Reception Weekly Blog (24.10.25)
Date: 24th Oct 2025 @ 3:22pm
Happy Half Term, everyone!
We would like to say a huge thank you for all the support you’ve given us at the start of our school journey together. It has been such a joy to see how far your little ones have come in such a short amount of time – they make us so proud every single day. We hope they have a well-deserved rest over the half term break.
We’ve had a full-on week to round off the first half term – very busy and very messy, just how we like it!
On Monday, we enjoyed a lovely walk to church with our buddies. The children listened beautifully as we learnt all about St. Luke, how he was not only an important doctor but also a close friend of Jesus, and how our school is named after him.
On Tuesday, we had so much fun exploring pumpkins and learning lots of new vocabulary to describe them. The children passed the pumpkin around the circle, sharing words to describe how it felt before getting hands-on and carving into it. We weren’t afraid to get messy as we delved our hands right to the bottom, squishing through the slimy strings and collecting all the seeds!
On Wednesday, we continued our pumpkin learning by looking closely at the seeds we found inside. We talked about how other vegetables grow from seeds too, which led us perfectly into sharing the story of The Enormous Turnip. The children loved exploring different versions of the story and thinking about how the characters might have felt while working together to pull up such a big vegetable!
On Thursday, we celebrated Diwali, the Festival of Light. The children listened so carefully to the story of Rama and Sita and learned about the Diva Lamps that were lit to remember their brave journey home to India. In the afternoon, the children created their own stunning diva lamps and explored colourful Rangoli patterns. Mrs McGill even showed off a beautiful henna tattoo, which the children were fascinated by!
On Friday, we rounded off our week by exploring the number 2. The children have spent time learning all about “2 things” – we met Numberblock 2, talked about how 2 is one more than 1, and compared the two numbers together. The children impressed us with their fantastic ‘talk to your partner’ skills as they discussed different pictures showing pairs. We also challenged them to spot things around them that come in twos – perhaps you can continue this over half term!
We spoke about shapes with two sides and introduced the skill of subitising – recognising quantities without counting. The children practised spotting irregular patterns of 1 and 2 using dotty dice and learnt that 2 is still 2, no matter how the dots are arranged.
Please do keep practising letter formation at home, using the formation phrases from the sheets we have sent home – it really makes a big difference.
This week we have learnt the first 5 of our special friends (two letters that make one sound) sh, th, ch, qu and ng in our RWI sessions, please continue to practise these at regular opportunities over the half term break. Children can find special friends really hard to retain so regular exposure is essential, we have attached the links to these sounds below:
sh - http://schools.ruthmiskin.com/training/view/BtkCKenN/aFm8WRkq
th - http://schools.ruthmiskin.com/training/view/JsNMY4oN/ox6fUdm6
ch - http://schools.ruthmiskin.com/training/view/bJAw2MZD/pQYbS5dh
qu - http://schools.ruthmiskin.com/training/view/oY5Hsiwl/19mWOS5k
ng - http://schools.ruthmiskin.com/training/view/6W21O2xM/uU5MqmbB
Remember to encourage your child to “Fred Talk, read the word”, a video is attached below to help you to support your child in learning how to read:
Reading green words: http://schools.ruthmiskin.com/training/view/XMUV9dWf/tPSwrvmL
http://schools.ruthmiskin.com/training/view/C4jx6MBI/kBrAy8Q0
We can’t wait to see your good news from over the break, please email us at [email protected] with news no matter how big or small, we love to see it!
Please don’t forget to send in your photo of your child reading one of their favourite books in one of their favourite places for our displays.
It’s been such a wonderful first half term in Reception – full of learning and laughter! We hope you all have a lovely, restful break and we can’t wait to see the children back, ready for more adventures next half term. When we will be exploring Fire, people who help us, caring about others and ice!
Have a lovely week, everyone. Don't forget to empty those book bags, thank you!
The Reception Team
