phonics – for children entering their reception year in ......phonics – for children entering...

Nursery Home Learning Summer 1

Hello! We hope this home-learning pack finds you well, that you’re enjoying yourselves, playing games and

looking after each other as best you can.

Don’t forget, the learning pack we gave you in March is a useful guide to the skills we want from our

nursery children.

In this issue we have five weeks’ worth of activities for:

Page

Phonics (for children entering their reception year in September)

1

Phonics (for children returning to nursery in September)

8

Physical development (writing) 11

Mathematics 17

Understanding the world 20

Remember – don’t take on too much. Having fun, talking, reading stories and getting as much physical play

and exercise are just as important as anything else.

Phonics – for children entering their reception year in September. Over these five weeks we are learning oral blending and segmenting – learning that words are made up of

phonemes, being able to hear these phonemes and discriminate between them.

Phoneme - the smallest unit of sound that we make when we are speaking. For example

the word ‘cat’ has three phonemes /c/ /a/ and /t/. The word chain also has three: /ch/ /ai/

and /n/. When you are saying a phoneme, keep it as short as possible. It’s important for

children to see your mouth as you say each phoneme

Grapheme – the letter or group of letters used to represent a phoneme. In the following

activities everything is done orally, through speaking and listening, the children are not

yet expected to write these words.

Do what you can, keep the activities to a maximum of 5-6 minutes. If you are worried that

you don’t understand, or your child isn’t getting it do not worry, they are learning and you

are helping them hugely!


Week 1:

Our phoneme of the week is /s/. It is written like this: S and (writing in this script, with the

strokes in and out of the letter helps the children develop cursive writing).

Phoneme box: This week collect items that begin with /s/. Anything you like, you could keep them

together in a box or a bucket – this will be your phoneme box!

Examples include

- Snake

- Socks

- Spoon

- NOT – Shoes, this begins with the phoneme /sh/

- Your child can look for other things that begin with /s/ to add to the box

Game 1 – Toy Talk I like using a robot for this one, but a teddy will do just fine! Do not use a puppet, it is important that the

children see your mouth making the phonemes.

Teddy is saying

something. He’s

saying he wants some

ch – ee - se

Can you touch

your

f – ee- t ?


Week 2:

This week we are learning a new phoneme: /a/. It looks like this:

It is written like this: A and

Phoneme box: This week collect items that begin with /a/. Just like last

week!

Examples include:

- Apple

- Ambulance

- Avocado

- Ant

- What others can you think of?

- You could put them in the box or draw them!

Game 2 - Clapping Sounds This game involves the phonemes ‘s, a, t, p, i, n’ – you will notice that the phoneme boxes for each week

are also following this order. Make three letter words from the above phonemes and clap for each

phoneme. Blend each word after you have said it, like so:

s – a – t … sat, p – i – n … pin, n – i – p … nip,

p – a –t … pat, t – a – p … tap, p – i – t … pit,

p – i – p … pip

NB. Always recap

what was learnt the

previous week. We

learned the

phoneme /s/. Show

your child this

written down and

ask them what it

says.

Once your child starts to get the hang of it, let them

blend the word together (say it) for you.


Week 3:

This week we are learning a new phoneme: /t/. It looks like this: t

It is written like this: T and

Phoneme box: This week collect items that begin with /t/. Just like last week

Examples include:

- Tomato

- Toothbrush

- Teddy

- Some things around the house that begin with T:

- Toilet

- Tap

Game 3 – Which one? Lay out some objects that have three phonemes (or as few as possible), like leaf, sheep, soap, bus, fish and

sock. Make sure your child recognises what they are and can say their names.

Listen very carefully. Teddy is going to say the phonemes for one of these things. Can you find the s – o –ck. That’s right, s – o – ck, sock! Say it back

to me, s – o –ck, sock! Well done!

Now find the b – u –s. Well done, that’s

right, b – u – s, bus. Say it back to me!


Week 4:

This week we are learning a new phoneme: /p/. It looks like this: p

It is written like this: P and

Phoneme box: This week collect items that begin with /p/.

Examples include:

- Pen

- Puppy

- Pig

- Potato

- What else can you find to add to the box?

Game 4 – Cross the river. Choose a selection of objects with three phonemes as in game 3. They don’t have to be the same objects,

and you can have more than one of each if you want. Draw a river outside with chalk, or use ropes or a

sheet, however you are able to represent a river. Make sure the children can name and recognise all of the

objects. When the child recognises the word that you have said, they move it across the river!

Teddy says the h –a - t can cross the river.

NB. Go through each of the items, remembering to get the

children to segment and blend them (“h-a-t, hat!”)


Week 5:

This week we are learning a new phoneme: /i/. It looks like this: i

It is written like this: and

Phoneme box: This week collect items that begin with /i/.

This is a tricky one! You may have to draw some of them.

Examples include:

- Igloo

- Insect

- Iguana

- What else can you find to add to the box?

Game 5 – I Spy. Start with a group of objects that have three phonemes as in game 4 and 5. Here I have chosen zip, hat,

comb, cup, boat and ball.

