WELCOME TO EYFS 

This year we have 31 children in our EYFS unit. We have two teachers Miss Healey and Miss Connell.
Miss Edwards and Mrs Freeman are our wonderful Teaching Assistants.
 

Excellence is at the Heart of everything we do
‘Every child deserves the best possible start in life and the support that enables them to fulfil their potential. Children          develop quickly in the early years and a child’s experiences between birth and age five have a major impact on their future life chances. A secure, safe and happy childhood is important in its own right. Good parenting and high-quality early learning together provide the foundation children need to make the most of their abilities and talents as they grow up.’ (EYFS Statutory Framework 2021)

The Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) is based on four principles:

• A Unique Child
• Positive Relationships
• Enabling Environments
• Learning and Developing
   

Areas of Learning

The EYFS is made up of seven areas of learning and development of which three are “prime areas,” and four “specific areas.” The prime areas are

• Communication and language
• Physical development
• Personal, social and emotional development.
• The specific areas are
• Literacy
• Mathematics
• Understanding of the world 
• Expressive arts and design

Class Organisation

The children are split into two classes and are taught in small groups for phonics, guided reading, writing and mathematics throughout the day. The rest of the time the children have access to continuous provision both indoors and out. Throughout this time the children also complete rainbow challenges that link to certain areas of the curriculum.

The environment plays a key role in supporting and extending children’s development and learning. When children feel emotionally safe and secure, they are able to explore and find out about the place they are in and the things they can see, touch, manoeuvre or manipulate. In the EYFS the environment is described in terms of three aspects: The emotional environment, the outdoor environment and the indoor environment. 

At Thorn Primary School our vision is that all children are taught in a stimulating learning environment with high quality resources. Our reception classroom is organised into separate areas. Each of the areas are carefully planned and resourced in order to provide the children with many different learning opportunities in their play.

EYFS Reading Meeting

Thank you to all our families who joined us at our parent reading workshop. It was lovely to see you all and discuss the importance of reading with your child. Reading is an enjoyable experience, this could be through their guided reading book that they will bring home weekly, nursery rhymes and playing games with tricky and high-frequency word cards. 
Below are the slides from the meeting if you were unable to attend or to re-visit the information from today.
 

Guided Reading books and Free reader books will be changed every TUESDAY.

EYFS Easter Crafts afternoon

Thank you to all our parents and carers who joined us for our Easter crafts this afternoon. It was lovely to see you all and we hope you enjoyed all of the activites. 

This morning we visited Morrisons where we took part in a fruit and vegetable tasting session, we had a tour of the shop, spoke about healthy eating, where fruit and vegetables come from and even had a go at scanning some items through the till. The children thoroughly enjoyed themselves.

To celebrate World Book Day, we invited Author and Illustrator Sean Perkins into school where he shared his book 
'The Birthday Party' to the children. This afternoon we completed a rhyming workshop called 'Silly Pie' the children sang along to the silly pie song adding and changing the different rhyming words. The children had a fantastic day and thoroughly enjoyed Sean sharing his book through song and rhyme.

EYFS Christmas Crafts afternoon

Thank you to all our families who joined us for our Christmas Craft afternoon, it was lovely to see you all, we hope you enjoyed it as much as we did!
 

Literacy Learning
In Literacy we have been looking at the poem 'The Old Woman who lived in a shoe' 
This morning we received a letter from The Old Woman asking for our help. We wrote a letter back to her with our super ideas and visited the post box to post the letter.    

    
This morning we made broth for the Old Woman. We gathered all of the ingredients, carefully peeled and chopped up the vegetables before boiling it on the hob.
 
This morning we had a special visit from 'The Old Woman' we shared the bread and brother with her and asked some interesting questions.

Maths Learning
This week we have been counting to 10. We have been matching pairs, grouping and looking at a range of objects that are big and small. 


This morning we had our Teddy Bear's Picnic looking at food items that are big and small.


This week we are looking at 'measurement' today we made a potion and found ways of making different sized containers full and empty. 

Festivals of Colour - Me & My World
Our topic this week is celebrating Birthday's. This week we are looking at how we celebrate birthdays, how other countries celebrate, what objects we use to represent our Birthday's.
We have had a busy afternoon making Birthday card's and writing our age, making a birthday cake with the playdoh in the Bakery and representing our age with the number of candles. 


This morning we baked some birthday brownies for our class mascot 'Ted' We measured, poured and mixed all of the ingredients. This afternoon we had a birthday party where we played lots of different games, made party hats, made cards for Ted and enjoyed the brownies we made!