EYFS

2022 - 2023

In EYFS we have been learning about repeating patterns.  We have got very good at this skill and here are a few of our examples we have done this week!

For International Women's Day, EYFS looked at amazing women from the past and present and what jobs they do.  We then drew pictures of amazing women in our lives!

In EYFS in R.E. we have been learning about Good Friday and how Jesus died on a cross.

In R.E. in EYFS we have been learning about why a palm cross is a special symbol for Christians.

In EYFS we are EXPLORERS! We made stick arrows to mark our trail as we explored around our school grounds. Here are just a few of the things we did... we went to the pond, discovered a trolls house, stomped over bridges, found worms and shooting acorns, smelt and felt herbs, heard lots of birds, saw mushrooms, discovered Ninja numbers and challenged ourselves to see how many children could fit on a tree stump and squeeze into a play house!!!! Phew we were tired after our adventure!!!!

EYFS have had great fun during our whole school STEM week.  Here are a few of the things we have been up to!

EYFS Number Day 2023

In Rainbow and Sunshine we have had lots of fun thinking about numbers all around us.  We have played games, sung songs and explored our environment to find out that numbers are EVERYWHERE!!

In R.E., EYFS have been learning about stories which are special to Christians during this term.  Today we read and acted out David and Goliath.  'David, David did you get a scare?' 'David, David, who is out there?'

EYFS had a great first official P.E. session. We were very independent at getting ourselves unchanged and dressed again afterwards. Please don't worry if our clothes are on slightly differently when we come home- it just means we did it ourselves! We used all of our skills that we have been showing in our child initiated 'choosing' time and showed how we could move - fast and slow and in different ways. We learnt all about the importance of space and how to keep ourselves and everyone else safe. We also learnt why it is important to be healthy and how it makes us feel.

'EYFS are fully in the Christmas spirit now after their lovely singing around the Christmas tree and the Christmas disco.  Here are a few of the tuff trays that the children have been choosing to play and learn with this week plus lots of other Christmas surprises!

EYFS children have been busy making Christmas lanterns ready to be hung in the churchyard for the Village Christmas Celebration on Saturday 10^th December.  Please go down and enjoy this lovely festive event.

Rainbow Class enjoyed being all spotty today for 'Children in Need'.  We learnt about Pudsey Bear and how some of our money raised can help children.

EYFS enjoyed having the police come in to visit them to learn about how people help us in our community.

Sunshine class have enjoyed wearing red today and showing racism the red card.

Rainbow Class enjoyed being bright and wearing RED today to show racism the red card.  We talked about how we would feel and what we could do to make our world a better place without racism.

'EYFS have made a great start to their first ever Term at Minster! They are settling in well and here is a snap shot showing some of the things we have been up to.'

'EYFS children worked together and painted or drew around their hand to create this hand print wreath as a mark of respect for Queen Elizabeth.'

2021 - 2022

EYFS had a fantastic trip to Margate beach. They learnt lots about beach safety and created fabulous beach art. All of the children set a fantastic example for our school on their first day trip out. Huge thank you to the RNLI, parent helpers and staff who made this trip possible.

Rainbow Class have had a lot of fun today for our Minster Musical Masterpiece  We have learnt songs, carried out body percussion, had an African drumming work shop and even made our own Djeme drum!

Term 4: Let's Explore!

We have had an eggcellent day travelling around the world to see what activities other countries do to celebrate Easter. 

The first part of our eggtravagant day began by discussing what we do in England. The children recalled their knowledge of the Easter story and also discussed the Easter bunny delivering eggs. They wanted to make the adults feel happy and loved by delivering gifts to their rooms. We hopped around the school as the Easter bunny and shared drawings and writing in little packages (we also slipped in a little chocolate surprise). Next, we cracked on to North Western Europe where we sat around a bonfire to scare away the winter and welcome the spring. We hopped over to Bermuda and made kites to represent Jesus rising. After lunch, the children had a smashing time in Scotland rolling hard boiled eggs down a grassy slope to see who could roll theirs the furthest. The children were able to link this to the boulder being rolled from Jesus' tomb to find that he had come back to life! We shellebrated Poland by painting some eggsquisite eggs. We carefully used cotton buds to paint on our designs and proudly showed them off to our friends. Finally, we eggsperienced some German tradition by decorating eggs and making an Easter Tree. We had such an eggciting day. 

As part of our RE learning, we worked together to make an Easter Garden. We worked with each other to wind string around sticks to make a cross, digging the soil in the planter, planting bulbs and building a tomb using rocks. We are so proud of our hard work and cannot wait to see what happens with the bulbs that we planted. 

In Futures Week, we were coders, archaeologists, sportspeople, artists and writers. We explored a variety of famous people to help us understand the world of work. We discussed gender in relation to different jobs and had fun sharing with our friends what we want to be when we grow up.

Pancake day fun! We practised flipping pancakes for Shrove Tuesday. We discussed the importance of Shrove Tuesday for Christians.

We dressed up as our favourite characters for World Book Day!

As the hook for our topic, we drew maps of our local area. We then decided to follow the maps to the play area! We had fun using the equipment, turn taking and following instructions!

Term 3: Topic- Big Wide World

We independently got ourselves changed ready for our first PE lesson in the hall. We played stuck in the mud, tag and explored different ways of moving around the space.

