Weekly beginning 25th September 2006

Weekly update
Information for new starters (25th September 2006)

Welcome to St Vincent's!

This is the first day of your child's exciting learning adventure at St Vincent's. There will be lots of new things to take in and many changes ahead. Please do not worry as the induction process has been carefully structured in order to enable your child to feel secure and happy making the transition into primary school.

This blogspot will be updated on a weekly basis and will contain lots of information regarding what your child will be learning in school for the week, websites you could visit to support the learning in school as well as activities you could try at home. It is updated every weekend in preparation for the coming week.

The next week will be a settling in time allowing the Foundation Stage Team to get to know your child, their needs and starting point. This indepth induction process enables us to provide your child with the right start to their learning, as we would not like to repeat anything that they have been taught before. If your pre-school provider gave you any records please could you let us have a look at them as this will help us to tune in alot quicker. Please do not worry if you do not have any.

Finally, information will be sent home via your child's reading diary. You should have received this today. The diary is a means of communication between home and school, and in particular we ask that you make a comment every week about your child's reading at home. There will be a further induction meeting, on 10th October, when all the children are in full time. At this meeting we will give further details regarding the types of comments you can make but we love to read your comments and always respond to them.

If you have anything you are unsure about please do not hesitate to see a member of the Foundation Stage Team.

Best wishes

Jayne Narraway x

Information for children already in school

Well! Can you believe it! Humpty Dumpty has not just written to the children but actually emailed them too!! This week the children are continuing to work on investigating the best way to build walls, looking at brick bonds, etc in preparation for their response to Humpty later in the week. The walls build so far are brilliant and ALL the children have been eager to have a go! These children have lots of 'get up and go' and we are looking forward to what this year holds in store for us. There has not been a day so far that we have not laughed out loud about something that has happened. 'A smile a day keeps the blues away!'.

Structured teaching will commence next week as this week we need to finalise and collate our assessments in preparation for the detailed planning of your child's learning experiences whilst they are in the Foundation Stage. However, never one to miss out on an opportunity, I have detailed some good websites you may want to try which will support your child's letter recognition.

www.ictgames.com/letterlifter.html - this is a great game. The children must look at the object and decide what sound it begins with. Once they have identified it they need to locate the letter symbol on the keyboard and type it in. If your child is still a little unsure of the sounds and can not hear the initial sounds yet then this may be one to leave for a later date.

www.ictgames.com/plankgameR.html - this supports the spelling and recogntion of the high frequency words throughout Reception.

www.ictgames.com/phonic_fighter4.html - I absolutely love this one!!

www.starfall.com - by far one of the best websites to support letter recognition in a fun and interactive way.

You may have noticed on last week's blog that I mentioned sending home handwriting homework. I think I may have been a little too ambitious with the planning last week and as a result the children were not taught the pattern. Therefore, we have decided to postpone handwriting homework until all the children are in full time. Therefore, Monday 2nd October will be the first day they receive handwriting homework.

Finally, can we just say how amazed we are at how quickly the children have settled this year. Well done to them all!

Here's to another great week!

Best Wishes

Jayne Narraway x