WELCOME TO EYFS & Key Stage 1
At Woodthorpe every child is recognised as a unique individual and we celebrate and welcome differences within our school community. Our aim is to enhance and invite children's curiosity, confidence and individual competency to flourish regardless of backgrounds, circumstances or needs. We aim to work collaboratively with parents and carers to encourage independent enthusiastic learners who thrive and reach their full potential.
EYFS Curriculum
The EYFS curriculum is thoroughly planned out to incorporate teacher led focus sessions. exploration with independent application time and an opportunity to work meaningfully outside. Our aim is to develop individuals who are creative, independent and who have a love of learning.
Our EYFS curriculum aims to enable our children to be:
- Competent and creative learners, who are curious about the world around them.
- Secure and confident, who enjoy coming to school and learning new skills and knowledge building on their existing learning.
- Skilful communicators, who connect with others through language and play, ensuring that they play in a vocabulary rich environment.
At Woodthorpe, we are using the revised EYFS Framework. Through a mixture of carefully planned adult activities and more spontaneous child led activities the children develop skills and understanding in seven areas of learning. To find out more, click on the links below.
EYFS Curriculum Parent Guide Reception Long Term Plan
Assessment
The staff are constantly assessing the children in their everyday activities, play and through more focused adult-led interactions and sessions. We use observations of the children, photos, the work that they do feedback from parents and comments made by the children to assess where the pupils are working. Evidence is recorded on Evidence Me.
The new EYFS Framework and Development Matters documents are used to inform the curriculum, the enhancements in the provision and next steps for pupils. The new Development Matters gives statements for the ages of the children. The planning focus for each term and each week is taken from the Long-Term Plan, the agreed focus, the previous week's findings, the interests of the children and the next steps.
EYFS FrameworkDevelopment Matters
Teaching Early Reading in EYFS & KS1
What is phonics?
At Woodthorpe, we strive for all children to read effectively and quickly using the Read Write Inc Phonics programme (RWI) which includes the teaching of synthetic phonics, sight vocabulary, decoding and encoding words as well as spelling and accurate letter formation.
We have put together a guide to how the RWI programme works together with some useful links. Mrs Pickering is our Read Write Inc lead teacher, so if you have any questions about RWI, contact the school who can refer you to her. Please take time to read the information, as it will provide invaluable information as to how you can help and support your child in reading.
What is Read Write Inc?
Read Write Inc (RWI) is a phonics based English programme which helps ALL children to learn to read fluently and at speed so they can focus on developing their skills in comprehension, vocabulary and spellings. The programme is designed for children aged 4-7. However, some children will need to access this programme beyond the age of 7 to meet individual needs. RWI was developed by Ruth Miskin and more information on this can be found at: http://ruthmiskin.com/en/find-out-more/parents/.
How will RWI be taught?
The children will be taught to:
- Decode effortlessly
- Spell and handwrite with ease
- Read with fluency and expression
- Comprehend what they read
- Write confidently using oral rehearsal
- Work effectively with a partner to articulate their learning at every step. All children are assessed regularly by the RWI lead and the reading team.
Reception
In Reception all children will learn how to 'read' the sounds in words and how those sounds can be written down.
Reading
The children:
- learn 44 sounds and the corresponding letters/letter groups using simple picture prompts- see below
- learn to read words using Fred Talk and sound blending
- read from a range of storybooks and non-fiction books matched to their phonic knowledge
- work well with partners
- develop comprehension skills in stories by answering 'Find it' and 'Prove it' discussion questions
Writing
The children:
- learn to write and form letters/letter groups which represent the 44 sounds with the help of fun phrases
- learn to write words by using Fred Talk
- learn to build sentences by practising sentences out loud before they write
Talking
The children work in pairs so that they:
- answer every question
- practise every activity with their partner
- take turns in talking and reading to each other
- develop ambitious vocabulary
Year 1 and Year 2
Children follow the same format as Reception but will work on complex sounds and read books appropriate to their reading level. Daily sessions of RWI phonics last for one hour.
Click on the link to find out the RWI progression.
Children will be taught how to read as follows:
Before you start to teach children how to read, we practise saying the sounds below. These are the sounds we use to speak English.
Fred Talk
We use pure sounds ('m' not 'muh', 's' not 'suh', etc) so that the children will be able to blend the sounds into words easily. At school we use a puppet called Fred who is an expert on sounding out words! We call it, 'Fred Talk'. E.g., m-o-p, c-a-t. m-a-n, sh-o-p, b-l-a-ck.
The following video is an example of blending with Fred. http://tinyurl.com/ycknapp7
The children are taught the sounds in three sets.
Set 1 sounds are taught in the following order together with rhymes to helps children form the letters correctly and instantly recognise sounds for blending.
Click on the link to learn how to say the sounds correctly. https://tinyurl.com/4u8k248c
Parent Guide
Set 1 Parent Booklet Set 1 Mini Flashcards
Green Words
'Green' Words are phonetically decodable words that the children learn to read. They allow children to become fluent readers, because regular reading of these words mean that they become familiar and are able to recognise/read them on sight. They can then use their knowledge of these words to read similar words more quickly.
The children are then taught the set 2 and 3 sounds.
Set 1, 2 and 3 Sounds Set 2 Green Words
Resources
Set 1 Mini FlashcardsSet 2 Mini FlashcardsSet 3 Mini Flashcards
Set 2 Word ListSet 3 Word List
Spelling with 'Fred Fingers'
The children will learn to spell using their 'Fred Fingers'. They will be encouraged to push the sounds onto their fingers to help them hear the sounds in the word for spelling. Each finger represents one sounds. For example. p-l-ay -3 sounds for spelling, b-r-igh-t- 4 sounds for spelling.
Click on> https://tinyurl.com/2xu33yua
Year 1 spellings to learn Year 2 spellings to learn
Handwriting
Alien Words
Alien words are nonsense words that the children must carefully Fred talk and blend to read the word. This is to show that they can apply their phonetic skills to unfamiliar words. Nonsense words are an important part of the Year 1 Phonics Screening Check taken at the end of Year 1. For example: th-ur-p, z-ew-p
Red Words
Red words are sometimes known as 'common exception words' or 'tricky words'. These are words that the children will need to learn on sight, because they contain parts that are not decodable, for example the word 'the'. The children must learn the correct pronunciation and spelling. Some of the red words are only tricky until a specific sound is learnt, or because people pronounce it differently in parts of the country.
Red Words Year 1 Reading Ribbons Year 1 Reading Ribbons Word Lists
recommended books and links
Recommended Reading Top tips for reading at home Reception and KS1 Rhymes to Learn Key Authors
https://www.booksfortopics.com/reception
https://www.booksfortopics.com/ks1
https://www.oxfordowl.co.uk/for-home/find-a-book/library-page/
