Embedded Files
Whizz Bang Workshop
We has a fantastic trip to Thomas Hardye School today to take part in a fun, hands-on science workshop all about Space!
We got to fly to the moon, making popping rockets; we got to make slime; we got to watch chemical reactions in the form of 'elephants toothpaste' and we got to see how much energy there is in a jelly baby.
It sparked a lot of interesting ideas and creative jobs once we got back to the classroom. Hopefully you'll hear all about it this evening.
Healthy Week
We have had a brilliant healthy week! It's been jam-packed with visitors, activities and to top it off, a BMX show presented by a 3 times Guinness World record holder!
We hope your children have come home talking excitedly about all the activities they've taken part in this week but if not, take time to look at the photos with them. We loved starting each day with Wake and Shake on the playground. We've been able to show off our best dance moves! We have had the pleasure of meeting a Community Police Office, a local children's nurse, fire fighters, SCARF and Harold the giraffe in the Life Ed tent and so much more. We've also made a healthy snack and made fresh bread rolls inspired by our Literacy work on The Little Red Hen.
Healthy Week is a great opportunity for us to talk to the children about how to keep our bodies and minds healthy and safe. We have been able to give them some wonderful experiences this week, some which we hope will live in their memories for a long time.
Can you help?
We are off to Gore Farm on Monday 28th April, this Monday coming. If you are able to help us by coming with us for the day please could you email the year group email at foundation@damers.dorset.sch.uk We really appreciate the support and help that enables us to carry out these amazing educational trips. All the information for timings are in the letters/emails we've sent out recently.
Many thanks.
W/b 24/03/25
Yesterday the children performed their dance and drumming to the rest of their strand and we were so proud of them! They all kept to the beat and danced with great timing and rhythm. The children sat beautifully to watch the older children, including some siblings and loved the variety of arts. They are excited to follow in their footsteps in the years to come.
In Literacy we have been reading The Night Pirates by Peter Harris and the children have loved hiding pirates and coins around our classroom, role playing pirates outside and writing a ‘How to be a Pirate’ guide. Here is a fun pirate dance to try at home… Just Dance Kids 2014 A Pirate You Shall Be
In Math's we have been measuring lengths, weight and exploring capacity. Have fun with this pan balance scale game… https://springroll-tc.pbskids.org/happy-camel/c01ef930ff95427b3d797687fc8ffb7e611ef75c/release/index.html
Please can I remind you all to bring back library books. If you have misplaced one, please feel free to replace it with another appropriate story book.
A reminder to please check book bags. The children have come home with a letter about a farm trip we are planning for after the Easter holidays.
Have a lovely weekend!
W/b 7 / 03/25
We had a fantastic day on Thursday celebrating World Book Day. The children loved parading their costumes and words for the other children in Foundation. We hope lots of families had fun participating in the sponsored read. Don’t forget to check bookbags for the World Book Day Tokens. Thank you for your continued support with the events we hold at Damers.
In Maths we have been learning about AB and ABC patterns. Children have been using lots of different resources to create patterns. I wonder if you could create some at home? Feel free to send them into the foundation email - we’d love to see them! You could use large and small objects, teddy bears and books or even pans and plates!
Here is a video all about patterns…
https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b0bp2t8d/numberblocks-series-3-pattern-palace
Don’t forget about our Stay and Play Session next Wednesday afternoon where the focus will be on handwriting. We look forward to seeing you.
Have a lovely weekend!
W/b: 24.2.25
We have had a great first week back and ended on a high in the sunshine! The sun has been perfect for our work on shadows linked to our new literacy text, My Shadow is Pink by Scott Stuart. We will be using the text to help us write a poster for the new children starting in September telling them about all the useful things they will need for school.
In our maths learning we have been focusing on 2D shape. The children have been identifying shapes and talking about their properties. We've enjoyed shape hunts in our outside area and lots of sorting and classifying tasks. Why not go on a shape hunt at home and see how many you can find, remember, shapes are everywhere! Shapes song Listen to this song we've been singing in the classroom, but be warned, it's catchy!
Don't forget it's World Book Day next Thursday 6th March and children are encouraged to dress up as a word.
