At Newton Primary School we have three forms of homework:

• Reading 
• Times Tables and maths fluency
• Spellings

Reading 

Children are expected to read on a daily basis as an essential part of their homework. In Reception and Key Stage 1, children bring home decodable books each week that correlate with the GPCs they have learnt.  In addition to this, we assign an e-book and a quiz each week on Oxford Reading Owl. This is the same book that your child will have read 3 times during the week with their phonics teacher so it will be a familiar text to them. 

https://www.oxfordowl.co.uk/login

Once fluent in their reading, children will move onto 'Accelerated Reader'. They will pick a book at an appropriate level for them and read it at their own pace. When finished, they will take a short quiz to check their comprehension of the book. 

We ask parents to read to their child regularly as well as hear them read, even when their child has become an independent reader. Young children also benefit from having stories read to them that they cannot read themselves. In Reception and Key Stage 1, children will bring home a 'reading for pleasure' book each week. If the children enjoy their book, they can recommend it to a friend the week after. 

We award 3 Dojos to children who read and get their diary signed 3 or 4 times weekly, and 5 Dojos for 5 times or more. 

Times Tables

Our children start to learn their times tables in KS1 with the expectation that they will be fluent by Year 4. Staff dedicate time to practise times tables weekly but without support from home, it is difficult to make these stick. Any work you can do to support your children to learn their times tables is greatly appreciated. All children have a log-in for EdShed and the children can then access MathsShed to practise their times tables. Teachers may also add games and links to Seesaw.  

Please see below for a link to EdShed: 

https://www.edshed.com/en-gb/login

At the beginning of each half term, children will also bring home a maths fluency sheet to support them in practising skills and fluency facts. 

Spellings 

In Reception and Key Stage 1, children are sent home with Read Write Inc practice sheets or 'ditty sheets' each week (see examples below).  Once children are secure with their phonics, they will move onto learning spelling rules. For this, we use Spelling Shed which the children can access with their EdShed log-in.

Teachers may occasionally put an optional quiz, such as a Science vocabulary quiz, on Seesaw. There may also be some pre-learning tasks for our enquiry sessions on here.