Spring 2025

 

Topic

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​Topic in Early Years covers a range of subjects – writing, history, geography, music, science, art, and computing. Our topics are half termly and allow for lots of investigation. As well as the areas listed below, we take our learning in any direction that the children are passionate about. During this half-term’s theme of ‘I wonder where they go’, we will be exploring sorting vehicles by type, why we need vehicles, maps, journeys and recycling. We enjoy lots of books during our time at school, but our key texts for the first half of spring term are If I Drove an Ice Cream Truck, Don’t Let an Elephant on the Bus, Martha Maps it Out, How a Recycling Truck Works, and Mr Grumpy’s Outing. During the second half of the spring term, our topic title is ‘I wonder if it every happened’ which involves learning about traditional tales. Through this, we will be exploring alternative endings and creating our own stories. The key texts for this theme are Mixed Up Fairytales, The True Story of the Three Little Pigs, Three Little Wolves and the Big Bad Pig, Three Little Pigs and You Choose Fairytales. Our Early Years classes will also be learning about the celebrations of Chinese New Year, Shrove Tuesday and Easter. In Computing, we will be creating digital music and developing our photography skills. Our art focuses are a Henri Matisse piece called ‘The Snail’ and a Claude Monet piece called ‘Peonies’. In Science, we will be observing light travelling through transparent objects and participate in cooking activities to experience how liquids and solids change when cooled or heated.

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Maths

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In Maths, we follow units of work. This term our units will be ‘mass and capacity’, ‘growing 6, 7, 8’, ‘length, height and time’, ‘building 9 and 10’, ‘exploring 3D shapes’, ‘to 20 and beyond’, and ‘how many now’. The key learning delivered through these are:

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• Finding, subitising, and representing numbers.

• Calculating one more and one less than a number.

• Exploring the composition of numbers.

• Making doubles.

• Combing groups of amounts to add.

• Exploring and comparing capacity and mass.

• Investigating bonds to 10.

• Recognising, naming, and locating 3D shapes.

• Identifying, copying and continuing complex patterns.

 

​We also have planned maths activities linked to our themes. ‘I wonder where they go’, activities include subitising details on vehicles, using vehicles to show bonds to ten, bus themed tens frames for investigating more or less passengers, exploring how many letters are in our names, using shapes to create small and large scale vehicles, and writing numbers on our creations e.g. bus numbers, train numbers, times for arrival and departure. During ‘I wonder if it ever happened’, activities include using shapes to build settings from stories, ordering and comparing the size of characters, using dough to represent amounts e.g. ten crowns, five pigs, seven wedding cakes, exploring numbers through stories e.g. the three bears, three pigs and seven dwarfs, and shape spotting when looking at different settings in stories.

 

Literacy

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In Reception, we have opportunities to develop our literacy skills in all areas of our learning. We have daily Read Write Inc. sessions, regular opportunities for writing, mark making and reading through continuous provision, writing books for special pieces of work, and reading escape time to share our love of high quality stories. Our learning during the spring term is focused on:

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• Recognising the initial sound of words, recognising most single set one sounds, blending a word when an adult uses Fred talk, and forming cvc words using RWI skills.

• Beginning to link sounds to letters when mark making or writing.

• Mark making, explaining what my marks mean to an adult.

• Beginning to independently write my name.

• Showing a dominant hand when writing some recognisable letters.

• Fostering a love of a range of books.

 

During the first half of the spring term, we will also be recognising, making or writing our own names, exploring word writing linked to vehicles to create a word train, and completing writing to describe what we observe when watching roads in our local area. In the second half of the spring term, we will be labelling body parts of animals from the tales, creating story maps and comparing the endings of books with similar titles but different storylines.

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Physical Development

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In Reception, we have access to lots of opportunities for physical development. We have our garden with a range of physical development resources, weekly physical education lessons, and an intervention programme called ‘Healthy Movers’ which is accessible to all children who choose to participate. Our spring term units of learning are dance and gymnastics. Dance encompasses skills such as showing dynamic movement, negotiating space, working safely and respectfully, showing confidence and independence, and creative thinking. Gymnastics involve making shapes through movement, balancing, jumping, rocking, rolling, travelling in a range of ways, sharing and turn taking, and showing determination and confidence. Our key learning focuses for this term are:

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• I can negotiate a moving obstacle.

• I show balance and stability when travelling on uneven surfaces.

• I show refined, fluent, rhythmic skipping movement.

• I have developed a range of ball skills.

• I can use core muscle strength to show good sitting posture.

• I can confidently and safely use small and large apparatus.

• I can stand in a line or a queue successfully.

• I can use a successful static or dynamic tripod grip.

• I can demonstrate effective scissor use when cutting more complex shapes.

