Upper Foundation – Ladybirds and Meerkats

Welcome to Reception!

At Horbury Primary Academy, we have two reception classes. Mrs Longo teaches Ladybirds and Miss Mussa teaches Meerkats. Mrs Garlick, Mrs Eyre and Mrs Blunden are also practitioners within the Reception team. We work together to challenge and support your child’s learning and development in their early years.

Our children are happy and excited  to learn through rich and challenging learning experiences. We have high ambitions for all our children and recognise that children have different starting points to their learning. We plan according to children’s stages of development so all can thrive and develop. We aim for children to be well-rounded individuals who are independent, resilient, and confident in themselves and with others.

Half Termly Newsletter

Please click below for our Reception Autumn 2 newsletter

Spring 1 newsletter

Yearly overview of topics

Please click below for the yearly overview of topics

UFS Long Term Planning Overview of Topics

Indoor Provision

Autumn 2 Whole Class Challenges

These are our whole class half termly challenges. Each child will also bring home their individual  ‘Next Steps’ targets for this half term, for literacy and mathematics.

Our Wow Wall!

In our reception classrooms we have a ‘Wow Wall’ so that we can record special events in your child’s life. Wow cards, completed by parents/carers, give a wonderful display of achievements and events that the children feel very proud of. They don’t need to be amazing feats, just special to your child. So it could be that, ‘Matthew rode his bike all by himself’, or ‘Jane used her knife and fork and ate all her dinner’, or ‘ Tom practised his target and wrote his name all by himself’.

Wow cards are a huge boost to your child’s self esteem and confidence, and show them that their life events are truly important to the adults around them. Each time your child brings in a new wow card, we place the previous card in their individual learning journey folders. Spare wow cards can be taken at any time from the baskets outside each reception classroom.

Please take time to read our wow cards on display!

Autumn 1 ‘Share a story’

Reception Meerkats and Ladybirds were thrilled to invite members of their family to share some of their favourite books, in our classrooms. We would like to say a big thank you to everyone who came to read with the children, it was a wonderful afternoon.

EYFS Phonics Meeting for Parents

Thank you to all our parents who came to our phonics meeting, it was lovely to see you all. We hope you found the evening informative and supportive. If you were unable to attend, you can see our presentation attached below. We have also listed a range of websites and phonic booklets to support you with your child’s phonics at home.

EYFS Phonics Presentation

Useful Booklets

Phase 2 Booklet

Phase 3 Booklet

Phase 4 Booklet

Useful Websites

Letters and Sounds

Phonics Play

ICT Games

Oxford Owl

Autumn 2 World Nursery Rhyme Week – Sponsored Event

All our reception children took  part in ‘World Nursery Rhyme Week’. They learnt the five rhymes and they performed each rhyme fantastically, to Mrs Kenworthy and all our nursery children. We would like to thank all  parents for your support with this and in particular for your huge effort and generosity in collecting sponsorship. We raised a total of £418.65. We used some of this money to pay for the performance for the children, from Tell Tale Hearts Theatre Company, ‘Suitcase Stories’.

Suitcase Stories

A well travelled lady captivates her audience with stories she has gathered on her journeys around the world, from Yorkshire, through Poland and on to India!

Using only the contents of her suitcase she creates landscapes of mountains and jungles, costumes for shepherds and kings and finds unique ways to bring characters to life. The children become a part of the story by helping our teller to create waves of water, make the sound of an army, hide away their dancing fairies and organise a troop of monkeys.

The performance was created to inspire children’s love of stories and enhance their knowledge of different cultures from around the world.

Our children loved listening to and interacting with the story teller. Below are some photographs for you to enjoy.

Secret Reader

Story time in reception is a very special time of the day. Each half term we will be inviting a special guest, ‘Secret Reader’ to come and read to our reception classes at story time. The children were very excited and curious when we introduced ‘Secret Reader’, this week and they loved guessing who it could be.

Autumn Term Secret Readers

Autumn fun in the forest

Our children have loved exploring the Autumn season in our forest as part of their learning and development  in Understanding of the world. They looked at the similarities and differences between the autumn trees and learnt about the changes in the forest during the season of Autumn. Below are some of the photographs and comments taken from our children during their explorations.

“I’ve found this leaf, it’s green brown and yellow”.  Paisley

“It’s like a circle leaf, it’s brown, it’s an autumn colour”. Henry

“Look what I’ve found, sticks. We can build a campfire”. Isabella

Autumn 2 A rainy Day!

The children had lots of opportunities this week to explore the rain! Playing in the rain gives children an opportunity to learn about where the water we use comes from, that rain comes at different rates of intensity, wind affects the direction of rain, that water seeks its own level so puddles collect in holes and slanted ground.

This is what the children had to say about the rain:

“I love the rain. Look at the big puddles”. Millie

“I’m wet. I like to get my hair wet. The rain makes me cold”. Joni

“I like to splash in muddy puddles”. Billy

“Help me fill my bucket with rain. When it’s full I’ll pour it down the drain”. Joseph

“I like to get wet”. Oscar

The Christmas Story

Mrs Davis, from Saint Mary’s Church, visited our reception classes. She brought both classes an advent calendar and told the children the Christmas story.

The children helped Mrs Davis tell the story with these wonderful knitted characters.