Dear Parents

Can’t believe it that this is week 7 and few days will start the midterm break, “Eid Mubarak “in advance.

This week we well Rap up our 6 weeks unit “all about me” with revise the following:

 Literacy:

·         Sounds  of the letters ( s,a,t,i,p) I would like to pay your attention that the children are introduce to the sound of the letter and the name of the letter with the action of the letter

·         S  Weave hand in an s shape, like a snake, and say ssssss.

·         a    Wiggle fingers above elbow as if ants crawling on you and say a, a, a.

·         t    Turn head from side to side as if watching tennis and say t, t, t.

·         i   Pretend to be a mouse by wriggling fingers at end of noise and squeak i, i, i.

·         p   Pretend to puff out candles and say p, p, p.

If you’re asking yourself why we are not doing it in alphabetical order the answer is?

The sounds are taught in a specific order (not alphabetically). This enables children to begin building words as early as possible.

Numeracy:

We will count from 0-5 the following skills will be revised

·         Able to sort and classify objects by shape or colour
·         Able to count the number of a few objects accurately
·         Able to count to 10
·         Able to recognise numbers

I would suggest the following activities that will be interesting to do with your child.

 These Activities promote early literacy and numeracy concepts here are some fun, everyday activities you can do with your child to help develop their literacy and numeracy skills:

• Play word games when out together, such as playing ‘I spy’ in the car. For young children, you can use colours such as ‘I spy something that is red’

• Paint and draw — art allows children to express themselves. As your child learns more words you may notice their paintings or drawings become more detailed

• sing songs or nursery rhymes while taking a walk, packing away toys or in the car

• dress up — children can practise their language and communication skills by playing ‘make believe’

• Play outdoors — pouring water or sand into containers, scales and measuring containers allows your child to explore numeracy concepts

• do a puzzle — puzzles are a great way for children to learn about sizes, shapes and colours

• play with blocks — concepts of size, numbers, patterns and problem-solving can be explored by playing with blocks. You can help extend your child’s mathematical and spatial concepts by giving them paper, pencil and a ruler for drawing their block buildings

• ask your child open-ended questions — this encourages them to practice expressing themselves and lets them know you value their thoughts

• think out loud — so your child can learn about how you solve problems

Understanding the world:

Last 6 weeks we learned a lot about “all about me” as we had been answering the following inquiries through different activities

Central idea: Every day I can learn more about who I am and what I can do.

An inquiry into:

·         my physical characteristics

·         what I can do

·         my feelings, likes and dislikes

·         myself as part of my family

·         How I am growing and changing.

How best will we learn?

Teacher- and/or student-designed activities which will address the key questions.

1. Structuring the Early years environment

The teacher supports inquiry and exploration by:

·         providing space and a changing array of props and mirrors to enable

        children to see themselves and watch others as they transform themselves

·         providing plenty opportunities for physical play

·         taking photographs of children engaged in many activities and displaying them in the classroom.

·         using photos, name tags and other symbols to identify children’s personal spaces and belongings in the classroom

·         providing an collection of art materials so that the child can create self in many mediums

·         organizing materials in the classroom so as to promote independence,

            self-direction and initiative.

2. Leading/facilitating activities last six weeks

The teacher supports inquiry and exploration by:

·         requesting children bring in photos to enable them to share their family and cultural backgrounds and personal histories

·         asking children to identify themselves in photos

·         involving children in making self-portraits and describing self using photos and mirrors throughout the year

·         encouraging children to create self using many different mediums, including life size, two-dimensional representation

·         making a chart of everything we have two of

·         making puppets of self to exchange identities with other children

·         Providing opportunities for children to test, record and reflect on their abilities, interests, wishes, likes and dislikes, and achievements over the unit.

·         providing opportunities for children to identify their names, and to identify symbols, as an extension of self, in meaningful contexts

·         encouraging children to select roles for themselves in socio-dramatic play or block play

·         Reading books about feelings including those of rejection and greed.

Book week

Dear Parents:

Book Week will be held from Monday 22^nd September, Early years Unit (Nursery-preschool) this year we are having a particular emphasis on inspiring our children to read  and enjoy Books, Each year group will be focusing on a  different book , and there are lots of exciting literacy based activities planned.

Age 2-3 will be introduced to The Very Hungry Caterpillar is a children's picture book designed, illustrated and written by Eric Carle.

Age 3-4 will be listening to the ginger bread man story The Gingerbread Man is a children's tale that has been told for many years. The moral of the story is that, in the end, you may think you know best but should always be on your guard.

The following schedule is for both age groups need your support to make the best of it:

Day & Date	Main Event	Parents role
Monday 22nd  September	Buying books from book exhibitions book fair	Please send  around 25-50 SDG with your child in an envelope , they will be buying one book with the teachers. Between 10:30-1:00 in very small groups.
Tuesday 23rd September	Backing	-
Wednesday 24th Sept	Story reader from a Volunteer Mother .	-
Thursday 25th	Year 5- year 6 will come and read for us.	-
Saturday 27th	Character day , we will visit and watch primary Assembly.	Please Don’t forget to send your child in his favorite book character

 We look forward to a busy and enjoyable week.

Early years Unit

(Formerly Nursery-preschool)

week 4
This week we will continue our “All About Me” theme by learning about our feelings.  It will be a week full of facial expressions, stomping, leaping, and pretending to cry.  Despite all of the pretend tears we will have so much fun and share a lot about ourselves and how things make us feel.  

We will start by learning and describing some new feeling words to use throughout the week.  We will focus on happy, excited, and scared (frightened), shy, tired, and angry (frustrated).  We will practice making faces for each feeling!  We will read stories about how we feel. We will talk about what helps us calm down when we are angry. 

We will continue the fun by adding some interpretive dance to our song of the week, “If You’re Happy and You Know It.”  We will dance around the classroom illustrating all the different emotions in our song - and laughing a lot too!  We started last Thursday with little take home packs including the theme activities that we have focused on so far. 

Letters:

Each sound has an action which helps children remember the letter that represents it. As your child progresses you can point to the letters and see how quickly s/he can do the action and say the sound.  Children should learn each letter by its sound rather than by its name, as this will help in blending. The names of each letter can follow later.

Week 2 letter s

Week 3 letter a

Week 4 letter t

Week 5 we will introduce letter i

Numeracy:

Think about all the ways that numbers and counting are part of your child’s life! From soapy toes in the bathtub to “get ready- set- go!” in the Yard,

Week 1 we had number 0 for preschool

Week 2 we had number 1

Week 3 we had number 2 

Week 4 we had number 3

 Week 5 We are going to introduce number 4