Apples | Orchard Infant School

During phonics this week, we have been introduced to our next 5 sounds, g,o,c,k,n, and have enjoyed playing different games to help us learn them. We have been working hard to form our letters using paint, chalk, salt and pencils of course!

In maths this week, we have been comparing different lengths, capacity and weights, and the children have been introduced to language such as longer, shorter, higher, lower, heavier, lighter, empty and full. We have had lots of fun doing our new maths carousel of activities, and applying what we have been learning.

We have continued to practise our number formation as well as counting and singing to help us with the order of numbers.

The colour monster has appeared again this week, and we have been talking about the 'blue' monster who feels sad. The children have spent time thinking about what makes them sad, and why this might be. We then compared this to last weeks feeling of happy.

We have continued to look at people in our community who help us, and have had fun finding out about police, firefighters and lifeboat rescue in the Apples class. The children went off independently and created their own pictures of these people.

During the week, we have been exploring the pulse/beat to Pharrel Williams 'Happy', and we learned the song 1,2,3,4,5 so that we could explore rhythm. What a week!

We’ve had so much fun this week! In literacy, we have made trumpets and elephant ears to use on listening walks, as well as learning the first 5 sounds in our phonics.

In the mornings we are being extremely independent, coming in, putting our book bags away, hanging up our coats up and starting our ‘morning jobs’. We have also been waking our bodies up by dancing to ‘wake up, shake up’, which helps us to get ready to learn.

In maths, we have been looking at similarities and differences of things in our environment, and the children have overwhelmed us with how much they have continued this in their ‘Busy Bee’ time. Alongside this, we have continued with our counting through songs, actions and stories.

In personal, social and emotional development, we have been focusing on the emotion of happiness which is the ‘yellow monster’ in the ‘Colour Monster’ book. We talked about times when we felt happy, explored different words with the same meaning, and drew things that made us happy.

he class were introduced to Mrs Needham our school librarian who showed the children around the library and read them a story.

We began joining the rest of the school in singing assembly this week, and have begun to learn the song ‘Consider Yourself’ from Oliver.

Wow what another fantastic week we have had! This week we have used our listening skills to identify different instruments and sounds. We have been exploring salt, flour and paint, using our fingers to write our name for our class teachers. We have been spending time listening stories about the school rules. We have enjoyed sharing our ‘All about me’ books with our friends and showing different members of our family and what they enjoy, and can’t wait to see what’s in store next week!

Our first week in school...

Well what can we say…? The children have completely blown our socks again off this week, coming into school so well. We have had lots of fun getting to know Lola the leopard, who has been popping up in our class circle times to help us with our listening skills. We have also been enjoying getting to know the other children in the class and who is important to them, sharing the ‘all about me’ books, and playing together in the learning gardens. What a wonderful week!

What a Wonderful Start to the Year!

Thank you to all the children and their families for welcoming us into their homes during the home visits.

The children came in for their final Stay and Play session with us before they begin their school journey at Orchard Infant School officially. We were overwhelmed with how wonderfully the children came into school and we had such a wonderful time seeing you all again, playing with you, exploring our classrooms and getting to know our new friends in the year group!