W/b 3.02.25
Number Day! What super costumes and numbers we have seen today! The children took part in a number parade with the rest of Foundation and loved seeing everyone's amazing numbers. We also made some number hats showing many different number representations including some of our recent addition learning! Thank you for all the generous donations towards the NSPCC Charity.
In Literacy we have begun our book called Super Milly and the Super School Day! We have talked about our own superpowers and how these can be things like super brave, super kind and super helpful.
We loved designing our own superhero obstacle course in our outside area this week. We gave ourselves challenges like, stepping over an obstacle whilst carrying something and balancing something on our heads as we moved. It was SUPER fun!
W/b 27.01.25
In Literacy we have reenacted the party scene from the The Magic Paintbrush book. The children had so much fun! They danced, ate moon shaped cookies, played some drums and danced some more! They are very knowledgeable about China and the story behind Luna New Year.
This week in Phonics we have reached the end of our phoneme journey. All children have been taught the Reception phonemes and graphemes. Your child’s Letters and Sounds booklet is now complete! Please use the booklets to consolidate their learning at home.
During our daily Phonics lesson we will now focus on filling gaps, reading longer words and strategies to support this alongside developing fluency and prosody.
NSPCC Number Day - Friday 7th February 2025
We paraded with our homemade drums, claves and dragon head for another class.
W/b 20.01.25
Over the past 2 weeks we have begun handwriting lessons. The children have been so grown up and sat at the tables, trying their best to form their letters correctly!
They have also been amazing with their segmenting to spell and remembering our new digraphs for their Magic Paintbrush story writing. The children have loved using their imaginations to create their very own magic story all about themselves!
In phonics we have been learning ur, ow, oi and ear as well as tricky words my, by and all. Please look in book bags for tricky word sheets, continue with the phoneme books and enjoy reading the library books plus listening to your child read their phonic reader book to you!
Phonics home learning ear, ow, ok, ur
Look at our play dough snakes! We're getting ready to celebrate Lunar New Year next week, the year of the snake.
w/b 13.01.25
In Literacy we have continued our learning with our literacy text ‘The Magic Paintbrush’ by creating our very own super playdough monsters! We have labeled their features too! We had big spikes, sharp teeth, long tails, multiple legs and eyes! Some were fearsome and some gentle creations but all unique. See if you can spot yours!
In our Phonics we have continued to learn new digraphs.
Phonics home learning oo, oo, ar, or
In Maths we have been learning about ordinal numbers by lining up and racing! We have talked about coming first, last, before and after as well as how to always congratulate the winners and keep on trying!
w/b 07.01.25
Happy New Year!
We hope you all had a lovely Christmas break and wish you all a Happy New Year! The children have settled back into our class routines really well and eager to learn! This week we have begun our new literacy text ‘The Magic Paintbrush’ and discovered our own magic paintbrush in the classroom! We have been busy painting our own pictures and learning about the country China.
In Maths we have been using our knowledge of 10 to count forwards and backwards. The children have used some great vocabulary such as more, less, inbetween, before, after, bigger and smaller. We finished the week creating number towers in teams and finding missing numbers!
In Phonics we have begun learning new digraphs and a trigraph (3 letters making 1 sound!) Phoneme books are dotted so please keep using them at home. Here is the video to enjoy… Phonics Home learning, oa, igh, ai and ee
MERRY CHRISTMAS MEADOW FOUNDATION 🎄🧑🎄
I can’t quite believe we’ve been in school for a whole term already! We’ve already achieved so much with our phonics, reading and writing, number work, two trips, a Christmas performance, a snow day, making new friends and so much more.
We were so proud of the children's Christmas performance of We're Going on a Star Hunt last week and thank you all for coming and watching, it means a lot to the children. It's a real benchmark for them on their journey through school and often a favourite memory for years. You will be emailed a link to a recorded performance soon so keep your eyes peeled for that.
We thank you all for your support over the last term and look forward to welcoming you back in the New Year on Tuesday 7th January 2025. Enjoy your Christmases together, have fun, eat plenty and make memories.
W/b: 2.12.24
Now December is here, Christmas is creeping into the classrooms.
