Happy Christmas!

 

 

Hello everyone, 

We hope you all enjoyed our Nativity performance this morning, we are SO, SO proud of the children and how hard they have worked to put it all together. 

We also wanted to take this opportunity to say thank you to all of you for your support this term and for the lovely Christmas cards and gifts we have received. You have been very kind and we are very appreciative.  

After Christmas we will start our new project "Lost and Found". There is a project letter which will give you a little more information and there is also a sheet for the children to complete, to give us their ideas for this project. These are in the children's Christmas folders, which have come home today. We would be very grateful if you would complete this with your child as we use the children's ideas to inform our future planning. The letters have also been added to the Early Years part of the website, under the "Our Projects" tab.

The children do not have their Reading folders - we do! Please don't worry, we want them to have a lovely break and enjoy the Christmas celebrations.

Finally, we would like to wish you all a wonderful Christmas and a Happy Healthy New Year! We look forward to seeing you all on Monday 5th January 2026, ready to start our next learning adventures!
With love
The Early Years Team xxx

15.12.25 - This coming week in Early Years

Hello everyone!

WOW!! We have had a busy, busy time in Early Years. We've also had Mrs Morgan in playing some of her instruments and playing some Christmas carols. The children looked fantastic in their Christmas Jumpers and we all enjoyed the Christmas lunch. Finally, we have had an amazing day today, with a very special visitor in school along with his reindeer, followed by our Christmas shopping afternoon! We definitely need the weekend to recover before our last week of the term!

On to our learning for next week, we will be:

• Watching the Key Stage 1 children perform their Christmas production on Monday.
• Finishing our Christmas cards and calendars ready to take them home to our families on Friday.
• Playing the different games on Phonics Play.
• Creating our own Fairy Light patterns and completing some Christmas counting activities in our Mathematics sessions.
• Performing our Nativity to the rest of the school on Thursday.
• Performing our Nativity to our families on Friday.

For the performance on Friday, please make your way round to the front of the school as we will be unable open all the gates. You will be able to enter the hall via the double doors in the car park. The PTA will be offering teas and coffees and there will also be a collection for the school charity at the end of the performance - so please bring along some pennies!

As Friday is the last day of term, it will also be a wellbeing day, so the children can come to school in comfy clothes - they will still be having PE and will also need to pop on their nativity costume, so please consider this when the children are picking their outfits!

Don't forget that school is also finishing at 2pm on Friday.

We are looking forward to sharing our Nativity with you all! Have a lovely weekend.

Miss Wakefield, Mrs Fincham and Miss Goddard

08.12.25 - This coming week in Early Years

Hello everyone!

The children have now picked their parts for our Nativity and we will be working hard on that next week. The costumes are all sorted and from next week some of the children will be bringing home some words to learn and we would be very grateful if you could support them with this.

Upcoming Events

• Tuesday 9th December - Early years will be going to St Michael's for a Christingle service
• Thursday 11th December - Christmas Jumper Day and Christmas lunch
• Friday 12th December - Father Christmas / PTA Christmas Shopping Day & Bazaar
• Friday 19th December - Early Years Nativity performance

Christmas Jumper Day - Thursday 11th December

On this day, the children can wear their fabulous festive jumpers and make a £1 donation which goes to our continued sponsorship of Khadiza. The charity Action Aid use this money to ensure that Khadiza and the other children in her community enjoy their right to an education, just like all of us at Down Hall! (Articles 28 & 29)

On to our learning for next week, we will be:

• Practising our Nativity, singing the songs and learning our words.
• Starting to make our own Christmas cards and calendars for our families.
• Visiting St Michael's church on Tuesday and taking part in a Christingle service.
• Working on our blending and segmenting of 3 phoneme words. 
• Thinking about our daily routines in our Mathematics sessions.
• Enjoying another Forest School session on Thursday. (The children can wear their jumpers with their Forest School trousers and bring their uniform to change into).
• Wearing our Christmas jumpers for Christmas Jumper day on Thursday and talking about Khadiza and enjoying Christmas Dinner together.

