Chicks News - 9th October 2026
This week our topic book in the Chicks and Hatchlings was "Little Red Riding Hood". Using a classic fairy-tale story supports early literacy development with a clear narrative structure (beginning, middle, end) and repetitive language patterns (eg "what big eyes you have") that all children can join in with. It also enabled us to build upon our "emotions" topics as we discussed how Little Red and Grandma might be feeling throughout the story and to bring in basic safeguarding principles of how to keep ourselves safe (stranger danger) and who we can trust and talk to if we need help.
In Art we created our own woodland scenes and used coloured shapes to create Little Red Riding Hood and the Big Bad Wolf. This enabled the children to practise their scissor skills as they cut the strips for the trees or alternatively to tear the paper. The older Chicks then extended this into a Maths lesson on 2D shapes.
The Role Play Area was set up to support the story, with red capes and wolf costumes, baskets, food and props to support the children retelling the story by packing baskets of food to take to Granny's house.
The Pink and Green Chicks sequenced the story in their lessons this week as well as continuing with their Outdoor Learning Day on Tuesday. The Purple Chicks moved onto "rhythm and rhyme" in their early phonics work and began their outdoor "listening walks". They also consolidated their colour knowledge and focused on some practical scissor and gluing skills.
To end the week we made porridge faces at Snack Time as part of our fundraiser for Mary's Meals and the children did a wonderful job of using fruit to bring their faces to life.
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