Reception Spring 2024-25

Welcome Back to Reception Class at Isleham C of E Primary School!

We are delighted to welcome your child back for the Spring Term in Reception Class! After an exciting and busy first term, we’re looking forward to continuing this journey of learning and discovery together.

 

This term promises to be full of engaging activities, new topics, and opportunities for your child to further explore and develop their skills across all areas of learning. We are excited to see how the children build on their progress from the autumn term as they grow in confidence and curiosity.

 

Here’s to another term of fun, friendships, and flourishing together in Reception!

Spring 1: People Who Help Us

 

This term, our topic is People Who Help Us, where we’ll explore the many important roles played by people in our community who help us in times of need or during emergencies. Through engaging stories, role play, and exciting activities, the children will learn about jobs such as doctors, nurses, firefighters, police officers, and many more.

 

We’ll discuss the ways these people help keep us safe, healthy, and cared for, encouraging the children to think about how they, too, can help others. This topic will provide opportunities to develop key skills across the curriculum, including:

  • Communication and Language: Talking about the roles of community helpers, asking questions, and sharing their own experiences.
  • Understanding the World: Learning about different professions, how these have changed over time and the tools or vehicles used in their work.
  • Personal, Social, and Emotional Development: Discussing how we can show gratitude to those who help us and understanding the importance of teamwork and kindness.
  • Expressive Arts and Design: Engaging in creative activities such as designing emergency vehicles or role-playing scenarios involving people who help us.

 

We may also have some special visitors from our local community to help bring the topic to life, allowing the children to interact with real-life community helpers and learn more about what they do.

Communication and Language 

 

This half term, our focus on Communication and Language will tie in with our new topic, People Who Help Us. Through stories, discussions, and role-play, children will have lots of opportunities to develop their speaking, listening, and understanding skills.

We will encourage children to:

  • Listen attentively in a range of situations: During discussions with and about community helpers, stories, and role-play activities, children will practise careful listening to enhance their comprehension and ability to respond thoughtfully.
  • Learn new words: Words like 'rescue', 'ambulance', and 'firefighter' will be introduced to help children build their vocabulary and use these words in their play and conversations.
  • Share their ideas: Children will be supported to talk about how people help us, explaining their thoughts clearly and in full sentences.
  • Take turns in conversations: We’ll practise asking and answering questions to help children develop good conversation skills.
 
The topic will also integrate storytelling and role-play, enabling children to re-enact scenarios such as visiting a doctor or calling a firefighter. 
Personal, Social, and Emotional Development
 
This term, we’ll build on the important skills developed in the autumn by helping children grow in confidence, independence, and empathy through our new topic, People Who Help Us.
 

We’ll focus on:

  • Understanding feelings: Children will explore how it feels to help others and be helped, as well as how their actions can affect the feelings of those around them.
  • Building relationships: Through role-play and group activities, children will practise working together, taking turns, and sharing ideas as they act out roles like doctors, paramedics, and police officers.
  • Developing independence: Encouraging children to take on small responsibilities, like tidying up or organising resources, helps build confidence and pride in their achievements.
  • Recognising kindness and respect: We’ll discuss how helpers in our community show care and respect for others and how we can do the same in our classroom and beyond.
 

We will also explore Healthy and Safer Lifestyles as part of our PSHE learning. Children will:

  • Learn how to keep their bodies healthy by eating a range of foods and drinking water.
  • Explore their likes and dislikes when it comes to food and understand why different foods and drinks help us stay well.
  • Talk about the importance of exercise and how it helps keep our bodies strong and fit.
  • Discuss why rest and sleep are vital for staying healthy.
  • Begin to make small, healthier choices in daily routines, such as choosing nutritious snacks or staying active during playtime.

Physcial Development

 

This term in PE, we’ll focus on developing ball skills through our engaging topic, Minibeasts. Using this theme, children will explore fundamental ball skills while building both fine and gross motor abilities.

 

Key Physical Skills include:

  • Rolling and stopping a rolling ball.
  • Throwing a ball to a target.
  • Bouncing and catching.
  • Dribbling a ball with their feet.
  • Kicking a ball accurately.

Through a variety of fun activities and games, children will also:

  • Work on coordination and control using different equipment.
  • Play independently and with a partner, practising teamwork and collaboration.
 
