Welcome all to ‘Cockles’ our Reception class here at Gors!

Mrs Griffiths is our class teacher and the lovely Miss Lewis is our classroom support.

Our classroom is a welcoming space where everyone is respected and encouraged to do their very best.

Our classroom is divided up into ‘areas’, which include a Numeracy, Literacy, Digital, Creative, Role Play and Calm area. When we are not learning in our focus, adult-led groups, we are encouraged to work independently on various ‘challenges’ within these areas of our classroom.

We love seeing our little ‘Cockles’ everyday. Please try your best to arrive and collect on time. We open our door at 8.40am and close it at 9am. The school day ends at 3.20pm.

Fruit is sold at a cost of 30p a day. Alternatively you can send in fruit with your child but please ensure that it is clearly marked with their name. If you choose to send in grapes, please ensure to cut them in half lengthways.

We will be doing PE on a Wednesday. The children will need to wear appropriate clothing and footwear.

We now have our very own school bottles with our pictures on so we do not need to have additional bottles in school, unless we are having sandwiches.

Please can you make sure that your children’s clothing is clearly labelled with their name as we do not want anything to get lost!

Each week we do two Literacy, two Numeracy and an activity based on our topic of ‘Hip Hip Hooray!’ which links to celebrations of all kinds including birthdays, Christmas and the life and work of Roald Dahl to name but a few!

Our reading and writing this half term will focus around Recount writing. We will use the Pie Corbett Talk for Writing technique and write lists, labels and captions. We use the Jolly phonics scheme to build the foundations for reading and writing which uses songs, jingles and actions aimed at developing recognition and correct pronunciation of sounds.  If you would like encourage your child at home, you can find them by following the link below.

https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=jolly+phonics+songs

Numeracy and mathematical concepts will be taught using the Numicon scheme and a range of practical approaches. This term we will focus on number facts and relationships, measuring and shape.

We have been working extremely hard on our phonics and numbers. We also created beautiful hand print daffodils.

We have been learning about 2D shapes. 

Our topic this Spring term has been 'Long Long Ago' and we have been finding out lots of things about dinosaurs. We have sorted dinosaurs and measured them.

We have also enjoyed making playdough for our Dough Disco sessions!

Our topic during the first half of the Summer term was 'We're going on an animal hunt.'

We were lucky enough to have a visit from a vet and also the RSPCA and their beautiful dog!

We discovered lots of different animals and looked at their habitats. We even took a virtual trip to the zoo and saw some amazing animals!

Our story this term is 'Goldilocks and the Three Bears'. We  looked at features of stories and created our own story maps!

We have also been learning to weigh using non standard units. We are starting to use special vocabulary linked to weighing too!

We have been busy creating story maps this half term. 

We have enjoyed learning new sounds during our daily phonics carousel and using the 'Magic glasses' to find our target sounds in the books!

We have also worked on building strength in our fingers in the finger gym.

We have been really lucky recently as we have had not only Sports Day but also we went on a trip to Margam Park! It was os much fun!

Our local policemen came in to talk to us about the emergency services and we even got to try on his uniform.

We have been learning about the importance of being the best that we can which includes how to take care of ourselves. We have been learning about the importance of handwashing and how to do it and also the importance of exercise.