Wishing you a lovely weekend!

Miss Wakefield, Mrs Fincham and Miss Goddard

01.12.25 - This coming week in Early Years

Hello everyone!

Over the last 2 weeks, the children have been busy creating some lovely Christmas Tree Gonks for the school's tree at the Christmas Tree Festival at Holy Trinity Church. The tree will be on display over this weekend, so if you are in Rayleigh and have the time, please do pop in and visit. The church is full of trees from lots of local schools and organisations and looks wonderful. (It would be great if you could vote for our tree if you do manage to visit too!)

Upcoming Events

• Thursday 27th until Sunday 30th November - Christmas Tree festival at Holy Trinity
• Tuesday 2nd December - Whole school trip to the Panto
• Friday 5th December - Non-uniform day - children to bring in some chocolate for the PTA Christmas Bazaar
• Friday 5th December - PTA Movie Night (a letter came home on Tuesday about this)
• Tuesday 9th December - Early years will be going to St Michael's for a Christingle service
• Thursday 11th December - Christmas Jumper Day and Christmas lunch
• Friday 12th December - Father Christmas / PTA Christmas Shopping Day & Bazaar
• Friday 19th December - Early Years Nativity performance

 On to our learning for next week, we will be:

• Talking about the start of Advent and our Advent calendar.
• Talking about different Christmas customs from around the world with our interactive Advent calendar.
• Decorating our classroom and putting up our Christmas tree in our Home Corner.
• Working on the songs for our Nativity and picking our parts.
• Learning the first of our vowel digraphs in our Phonics sessions.
• Learning about 4 sided shapes in our Mathematic sessions.

Drop in this week will be on FRIDAY.

Have a lovely weekend

Miss Wakefield, Mrs Fincham and Miss Goddard

24.11.25 - This coming week in Early Years

Hello everyone!

It was lovely to see you all at the Parent/Teacher consultations this week and have the chance to chat about how the children are doing. We hope you enjoyed looking through your child's books and seeing all of their learning.

This week also has marked Day 50 - so we are halfway to our Day 100 celebrations!

Today, the children have enjoyed an assembly by Mike Mullens. He came along with his BMX and showed us lots of different tricks, including jumping over Miss Bamber and Mrs O'Connor!! Some of the older children then got to have some workshops with him, so it has been a busy day.

Upcoming Events

As we approach a busy time of year there is an increasing number of events coming up. We thought it might be helpful if we added them to the blog each week. Further information is always in the newsletter.

• Thursday 27th until Sunday 30th November - Christmas Tree festival at Holy Trinity (the Early Years children have made some of the decorations for our tree)
• Tuesday 2nd December - Whole school trip to the Panto
• Friday 5th December - Non-uniform day - children to bring in some chocolate for the PTA Christmas Bazaar
• Friday 5th December - PTA Movie Night
• Tuesday 9th December - Early years will be going to St Michael's for a Christingle service
• Thursday 11th December - Christmas Jumper Day and Christmas lunch
• Friday 12th December - Father Christmas / PTA Christmas Shopping Day & Bazaar
• Friday 19th December - Early Years Nativity performance

On to our learning for next week, we will be:

• Reading the story "Each Peach Pear Plum" and trying to identify all the different nursery rhyme and story book characters.
• Identifying the rhyming words in our story and making lists of rhyming words.
• Trying to learn the rhyme in the book, working on our memory skills!
• Continuing our work about the numbers 4 and 5 in our Mathematics sessions; by finding 1 more or 1 less than them.
• Creating our own picnic scene, like the one in the story, by carefully cutting out story book characters.
• Enjoying our next Forest School session on Thursday.

This week's drop in will be on FRIDAY.

We hope you have a lovely weekend. 

