Guest Posted April 6, 2014 Posted April 6, 2014 Hi I am a NQT working in Reception and been asked to change the structure of the lessons for the last term to prepare the children ready for year 1. Currently we have literacy and maths each day but only work with one group of children while the others have free choice in all the areas of provision including outside. I thought about having more focused activities for example when doing literacy have literacy activities out related to our topic or story. What do you think? Would be interested to hear what other people do. x
Guest Posted April 6, 2014 Posted April 6, 2014 So many things I want to say about the wrongness of getting children ready for Year 1 but I won't now. Suffice to say I was an NQT last year and was asked to do something similar but even earlier than you've been asked to do. It went against everything I felt was right and as a consequence didn't work well at all! As an NQT I know it is difficult to suggest you have another way and it is potentially a good way/just as valid/etc, so if you feel you can't say no or even that you don't want to because the children are ready for something more, then make sure it is something you are comfortable with. I like the sound of your plan as it seems to mix the required (by the school), more formal approach with a play based one which the children have obviously been used to. Hope it works for you.
Guest Posted April 6, 2014 Posted April 6, 2014 Thank you for your reply! I don't really agree with it either. Some children are ready for more structure but some of the others are much further behind in their development and are not ready for this yet! I am worried how some will cope once they are in year one and unsure what to do for the best! They are not ready yet so I don't want to do something that is not right for them but if I continue with lots of free choice how will they cope when they are in year 1?! I just want to do the best for the children!
Guest Posted April 7, 2014 Posted April 7, 2014 It depends on how many staff you have in class but would it be possible to give those who are ready more structure and give more adult support in play to the others? That way you are working to meet all needs but not restricting anyone. Unfortunately I found that my staffing didn't really allow this to work well. Otherwise my other approach would be to ask for support from head or mentor in school - playing the 'NQT' card and claiming to need more guidance. I was lucky that my mentor was the Y1 teacher and she completely got what was happening. So much so in fact she started to introduce more play based learning into Y1 to help support the children the following year.
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