Autumn Term 2026 

Dear Parents/Carers,  

We have had a wonderful start to our Autumn term and it is lovely to have all the children in Pre-school. Over the past couple of weeks, we have been getting used to our routine and getting to know each other and all the children have settled in well.  

In Pre-school, we want to build upon the children’s independence and to be school ready so we encourage the children to be as independent as they can and help them to learn this. We encourage children to hang their belongings on their own peg, to put their own water bottle in the tray as they come into Pre-school. Opportunities such as rolling snack, putting their own coat on and changing from shoes into wellies and vice versa all encourages the children to be independent. It would be great for your support with this at home with putting coat and shoes/wellies on independently.  

We have just begun our phonics sessions this week and as a school we follow the ELS programme. The programme for 3-4 year olds focuses on helping the children to hear sounds in words and to be able to oral blend. We pretend to be robots in our sessions and we use robot arms and blending hands to help the children with this. In the Spring term, we add in learning the individual sounds.  

Our curriculum for Pre-school concentrates on six books a term and a focus book for three weeks at a time. Our continuous provision is planned with links to the two books for that week. This term books are the following:  

The three areas for this autumn term that we focus on are communication and language, physical development and personal, social and emotional development. We have introduced library books this year which we have already started and I hope you are enjoying reading these books at home with your child. This is a great opportunity to discuss what the book is about and for the children to be exposed to a wider vocabulary. We aim to change library books every Tuesday/Wednesday so please bring them back in so we can change the book. 

As part of our routine, we encourage several carpet sessions throughout the day to build upon the ability for the children to maintain focus, to follow instructions and boundaries that we have at Pre-school. Children are encouraged to do good listening, good sitting and good looking. We will build upon the length of time as we go throughout the year. One of these sessions is singing time whereby we have termly nursery rhymes which I have already shared with you on tapestry.  

Tapestry is a key way of the team communicating with you and sharing all the lovely activities that we do. We share important information throughout the year so please do check tapestry and let me know if you are having any trouble with tapestry.  

What to bring: 

• Spare clothes (named) 

• Reusable water bottle with water in (named) 

• Wellies (named and to stay at school) 

• Waterproofs (named and to stay at school) 

• Coat (named) 

• Pack lunch (if not a school lunch and named) 

Home toys to stay at home as much as possible please. 

We have started to venture out on to the school field to use the track and we plan to do this on a regular basis as well as physical activities. It would be great if the children could come to Pre-school wearing suitable footwear.  

 

Key dates for Autumn Term 

Thursday 15th October 2026 – Stay and play at 2pm 

Friday 23rd October 2026 – Inset day 

Thursday 19th November 2026 – Photos 

Monday 30th November 2026 – Inset day 

Wednesday 2nd December 2026 – Christmas singing at 1.45pm 

 

Thank you for your support.  

Pre-school team 

Michelle (Pre-school lead), Hannah, Jolene and Sari