Miss Wakefield, Mrs Fincham and Miss Goddard

17.11.25 - This coming week in Early Years

Hello everyone! 

Firstly, we just wanted to say how proud we were of the children on Tuesday when we all sat for the silence as part of our work about Remembrance. The children wore their poppies with pride. 

We all enjoyed our first Forest School session on Thursday, we will share photos of this in next week's newsletter.

Now on to our learning for next week, we will be:

• Reading different versions of the story "Little Red Riding Hood" and talking about the different characters.
• Discussing whether Red Riding Hood did the right thing by straying from the path and thinking about what would happen if we didn't follow a Duty Bearer's instructions.
• Continuing to learn the Phase 3 sounds in our Phonics sessions, learning the remaining consonant digraphs.
• Working on Number again in our Mathematics sessions, working with numbers to 5.
• Using our sounds to write a shopping list for Red Riding Hood.
• Carefully weaving paper strips, remembering the pattern of over, under, over, under, to create a basket effect.
• Creating some decorations for the Christmas Tree festival. These will be on display at Holy Trinity church in a few weeks time. 

There will be no drop in this week due to the Parent/Teacher consultations on Wednesday and Thursday. These meetings will take place in the hall, please come into school via the entrance at the school office. 

Have a lovely weekend

Miss Wakefield, Mrs Fincham and Miss Goddard

10.11.25 - This coming week in Early Years

Hello everyone, 

We have had a very busy 4 days!! Yesterday, the children brought home the QR code for their school photo. If your child has a sibling in school then this code will also allow you to see the sibling photos. In the children's folders are the next sounds along with the first 4 Rainbow Words. These are words that we just have to remember by sight. 

Now on to our learning for this coming week, we will be:

• Reading different versions of this week's story, "The Three Little Pigs".
• Building houses using different construction materials and then testing them against a big bad wolf!
• Continuing with our Phase 3 Phonics, learning the sounds for the remaining letters of the alphabet.
• Learning about some 2D shapes in our Mathematics sessions and going on a shape hunt to find them in our classrooms.
• Watching the CBeebies film "Poppies" and observing the 2 minute silence on Tuesday.
• Enjoying our first Forest School session on Thursday. (See below)

The children will need to come in on Thursday wearing their Forest School clothes, we will help them change into their uniforms after their session. Wellies and coats that the children already have in school are fine for them to use. A reminder will be sent via Dojo on Wednesday.

This week we will resume our drop in sessions after school. The drop in this week will be on THURSDAY.

Have a lovely weekend, 

Miss Wakefield, Mrs Fincham and Miss Goddard 

03.11.25 - This coming week in Early Years

Hello everyone! 

We hope you have all had a lovely half term. We are looking forward to seeing the children again tomorrow and look forward to hearing all about what they have been doing during the break.

So here are our plans for the coming week, when we will be starting our new project with the traditional tale "Goldilocks and the Three Bears".

We will be:

• Reading different versions of the Goldilocks story.
• Creating some puppets of Goldilocks and the Bears to help us retell the story in our own words.
• Thinking about how to find 1 more and 1 less in our Mathematics sessions.
• Moving on to Phase 3 in our Phonics sessions.
• Continuing with our handwriting sessions, working on a new pattern.
• Creating some fabulous firework pictures using different media.
• Creating some poppies for Remembrance, which we will then wear next Tuesday.

School photographs take place on Thursday this week.

Drop in sessions will start again next week.

See you in the morning!

Miss Wakefield, Mrs Fincham and Miss Goddard

Happy October Half Term!

We have reached the end of the children's first half term at Down Hall! We are SO proud of them all and all of their achievements and we hope you feel the same. This is just a quick blog to wish you all a lovely half term and to also explain the different things that have come home with the children today and their half term homework.

