Year 1
What have we been learning this week?
Week beginning Wednesday 2nd September 2026
Welcome Back Year 1!
It was lovely to see the children arriving with so much confidence this week! After a long break, the children all seemed ready and keen to start their new school year. This week, the children have been getting to know their new surroundings in the Year 1 classrooms and learning about the expectations and routines we have in Year 1. They have certainly risen to the challenge so far. We have also begun our English learning through the use of rhyme, focusing on the story 'Duck in the Truck'. The children have enjoyed making rhyming strings through a scavenger hunt and have enjoyed playing rhyming games in the classroom. In Maths they have begun to look at the number system and have been showing us their fantastic number knowledge. As part of our PHSE learning, the children have discussed what makes a happy, safe classroom and each class has come up with their own classroom rules as a team.
How you can help:
Please ensure your child has a named PE kit in school by Monday 7th September as they will be starting their PE lessons that day.
Year 1 Curriculum Meeting
*** To follow after Curriculum Meeting on Thursday 17th September 9am***
Welcome
Welcome back to all our wonderful Year 1 children and their families. We hope you all had a lovely Summer break and enjoyed some family time. We will be starting the year with our new topic 'Enchanted Forest'.
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Year 1 - Spring Term Curriculum Map
Our Topic this term is 'Around the World'. Below are some of the things the children will be learning this term.
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Year 1 - Summer Term Curriculum Map
Our Topic this term is 'Animals and Plants'. Below are some of the things the children will be learning this term.
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How can I support my child at home?
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- It is extremely important that your child uses a comfortable and efficient pencil grip, even though this may not be the same as your own. This should be the pincer grip. See picture above.
- Help your child to practise dressing and undressing including being able to turn clothes the right way out.
- Help your child to practise putting on his/her coat and doing/undoing the fastenings, including zips.
- Practise cutting up food so they can use a knife and fork in the dinner hall.
- Develop independence and thinking skills by encouraging your child to think for themselves and solve simple problems with minimal prompting
- Play games which might involve turn taking, rolling dice or moving counters
- Share stories together, discussing the pictures, plot and characters
- Listen to your child read their school reading books daily and complete the reading worm.
- Read and spell words from the Year R and Year 1 Common Exception Words.
- Practise writing your child's full name with correct letter formation and a capital letter to start.
- Practise individual letters, starting in the correct place
- Read, write and order numbers from 0-50 and 0-100
- Count forwards and backwards from 0-50/50-0 and 0-100/100-0
- Practise mental maths toolkits, little and often, to embed skills (copies of these below).
- Finding pairs of numbers that make 10 as well as other numbers e.g. 5 = 0+5, 1+4, 2+3, 3+2, 4+1, 5+0
Key information
Key words
In Year 1 it is expected that children will read key words on sight, or be able to fluently apply their phonics to read them. Throughout the year children will also be learning to spell these words. Some of these words are 'tricky words' that cannot be sounded out (e.g. said) and some of these words require the children to apply their phonics knowledge (e.g. sound). Please use the lists above (for spellings) as these are also the words that the children will be covering in Year 1, through their phonics lessons, spelling time and the English curriculum. It would be really helpful to practice reading a few words at a time at home too.
Reading
Your child will bring home a scheme book appropriate for their reading level in their book bag each day. Once the book has been read either at home or school, and this has been recorded in the reading diary, your child will be able to change their book to get the next one in that particular scheme. Thank you for your continued support in reading regularly with your child at home.
Phonics
When supporting your child with their reading, you may find it useful to refer to these sounds. As well as the individual alphabet sounds (e.g. the 'd' sound in 'dog'), your child will also learn these digraphs (sounds with two letters) and trigraphs (sounds with three letters).
Mental Maths Toolkits