We will also be doing a dance unit. In this unit children will develop their expressive movement through the topic of 'everyday life'. Children explore space and how to use space safely. They explore travelling movements, shapes and balances. Children choose their own actions in response to a stimulus. They are given the opportunity to copy, repeat and remember actions. They are introduced to counting to help them keep in time with the music. They perform to others and begin to provide simple feedback.
 
 
 

Building on the strong foundations established in the autumn term, this term we will continue to support children in refining their fine motor skills to develop greater precision and control.

Activities will focus on:

  • Tool Use: Practising with scissors, pencils, paintbrushes, and other tools to improve control and safety.
  • Writing Skills: Strengthening pencil grip and letter formation as children begin writing simple words and short sentences.
  • Creative Work: Using a variety of materials for cutting, sticking, threading, and construction to enhance hand-eye coordination and dexterity.
  • Manipulative Play: Working with small objects, such as beads, tweezers, and interlocking toys, to improve grip strength and precision.
Literacy
 

As we continue building on the skills developed in the autumn term, this spring we will focus on expanding our writing abilities, linking both our phonics knowledge and fine motor skills to create short phrases and captions.

Children will continue to practise name writing with an emphasis on correct letter formation and pencil grip. They will also build confidence in writing CVC (consonant-vowel-consonant) words, moving towards using them in short phrases and captions. For example, they might write a simple sentence to describe a picture or a favourite part of a story.

In addition, we will keep reinforcing the skills learned through our Little Wandle phonics programme, which supports children in developing their understanding of letter sounds and their ability to blend and segment words. This phonics knowledge will be applied directly to their reading books, allowing them to connect their growing reading skills with their writing practice.

Through these activities, children will develop both their confidence in writing and a deeper understanding of how words work, which is fundamental for becoming independent readers and writers. 

Maths 
 
In the spring term, children will continue to develop their skills in counting, comparing, and ordering numbers. We will extend their understanding of one more and one less, as well as number bonds to 10, helping them to gain a strong understanding of how numbers work together. Children will be introduced to addition and subtraction in a practical and hands-on way, using the Numberblocks to explore how numbers combine and take away from each other. We will also be thinking more closely about part-whole models.
Understanding the World 
 

This spring term in Understanding the World, we will be exploring the exciting topic of People Who Help Us, focusing on how people in our communities assist us in times of need and emergency. This theme will help children understand the roles of various community helpers such as police officers, firefighters, doctors, and nurses, and how they contribute to keeping us safe and well.

As part of this unit, we will explore how certain jobs have changed over time. Children will look at how the role of community helpers has evolved, for example, how fire-fighting equipment or hospital technology has advanced. This will help children understand the concept of change over time, linking the past to the present and making connections between the world around them and history.

We will also use resources like photographs, videos, and books to support this learning, helping children gain a broader understanding of how people have been helping in different ways throughout history. This will support their developing skills in observing and describing the world around them.

 

Throughout the term, we will continue to explore other areas of Understanding the World, including:

  • The Natural World: We will observe changes in the seasons and discuss what we can see in our environment as it changes. We have already obsevred changes from autumn to winter and we will now look more closely at winter to spring. 

  • People, Culture, and Communities: In addition to looking at community helpers, children will also explore the people in their immediate family and community, discussing how we care for one another. They will talk about special places, traditions, and celebrations within their communities, broadening their understanding of different cultures.

Expressive Arts 
 
 
In the Kapow we will complete the 'Music and Movement' unit, children will focus on expressing emotions through movement. They will create simple actions to songs, learning how to move to a beat and developing their understanding of rhythm. As children explore how different movements can represent feelings, they will express joy, surprise, excitement, and calm through physical actions in response to music. 
 
Creating with Materials:
Continuing from the autumn term, children will further develop their skills in creating with materials. They will use a range of tools and resources to make items connected to the People Who Help Us topic, such as ambulance vehicles, or police badges, encouraging them to explore their creativity and develop their fine motor skills. 
 
This term, they will start adding more detail to their work, improving what they created before. Children will also talk about their creations, explaining how they made them and why they chose certain materials. This encourages them to use language skills and express their ideas. As they continue to create, they will refine their work, learning how to represent real-life things more clearly.