Penguin Post
Click on the link below to see what we have been up to in Reception.
Issue 1 September 2022
Archived Issues (September 2021 - July 2022)
Issue 1
11th October - 22nd October
Over the past few weeks, the Penguins have been celebrating all things harvest. They took part in their first whole school assembly, wearing the leaf crowns they had made and singing ‘Big Red Combine Harvester’ with KS1 in the hall. The children enjoyed preparing apple crumbles and learned some new cookery skills by peeling, chopping and rubbing topping ingredients together. The crumble went down a storm and it was lovely to welcome so many family and friends to sample the children’s cooking! Alongside harvest, we have been reading several of the Percy Park Keeper stories by Nick Butterworth and Percy came to share some of our hot chocolate at forest school this week. Linked to this, the Penguins have designed animal homes, made story maps, been on Autumn treasure hunts and made lists of jobs for Percy. This week we planted some herbs in our outdoor area and created pumpkin bird feeders. We’re looking forward to further developing our planting and wildlife areas with the children throughout the year.
Issue 2
1st - 12th November
We have had a busy fortnight in Reception. We started our new topic of ‘Celebrations’ by learning about Diwali. We listened to the story of Rama and Sita and made diya lamps to help guide the characters safely home. The children enjoyed linking Diwali with lots of different areas: making colourful rangoli rice patterns and firework pictures, acting out the story of Rama and Sita and learning about India. During our Indian food tasting, the penguins smelt and tasted samosas, bhajis, poppadoms and chutney. Last week the children took part in Lakeside’s outdoor learning day, making ant trails on the field, hunting for minibeasts in the orchard, as well as collecting and sticking natural materials to make a nature strip in the forest school. This week, we read the story ‘Where the Poppies Now Grow’ to learn about Armistice Day. The children made poppies and we marked the two minute silence. When exploring the colours and shape of the poppy, the children were eager to do some gardening, so we worked collaboratively to plant some Spring bulbs outside.