The children designed and made their own vehicles when looking at trains, planes and automobiles.

As part of our topic, we looked at how to look after our world. The children decided that helping with tasks such as clearing litter would benefit the animals and plants. 

Term 2: Topic- Starry Night

Planetarium Visit

We had an exciting visit from Mr Star-man who took us on a fantastic adventure to space! We learnt about some of the different constellations and listened to the noises made by some nocturnal animals. We were really good at guessing what animal we could hear! We learnt about what astronauts wear in space and found out that the moon is really hot to stand on so they need special overshoes to stop their boots melting.  

During afternoon Choosing Time, we had a go at making our own constellations. We worked on our fine motor skills by drawing our picture and then carefully poked holes in the paper to show the stars. We then revealed our constellation using a light box. 

Fire Fighter Visit

What an incredible morning! We had a visit from a team of Margate Fire Fighters who came to show us what equipment they have in their fire engine. They told us what each bit of equipment is used for and gave us a demonstration of how it works. We were allowed to go into the back seat of the fire engine and see what is in there. Then, we got to use the hose to squirt a ball off of a cone. We all have great aim as we managed to do it, the grown ups too. It was so much FUN! We were allowed to squirt water at Fire Fighter Joe (who was wearing his water kit). This afternoon we role played as fire fighters and had a go at draw and writing about our experience.  

Bonfire Night

We went on a walk around school to collect lots of sticks. When we returned to our garden, we transformed our sticks into sparklers. We did this by cutting some paper and twisting it around the top of the sticks and taping it into place. This helped us to develop our fine motor skills. 

We then used our sparklers to show how we can be safe later on when we use real ones at home. 

We have started having a go at writing the letters we are learning in our Phonics lessons. 

This week we have learnt 's', 'a' and 't'.

Term 1: Topic- Me and My Community

We learnt about people who help us during our Topic lessons. 

In our Child Initiated time, we helped our friends feel better. 

The children dressed up as people who help us. They chose to role play as Fire Fighters and Police. 

The children in Sunshine Class have had a wonderful time sharing books together this afternoon.

Rainbow and Sunshine have completed their transition into full time schooling! We are so proud at how well they have settled into school life and already feel like a part of Team Minster! We have also been really impressed with how welcoming and friendly the rest of the school have been when they see the Early Years children around the school. Thank you all!

2020 - 2021

Term 5- Will you read me a story? 

World Bee Day 2021

The EYFS children went to explore our wild garden areas to see how many flowers had grown. They looked carefully to see if they could see any bees (it was a cold and windy day) and they found 1 bumblebee on a flower. They learnt about the importance of bees because they help the flowers to produce our food! 

"Run, run, as fast as you can" Watch out, EYFS are going to eat the Gingerbread man!

"Fee-fi-fo-fum" EYFS have been climbing and crawling to try and escape the giant! 

"Someone's been eating my porridge" and we know who it was! It was our EYFS children who made and tasted porridge as part of our Topic learning. 

We have been learning about repeating patterns in our Maths lessons. 

EYFS children have been planting seeds to grow in our classroom before they are planted outside.

We have been learning about the importance of bees and other pollinators as part of our topic for this term. 

The children then wrote some labels for our tray so we remembered what the plants need to grow. 

Being brave and sliding down the pirate ship pole! 

WORLD BOOK DAY 2021

We spent the day dressed as a character of our choosing! 

We had a go at writing a sentence to say who we were! 

Bojingles the Elf is missing!

Sunshine Class arrived at school this morning to find a note suggesting that our elf had been elf-napped! 

Throughout the day, the children were given challenges to help him find his way home to us!  

The children have put a lot of effort into their writing today and have shown excellent resilience and engagement. Meaning there have been lots of house points earnt. 

Let's hope Bojingles returns to us tomorrow! 

This week in Sunshine Class and Rainbow Class, we have been busy exploring pumpkins. Thank you to Sainsbury's in Herne Bay for donating us 4 large pumpkins. We are also thankful for our donation of gourds from a friend of Mrs Ward. 

We have used our hands to pull out seeds, break them up, sort them into similar shapes, hammer in sticks, draw, roll, stamp and finally predict what would happen when a pumpkin is dropped! We dropped the pumpkin from 4 different heights to see what happened. As it didn't quite smash, the children wanted to see the pumpkin dropped off of the grand stand. It was a smashing day! 

"We're going on a Bear Hunt" by Michael Rosen

We read Michael Rosen's 'We're going on a bear hunt' during snack time. Then in the afternoon, we went on our very own bear hunt! We splashed through the shark water, swished through the long grass, squelched through the sticky mud, tripped through the tall forest and tip toed through the cave. Then, we saw a big bear! We ran away, going through all of our movements and finally got back to the class (we had to run back and shut the gate). We whizzed into the classroom and hid on our bugs on the rug.

Aspiration

We have been learning what aspiration means and the children have drawn pictures of who they aspire to be.

Starting School

All of the children have settled well into school life and are working well as a team.  They are showing kindness and consideration to each other and are the tidiest Early Years group we have had for a long time!! 
Our topic this term is 'Do you want to be friends?' and the children have been fantastic learning how to be a good friend and how to support each other.

Children have also started to learn our school values:
Independence
Engagement
Love
Christianity
Aspiration