Author: Jane Watkins

Hello Reception,

Welcome to Friday’s activty ideas, I hope you are having lots of fun and enjoying lots family time. Please keep sending me all the lovely pictures of you playing at home and I will try and post as many as I can to the blog each day. Make sure you all look after yourselves and your families and I cannot wait to see you all when school returns to normal.

This Week’s Maths Challenge – With your child help them to use their 10 fingers to make number bonds to 10 (2 numbers which add up to 10). Try recording them in a number sentence, have some fingers up and some fingers down e.g. 6 up and 4 down, record 6+4=10. Repeat with different amounts.

Physical Fun – 5-a-day Fitness is a collection of online 5-minute follow-along fun fitness routines with an array of different themes, from pirates to superheroes, and pop to jive. Resources can easily be used at any time, in most spaces, and without any physical equipment. 5-a-day Fitness would like to offer pupils a free subscription during these difficult times, as a gesture of goodwill. Please see the details below with information about how to access 5-a-day resources at home.

USERNAME: 5-a-dayAtHome    

PASSWORD: AtHome123

Please visit www.5-a-day.tv to log in using these details. When your children becomes really confident with different dance moves, why not ask them to design your own exercise routine. Take turns teaching an “exercise class” to your favourite music. 

Children should be reading daily. Please remember that children should be reading to themselves but also to an adult or to a sibling and they should also be read to as well. Children’s understanding of their reading should also be checked with a variety of questions. Children should also be drawing daily and writing a sentence or a caption about their picture. This is really important as it will help them to continue to develop their writing and drawing skills.

Yesterday, I received some fabulous work from Bernard and his family:

Good morning everyone,

I hope by now you are all starting to find a new rhythm to your day and are managing to maintain some kind of routine. Please continue to practise counting, recognising numbers to 20 and ensuring your child can match objects to numbers – this could be done simply by asking them to show you the number 9 using their fingers.

STUFF ART – Collect loads of random ‘stuff’ from around your house…pennies, pencils, tins, boxes, left over flat pack and whatever is in that kitchen drawer! Once you have collected your treasures let the children make pictures and sculptures – whatever takes their fancy! (I would love to see their creations, please email them to me)

MAKE A BAND – you will need pots, pans and wooden spoons, old food containers (with tops), rice, pasta or anything else that will rattle! Using clean containers, decorate the outside of the shakers and fill with rice or pasta. Create drums using upturned pots, pans and wooden spoons. Practise altogether singing nursery rhymes and songs, Bang or shake to the rhythm. Why not record a ‘performance’ to share with family, friends or your class here on the blog.

At 11am today and everyday, David Williams is doing a free story session on his website: www.worldofdavidwalliams.com

Yesterday, I received some wonderful work from Florence and Max:

Hello everybody,

Another exciting day for home learning opportunities and what better time to start introducing cooking skills with your child, children are always so keen to join in. Look through recipe books together and some gather ideas. Can they help scrub and chop the vegetables, stir the sauce, make the salad and help pour a drink for you and your family at dinner time? Can they help lay the table or dinner trays?

Music is a brilliant why to be physical whilst at home, as it doesn’t cost anything – you can play music from phones, the TV, iPad, amazon etc. So why not put on your favourite songs and dance, sing, jump, leap and be silly. Try and copy your child’s move as this makes them feel confident and it’s also just a lot of fun!

Please continue to count daily to – remember to use silly voices or physical actions. Jack Hartman on youtube has some really good counting and moving songs to aid you with this.

Please continue to practise writing and reading the tricky words the children have been learning over the past two terms.

Dear children and parents,

Good morning, I hope you are all okay and enjoying your time off together.

Today, why not practise counting to 50 using different voices e.g 1-10 monster voices, 11-20 fairy voices etc. Play ‘fastest fingers first’, both you and your child put your hands behind your backs, call out the number 7 and the first person to show the number on their fingers is the winner. Repeat with different amounts to 10.

Sound Hunt
Encourage your child to hunt around the house or garden for objects beginning with letters from the alphabet. Encourage your child to make a list of the items they find. Maybe set a timer, how many can they find in 10 minutes?

Whilst at home, encourage your child to participate as much as possible with household jobs. In doing this, you will be supporting your child’s organisational skills, fine motor skills and providing them with responsibility and a sense of purpose. Suitable jobs could be: teaching them to make their own bed in the morning, tidying up after themselves, pairing up socks and folding washing, washing and drying up, dusting, gardening – planting seeds, watering, digging etc

Thank you Ned for your beautiful picture yesterday, you really filled my bucket.