We would like parents, carers and other family members to support us in making a real difference to their children’s education; home learning supports this aim. Research shows that when parents and schools work together, children do better.

Home Learning can take many different forms:-

• Activities for your child to share with you
• Activities for your child to do independently
• Activities for the whole family
• Reading – this should be a daily activity which should include talking about the story or the characters, making predictions, expressing opinions etc
• Learning spellings
• Learning times tables

Home Learning in Key Stage 1

In Key Stage 1 Home Learning is set at the beginning of each half term. Children will bring home an activity pack and must complete at least three activities (one writing, one mathematics and one topic every two weeks. So three tasks will be completed in total over the half term. 

The termly activities are designed to be open ended and extend learning and understanding, with a chilli-rating which reflects time and effort level, rather than ability.  We hope this way of working will: facilitate children and families; give more time to choose and plan activities; work collaboratively; and fit into home life.  Most importantly we want home learning to be fun.

Reading – We encourage you to read daily with your child, discussing what they have read, what characters are thinking and feeling, what might happen next.  You can support your child in using a range of strategies to work out words they don’t know, such as phonic strategies, context or grammar clues and pictures. Try to change books twice a week.  We do not encourage changing books more frequently than this.

Spellings – In Key Stage 1 children follow the phonics rule that your child has been learning that week.  You will be provided with an explanation of the rule, some examples, and a list of words that follow the rule. Sometimes children will be given ‘secret’ words, which follow the rule but which have not been included in the list. This is to encourage independent application of the rule in all writing opportunities.

Home Learning in Key Stage 2

In Key Stage 2 home learning is set weekly and is a task linked to the learning that week in Maths or Topic. 

Spellings - Set weekly based on a spelling pattern and will include some unknown words, so it is worth practising a range of unknown words with your child.  From Year 4 upwards, children will be required to write a dictated sentence using the word in context.  

Reading – Even if your child is a fluent and independent reader, we encourage you to continue to hear them read on a regular basis, discussing the story, characters and vocabulary to develop their skills in prediction, inference and comprehension.

Home Learning in Reception

Home Learning is not set on a regular basis in the EYFS, however we highly recommend reading on a daily basis with your child, which could be sharing a story together or reading a book from school using phonics skills and talking about the what is happening, the pictures and what the characters are doing or feeling.  We will also send home ad-hoc 'project s' to undertake with your child to extend the work we have been enjoying in class.  

If your child has any particular work, experiences or ideas that they would like to share with their teacher or the class, we welcome this input from home and would love to see it or hear about it.  You can email as via the office email address.