Year 1 marks the transition from the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) curriculum your child followed in Reception into Key Stage 1 of the National Curriculum.

Key Stage 1 (KS1) is the first key stage of primary school, a phase of education for 5-7-year-old children.

We always aim to make the transition from Reception to Year 1 a smooth one: the children will still be learning through play, both indoors and outdoors, but across the course of the year, your child’s day will become more structured.

The children will work with their teachers and classmates to build on their existing knowledge, understanding and skills; they will begin to record and share their learning independently and collaboratively, and record it in a range of ways.

We value each child as an individual learner and encourage the children to be as independent as they can in everything they do.

Phonics
Phonics is a big part of Year 1. Your child will continue to expand on their knowledge of phonics and will probably surprise you with just how quickly they develop their reading. They will do at least 20 minutes of phonics learning each day, just like they did in Reception. These are fun, fast-paced sessions which involve games and tasks. They will learn tricky words, spelling rules and how to sound out and blend to aid them with their reading and writing.

They will begin to ‘have a go’ at spelling when writing independently, by phonetically sounding out words and using knowledge and skills learned in phonics sessions. Their teacher may well ask them to ‘write it like it sounds’ and, as time goes by, they will learn the correct sounds to replace those guesses.

Literacy and Stories

They will learn English through a wonderful and diverse range of stories and they will also act out stories that may be familiar to you at home.

They will plan and write their own creative stories, design posters and leaflets. They will learn to write in sentences and to use exciting language — all while improving their handwriting.

Maths

Maths lessons this year tend to be enjoyable, with plenty of hands-on activities. Your Year 1 child will count with objects and work in groups to explore shapes and pattern. Now that they are using numbers over 20, they will learn to use a 100 square to help with their adding and subtracting. Number bonds will also be reinforced.

They will learn to count forwards, backwards, in 2s, 5s, 10s, 20s, and they will double and halve. They will do maths inside and outdoors and, because we work in a very cross-curricular way in Year 1, he/she will be talking about maths during other subjects, for example; while measuring ingredients for cooking (DT), drawing tables to record experiments in science or drawing maps in geography.

Beyond literacy and numeracy
There are a wide range of topics covered in Year 1, and your child will undoubtedly have their personal favourites.

Some of the Year 1 activities include:

• experiments (science) product design (DT)
• learning the history of things (history) and about the local area we live in (geography)
• dancing, playing games and using gym apparatus (PE)
• painting, drawing and more creative processes (art)

We also develop their social skills and empathy for each other during RE and circle times. Year 1 is an important year for your child’s increasing independence. The days are so varied and busy, the hours just fly by!

Teacher: Ms Tucker
HLTA: Mrs Srinivasan

PE days are Tuesday and Wednesday.

Please come to school wearing PE kit on those days (trainers, white t-shirt and plain navy or black jogging bottoms- no earrings please). On cooler days, children can wear their school jumper / cardigan or fleece over their t-shirt.

Snack
All Year 1 children will receive a piece of fruit each day, free of charge.

If you wish for your child to have an additional snack, a voluntary contribution of £1 per week will cover this cost.

The school day begins promptly at 8.45 children should be collected at 3.15pm daily from the Year 1 courtyard.