The important things for half term are:

1. Half Term homework - now that the weather is starting to turn a little colder it will start to take us longer and longer to get ready for going outside. We would be very grateful if you could spend a little bit of the holiday encouraging your child to put on their coat and try to do it up by themselves. We would love to see any of the children giving it a go, so please feel free to send us any photos using ClassDojo.
2. In your child's bag is their Christmas card design and the letter explaining the process. The deadline for the children's art work to be returned to school is Tuesday 4th November.
3. In your child's bag is a project letter telling you about our next project "Once Upon a Time" which we start after half term. This letter is also on our website and can be found here.

There will be a blog on Sunday 2nd November to let you know about our first week back. Don't forget the children return to school on Tuesday 4th November due to our INSET day. 

Have a lovely break!

Miss Wakefield, Mrs Fincham and Miss Goddard

20.10.25 - This coming week in Early Years

Hello everyone!

We have continued our reading sessions this week and would like to remind everyone that it would be really helpful if the books could remain in the coloured wallets and be in the children's bags everyday, but particularly on a THURSDAY.  Thank you so much for all of your support with the children's reading, it was lovely to read all the lovely comments in their diaries.

On to our learning for this coming week, we will be:

• Sharing the story "Pumpkin Soup" about the Cat, the Duck and the Squirrel and talking about how they behaved towards each other in the story.
• Singing some harvest songs together and talking about the harvest collection.
• Talking about pumpkins, using our different senses.
• Seeing how many seeds there are inside a pumpkin and counting them carefully.
• Bringing home our Christmas card designs on Friday.

Drop in this week will be on TUESDAY.

Have a lovely weekend!

Miss Wakefield and Mrs Fincham

13.10.25 - This coming week in Early Years

Hello everyone, 

We have had another busy week, with our Reading sessions starting this week. The children have brought home their reading book and diary today. The books are those which the children have read during the week in school. Please write in the diary to let us know how the reading is going at home. The books will be changed every Friday. It is VERY IMPORTANT that the children have their books in their bags every day and particularly on a Thursday, when we take them out so they can get swapped. Please use the coloured wallet for these books to try and keep them safe from water bottle spillages!

Now on to our learning for the coming week, we will be:

• Continuing our daily Phonics sessions, learning the next 4 sounds and the next Rainbow word.
• Thinking about patterns in our Mathematics sessions.
• Carefully drawing around a template and then cutting out some Autumn leaves using different coloured paper.
• Going on an Autumn walk around our school grounds, seeing how many different coloured leaves we can find.
• Talking about how we have changed since we were a baby. Many thanks to everyone who has sent in a baby photo so far. PLEASE send in a photo by Monday, this can be done via ClassDojo if that is easier. 

Following the disappointment of the Echo photo, we have been told today it will be published in Monday's edition.

This week our drop in will be on FRIDAY.

Have a lovely weekend

Miss Wakefield and Mrs Fincham

06.10.25 - This coming week in Early Years

Hello everyone, 

It was lovely to see so many of you at our Phonics Workshop today. We hope you have found it helpful. I have added a link to our Phonics page on the website. This is where you can find out how we say the sound for each letter and how we teach the children to write each letter. The Phonics page can be found here.

This week has seen our second bundle of 10, meaning we have passed day 20! It is good to reflect on how much your children have already done in such a short time in school - we are very proud of how well they have adapted to our Phonics and name writing sessions and are excited for our Reading sessions that will start next week.

Now on to our learning for the coming week, we will be:

• Sharing the story "A Book of People Like Me" and thinking about things that we like and things that we don't like. 
• Continuing our daily Phonics sessions, learning the next 4 sounds and our first Rainbow word.
• Starting our Reading sessions this week, sharing books linked to our Anima Phonics sounds. (The children will then bring these books home on Friday)
• Comparing objects by their size, mass or capacity in our Mathematics sessions.
• Working on our Christmas card designs, as we ran out of time last week.
• Writing a sentence again, remembering to use finger spaces. 

Thank you to everyone who has sent in a baby photo. We will need these by Monday 13th October. Please can the children either bring in a photo OR can 1 be sent in via ClassDojo for us to print out in school. 

