This week in Reception, we explored autumn and the changing seasons. We enjoyed activities such as creating autumn-themed pictures and having a group walk to collect natural resources to investigate at our sensory table.

This week, we continued to learn our Little Wandle phonics sounds, further learning new sounds like i, m, n, and d. For more information, please refer to our curriculum overview. We also started exploring numbers, focusing on those up to 5 to enhance our recognition and early maths skills. Next week, we will concentrate on numbers from 5 to 10.

Our reception topic this week is focused on families as part of our "All About Me" theme. We began our floor book by creating a two-page spread of our fantastic families.

Just a reminder, please email or place in your child's bag a family photo so we can display this on our family photo wall. Additionally, a letter has been placed in your child's bag containing a QR code for accessing school-based apps, such as Google Classroom.

Thank you to all the parents that have come to visit our year 1 unit this week during our open classroom events. It has been wonderful to invite you to see the spaces that your child works in during the day. The children were all very excited to welcome you and show you around. Please continue to send in any family photos if your child doesn't have one yet. They can be sent to the office where we will print them out and add them to our display wall and tree. 

This is our last revisit week and we will begin to learn our new phase 5 sounds from next week. We will make sure we add a summary sheet of our phonics learning to google classroom each Friday. You don't need to send anything back to us but do use it as a chance to revisit sounds and words we have explored that week at home. 

Quick reminder that book change and library book change day is Monday. Please make sure the school reading book is brought back in the plastic reading wallet. We are teaching the children to hand them in at the beginning of the day. We have a small collection of unnamed cardigans and jumpers. We will pop them on the fence next week. Do remember to name all items of clothing especially coats, scarves, gloves and hats as the weather is starting to get colder.  

We've had an amazing week in Year 2! In English, we wrote our own disaster stories inspired by The Frog and the Stranger, using lots of conjunctions to add detail and make our writing more exciting. In Maths, we explored odd and even numbers and began looking closely at place value. During our topic lessons, we became scientists and learnt all about living things and their habitats. We talked about what a habitat is and why different creatures need different types of homes to survive. One of the highlights of our week was going on a minibeast hunt around the school, where we discovered a variety of insects and observed the different habitats they live in, such as under logs, in the grass, and in dark, damp places.  

We have been thrilled to see Year 4 so engaged in their learning and contributing to class discussions across the curriculum.

In Maths, they have revisited benchmarks and used these to estimate numbers on a number line. They have also been using rhymes to help them when rounding numbers to the nearest 10, 100 and 1000.

In English, they have completed their graphic novels and selected one scene to develop into a narrative. They used expanded noun phrases, dialogue and the 'show, not tell' technique to capture the readers attention and add detail to their story.  

The children have also been exploring living things and their habitats in our science lessons. They have considered if animals are vertebrates or invertebrates and the seven life processes. They will be moving on to think about plants and how they can be classified.

Finally, we have been impressed with year 4's enquiry skills as they always ask lots of questions to develop their learning. 

Over the past two weeks, Year 6 have been smashing it in their writing. They have just finished stories titled 'Things that go bump in the night'. These are definitely going to keep the Year 6 teachers up at night with the suspenseful atmosphere they create with adjectives and varied sentence openers. We have thoroughly enjoyed reading all of them.

In Maths, we have been practising our rounding to the nearest 10,000, 1,000, 100, and 10. Also, we have just started to multiply and divide by 1000, 100 and 10. Next, we will start to put our Maths brains to the test through reasoning and problem solving questions.

In the afternoons, we finished our learning of WWII and are now moving on to Electricity in Science. Get ready to hear all about the experiments we get up to!

We are inching closer to PGL, please don't hesitate to get in contact with us with any questions or concerns. 

Thank you so much to all the parents and carers who booked onto our APDR (Assess, Plan, Do, Review) meetings and attended the recent SEND drop-in sessions. Your involvement and support are vital in helping us work together to achieve the best outcomes for our pupils.

SEND Parent Café:
A quick reminder that our SEND Parent Café is happening tomorrow morning. This is a great opportunity to meet other parents, chat informally with staff, and find out more about the support available at Green Lanes Primary. We hope to see many of you there!

Parent Course:
We’ve also attached details of a course we’ve been asked to share, which may be of interest to you. Please take a look and let us know if you have any questions.

Staffing Update:
We are delighted to share that Mrs Patel has taken on the role of Assistant INCo (Inclusion Coordinator). She may be in touch with you regarding SEND matters, and we know she’ll be a fantastic support to you and your children.

Pupil Voice:
We’re excited to announce that we’ll soon be appointing our Banksy Council Representatives. These pupils will play an important role in representing the voice of children across the school and what they need to support children's wellbeing. More details coming soon!

The One Welwyn Hatfield Community Awards are back for 2026!

Do you know staff, students, volunteers, residents, sports stars, businesses, or community champions that deserve to be recognised for their work in Welwyn Hatfield? If so, we would love to hear from you and recognise them as part of the annual borough community awards. Nominations are now open with the ceremony being held for shortlisted nominees on Thursday 26^th February 2026.

These awards are to recognise those who go above and beyond, whether that is in the business, with their community, in a sport or club, or if it’s their own personal progression and dedication to being the best they can be.

 Individuals and groups can be nominated by their teachers, coaches, employers, customers and service users, peers or fellow residents. There are 13 categories to choose from and these are listed below.

• Mayors Civic Award
• Welwyn Hatfield for All
• Community Sports Club of the Year
• Young Sportsperson
• Health and Wellbeing Champion
• Inspirational Young Person
• Local Business of the Year
• Community Culture
• Public Service Hero
• Climate Champion and Environment Award
• Volunteer of the Year
• Young Volunteer of the Year
• Voluntary and Community Sector Organisation of the Year
• Positive Change Award

More information on these categories and the nomination criteria can be found on the website.

One Welwyn Hatfield Community Awards – One Welwyn Hatfield

We would be grateful if you could share this around so that we get as many nominations as possible. The awards are an opportunity for residents to celebrate the unsung heroes who go above and beyond to make the borough a better place. Whether they are the quiet heroes working tirelessly behind the scenes or the stars of their local neighbourhood, these awards will acknowledge their outstanding contributions.

Nominations are open until Friday 19^th December.

If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact communitypartnerships@welhat.gov.uk