The parent newsletter is sent out, via email, on Mondays. Please read this every week for the most recent updates on events.

Phonics screening check- Week commencing Monday 8th June 2026

Summer 1:

Term starts on (for pupils): Monday 13th April 2026 (children start at 11.00am)

May Bank Holiday: Monday 4th May 2026

Term ends on (for pupils): Friday 22nd May 2026

May Half Term Holiday:

Monday 25^th May to Friday 29th May 2026

Summer 2:
Term starts on (for pupils):Monday 1st June 2026

Year 1 trip to Didcot Railway Centre: Wednesday 17th June 2026

Term ends on (for pupils):Wednesday 22nd July 2026 (12.30pm)

In PE this term, the children will take part in a range of exciting activities designed to build teamwork, coordination, and confidence. They will begin with team-building games that encourage cooperation, turn-taking, and an understanding of fairness, helping them learn how to work positively with others.

As the term progresses, the focus will shift to developing skills using rackets, bats, and balls. The children will practise key techniques such as hitting (striking a ball with a bat or racket), pushing (gently sending a ball to a teammate or target), and aiming (directing the ball into a specific space). Through these activities, they will also learn how to move effectively into space and apply simple tactics in games.

Alongside this, the children will begin preparing for Sports Day in the Summer term. They will practise a variety of races and activities, building their confidence, resilience, and team spirit as they get ready to take part in this exciting whole-school event.

All Children in Year 1 will be taking part in the Phonics Screening Check in the week commencing 8th June. Phonics Screening Check is a short, statutory assessment for Year 1 pupils in England, designed to confirm they have learned phonic decoding to an age-appropriate standard. It identifies children needing extra reading support early, ensuring they don't fall behind in fundamental decoding, blending, and reading skills

To support your child at home please can you-

- Watch the videos sent home weekly by their phonics' teacher each week via teams. Watch these daily.

- Read with your child everyday for 20 minutes. To support your child when reading at home - create a comfortable environment, ask questions about characters and plots to boost comprehension, use varied voices, and model reading behaviour by letting children see you read.

- Practice speed reading the green words sheet sent home (this is a sheet with a variety of words on). This could be made into a game ' how many words can you read in 1 minute'

- Regularly use the speed sounds chart at the front of the phonics book to rehearse the sounds. See image attached.

- Practice reading 'alien words' with your child at home. These are made up words that support you child in learning to blend sounds.

• PSHE: At the start of this term, the children will be looking at Relationships. We will be talking about families, friendships, people who help us and the relationship we have with ourselves. The children will identify how they can be a better friend to each-other and the qualities of a good friend. Who in our community can help and the importance of this. They will also identify their own strengths and qualities.

  We will then move onto the topic of 'Changing me'. The children will look at different life cycles, physical changes since being a baby, feelings about changes and finally we will discuss transition into Year 2 and feelings around that.

  
  

  RE: This term the children will be learning about Sikhism, focusing on the key question: Who is God to Sikhs?

  They will explore the story of Guru Nanak, the founder of Sikhism, and learn about the importance of the Guru Granth Sahib, the Sikh holy book. The children will also begin to understand how Sikhs show their beliefs through their daily lives, worship, and celebrations.

  
  

  In the second half of the term the children will learn and answer the question: Why do Sikhs admire their gurus?

  Throughout the term the children will learn about Sikh place of worship ' Gurudwara' and Sikhs behave in there.

  
  

  To support your child at home please can you ...

  • Talk about your family and create a family tree.

  • What to do if you upset your friend or your friend upsets you?

  • Encourage your child to approach some friends - perhaps by joining a club or playing with different children at playtime.

  • Please discuss that different people have different beliefs and this is something to be celebrated. Spend time talking about different cultures and religions and how they may relate to your own.

    
    

In History, the children will step back in time to discover the remarkable achievements of Isambard Kingdom Brunel and the exciting development of the railways.

Throughout the first half of the Summer term, they will explore how Brunel transformed the way people lived and travelled during the Victorian era. They’ll learn how his bold ideas and engineering brilliance made journeys faster, easier, and more connected—changes that still shape our lives today.

The children will investigate some of Brunel’s most famous projects, including Paddington Station and the Great Western Railway, helping them make links to their own local area. As their learning continues, they will also discover Brunel’s work on impressive bridges and powerful ships, broadening their understanding of his impact.

To bring their learning together, the children will answer the big question: “Why is Brunel important?” They will use everything they have learned to explain how his inventions changed the way people live, building their confidence as young historians while sharing their ideas clearly and thoughtfully.

To support your child at home please can you...

• Take a trip into London to visit Paddington Station, one of Brunel’s most famous achievements. Look out for the statue of Brunel and talk about how old the station is and how it’s still used today.

• Visit Slough Station and spot the signs of Brunel’s railway line. You could even take a short train journey and talk about how different this would have felt in Victorian times.

• Explore books or watch child-friendly videos about Isambard Kingdom Brunel. Talk about his famous hat and why he is remembered as a great engineer.

• Research Brunel: Who was he? When did he live? What made him such a famous engineer? Why do we still learn about him today?

Throughout the first half of this term we will be reading the Tales of Peter Rabbit by Beatrix Potter. We will be linking it our science learning of plants and the children will be exploring our school grounds for different plants and animals.

Alongside this, we will be reading a range of non fiction texts linked to the Tales of Peter Rabbit. This will give the children the background knowledge needed to understand the text.

Later in the term, the children will read a fairytale by Radiya Hafiza 'Rumaysa'. It is an empowering children's book that reimagines classic tales like Rapunzel, Cinderella, and Sleeping Beauty with a South Asian twist. The children will celebrate kindness, friendships, courage and South Asian culture.

