Reception

Welcome to our Reception Class at St James’

Welcome to Reception Class, my name is Miss Guthrie and I am the Class Teacher along with Ms Capot (Class Teacher) who works in Reception one day per week. Mrs Watson is our Nursery Nurse and we are supported by Teaching Assistants Mrs Gibbons and Ms Walton at different times during the week.

Reception Noticeboard

All children have a home school reading book which is kept in their book bags. We ask that book bags are brought to school every day. We will hear your child read once a week. Reading books are changed weekly.
PE in Reception is on Thursday. Make sure you have your full St James PE kit.
We use Tapestry as a means of sharing our learning, celebrations and activities.
Please bring fresh water daily.
We pray every day in school. Please help your child to become familiar with our prayers here Little Book of Prayers EYFS and KS1

Summer Tern in Reception Class

We will begin our new term with an exciting topic about real superheroes. We will be learning about people who help us at home and in the community. Our initial discussions will be about our family who love and care for us at home, then we will move on to talk about members of the community who help us such as teachers, bakers, lollipop persons and waste collection people. Finally, we will learn about emergencies, and we will learn how different services such as the fire brigade, police, doctors, vets and coastguard can help us in an emergency.

We will read A Superhero Like You by Dr Ranj and consider the type of superhero we would like to be when we grow up and what superpowers we will have.

In play we will design and build our own emergency vehicles such as a lifeboat and will explore floating and sinking. We will transform our role play area into a doctor’s surgery and we will imagine that we are real superheroes who help to take care of people. We will add a fire station and emergency vehicles to our small world play, and we will become bakers when playing with the playdough.

We will also learn about ways in which we can keep ourselves safe and we will learn about ways in which we can stay healthy. We will take part in the schools toothbrushing scheme in partnership with the NHS to practice good oral hygiene.

Later in the term we will learn about transport and travel, exploring our wonderful world and ways in which we can move around it. We will learn that there are different types of transport and transport has different purposes. We will look at transport in the past compared to transport today and we will further develop our understanding of how things change over time.

In maths we will explore numbers to 20 and beyond and continue our exploration of shape, looking specifically at 3D shapes.

In phonics we will learn new sounds and spellings, introducing children to, sh, ch and th.

In Religious Education we will be learning about Pentecost, which follows Easter – the Good News of the Holy Spirit coming to be with us.

Tips on how to help your child’s learning during the Summer Term:

Practice ways of staying safe and healthy:
Remember to brush teeth twice a day for two minutes. The two minute toothbrushing song available on YouTube is good fun to brush along to.
Choose healthy snacks, drink plenty of water and keep active.
Learn ways to stay safe when online, outdoors and when travelling.
Create a plan for what to do in an emergency at home.

Use this information to support:

Summer 1 Real Superheroes

Spring Term in Reception Class

In Reception Class we begin the new term by exploring seasonal changes around us. We look at winter and the effect this has on the environment and living things. We learn how to protect ourselves from the cold weather and we learn how to help wildlife survive in the winter months.

We explore the polar regions, learning about artic animals and indigenous people. We learn about freezing and melting processes and conduct a scientific experiment with blubber to learn how artic animals keep warm in freezing conditions.

We continue to listen to the children read at least once a week and encourage parents to listen to children read at least three times per week. In Literacy, the children continue to learn about the structure of writing, building sentences and practicing the correct formation of letters.

In Maths we continue to improve number sense by working on numbers to 8. We will also explore weights and measures, looking at mass, capacity, length, height and time.

Later in the term the celebration of Chinese New Year will provide some nice crafting opportunities as well as developing our knowledge and understanding of celebrations around the world.

In RE, we look at Celebrations, both at home and as a church family.

Tips on how to help your child’s learning during the Spring Term:

Use these questions to talk about winter at home:

What is the weather today?
What should we wear outside today?
Can you describe how it feels?
What can you see?
What colours can you see?
What has happened to the leaves on the trees?
What are your favourite things to do in winter?
How could we help the birds during winter?

Use this information to support the development of reading and writing at home:

It’s the end of the Spring Term

Reception Class have been having a lovely time in school during the second part of the Spring Term. They have enjoyed listening to a range of traditional tales and exploring them through a range of creative and writing activities and re-enacting them through role-play.

They have been impressing us with their super writing skills as they try hard to write simple sentences that can be read by themselves and others. They are continuing to display a good understanding of their phonics in our daily phonics sessions and their reading is becoming more fluent.

In Maths we have been exploring the composition of numbers to 10 and have been developing our understanding of number bonds through simple addition and subtraction. We have also been developing our understanding of measurement through activities involving length, weight, time and capacity.

In RE we have thought about times in which we gather – to worship, learn, celebrate and play. We have thought about how our mothers are special to us and we showed how much we love and appreciate them by making colourful Mother’s Day cards.

We celebrated Eid with our friends and created some lovely Mehndi patterns on our hands. We learnt about the Qur’an and looked at some pictures of a mosque. Our lovely friend told us all about his visit to the mosque and demonstrated how he said his prayers on a big mat. We made celebration cards together and we each received a small gift.

In preparation for Easter, we have made special Lenten promises which we are trying very hard to keep and the class are trying their very best to be extra kind and thoughtful towards one another during this special time of year. We attended a special mass at St James Church and Father Simon thanked us for our wonderful contribution to the service. We are having lots of fun with our Easter crafts and are looking forward to our Easter egg competition.