Drop in this week will be on THURSDAY.

Have a lovely weekend

Miss Wakefield and Mrs Fincham

29.09.25 - This coming week in Early Years

Hello everyone, 

This week we have started our Phonics and Mathematics sessions. We are very proud of how the children have adapted to these new daily sessions. Don't forget the Phonics workshop is taking place on Friday 3rd at 2.30pm. This is an opportunity to find out about how we teach Phonics at Down Hall. (Please don't worry if you are unable to make it, all information given will be shared).

On to our learning for the coming week, we will be:

• Reading another story about the Ten in the Bed characters, this time they are playing Hide and Seek.
• Continuing our Phonics sessions, learning the next 4 sounds. 
• Using our teddy bear puppets that we made last week to play a "Where's the Bear?" game.
• Starting to create our Christmas card design, these will come home when finished for you to see and order (should you decide to).
• Starting our handwriting sessions and learning how to use our special lightboxes.

In two weeks time, we will be looking at how we have changed since being a baby. It would be lovely if the children could either bring in a baby photo OR for 1 to be sent in via ClassDojo for us to print out in school. We will need them by Monday 13th October. 

There is no drop in next week due to our Phonics Workshop on Friday. 

Have a lovely weekend!

Miss Wakefield and Mrs Fincham

 

22.09.25 - This coming week in Early Years

Hello everyone!

We have reached double digits for our days in school and we have discussed how we get to make a 10 bundle with our lollysticks and thinking about how to write the number 10. We also spent time in our Houses on Thursday, electing the House Captains. We were very impressed with how well the children could remember which colour house they belong in.  

Next week looks set to be another busy week, we will be:

• Reading and sharing the story "Ten in the Bed" and singing the number rhyme with the same name.
• Trying to recall all the different parts of a book during our story sessions.
• Starting our Phonics sessions, learning the first 4 sounds. 
• Creating some lolly stick teddy bear puppets which we will need for some upcoming learning.
• Matching, sorting and comparing objects in our Mathematics sessions. 

A reminder - we will be holding our Phonics Workshop on Friday 3rd October at 2.30pm. This will be held in our Early Years room. If you are unable to attend then any information will come home afterwards.

This week's drop in session will be on MONDAY. 

Have a lovely weekend

Miss Wakefield and Mrs Fincham

15.09.25 - This coming week in Early Years

Hello Everyone!

WOW! What a busy week! The children are probably very tired today, as are we, but we are so proud of how they have coped during their first full week! 😊 It was also lovely to see so many amazing costumes today, we enjoyed talking about them all.

On to our learning for next week, we will be:

• Sharing some more stories together and talking about what happens in them, including the story "Titch".
• Thinking about the members of Titch's family and talking about our own families.
• Learning about a famous family, our Royal Family, finding out about King Charles and his family.
• Learning about some more of the characters from Anima Phonics.
• Playing some more games with our namecards.
• Continuing to sing our "How Many Days" song and finding out what happens when we get to 10 days.
• Singing number rhymes, including the silly one about the monkeys and the crocodile!

Our drop-in will take place on TUESDAY. Please remember, these are an opportunity to come into the class and have a look at what we have been doing. Many thanks to those that came today.

A date for your diaries - we will be holding our Phonics Workshop on Friday 3rd October at 2.30pm. This will be held in our Early Years room. If you are unable to attend then any information will come home afterwards.

Have a lovely weekend

Miss Wakefield and Mrs Fincham

08.09.25 - This coming week in Early Years

Hello everyone!

We have had a lovely first 2 days in Early Years, getting to know all of the children and having fun together. The children have also enjoyed their first assembly and PE session today.

It was lovely to meet so many of you earlier this week for our parent/teacher meetings and thank you for all of the waterproofs, wellies and completed packs that have already come in. Please feel free to send any outstanding ones in next week.

