Welcome to the Foundation Stage

Creating a positive start to your child's journey at school is crucial. At Woodland Grange we want our children to be active, independent learners from their very first day with us.

• We encourage them to be curious and imaginative.
• We teach them to ask and answer questions — find things out & explain to others.
• We want our children to be aware of the world around them.
• We encourage them to be independent.

Forest School and outdoor learning is a big feature at our school. This helps the children develop their physical skills and core strength, which is vital for everyday life at school and beyond. It also provides many open-ended learning opportunities, which in turn creates team work, problem-solving and allows the imagination to flourish. 

Our PE day is on a Friday- Please remember to send your child into school wearing their PE kit.

Please ensure that children have their waterproofs and willies in school all year round, as well as a set of spare clothes.

Here is the menu for 2023/24. As a school we are option 1 & 3, please click here for the menu.

 

 

Week Beginning 20th May 2024

Focus Text : The Rainbow Fish (continued)

Phonics

This week we will be having a consolidation week in phonics to enable the children to recap the sounds they have learnt so far this term and support them to apply these to their reading and writing more confidently. We will also continue to consolidate the common exception words covered so far too. 

Maths

This week’s focus is on assessing and deepening the children’s understanding of our counting system. The activities included will help us to check their comprehension, and will provide opportunities for further counting experiences. Now we are fast approaching the end of the year, we will be using our professional judgement to determine whether the children can demonstrate these key skills:

• tagging each object in a group of up to 10 objects (1-to-1 correspondence)
• knowing number names to 10 and their order (stable order principle)
• knowing that the last number counted gives the total in the set (cardinal principle)
• counting up to 10 things that can't be seen or tagged, such as jumps, hops, sounds, etc. (abstraction principle)
• understanding that the quantity remains the same when (up to 10) objects are counted in a different order (order irrelevance principle)
• developing strategies to keep track of what has and has not been counted (e.g. rearranging objects into a line, moving objects as they’re counted)
• recognising the pattern of the counting system, when beginning to count beyond 20.

Counting beyond 20 is an important focus this week. Unlike other languages (e.g. Welsh, Mandarin), English ‘teen’ number names do not follow a logical pattern; we say ‘eleven, twelve, thirteen’ instead of ‘ten-one, ten-two, ten-three’.

It is only when we count beyond 20 that the pattern of our number system begins to become clear. For the children to develop familiarity with the structure and pattern of this system, we need to give them experiences of counting to these larger numbers. The children do not need to remember the names of every ‘tens’ number (thirty, forty, fifty, etc.) but, when prompted, they should be able to rejoin the count because they have understood the pattern of the ‘ones’.

This week’s activities are designed to allow ALL of the children to practise these key skills and to deepen their sense of number.

 

In the classroom you will see...

We will be continuing our text this week, The Rainbow Fish. Now the children have a deeper understanding of our focus text, they will be having a go at writing captions to match the sequence of the story and make their own Rainbow fish books. The children will continue to develop their fine motor skills by using pipettes to squeeze liquid into a range of different containers. The small world area contains blue rice, sea creatures, characters from the text and a range of different sized containers and scoops for children to explore and retell the story. We will continue to explore a range of time adverbials by using sequencing cards for children to determine what comes first, then and next in an event. In the creative area, the children will be using the work of the Artist Paul Klee to inspire them to make their own work of art using chalks. 

Our role-play area will continue to be hairdressers and the beauty salon has been a hit. Children will be taking on different roles, booking appointments and role-playing between hairdressers/ customers in our Woodland Grange hairdressers.  Our recent café has sparked lots of discussions with children visiting local coffee shops with their families, so this week we have transformed it into one of the children's favourites, Jennos!  In this café, children will be designing their own drinks, ordering by size, exploring capacity by making their own drinks, as well as a range of other skills to support their imaginative play. 

 

Other areas of the curriculum....

RE - We will continue to explore one of our focus texts from our 'Everyone's Welcome' unit, The Blue Chameleon. This text looks at making new friends. The children will be completing a range of activities to support this unit throughout the week. 

Music - We will be continuing the unit of Pitch

Topic - Paul Klee- Children will be exploring the work of the artist Paul Klee, learning all about him and his work and having a go at using his pieces to inspire them to make their own. 

PSED - We will continue to think about and discuss the transition to year 1.

PE - To follow instructions and move safely when playing tagging games. In this unit, children will practise and further develop their fundamental movement skills through a range of different themes. Children will learn and develop these skills by playing a variety of games. They will also learn how to work as a team, take turns, keep the score, play against an opponent and play by the rules.

 

Week Beginning 13th May 2024

Focus Text : The Rainbow Fish (continued)

Phonics

We are now beginning to cover some of the more complex digraphs/trigraphs within our daily phonics sessions and children are working hard to apply these to their independent writing. Please see the image below which identifies which sounds we will be covering this week.

Maths

The Mastering Number Programme has developed the children’s skills in subitising by giving them regular practice of recognising small numbers without counting. Subitising is important because it encourages the children to recognise small amounts efficiently (perceptual subitising) and to quickly see the ‘numbers within’ other numbers (conceptual subitising). Both skills will support the children in developing their understanding of the composition of numbers and will support greater fluency with calculation.

While this week’s materials continue to provide further subitising practice within familiar contexts, a new focus this week will be on subitising beads on a rekenrek. This key piece of equipment will allow the children to continue to develop their subitising skills as they explore the structure of small numbers, while building a foundation for further work in Year 1.

This week’s activities have a continued focus on using spatial language and visualisation. Encouraging the children to visualise and describe arrangements of objects will further deepen their number sense.

