During Spring 1 we will be focusing on our topic called 'I Wonder........What Changes?'.  This topic is a fantastic way for our Kingfishers to explore the seasons. We will explore what we can see, hear, feel and touch during the different seasons, focusing particularly on winter. We will have discussions during our topic times about the different seasons, weather and light and dark. We will set out fun and inviting activities during Rainbow Time linked to our topic (free play). We will also have many activities linked to the children’s interests e.g. number blocks, crafts and small world play. We will link their learning and next steps using their interests. 

We will be exploring the following texts:

Communication and Language

Our children will use their communication and language skills through a variety of discussions we have during this topic.  We will be organising and clarify thinking about the changes that we can hear, see and feel in the different season and discussing this both in small groups and in our topic whole-class sessions. We will be looking at fiction and non-fiction books about seasons, weather, light and dark, changing states. Children will be encouraged to ask and answer questions about the stories and books , focusing on the illustrations and what they already know about the topic.

Personal, Social and Emotional Development

When thinking about what changes, we will also talk about New Year’s resolutions, focusing on what we individually want to get better at and how this can be achieved and thinking about what makes them special.  There will be many opportunities for pupils to try new things. They will learn about how to keep themselves safe in the dark and how to look after themselves to support their health and well-being.  When looking at seasons and weather will be thinking about how to help creatures living outside in the colder months. 

Physical Development

During our P.E. lessons pupils will be learning multi-skills.  They will use these skills to practice their throwing, catching and rolling .  We will focus on showing increasing control over objects such as balls and beanbags.  The children will have many opportunities to continue to develop their fine motor skills, whether it’s making bird feeders, making ice and cutting and sorting activities.

Literacy

We will continue to learn new sounds through our phonics sessions, moving into Phase 3 of Bug Club Phonics. The children will learn that a digraph is a sound containing two letters and a trigraph is a sound containing three letters.  They will take part in a number of activities where they will need to identify digraphs and trigraphs within words. Pupils will practise their blending skills to enable them to read short phonetic words and will start to recognise ‘tricky’ words independently. 

We will look at the language linked to the topic we study, discussing what new words mean. Our children will be encouraged to use these new learnt words with their own play and discussions. Pupils will grow in confidence when identifying if a book is ‘fiction’ or ‘non-fiction’, being able to share the features of each.

Pupils will begin to take part in more formal small group writing sessions.  Our writing will be based upon our topic, such as writing instructions for making bird feeders or writing about their New Year’s resolution.  We will be focusing on applying our sounds when writing words and using finger spaces between words.  Our children will be exposed to sentence writing each day to enable them to gain a better understanding of what a sentence is and the process we go through when writing one.

Literacy skills will also be encouraged throughout our provision.  This could be through writing a construction plan before building something from Lego or the large wooden blocks outside, or writing a a list for shopping in the role play area. 

Maths

The children will continue to consolidate their deeper understanding of numbers 1-5 and how smaller numbers make up bigger numbers, for example 2 and 2 make 4, so does 1 and 3. They will use their subitising skills to know how many objects or dots are there by seeing and saying, rather than counting.

We will begin looking at numbers 6-8 in more depth, and how these numbers are made up and we will order numbers to 10. We will be partitioning numbers to 5 into 2 parts, thinking about the number bonds to 5. We will look at combining numbers for simple addition and subtraction, using objects and a tens frame to help us. 

We will be looking at mass, capacity, weight and height and making comparisons, using the correct language when describing. We will then go onto looking at time, ordering and sequencing.

Understanding the World

The children will be exploring the natural environment. We will be finding out more about the seasons, with a particular focus on winter. For example, the children will be observing ice, thinking about why and how it is formed and why and how it melts.
We will continue using our daily calendar and talking about days of the week and months of the year and talk about what the weather is like. We will be thinking about how we can keep warm and sort seasonal clothing.
We will learn facts about the Polar Regions comparing them to where we live. Discussing what is similar and different. We will use maps to identify where these countries are, will think about how far away they are from England and will compare their size. 

Expressive Arts and Design

Pupils will take part in many art and craft based activities e.g. making our own bird feeders, making a sun catcher and winter pictures. We will explore lots of art linked to our texts e.g. tree collages of the trees in different seasons. Pupils will experiment with a variety of instruments and dance movements to replicate performances for Chinese New year , such as Chinese Lion and Dragon dances. The children will continue to have access to their favourites including playdough, junk modelling and
painting.

What you can do at home to support your child 

Please continue to read books you may have at home with your child, as well as the school library and reading books that are sent home.  Encourage your child to sound out and blend words, giving them time to do this independently before helping them.  Can your child tell you what they have just read?

Your child will continue to bring ‘sound of the day’ home. Please ask them to teach it to you, they can tell you the name and sound.  Look at different words containing the sound.  Can they put sound buttons under the word?  Can they identify digraphs and trigraphs within words?

Please continue to help your child to learn to read and spell their ‘Key/Tricky’ words.