Hygiene

Please can you support your children in becoming independent at blowing noses and using tissues. It is a strange time of year for colds and sneezes. Please provide tissues as paper towels can be a bit rough on the nose. Also remind them that after using the toilet they need to flush it and wash their hands. Whilst some children do this as a matter of routine, many continue to need reminders. It might well be that children forget in school as there are lots of distractions.

Can you check cardigans and sweaters as we have a couple of missing girls cardigans. A pink coat was returned today and we are unable to locate the owner as there is no name in it. Whilst we do try to give articles of clothing back to the children we can only do so if they are named. Sometimes clothing goes missing at different times of the day such as lunch hour and without names these bits may end up in lost property outside the office. Gloves are a continuing difficulty and children forget to put them in pockets. My boys used to have glove clips attaching them to the bottom of the sleeves, in my day it was the elastic through the sleeve.

I am learning how to post videos onto the blog and hopefully there may be some coming soon.

No spellings Monday

Sorry, I was out of the class for much of Monday afternoon and forgot to send spellings home. I will try and do so tomorrow.

A super Thursday morning

Thursday morning seemed to be a real success and it was great seeing how well supported the children were. They were so enthusiastic on their return to class and very proud of what they had created. As a teacher, the morning gave me chance to observe interactions and support between adults and children and interpretations of what is independent having a go and adult led having a go. There really is no right or wrong in learning, it is the having a go and reassurance that gives us the confidence to try something again. I don't think Darcey's mum will mind me mentioning her as a brilliant example of learning this week when she started to see herself as a reader as well as believing that not getting it right the first time matters. As we say in Cygnus class, we can't do it yet but with practice it will get easier.

I am opening my doors on Wednesday morning this week from drop off to about 9 o'clock to look at writing journals and share some white board writing with your children. Once again please make farewells as brief as possible as there have been a few tears from a couple of children recently although these stop as soon as they are back engaged with learning.

Please can I remind again about earrings and having hair tied up on PE days which at the moment is Friday. Earrings must be removed or plasters placed over them. I am unable to do this for the children. Ruby independently covers her earrings with an easy to use tape and is always proud of being able to do so. The reason behind covering/ removing earrings is to minimise the risk of them getting caught and torn from ears.

I am sending spellings out on Monday. These are a repeat of the first two weeks and will not be collected in as they are for the children to keep on learning at home as to how to write them confidently without relying on the adult helping them. Everyone now have been given all tricky sight words even if not yet ready. These are for the children to work through at their own level. Sight vocabulary are words to look at and just say. Whilst we might think a few can be sounded out, most of them can't. When I assess children I am looking at whether they can immediately say what the word is. Reading is made up of words that can be sounded out which is why most children are now on a phonic base reading book and tricky sight words. In class we are reading all the time from signs and captions to sentences in our daily phonics lesson to big book shared reading. We will hear your children read usually once a week, more if we have time on top of the writing, phonics, number, maths, art, handwriting, communication and language, science, Religious Education and other areas that we cover each week. This is why the more often you support reading at home, the more confidence the children have.

Some of your children may have returned home on Wednesday talking about the puddle splashing. We had great fun in the rain looking for the giants as well as finding puddles to splash in and worms to rescue. The children had our splash suits on and wellingtons but many did get their socks wet. Please can you ensure that there is a change of clothes in school for these moments in particular. Some children did have clothes but no plastic bag to put the wet ones in and this only dawned on me when I found soggy socks in a book bag the next day along with a soggy book.  Thank you.

See you in the morning
Mrs Bq