This week in Reception, a bottle appeared on the table in our classroom! The children predicted where they thought it might have come from, and who could have sent it. They had lots of wonderful ideas! Some thought it might be a treasure map sent by a pirate, and others thought it might be a message from Tiddler the fish.

The children helped Miss Tsang read the letter, and found out it was from our friend Pearl from Bonnie Cove. She wanted us to tell Nori about all the things that we can find in the sand. We wrote letters back to Pearl, and we also asked her nicely, if we can visit Bonnie Cove again!

This week Reception had a visit from a beachcomber, all the way from a seaside resort called Bonnie Cove. Pearl the beachcomber invited us to Bonnie Cove to help her search for hidden treasures in the sand. We helped her dig and sieve the sand and found all sorts of different things; gems, shells, and even diamonds!

We then met another person hiding at Bonnie Cove her name was Nori, but she could not speak the same language as us. She told us her story of how she ended up at Bonnie Cove.

Reception had to get their clever brains working to think of different ways for Pearl and Nori to become friends. The children thought of so many lovely ways for Pearl and Nori to communicate.

We would love to visit Bonnie Cove again!

This week, we were lucky to have the school nurse visit Reception to teach us all about the importance of hand washing. We know that we need to wash our hands regularly and with soap! We were taught how to wash our hands properly. We know we need to remember to wash every part of our hands, especially our thumbs and around the finger nails. The nurse also showed us a special germ detector where we could see all of the nasty germs on our hands!

Over the past few weeks, we have been observing the changes to the Troll cress heads that we have planted. We have been watering the cress, and made sure that we placed them in direct sunlight. When they were fully grown, we cut the cress and mixed it with boiled egg and mayonnaise.  We made sandwiches and took them outside for a picnic! They were delicious!

It has been a super busy week in Reception! We have been taking part in lots of maths activities including a workshop with our parents, exploring the shapes in Kandinsky’s art,  taking part in a maths outside trail and also making our very own human bar chart!

On Tuesday, we had our lovely parents in to help with our maths investigation. Jack and the Giant had left their smelly socks in our classroom. We had to find out if Jack’s or the Giant’s sock could fit more cubes in it. We used our estimation skills, and careful counting to find this out! We all enjoyed the other maths activities, especially picking out numbers found in the Giant’s snot!

This week, we have been busy making our very own Troll cress heads. We didn’t want our Troll’s to be bald, so we decided to grow some hair! Some of the children used their phonics knowledge to read some instructions to make their version of cress. They used cotton wool and kitchen roll.

We also decided to make a different version of the cress heads to see which type would grow faster! First, we decorated our tiny pot with googly eyes and scary features, just like the troll in the story of ‘The Three Billy Goats Gruff’. Then we filled the pot with compost, but only half way. After that, we placed the cress seeds and  topped it up with more compost. Finally, we watered our cress heads and now waiting for the troll’s hair to grow!

This week we have started Talk for Writing of ‘The Three Billy Goats Gruff’. We have had a busy week; re-telling, acting out, making our own story maps and creating our own stick puppets and masks.

We have also been busy creating a bridge just like the one in the story. The children were really creative and thought of lots of different things we could use. We had to make sure the bridge was strong enough for the goats to walk over, and big enough for the nasty troll to fit under it!

“Who’s trip trapping across my bridge?

On Wednesday, we were able to recall and sequence some of the story in the correct order. However, to help us re-tell the whole story we created a class story map. Mrs Bi helped us draw our story map with her fabulous drawing skills! We also created our own story maps, and were able to retell the story using some fantastic story language and repeated refrains from the story. We really enjoyed getting into the role of the characters, especially the role of the nasty, mean Troll.

We have had an enjoyable week introducing Talk for Writing, and looking forward to adding actions to our story next week!

This week in maths, we have been learning to find different ways of making 10. We explored making 10 by using pegs, numicon, paper chains and the Queen’s gems. We have had so much fun!

In order to help us remember our number bonds to 10, we have learnt a song. Here are the words, if you want to learn it with us:

0 and 10, 0 and 10, 10 and 0, 10 and 0. Put them altogether, put them altogether. It makes 10, it makes 10.

1 and 9, 1 and 9, 9 and 1, 9 and 1. Put them altogether, put them altogether. It makes 10, it makes 10.

2 and 8, 2 and 8, 8 and 2, 8 and 2. Put them altogether, put them altogether. It makes 10, it makes 10.

3 and 7, 3 and 7, 7 and 3, 7 and 3. Put them altogether, put them altogether. It makes 10, it makes 10.

4 and 6, 4 and 6, 6 and 4, 6 and 4. Put them altogether, put them altogether. It makes 10, it makes 10.

5 and 5, 5 and 5, 5 and 5, 5 and 5. Put them altogether, put them altogether. It makes 10, it makes 10.

Take a look at us singing the song below!

My Movie- number bonds song3

The Queen’s Celebrations

This week in Reception, we have been busy preparing for the Queen’s 90th birthday celebrations. Firstly, we used our phonics knowledge to write shopping lists to decide what we would like to eat at the Queen’s party. We then explored where she lives, and drew some amazing pictures of the castle we thought the Queen might live in.

Today, we enjoyed our Queen’s 90th birthday celebration. We wore red, blue and white,  and made our own flags to wave at the party! We enjoyed making our own sandwiches, and made some special kites that we can fly on a windy day!

 Best of all,  we received a very special coin from Mr Ricketts to help us remember such a special day!

 Reception Team =)