Minibeasts

Finding mini beasts in the garden is very exciting and the children have really enjoyed learning more about the creatures they have found. We have asked lots of questions about the creatures ; 'What do they look like?', 'Where do we find them?', ' How do they move?' We have also learnt how non-fiction books and the internet help us to learn more about mini beasts and now we love telling everyone about them!

Caterpillars!

We have been looking after our caterpillars in nursery, learning about how they develop and change within their life cycle. The children have explored the different parts of the life cycle through story, discussion, art, and dance. We are now waiting patiently for our butterflies to emerge so that we can release them in the garden. 

Coronation Celebrations

We had a fabulous week learning about the King's Coronation, finding out all about what happens and why. The children decorated a throne, made crowns, experienced being a King or Queen and made their own promises, just as a monarch does. We were able to join with the rest of school for a celebration event followed by a Party Picnic. Great fun and wonderful memories from this historic event!

Eid al-Fitr

We learnt about the celebration of Eid al-Fitr and the children loved sharing their experiences, showing their clothes, making jewellery and offering treats as gifts to their friends. Eid Mubarak!

Spring

As the weather (slowly) improves, we have been noticing the changes of the Spring season. We have explored flowers and learnt about their different parts, worked in our digging area and planted our own bean seeds. We are now waiting patiently to see our shoots emerge and watch our beanstalks grow. Jack and the beanstalk is a great story to retell and act out - especially when you are creating your very own giant beanstalk in the classroom!

Easter celebrations!

We had great fun with our Easter Challenge, finding the eggs that the Easter Bunny had left for us. The children loved their reward treat too!

Stay and Play Sessions

We had great fun at our two Stay and Play sessions, where many parents came to join us and played alongside their child. We took time to think about how we can all support the early development of reading and writing, with the parents taking away lots of ideas to try at home. We are looking forward to our next sessions, where we will be talking about how we can best prepare the children as they start Reception in September.

Stories

We really enjoy sharing stories every day in Nursery and this month, we have been sharing our own favourite stories and talking about why we enjoy listening to them. We loved seeing the photographs posted on Tapestry and the children enjoyed telling their friends about the characters and events in their chosen book,

We then spent time sharing 'Traditional Tales', learning about how some stories have been told for many years, We acted them out, made character puppets and tries oud lots of different character voices! The children particularly loved looking at 'old' photos of their teachers and finding out about how they loved listening to stories when they were younger..

Feelings

We know how important it is for young children to learn how to express their feelings in words and recognise the emotions in others. We have read lots of stories, looked at how our faces change and talked about the situations that may make us feel a particular emotion.

The range of feelings we have explored are happy, sad, scared, shocked, worried, poorly, excited, cross, surprised, hot, cold and tired. The children even know how to sign the words in case they do not feel like saying it out loud. Great work Nursery!

Mini Scientists!

This month, the children have learning about being ‘scientists’ through our exploration of hot and cold. We have learnt so much about volcanoes and ice, using our skills of observing, discussing and asking lots of questions. We are excited to see what our mini scientists will be discovering next! 

Christmas Activities

The children have had a great time learning about the different aspects of the Christmas celebration. In the midst of lots of talk and excitement around Santa and the events building up to Christmas Day, we have also been learning about why the celebration is important for Christians and shared the Nativity story.

Our Calendar

We have created a calendar for the children to use as they prepare for and talk about the different events coming up over the next few weeks. Showing the information visually can be helpful as children learn about time and how calendars help us to remember important events. You could make a calendar around any significant events in your family life to help your child learn. They will love to use it and talk about it with you.

Stay and Play

After meeting everyone for Parent Evening chats, we invited our parents into Nursery for a ‘Stay and Play’ session. This was a fabulous opportunity for parents to see how we work and for the children to show their independence and play. We talked about why play is so important in the early years and had some fabulous feedback from the 40 parents who were able to attend!

We would like to say thank you to all of our families for their ongoing support.

Rhyme Challenge!

The children took part in the Rhyme Challenge and performed their 10 nursery rhymes for a fabulous audience of proud parents and carers. They were all amazing and  have worked so hard to learn them all. As part of the fun, the children raised £67 pounds for the Children in Need charity.  Well done team!

November

As we talked about the different Autumn celebrations, the children learnt about how we are not all the same and we all celebrate in different ways and at different times. The children shared their experiences of Diwali and Halloween, talking about the events, clothes, food and treats! We then learnt together about Bonfire Night and we all loved the many activities that helped us to reflect what we could see and hear around us. 

October

Exploring outdoors in Autumn is very exciting. There are so many things to notice and ask questions about. The children have been fascinated by the different leaves that they have found. We have talked about colours, sizes, shapes and textures. Using the leaves we have painted, made rubbings, watched them fall, collected and sorted them and even pretended to be an autumn tree ourselves! Talking about the different weather that we experience in Autumn, we have explored how we change our clothing and activities at this time of year. So much to talk about the world around us!

We have been learning about the importance of listening and we have been working together in lots of different ways to develop our skills. We learnt about listening to both adults and our friends through games, stories and play activities.

Our (puppet) friend Ollie the Owl helps us to remember how to listen at group time and the children love showing him their skills!

After meeting Ollie, we decided to learn more about owls and what makes them special. The children loved hearing the story of 'Owl Babies' (Martin Waddell) and enjoyed storytelling with puppets, drawing and painting their own owls.

Our first few days in Nursery!

We have had more fun this week with lots of new friends joining us in Nursery.

We have spent time getting to know our new teachers and friends in the Nursery. We are looking forward to welcoming more children next week!

Welcome to Nursery!

We are looking forward to welcoming your child into Nursery over the next couple of weeks!

The Nursery team have recorded some songs and stories for you to watch with your child. Please take some time to watch them together as this will help your child to become a little more familiar with the team members before they arrive their first day.