I spy a c – u - p

You can make this harder by including objects with the same

initial phoneme – like and pig, pen – to tell the difference, the

children really have to listen to all of the phonemes.


Cut out flashcards for phonics. These match the phonemes we are learning week by week. Each week add the new one, but don’t forget

to recap all of those learned before.


Phonics – for children returning to nursery in September.

Children should be singing songs and learning rhymes every day. Adding stomping, knee-patting and

clapping to these helps add a multi-sensory element.

Environmental sounds: Can you tell the difference between different sounds in the environment? Can you tell the difference

between different animal sounds?

Instrumental sounds. This will depend on whether you have access to percussion instruments:

Which instrument? There are lots of activities that lend themselves to sound discrimination. For instance if you happen to have

two sets of identical instruments you could lay one set out so the child can see them and hide another

behind a veil. Play one of the hidden instruments. Can your child tell you which one it is? Or if you don’t

Remember

to name the

instruments.


have two sets organise them so that the child can’t see them, play one and ask if your child can tell you

which one you were playing.

Adjust the volume. With an instrument each, such as a drum, alternate between playing loud sounds and soft sounds. Can

your child copy you? When this is going well you could introduce pictures to represent loud and soft, for

instance a megaphone for loud and a mouse for quiet.

Copy a rhythm. Tap a short rhythm, can your child copy it?

Voice Sounds


Rhyme

Physical development. In this section we are going to be addressing pencil grip and fine-motor control. However do not forget the

following:


Pencil Grip By the summer holidays we expect our children to,

Have chosen a dominant hand (this cannot be forced or ‘taught’, it is achieved by giving the children lots of fine-motor opportunities, such as cutting, drawing, chalking, painting, tweezers etc.)

Have an effective pencil grip (holding the pencil between thumb and two fingers). Write the letters of their names.

If you are ready for a 5-6 minute writing activity then let’s start!

1. Make sure you are sitting down comfortably on the chair. 2. Warm up – with just your fingers, touch one finger on the table at a time, swirl your fingers in the

air (there are lots of warm–up ideas on the website listed below). 3. Pick up the pencil between thumb and two forefingers (see below). 4. Draw some spirals (worksheets are on the following pages). Can you copy one of the letters of your

name? Can you copy all of the letters of your name?

To take a step back: learning to write takes time, and there are many skills that go into it. Other activities that will help fine-motor skills, strength and hand-eye coordination are – ripping newspaper with both hands and scrunching it up (with one hand), using chalks outside, painting, squeezing a ball, using child tweezers. If you have access to a tablet or computer: more ideas for warm ups and shape/letter formation can be found on the Letter-Join website, the log-in details are as follows:

https://www.letterjoin.co.uk/

Desktop: Username: vt0726 Password: home

Tablet: Username: vt0726 Password: Swipe an 'L' shape from top left all the way to bottom right.


NB, although the focus here is on a pencil, you can also let the children use chalks (outside or

on a chalk-board), or paint to add extra interest. I like to use adult pens and writing materials

such as old diaries and notebooks. This really interests the children!


Mathematics Numbers Reciting numbers to 10 and beyond is important, but our children sometimes struggle to count objects

reliably and manipulate number in a real-world setting:

Counting accurately from a large group. Make a pile of objects and ask your child how many objects are in it.

Tip, move each one as it is counted: children will often count to quickly and double count some objects.

Choosing a specified number. Ask your child to give you a certain amount from a group of objects, for example “please give me seven.”

Tip, move each one as it is counted. Children will often count the entire set. Remind them that you just

want seven.

Sharing. Get two or three toys such as teddies. Put an assortment of objects in the middle (to begin with it helps if

the number of objects can be equally shared by the toys). Ask your child to count how many objects there

are (here it’s buttons). Can they share them out between the teddies so that they are all happy?

Tip: place one button at a time, going round in a circle. Make sure you emphasise the language all

together, sharing, the same. Make sure they understand that although the buttons are shared out, the

amount of buttons remains the same.


Number recognition Make sure your children can recognise the numbers 0 – 10. It’s great to go beyond this, but make sure that 0 – 10

are securely recognised. Please cut the following numbers out. Once your child recognises these you can mix them

up, to check your child isn’t just reciting the numbers to 10.


Shape, space and measures

Water play - capacity. As the weather is nice water play can help build up our vocabulary and mathematical understanding. This

can be done outside with a tub of water and some containers, or it can be done at bath time.

Some questions to ask your children: can you fill the container? Is it full? Can you fill it half way up? How

many cups will it take to fill it?

Shapes in the environment

There are shapes all around us, we would like your children to be able to describe their features. We are

looking for vocabulary like round, curve, straight, wavy, edge .

Naming shapes Learn the names of the following shapes.


Understanding the world.

The final page of this booklet is left for your child to draw some of the things that they can see outside. The

season is Spring, but summer will be here soon. Maybe they would like to draw the trees or flowers that

they can see. Or maybe a minibeast (insect, spider, snail) or two!

Remember to write your name.

phonics – for children entering their reception year in ......phonics – for children entering...

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