This week we’ve been excited to have a visit from the postmaster from The Buttermarket Post Office. The children loved buying their own stamps to stick on their envelopes and had lots of questions to ask about the postal service! We are busy making and writing Christmas or winter cards in class. If you’re doing any at home this is a great opportunity for your child to practise writing their name with a real purpose to it. We will be going to the post box on Monday 16th and will need plenty of adults to walk with us. If you can spare a bit of time that afternoon please let us know at the gate. We really appreciate your support.
This week we are back to learning a new phoneme each day. You can find the ones we've learnt this week in the video below. Please remember to keep up with your phoneme book at home too, it really helps!
Phonics Home learning th, ng, nk, sh
Don't forget we need all Christmas play outfits in on Monday 9th ready for a full dress rehearsal and photos before our show day on Thursday 12th December. Thank you.
W/b: 25.11.24
We've had a busy week! Preparations are underway for the Christmas performance and we can't wait to show you what we've been working on on Thursday 12th December at 2.15pm in the school hall. Please don't forget that we need all costumes in by Monday 9th December at the latest. You're welcome to bring them in before that if you have them. Please ensure they are in a clearly named bag.
We have been learning our Christmas story through story mapping. Our story maps help us to retell the story in the correct sequence. Alongside retelling the story we have been adding actions and songs. See some of our story maps below.
We are very excited for our visitor from the Post Office to come in next week. Don't forget to send your envelope back with 85p for a second class stamp and the slip filled out. The children will be buying their own stamp to go on their envelope and learn more about the Post Office's role in our community. We will write our Christmas cards and walk to a local post box in the next couple of weeks to post our cards.
This week we have learnt two new phonemes - qu and ch. The pages in your child's phoneme book have been up dated so please spend some time adding to those two pages. See the link below for our phonics video.
W/b: 18.11.24
We've had a beautiful week with the snow and sunshine. We loved exploring the freezing snow and watching as it melted as we played with it. We filled up our tuff tray in the classroom with the snow from outside and made mini snowmen and winter homes. Later, we enjoyed snowball fights and making marks in the snow outside.
We felt very Christmassy with all the snow and ended up putting up our classroom Christmas tree!
A great team effort from all in Meadow Foundation.
Don't forget this week has been a consolidation week in Phonics and we have been revisiting some sounds that we've already taught. This means that you do not need to fill out your phoneme book.
Please check bookbags for your child's part in the Christmas show. We're very excited to start rehearsals next week! Be prepared for a lot of Christmas songs and story telling.
W/b: 11.11.24
The Children had a wonderful time parading their bikes/scooters to the rest of the school. It was a very festive morning. Congratulations to Minnie-Lee for having the best blingy bike/scooter in the class!
At Damers we want to encourage as many children to cycle and scooter to school as possible. Cycling to school is healthy, good for the environment and cheaper than car travel. It means there will be fewer cars at the school gates and above all, it’s great fun! Thank you to everyone for your participation in this.
Towards the end of last half term we introduced ‘Tricky Words’ in our Little Wandle (Phonics) Sessions. Tricky words are words that can not be decoded easily. We use many of these tricky words often and they are used early on in decodable books, so its important for children to be able to read them fluently. We teach tricky words by identifying the ‘tricky part’ and the sounds it makes, then sound out and blending the word as normal. Please practise these with your child at home. Each week on a Friday your child will come home with a sheet of the tricky words taught that week - PLEASE CHECK BOOK BAGS!
This week in Phonics we have learnt the new phonemes v, w, x and y. There will be no new phonemes or digraphs taught next week as we will be consolidating a few that we are finding tricky in class therefore there will be no pages to complete in their Letters and Sounds book. Please support your child by looking back through their book.
Thank you for continuing to support your child at home with their phonics learning - Here is this week’s video - have fun.
Phonics home learning v, w, x, y
DON'T FORGET...
It's our next Stay and Play on Wednesday 20th November at 2.50pm. This time we will have a focus on phonics. We look forward to seeing you there!
W.b 4/11/24
This week we have been looking at the book ‘Where the Wild Things Are’ by Maurice Sendak.
