Welcome to the Foundation Stage 

We are delighted to welcome you to our Foundation Stage class and look forward to working with you and your child.

Foundation Stage staff
Mrs Harvey - Foundation Stage Teacher and EYFS lead

Miss Hey - Foundation Stage Teacher

Mrs. Sutherland - Foundation Stage Teacher

Miss Boyce - Foundation Stage Practitioner  

Mr. Punio - Foundation stage practitioner

If you have any queries or concerns across the year please contact a member of the Foundation Stage team.

Mrs Harvey - lauraw@spmillend.herts.sch.uk

Miss Hey - ashleyh@spmillend.herts.sch.uk

Mrs Sutherland - hannahs@spmillend.herts.sch.uk

Foundation Stage Vision

For children; pupils who are happy, enthused, curious, safe, have a love of learning. We cater for our diverse demographic by giving all children what they need including a range of experiences, books and vocabulary to develop the breadth and depth of their knowledge. We want our children to leave Early years as well-rounded individuals with an understanding of our school values, SMSC and British values as well as strong social skills and confident in their wellbeing.

For staff; we want our staff to be skilled and confident to carry out our vision through having a passion for Early Years and wanting the best for our pupils. We want our staff to feel confident to have some autonomy to try new ideas and get involved in decisions and planning around the children’s learning and interests. Staff should be knowledgeable about all areas of learning to enable them to push learning forwards ensuring all children make good or better progress. 

For environment; We want our environment to offer a wide range of resources to support the development of cultural capital, awe and wonder and learning opportunities. Our environment is enticing, reflects the various cultures within our community. We have a strong focus on communication so our environment is print rich, interactive, engaged, changes regularly to reflect the children needs and interests as well as promoting independence.       

For standards; We aim to offer the best standards possible in early reading and maths supporting all children to make good or better progress. We have designed our curriculum to ensure we are striving for the best for all children based on their start points through regularly challenging and scaffolding their learning to enable them to be ready for next stage in their education.

Foundation Stage Aims

• To provide an opportunity for children to reinforce skills, reflect and build upon their learning in the classroom.

• To further foster the partnership between home and school for the benefit of your child

• To involve parents (and other adults) in pupils’ work

• To encourage the development of independent study

• To encourage the development of pupils’ organisational skills, self-discipline and confidence

Our expectations

Please note: These expectations will be added and built on throughout the year as and when the children are ready for them. 

• Children are encouraged to find out information, bring in books or object of interest or a similar related task pertaining to the focus topic being carried out.

• Library  – All the of the children in our Foundation Stage will be bringing home library books on a Friday to be returned the following week on a Wednesday

• F2 (4-5 year olds) - In Autumn 2 your child/children will be bringing a reading book to enjoy at home. 5 – 10 minutes daily practise. This will be sent out on a Friday and to be returned on a Wednesday.

• Tapestry – sharing with you what the children do at school as well as you sharing with us what you do at home together.

• Independence -encouraging the children to do things independently is really important as they move through the school. This includes getting dressed, cutting food, and putting coats and shoes on.

Foundation Stage Learning 

Week beginning - 18th July 

I hope you all had a lovely weekend. 

The team contacted parents this week regarding your child's Tapestry journal. This journal will be deleted next Friday, please make sure you save this before then.  

Literacy

This week we are starting a new topic learning about the seaside and summer. The children will be exploring things they might see at the beach. They will be looking at the seaside in the past and comparing it to today's holidays. 

Phonics 

F1 - Over the next term the children will be playing games to support their phonemic awareness. 

F2 - This week the children will be recapping and recovering areas from throughout the year. This will focus on areas that the children may find tricky. This is in preparation for our end of term assessment. 

The children will also take part in 3 guided reading lesson throughout the week and on Friday they will bring this book home to share with you. 

Please continue practising the phase 3 sounds and the tricky words at home as often as possible.

Also please make sure you are recording your child's reading at home in their reading record.

Maths

F1 - This week F1 will be consolidating the learning from this half term. They will be recapping 3D shape name and properties 

F2 - This week’s focus is on assessing and deepening the children’s developing automaticity with some number facts. The children will be:

• knowing that whole amounts can be split into parts
• knowing that parts can be combined to make whole amounts, and that the whole is larger than each of its parts
• knowing the ‘numbers within’ 3 (i.e. that 3 is composed of 2 and 1)
• knowing the different ‘numbers within’ 4 and 5, and naming the parts that make the whole number (e.g. that 5 is composed of 4 and 1, and 3 and 2)
• when shown a quantity to 5, saying how many are subsequently hidden under a cloth or bowl
• knowing the different ‘numbers within’ 10, and naming the parts that make the whole number, e.g. that 10 is composed of 5 and 5, or 6 and 4

knowing doubles facts up to ‘5 and 5 make 10’.

Makaton

Makaton sign of the week - finished 

Continuous Provision 

Prime areas 

Roleplaying - Ice cream parlour

Sand - Ice cream sand

Fine motor - Cutting and sticking

Gross Motor - Riding bikes, obstacle course, prams, water painting 

Library area - Books all about sea creatures, sharks and the beach 

Floor writing - Making chalk paint and using stencils to create images on the path

Sharing a story - Responding to and asking questions 

Learning new vocabulary related to our core book

Mark making - Name writing and tracing different lines

Fine Motor outdoors - woodwork, hammering and sawing wood

Specific areas 

Writing area - writing letters 

Creative - creating a fan 

Painting area -  crabs 

Technology - whiteboard phonics games  

Sand - capacity

water - guttering and watering cans 

Topic table - hole punch and thread sun pictures   

F1 Maths - Exploring weight

I hope you all have a fantastic week

Mrs Harvey and the Foundation Stage Team