about what you have read together to further develop their understanding.
We are currently reading ‘Happy Hatch Day’ by Rob Biddulph.
– Get your child involved in planning parties or trips – this involves lots of talking, thinking and planning. ‘Who will be coming? What will you need to do? What food will you need? What can you do before? Who needs to do what?’ and maybe even ‘ How can we keep costs down?’
– Play word games – see the attachment within Merry Hill Matters this week
-Singing nursery rhymes. This week’s nursery rhyme is ‘Sleeping Little Bunnies’. Join in here: https://www.bbc.co.uk/cbeebies/watch/something-special-sleeping-bunnies
Phonics
In Phonics this week we have learnt three new phonemes:
The mnemonics are as follows:
ow – go slow in the snow
er- a bitter winter
ure – sure it’s the cure
We have also enjoyed learning about Hedgehog Day (2nd February) and the things we can do to help look after them. During our forest lesson we made some brilliant hedgehog pictures by working in a team to collect sticks and pebbles then laying them on the playground in chalk hedgehog shapes.
Wishing you all a super weekend,
The Reception Team