When facilitating the suggested activities, you should use your professional judgement to determine whether the children can demonstrate these key skills:

• perceptual subitising (recognising small amounts without counting) of up to 4 clearly defined objects in different contexts
• perceptual subitising to 5 – saying an amount to 5 shown in a familiar, structured arrangement, e.g. finger patterns, die patterns, number plates or dots on a 10-frame
• auditory subitising – correctly saying when they have heard 2, 3 or 4 drum beats
• conceptual subitising to 5 – quickly saying the groups that they have seen in standard and non-standard arrangements, and naming the whole amount, e.g. I know it’s 5 because I can see 4 and 1 more.

This week’s activities are designed to allow ALL the children to explore the rekenreks and to practise these key skills.

 

In the classroom you will see...

We will be continuing our text this week, The Rainbow Fish. We will be looking at a range of different sea creatures and the children will be writing their own Acrostic poems in the writing area. In the creative area the children will be using a range of materials/stamps/sponges/rollers tec to create their own under the sea pictures. In the small world area, there will be some blue spaghetti to create a sea effect and act as a sensory experience for the children. The 'sea' will have a range of different sea creatures inside for the children to explore. The children will be using time adverbials to discuss the order of sequences (first,then,next)

Our role-play will continue to be a  hairdressers, but will be enhanced with a beauty salon which follows lots of interests the children have shown recently. Children will be taking on different roles, booking appointments and role-playing between hairdressers/ customers in our Woodland Grange hairdressers.  Our Bubble Tea café has been transformed into a Costa cafe due to lots of the links the children have made. This will support children in their imaginative play and allow them to share their own experiences. In this café, children will be designing their own drinks, ordering by size, exploring capacity by making their own drinks, as well as a range of other skills to support their imaginative play. 

 

Other areas of the curriculum....

RE - We will continue to look at places/things which are special to us and discuss why

Music - We will be continuing the unit of Pitch

Topic - We will be looking at facts about sea creatures

PSED - We will begin to think about and discuss transition to year 1l.

PE - To follow instructions and move safely when playing tagging games. In this unit, children will practise and further develop their fundamental movement skills through a range of different themes. Children will learn and develop these skills by playing a variety of games. They will also learn how to work as a team, take turns, keep the score, play against an opponent and play by the rules.

 

Week Beginning 29th April 2024

Focus Text : Clean Up - Nathan Bryon (continued)

Phonics

We are now beginning to cover some of the more complex digraphs/trigraphs within our daily phonics sessions and children are working hard to apply these to their independent writing. Please see the image below which identifies which sounds we will be covering this week.

Maths

This week, the children will review the composition of the numbers 6 to 9 using the ‘5 and a bit’ structure, and then begin to explore how 10 can be composed. They will also develop a sense of the ‘ten-ness of 10’ by making their own collections of 10 objects.

When exploring how 10 can be composed of 2 parts, the focus is on developing the children’s ability to subitise the parts in structured arrangements. A key representation to support this will be the double dice frame, which will allow them to build on their experiences in Week 23. The children will be encouraged to recognise a larger part of 10 when it is presented in the ‘5 and a bit’ structure, and then subitise the smaller part. They will also be encouraged to see how finger patterns can be used to represent 2 parts of 10, using the ‘fingers up and fingers down’ approach that was used when exploring the composition of 5. The children can also be given opportunities to see the composition of 10 represented on a 10-frame.  

Connections

The children will already have experience of subitising small quantities and will use their existing skills to identify the ‘5 and a bit’ structure of the numbers 6 to 9. They will have previously built towers of blocks and made patterns of numbers to 10 in different ways, and they will build on these skills to further explore numbers between 5 and 10.

When the children can compose and flexibly de-compose numbers mentally, they will become more fluent in their knowledge of number bonds and will be able to use this knowledge to become efficient when calculating in Key Stage 1 and Key Stage 2. Understanding and recalling how 10 can be composed is especially important as it underpins our number system.

 

In the classroom you will see...

As we continue our focus text, Clean Up, we will be exploring more ways to be environmentally friendly and look after our planet. We will be using our phonics knowledge to create posters of different ways we can help to protect our planet, to encourage others to make small changes. We will be creating a collaborative art piece to showcase on a display board in the classroom. All children will be involved in using a range of materials, some of which will be recyclable, to create a big under the sea masterpiece! 

The children will be using ten frames and counters, focusing on the nursery rhyme '10 fat sausages' and the mathematics that occurs within the rhyme. Children will use a range of props to support them to retell and explain the maths within the rhyme. 

Our role-play area will continue to be a recycling centre. This is being enhanced with a range of dress-up clothes. dress-up clothes will be the uniforms of a range of different occupations, specifically people that help us. We will also be opening a brand new Bubble Tea café in the base to follow the interest that some of the children have recently shared. In this café, children will be designing their own bubble tea drinks, ordering by size, exploring capacity by making their own drinks, as well as a range of other skills to support their imaginative play. 

 

Other areas of the curriculum....

RE - We will be looking at similarities and differences between some places of worship

Music - We will be continuing the unit of Pitch

Topic - Looking at a range of occupations, we are lucky enough to have a real ambulance come into the school for us to visit and explore.

PSED - We will be looking at the NSPCC Pantosaurus book which looks at the power of PANTS to help children understand their body belongs to them.

PE - To follow instructions and move safely when playing tagging games. In this unit, children will practise and further develop their fundamental movement skills through a range of different themes. Children will learn and develop these skills by playing a variety of games. They will also learn how to work as a team, take turns, keep the score, play against an opponent and play by the rules.