We are excited for our first full week with the children, so on to our learning for this coming week, we will be:

• Sharing the story "Starting School" and thinking about all the things that we have done in our new class.
• Finding out about different areas around school - exploring the ladybird garden, field and adventure playground.
• Drawing pictures of ourselves for our classroom display.
• Talking about how we can work together to make our class a happy place to work and play. (RRS Article 31)
• Taking a class photo for the Echo New Starters supplement. If you do not want your child in this photograph please let us know.
• Joining in with the Roald Dahl day on Friday, please see the newsletter for more information. (Please don't worry if your child doesn't want to dress up).
• Going to Celebration Assembly on Friday to find out who will be our first pupil of the week.

We will be having our first drop in session on FRIDAY.

Please remember we are only ever a message away, please use Class Dojo to send us any queries or messages.

Miss Wakefield and Mrs Fincham

Welcome to the Early Years blog!

Welcome to our Early Years Blog, we hope you will find it helpful as your child starts their life at Down Hall Primary School. This blog is updated each week with information for the following week.

We are looking forward to meeting you all this week for our parent/teacher meetings. Please contact the school office if you have not made an appointment and they will be able to help. 

See you soon!

Miss Wakefield and Mrs Fincham

Thank you everyone!

 

We would just like to thank all of our fabulous families for the lovely gifts, cards, hugs and kind words. We have had a fantastic year together and know that the children are ready for Year 1, where they will continue their learning journey at Down Hall. 

Whilst the children are off to pastures new, they are also taking Mrs O'Connor, Miss Langley and Miss Bridges with them. Miss Wakefield and Mrs Fincham will miss them all, but know that we will still get to hear about their new adventures!

We hope you all have a fantabulous summer and we look forward to seeing you all in September. Please remember the children are due back on Tuesday 2nd September.

Thank you once again for your kindness and for trusting us with your lovely children this year!

With all our love,

Miss Wakefield, Mrs O'Connor, Miss Langley, Mrs Fincham and Miss Bridges xxxxx

21.07.25 - This coming week in Early Years

Hello everyone! 

It is hard to believe that we are coming to the end of our journey together and that soon the summer holidays will be here! Last week we took in the children's reading books and we will be sending work home from Monday. There is not much else to say this week, just a few notices.

Upcoming Date

Tuesday 22nd July              Wellbeing day and whole school picnic

Final day arrangements

Don't forget that on the last day of term, the children can come to school wearing comfy clothes. We are also having our picnic on the field with our families from 12-1pm. The children will need to come in at 1pm for the register, before then going home for the start of the summer holidays!

See you in the morning, 

Love

Miss Wakefield, Mrs O'Connor and Miss Langley xxx 

14.07.25 - This coming week in Early Years

Hello everyone! 

We have had another lovely week, although there were some pesky wasps that tried to ruin it. Thankfully, Mrs Jimmick and her wasp traps have worked wonders.  

Upcoming Dates

Saturday 12th July            PTA Summer Fete

Monday 14th July              Reports out

Thursday 17th July            Class swaps - children spending time with their new teacher

Friday 18th July                 PTA disco

Tuesday 22nd July            Wellbeing day and whole school picnic

Reading Books

In preparation for next year, we will be collecting in all reading books by Wednesday 16th July. We would encourage you all to take part in the summer reading scheme at the library during the holidays to help keep up your child's reading during the 6 week break.

On to our learning for this week, we will be:

• Sharing the story "One Year with Kipper" and thinking about our first year at school.
• Thinking about our project and checking if we have answered all of the questions we asked at the start of the project.
• Discussing the story "The Worrysaurus" in our Circle Time session.
• Having our final JIGSAW and Charanga sessions.
• Visiting our new classes on Thursday.

Our final drop in session for the year will be on WEDNESDAY.

Have a lovely weekend, 

Love

Miss Wakefield, Mrs O'Connor and Miss Langley xxx