Foxes
The year before primary school. Preparation for reading and writing in Turkish, number sense and storytelling in English; the habit of working independently.
- Age
- Age 5–6
- Months
- 60–72 months
- Class size
- At most 16 children
- Staff
- 1 Turkish + 1 native English teacher
Language of the day
The Foxes class is the last year on the road to primary school. Merve runs the school readiness goals of the national preschool programme in Turkish: hearing sounds in words, holding a pencil correctly, line work, matching numbers to objects and simple problems. Teaching reading and writing is the job of primary school; this year we lay the ground for it.
With Grace the English side turns into storytelling. Each week the children listen to a picture book, retell it in turns, change the ending and stage it as a small play for the class. By the end of the year most children express their daily needs comfortably in English; but every child has their own pace, and we talk about it with families regularly.
Once a term, a development file prepared together by both teachers is shared with each family in a face-to-face meeting.
What we work on this year
- Hearing sounds in words and finding words that start with the same sound
- Holding a pencil correctly and completing line and shape work
- Matching numbers to objects up to 20; solving simple adding and taking-away problems with real objects
- Retelling an English story in order from the pictures
- Starting a task and finishing it; keeping their own table and bag tidy
The class teachers
One Turkish side, one English side. Both are in the classroom all day.
All staff and their training