Autumn Term in Reception Class

To begin our learning journey in reception class we are learning about ourselves. We are getting to know one another and we are discovering some of the similarities and differences between us.

We have created some wonderful self-portraits as part of our learning journey and we have read Elmer to support our understanding of embracing differences and valuing uniqueness.

We are learning about our school and are familiarising ourselves with the rules and routines. We read the Colour Monster Starts School to support our understanding of the different feelings and emotions that we may go through during the school day, including feelings of nervousness, happiness and calmness. We are gaining in confidence as the term goes on and we are having lots of fun exploring our provision. We are making lots of new friends and we are ready to learn.

In phonics we follow the Sounds Write programme and are learning the initial code. We will work through units 1 – 7 by the end of the autumn term, learning to read and write CVC words with the sounds; a, I, m, s, t, n, o, p, b, c, g, h, d, e, f, v, k, l, r, u, j, w, z, x, y, ff, ll, ss, zz. We are also learning to read and write our name.

In maths the children have been learning to match, sort and compare. They have been exploring measures and patterns and soon will be exploring numbers to 5. They will also look at shapes, including shapes with 4 sides, circles and triangles.

In our exploration of the natural world the children have been learning about our local environment and seasonal changes. We visited our local park and searched for signs of autumn. We found lots of beautiful leaves, seeds and spotted some mushrooms growing in the soil. As the term progresses the children will learn about hibernation and explore different animals that hibernate with a focus on hedgehogs. We will find out about farmers and their crops and we will learn why harvesting is important and why it happens at certain times throughout the year. We will learn about harvest festivals and why/how people celebrate harvest time.

In R.E. we have been learning about our names and that we are all part of the St James family. We have been learning our daily prayers and we have learnt some new hymns. We particularly like the hymn, If I Were a Butterfly therefore sang this at our first stay and pray session with parents.

Tips on how to help your child’s learning during the Autumn Term:

Look at family photos together, drawing attention to the people and the places in the photos.
Talk about things that you have done or are going to do together as a family.
Develop and reinforce good hygiene practices such as washing hands and brushing teeth.
Develop good bedtime routines.
Draw children’s attention to seasonal changes you notice when outside. Talk about the leaves changing colour and falling to the ground, search for autumnal items together.
Read a story daily with your child, talking lots about the illustrations and characters. Can you predict what might happen next in the story? – Access the free Sounds Write Training for parents available at – https://sounds-write.co.uk/support-for-parents-and-carers/ to help your child learn to read and write.
Help your child to complete their phonics homework each week.
When reading books are issued later this term, read with your child at least 3x per week, to support them with their reading journey.
Return reading books to school each day so that they are available for your child to read in school with a member of staff.
Help your child to learn to write their name by practicing this with them.
Play with playdough to help develop fine motor skills. This will help with their pencil grip when writing.
Sing number rhymes together.
Talk about shapes and patterns you notice in the world around you.
Bake together, reading recipes and measuring out ingredients.

Its the end of our Autumn Term

What a busy time we have had in Reception Class following the October half term!

We took part in an art competition called Get Creative for Justice by CAFORD. The theme for this was about saving our planet from pollution and the children worked together to create a wonderful piece of art titled, We’ve Got the World in Our Hands. We learnt lots about how we can help to save the planet from pollution, such as turning out the lights when we are not using them, switching to cloth bags for our shopping and recycling our rubbish. We also focused our class stay and pray session on this topic and we shared the story of creation with parents.

In maths we have learnt about circles, triangles and shapes with four sides. We have explored numbers to 5 in detail and we have used number rhymes such as Five Currant Buns and One Elephant Went Out to Play to help us to find one more and one less than a given number to 5.

In phonics the children worked towards unit 7 of the Sounds Write Framework and received their first reading books to take home to share with parents.

Our special friends introduced us to our school library and help us to choose a new book each week to read for pleasure at home with parents.

We have learnt lots about different festivals and celebrations around the world such as bonfire night, Diwali, Remembrance Day and of course Christmas. We learnt about the story of Christmas and Advent in RE and performed a wonderful Nativity show for parents, in which we were absolutely amazing. Our acting skills and singing were simply the best and everyone agreed it was a lovely show.

Our Christmas crafts have been a big hit with the children, who have enjoyed creating their own Christmas designs, cards and decorations. We entered Kate Osbourne’s Christmas card competition and a very proud to say that one of our children won this year and was presented with a gift and certificate from Kate herself!

We hope you have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year and enjoy lots of special family time together!

Reception News

Here at St James we love celebrating the joy of books. We’ve had a fantastic World Book Day 2025 in school.

Our Reception and Year 1 children took part in a balance bike fun day in school. Thank you to Pro-Ride Coaching who deliver a program which incorporates a range of fun activities that will challenge each child to develop their balance and coordination, resilience, and confidence by taking part in skill games, obstacle challenges and mini-races.

Here are some reasons why cycling is beneficial for children:

Physical health: Cycling strengthens muscles and bones, and it’s a low-impact exercise that is safe for growing children.
Mental well-being: Cycling reduces stress, improves mood, and fosters independence and confidence.
Motor skills development: Riding a bike helps develop coordination and balance