A warm welcome to the Summer Term in Catkin Class. We hope you and your families have enjoyed a wonderful Easter break.
You may have noticed prior to the Easter break that our Catkin’s team has grown. Miss Macquillin has joined us from the University of Chichester. She is in the second year of a teaching degree and we are lucky enough to have her with us on placement until June. As part of her placement, she will be actively involved in planning, teaching and assessing. I know she is looking forward to getting to know our Catkin families and I hope you will join us in welcoming her to Slindon!
Our class topic this half term will be 'A Ticket to Ride’ This topic will offer a wealth of opportunities for the children to learn about travel and transport. We will be learning about the history of transport and travel. We will be exploring travel and tourism to different countries around the world. We will explore and draw maps and compare environments to our own locality.
This term we will also be consolidating our previous learning on animals and plants by venturing out on two school trips including a visit to Marwell Zoo with Hazel Class.
For more information about the learning intentions for this topic and how they link to the Early Years Foundation Stage Curriculum, please take a look at the ‘Ticket to Ride Topic Web’ available to download on this webpage.
Phonics Shed
This term we will be continuing with our daily Phonics Shed sessions. So far this year the children have all made fantastic progress learning all 42 of their single letter sounds and double letter diagraphs. The children are developing confidence and independence in applying their new found phonic knowledge in their independent reading and writing.
We will be focusing this half term on continuing to learn our new Chapter 3 diagraph and trigraphs. We will also continue to work through our high frequency and common exception words. More information regarding the Phonics Shed scheme is available on the Curriculum tab under Phonics at Slindon.
Home Reading
Your child’s home reading books are linked to the sounds they are working on in their phonics lessons. Home reading is therefore a great opportunity for you to practice these sounds at home with your child. We would recommend that you take time to read with your child daily to support with fluency. Please sign your child’s reading record after each read to indicate that your child has read with you at home.
In school we will aim to read with your child individually at least twice a week. We would therefore ask that your child brings their book bag along with their reading book and reading record to school every day. We will change your child’s book every Tuesday and Friday.
You may notice a red heart sticker on some of the reading books that your child brings home. These have been added to books to indicate to the children that they may not be fully phonetically decodable at the child’s current reading level. Please be assured the children are free to choose one of these texts which we refer to in school as ‘Love for reading books’. If your child brings one of these books home they may just require a little extra support to decode some of the text. These books are ideal for parent / carers to share together to promote a love for reading!
PE Lessons
Our PE lessons will continue to be on a Tuesday afternoon led by the Premier Sport coaches. We would therefore request that your child arrives dressed appropriately for PE every Tuesday. This includes ensuring that long hair is tied back and any earrings are removed or taped over.
If you have any questions or concerns, please feel free to catch me on the playground at the end of the school day.
Forest Fridays
We will be continuing with our ‘Forest Fridays’ throughout the summer term. This term we will be accompanied in rotation by Hazel, Acorn and Chestnut Class. This will be a fantastic opportunity for the children to share their learning with their peers throughout the school.
Forest Fridays are an opportunity for the children to spend every Friday morning in the woods adjacent to the school. We will be visiting the forest regardless of the weather, so all children should come to school appropriately dressed for the weather conditions - trousers (such as joggers) a long sleeve top, a jumper, a hat, gloves and a scarf. We can provide waterproofs and wellies if needed.
We will need a minimum of one parent volunteer each week for the visit to go ahead. If you are available and would like to help, please contact the school office for more information.
With best wishes,
Mrs Emmajane Merrett [Class Teacher]