Reception 2024 - 2025

September 2024

Dear Parents/Carers,

Welcome back to Holy Name, we hope you have had a lovely summer holiday and are looking forward to a successful new year.

I would like to take this opportunity to introduce myself, I am Mrs Nolan, Reception teacher and Foundation Stage leader, I work alongside Ms Cohen teaching reception. Together, we work closely with the Nursery team to ensure children have access to a wide range of activities to support them throughout their Foundation Stage journey. I look forward to working closely with you all to ensure your children have the best start to their time in Holy Name.

We are proud to share that in July 2024 we, as the EYFS team, were awarded the status of “Communication Friendly Setting” meaning all practitioners have been trained to support the development of children’s speech, language and communication, with both myself, and Miss Lohan in the Nursery, becoming lead practitioners in developing children’s communication skills.

As the Reception team, Ms Cohen and I are looking forward to an exciting and productive year! As the children arrive each morning, groups, identified by a colour name, will be used to guide children to their morning activities, for example; red group may be on name writing, blue group on number formation. These groups are not ability based and will ensure all children enjoy a range of experiences and receive high quality teaching alongside developing their independent skills. Following our short morning activity, we will come together to say our morning prayers, share a story, and begin our days learning.

In the Foundation Stage we use the Development Matters guidance, underpinned by 4 themes, Unique Child, Positive Relationships, Enabling Environments, Learning and Development, this guidance allows us to ensure our bespoke curriculum facilitates opportunities to optimise children’s learning and development and ensure we are matching our provision to children’s needs.

This year our main topics, through which we will support children’s development are:

We will use these topics as a basis through which we support your child through their learning journey ensuring opportunities for learning are ever present. 

We will be using Read Write Inc to support your child’s phonic development, which is key to their learning to read and write. Reception children will receive their reading pack, which will include, sound flash cards, tricky words and a reading books as appropriate, please take care of these resources as they will support your child’s reading throughout the Reception year. There will also be some information regarding supporting your child with reading.
We will have daily English and Maths lessons followed by an adult led focused activity to give children an opportunity to apply their newly learnt skills. Our continuous provision will offer your children opportunities to explore and develop through a combination of play and focused activities. Lessons for all children will begin at 9:05 am so it is important that your child is in school on time.

PE days are Tuesday and Friday; we will continue to work with City in the Community to provide specialist teaching to develop children’s fundamental skills. Children should arrive in PE kit on these days. PE kit consists of navy blue shorts, white t-shirt and black pumps, navy blue jogging bottoms are allowed where necessary. Please ensure your child has suitable footwear for outdoor PE on Tuesdays.

We will be sharing your child’s progress with you via Tapestry and you will have access to observations made of your child. You will receive you log in details via a direct email from Tapestry once you have returned the completed consent form.

Each Friday we will attend Good News assembly with the whole school. During this assembly, children have the opportunity to celebrate their achievements with 2 children from each year group receiving a certificate based on our school learning powers of Confidence, Happiness, Resilience, Independence, Safety and Tolerance. As you may notice, these initials spell out Christ, who is at the centre of all we do in school.

If children participate in any out of school clubs and receive certificates, badges or trophies, these can be brought into school on Friday to be presented during the assembly giving children the opportunity to share their achievements with the whole school!

Snack will be provided each day, milk and fruit is available for children who wish to have it. There is a charge for milk for children aged 5+ which can be paid for via ParentPay.

It may be necessary for children to have a change of clothes in school in case of accidents, these can be left in school in a bag until needed.

We will be happy to discuss any issues with you as needed, we do ask however that if you wish to speak to us after school that you wait until all the other children are handed over to their parents/carers to ensure their safety.

Alternatively, we can be contacted via email, admin@holyname.manchester.sch.uk. (Please do not email with urgent messages – call the school: 0161 226 6303)

We look forward to a very happy and successful year working together. 

 
Many thanks for your continued support,

Mrs Nolan & The Reception Team.

Useful Websites

• BBC Nursery Songs and Rhymes
• Phonics Play
• Numbots
• Colouring Pages
• Topmarks