• I can choose the right tools for a purpose.

• I am developing the foundations of a handwriting style which is fast, accurate and efficient. ​

Communication and Language

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Whilst we do not complete specific lessons based on this, communication and language filters into all aspects of life in Reception. During their time in Reception, children will be working towards developing an age appropriate level of:

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• Showing careful listening and knowing why this is important.

• Learning a range of new vocabulary from different resources and experiences and applying this new vocabulary to different scenarios.

• Asking questions to find out more information, and answering who, where, when and why questions.

• Using complete sentences when speaking, using conjunctions to join ideas and actions.

• Adding detail to what they are saying for enhancement.

• Using talk when solving a problem.

• Developing a use of key social phrases including manners.

• Listening to, and retelling a range of stories, songs, and rhymes, considering the patterns within them.

• Engaging with a range of fiction and non-fiction books, recalling and retelling key aspects.

 

​As well as these yearly targets, we also plan specific learning opportunities delivered within each theme. During ‘I wonder where they go’, the children will be playing imagination games linked to journeys, singing songs about vehicles whilst playing musical instruments, using descriptive vocabulary and social phrases through play e.g. all aboard, and exploring non-fiction texts about different vehicles and their locations.  During ‘I wonder if it ever happened’, the children will be retelling traditional tales in an accurate order, considering if the endings of stories are always happy, participating in hot seating taking on the role of key characters, and creating our own puppets to use whilst retelling.
 

Personal, Social and Emotional Development

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Personal, social and emotional development is another strand of learning which filters into all aspects of life in Reception. During their time in Reception, children will be working towards developing an age appropriate level of:

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• Identifying the emotions of self and others.

• Showing patience, impulse control and regulation of own behaviour.

• Following single and groups of instructions.

• Showing focus when listening to other children and adults.

• Understanding the importance of using the toilet, regular exercise, healthy eating, healthy sleep, and road safety.

• Seeing themselves as an individual, showing resilience and perseverance.

• Managing own toileting and dressing needs.

• Building constructive relationships with other children and adults.

• Expressing their own feelings and considering the feelings of others.

• Showing sensitivity to the needs of others.

• Taking turns when playing.

 

During the first half of the spring term, we will also be considering the emotions of characters throughout stories, considering how they change and why, creating obstacle courses and navigating them whilst imitating different characters, and creating our own fairytales and sharing them with the class. In our second half term of spring, we will be talking about how we travel to school, pretending we are going on a magical journey, considering where we will go and how we will get there, and also working in pairs using timers to measure our speed when riding bikes and scooters.

 

Understanding the World

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Understanding the World is the third strand of learning which filters into all aspects of life in Reception. During their time in Reception, children will be working towards developing an age-appropriate level of: ​

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• Talking about their family and community.

• Discussing different places, their locations on maps and understanding how some places are special to certain people.

• Understanding that not everybody celebrates the same special times or believes in the same religion.

• Understanding that lives in different countries can be different to our own.

• Recognising that the immediate area around our school might not be the same for all children, both in England and in other countries.     

• Exploring the natural outdoor world including using our senses, recording observations, as well as observing and interacting with natural processes.

• Considering the effects of the changing seasons.

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During ‘I wonder where they go’, the children will have the opportunity to investigate maps using small world vehicles and cars, compare old and new transport, investigate sinking and floating, and look at vehicles with more than one use. During ‘I wonder if it ever happened’, the children will be comparing clothes in fairytales to those that we wear today, talking about strong and weak materials whilst exploring what our school is made up of, comparing the pigs homes to homes around the world, and creating 3D maps as well as our local area.  

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Expressive Art and Design

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Expressive Art and Design is the final strand of learning that filters into all aspects of life in Reception. During their time in Reception, children will be working towards developing an age-appropriate level of:

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• Exploring and refining artistic effects to express ideas and feelings.

• Showing colour mixing skills to match the colours needed.

• Sharing ideas, resources, and skills to create collaboratively.

• Defining colours, shapes, textures and smells.

• Listening to, moving, and talking about music and dance performances.

• Singing and performing nursery rhymes, poems and stories.

• Developing storylines in pretend play.

• Using props and instruments to enhance storylines.

 

​During the first half of the spring term, we will also be using junk modelling to create a range of vehicles and locations, using music to imitate different vehicles, creating small worlds which are becoming more detailed, and changing the lyrics to row row row your boat to match different vehicles and locations. In the second half of the spring term, we will be exploring materials to make houses for the pigs such as spaghetti, marshmallows, lolly sticks and biscuits. We will also be making celebration decorations, performing traditional tales using props, puppets and dressing up clothes, and creating our own poems and songs linked to the tales.

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