To immerse the children into this story on Monday the children found some evidence that some kind of creature had been in our classroom! He left a sack with lots of items that begin with s. I wonder if the children can remember any? We will continue to build on this story over the coming weeks!
Wednesday was a fantastic day at Thorncombe Woods! The children became nature detectives looking for a range of autumn and winter treasures. The sun was shining through the trees as the children enjoyed exploring in the forest. We would like to thank all the parent and carer volunteers for supporting us on this trip.
In Maths we have been looking at the number 5. We have looked at various ways we can represent the number 5 and what number pairs make 5. The children remembered tally marks, 5 frames, 10 frames, Numicon, the use of pictures and our fingers plus the part-part whole model. We have been challenging children to find number pairs to make the number 5 this week. (Number pairs are two number you can add together to make another number e.g 3 and 2 make 5, 5 and 0 make 5)
This week in Phonics we have learnt the new digraphs ss, ff, ll and the phoneme j . (Digraph - two letters that make one sound)
Thank you for continuing to support your child at home with their phonics learning - Here is this week’s video - have fun.
w/b 07.10.24
This week we have begun to talk about and observe the signs of Autumn. We have found beautiful coloured leaves, shiny conkers and acorns. I wonder what you can find whilst out and about?!
Here is this week's phonics video covering the new phonemes taught this week. ‘Ck’ is our first digraph… 2 letters making 1 sound! Have fun watching and don't forget to join in!
Phonics Home Learning CK, U, E, R
This week in Maths we have been learning all about the number three. We have explored the number pairs 2 and 1, 3 and 0. We have also listened to traditional stories that have 3 main characters. Why not read a story at home such as The Three Little Pigs!
Skipper Foundation have loved our Rhyme this week of one, two buckle my shoe. Here's a link to sing along...
W/b 30.09.24
W/b 30.09.24
This week we have been looking closely at our features in the mirror to help us to paint a self portrait. We have learnt that every one of us is unique.
Here is this week's phonics video covering the new phonemes taught this week ‘g,o,c,k’. Have fun watching and don't forget to join in!
Phonics home learning, G, O, C, K
This week in Maths we have been learning all about the number two. We have discovered what a pair is and played lots of pair matching games. I wonder if you can find some things that come in pairs around your house..? Maybe a pair of sunglasses, a pair of socks or even a pair of gloves!
PHONICS
We have started our Phonics learning. So far we have looked at the phonemes s, a, t, p, i ,n, m, d. All of the children have done super listening and fantastic remembering of these new phonemes. We will be learning 4 new sounds most weeks apart from the last week of each half term - These are assessment weeks. Every Friday will be a consolidation day where we will review and use the sounds learnt throughout the week. (This might look slightly different some weeks depending on trips/bank holidays etc)
We really appreciate the time you are spending with your child at home going through their Letter and Sounds booklet and completing each phoneme. It's so important that the children are supported at school and at home with their learning.
In addition to the Letters and Sounds book that is sent home daily the Foundation teachers at Damers have also created some short Youtube videos that you can watch at home alongside your child. There is a video for each week which we will upload every Friday.
S A T P - W/b 16.09.24 Phonics video
I N M D - w/b 23.09.24 - Phonics Video
Settling In
After reading All Through the Night we used our bakery to make baked goods with our friends.
After reading All Through the Night we used our bakery to make baked goods with our friends.
Each week we learn a new nursery rhyme. After learning Twinkle Twinkle Little Star we made our own star wands.
Each week we learn a new nursery rhyme. After learning Twinkle Twinkle Little Star we made our own star wands.
We hope you all received your first day photo of your child in their book bag. Don't forget to check them daily for letters, art work and phoneme books.
We hope you all received your first day photo of your child in their book bag. Don't forget to check them daily for letters, art work and phoneme books.
The First Few Weeks
The children have had a lovely first few weeks in Meadow Foundation. It’s been lovely getting to know the children and learning about their individual personalities. We have been focusing on making new friends, learning new routines and exploring our learning environments both in the classroom and outside. Click through the pictures below to see the different areas of our classroom. We're sure your child can tell you about each area and how they can use the Busy Bee Board to choose where they want to learn and play.
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