WHAT ARE WE LEARNING ABOUT?

Summer 1: All Creatures Great and Small 

Throughout this term, children will be encouraged to question their observations of the changing season.  They will observe closely how the plants we have grown from seeds and bulbs, continue to change and how other plants and trees develop through the season. Using information and story texts, children will learn which animals hatch from eggs and later in the term, which animals are born on farms and in hotter countries. 

As part of mathematical development, children will begin to use their knowledge of numbers 1-5 to solve problems. They will continue to use what they know about the properties of shape to make pictures and to talk about them using everyday language. We will use the work of artist James Brunt as inspiration to explore those properties, and make structures using stones. Additionally, children will continue to look at patterns on animals and in simple colour or shape sequences. 

Our Personal, Social and Emotional learning will focus on talking about the rules of nursery, how to problem solve in play, the importance of keeping clean and heating healthily. Alongside this we will continue to revisit PANTS Rules and e-safety topics. 

The fiction texts we will share will have a focus on discussions about how and why events happen or characters behave in a certain way! In phonics we will begin to segment and blend words into syllables initially then phonemes. 

Our creative play will be developed using exciting small worlds and role play areas as well as through dance and music sessions. Children will also have opportunities to explore printing using paint and different tools, and using fabric and patterned paper to create pictures as used by the illustrator Lauren Child. In PE, there will be a continuing focus on using equipment to develop our balancing skills, jumping and landing safely, and there will be opportunities to develop throwing and catching skills using beanbags but also telling stories through dance, movement and yoga.

 In Religious Education discussions children will talk about special places in their everyday life whether at home or school, and they will learn about places that believers visit eg churches, synagogues, mosques, temples etc 

Key books we will be using this term will include:

The focus for teaching and learning will continue to be in the Prime Areas of the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) curriculum which are Personal, Social and Emotional Development, Communication and Language and Physical Development.

• I can use past tense.
• I can question why things happen
• I understand prepositions such as ‘under’, ‘on top’, ‘behind’. (Egg Hunt)

• I can understand and answer ‘how’ questions.
• I can articulate multisyllabic words such as ‘pterodactyl’ or ‘hippopotamus.’
• I can use ‘and’ and ‘because’ to link sentences.