To support your child at home please can you ...

- You could watch the films and programs surrounding Beatrix Potter's tale. However, explain to them this is a modern version and has been inspired by a very old book written by Beatrix Potter.

- Visit a local farm or Pets at Home to visit real life animals from the stories. Talk about what they are like in real life.

- Start a vegetable patch at home, linking this to their enquiry learning last term. 

- Research Beatrix Potter, who is she? When was she alive? Why did she write books about animals? What is special about her books, that means we still read them today?

This term, we will be learning about money and fractions. The children will explore and begin to recognise different coins and notes and the value of them. In Year 1, the classes will come alive with a new role play shop where children will use money to buy items - combining their learning with real life experiences.

In addition to money, the children in year 1 will use shapes and quantities to explore the relationships between wholes and parts - specifically that half is 2 equal parts and a quarter is 4 equal parts.

Later in the term, the children will be introduces to multiplication and division concepts using concrete objects whilst also recapping addition, subtraction, money and number bonds to 20. This half term will allow the children to combine all the mathematical knowledge they have acquired this year and apply it to reasoning questions.

To support you child at home please can you..

- Practise number skills on Numbots

- Play addition and subtraction games, such as..

https://www.topmarks.co.uk/addition/robot-addition

-  Go on Hit the button. Focusing on: number bonds to 10 and 20 , doubles to 10 and addition and subtraction within 10. https://www.topmarks.co.uk/maths-games/hit-the-button

- Practice writing out numbers from 1- 100. Creating their own number line or number cards. If you would like to challenge your child, miss a few numbers out and ask them to fill them in.

Throughout the Summer term, we will be learning about plants. In class, the children will identify and name a variety of common wild and garden plants (daisy, daffodils and buttercups). They will explore and observe the plants growing in the local area, looking at how they change over time. Children will identify and describe the parts of a plant including leaves, flowers/blossom, petals, fruit, roots, bulb seed, trunk, branches, stem. We will plant and grow seeds observing how they change as they grow. In Year 1, we will also identify trees on the school grounds as well as learn about evergreen and deciduous trees. For their final task, the children will create a fact file of a plant on the school grounds.

In Science, alongside their learning about plants, the children will become keen observers of the changing seasons. They will explore how the world around them transforms over time, noticing differences in weather, daylight, and the environment. Through discussion and hands-on observation, they will begin to identify and describe these seasonal changes and how they affect plants and living things.

Using what they have discovered, the children will then create their own non-fiction reports, sharing facts about the seasons and the changes they bring. This will give them the opportunity to develop their scientific understanding while practising clear and informative writing.

To support your child at home please can you...

• Look at the plants and wildlife on the way to school or in everyday life. Describe what they look like, try to encourage your child to use the correct vocabulary to describe them- for example 'I like the pink petals on this flower'

• Plant seeds at home, discuss what a plant needs to grow. Cress is a brilliant to grow at home and can even be eaten.

• Draw a picture of a deciduous tree and how it changes over the seasons, compare this to an evergreen tree.

• Observe changes in the seasons and recognise signs of different seasons as they change.

The children will be learning how to say body parts, sizes and some colours in Spanish.

determiners: singular masculine / femenine el/la (the) un/una  (a, an)

verb : to have in 2 forms (tú tienes, yo tengo)

Key question: ¿Qué es ésto?   

Phonics:  j, ll, v, b (cross-curricular literacy)

To support your children at home please could you:

Learn the body song:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E7c29tRW4lQ&list=RDE7c29tRW4lQ&start_radio=1

In the second half of the Autumn term, the classroom will come alive with the magic of poetry! The children will dive into the delightful poem “When the wind blows” using it as a springboard to explore the wonders of their senses. They’ll listen for hidden sounds, notice vibrant sights, and imagine sweet and earthy smells, bringing their ideas vividly to life.

As their confidence grows, the children will experiment with playful rhymes and create their very own poems, full of imagination and expression. The journey will end in a special performance, where they will proudly share their work with other Year 1 classes—transforming words into an exciting and memorable experience for both performers and audience alike.

To support your child at home please can you ...

- Help your child learn the story and the poem off by heart, we will share the story via Teams.

- Write out small parts of the story, checking their punctuation focusing on capital letters, finger spaces and full stops.

-Ensure your child forms their letters correctly and holds their pencil with the 'perfect pencil grip'.

Music: We will enjoy learning lots of playground songs and games this term which will include recapping the notes and rhythms we have learnt. We will be practicing songs in our wonderful outdoor space. We will also learn songs in different languages from different countries including kis nay banayaa from India/Pakistan and Tanczymy labada from Poland. 

To support your child at home please can you...

Share songs and games at home, hopefully the children will be able to start sharing some of the songs they learn at school, you can teach them any playground songs and games you know. If you have some to share including songs in different languages please get in touch with Mrs Goodman we would love to learn more. 

Art: Colour splash - In art this term the children will be exploring colour mixing through paint play, using a range of tools to paint on different surfaces and creating paintings inspired by Clarice Cliff and Jasper Johns.

The children will learn to develop some control when using a wide range of tools to draw, paint and create crafts and sculptures. The children will learn how primary colours can be mixed to create secondary colours.

DT: Make a fruit smoothie - In DT this term the children will be cutting and juicing fruits and vegetables to create a smoothie that meets a design brief, the children will have opportunities to develop food preparation skills with an increased focus on taste testing and ingredient choices.

To support your child at home please can you...

• Discuss primary and secondary colours and create a painting using primary colours to create secondary colours.

• Recognise what is a fruit and what is a vegetable.

• Support your child to prepare fruit to make a fruit smoothie by using a blender.