Welcome to Nursery!

Welcome to Nursery and thank you for reading our blog. Every week we will post details of what we have been learning in Nursery, and what the children will be learning the following week. We will let you know about events coming up and post reminders. You are welcome to share the posts with your children and please comment on things that the children have found enjoyable that week in Nursery.

We have had a fantastic week in Nursery getting to know the children and it has been lovely to see how they have been enjoying the different areas and settling in to their new environment.

The children have enjoyed exploring the different areas both inside and outside. Morning Nursery have produced some lovely paintings, exploring what happens when they mix colours. The children have really enjoyed playing outside on the apparatus, ‘trip-trapping’ over the bridge. They have used their problem solving skills in the water tray, trying to fix different sized pipes together so that they would fit. They have learned how to use our Muddy Kitchen area.

The afternoon children have explored the reception side of the playground and loved wearing the suits to go splashing in the puddles today. They have been great musicians playing along to the Disney tunes. The children have all enjoyed playing with the purple sand indoors and now that our cover has arrived for the new sandpit outside, the children will get the chance to play in it next week.

Our favourite comment of the week; ‘This pre-school is amazing.’

The children are looking forward to wearing their new P.E. kits next week. Please remember to bring them in on Monday.

We are going to start our Brilliant Books topic by reading Each Peach Pear Plum and Kathryn Holt is coming in to do some story telling.

Our rhyme of the week next week will be ‘Jack and Jill.’

There is a 'New to...' meeting on Tuesday 20th September and for Nursery this starts at 8pm. Please come and found out a bit more about Nursery and to meet the Early Years Foundation Stage team.

Butterflies

What an exciting week we have had in Nursery! Last week 10 of our caterpillars emerged from their cocoons as butterflies and at the beginning of the week we took them down to the meadow to release them. Brooke, George C, Jessica, McKenzie, Ross and Harry were all very gentle holding them and they carefully put them onto the beautiful flowers which were planted earlier in the term. Some of the butterflies quickly flew away as soon as we let them out so we waved goodbye.

We have been learning about Under the Sea this week and have been creative making fish and under the sea worlds. We have also started to think about what we want to share with you in our sharing assemblies on 21st July. We will be busy practising over the next couple of weeks.

On Monday next week we have our talent show if any of the children want to share a talent they have with the rest of the class. We will also be practising our assembly.

Please come along to our Open Evening on Monday 5-7pm to see all the fantastic things the children have been learning about this year.

Caterpillars

This week we saw a big difference in the caterpillars that had come to visit Nursery. They were no longer crawling around and had made their way to the top of the pot, curled up and spun themselves a cocoon. We were allowed to look at them but could not touch them as we have to be very careful during this important stage. Next week we are hoping to move them into the butterfly house and wait for them to appear as butterflies.

We also begun decorating our pots which can be bought at the Strawberry Fayre next weekend.

Next week we are going to be looking at the sunflowers we planted a couple of weeks ago, to see whether there have been any changes.

We will also be reading different versions of Jack and the Beanstalk.

Our sound of the week will be 'w'. In letters and sounds we will also be continuing to play rhyming games which the children can have fun playing at home.

Growing

What a busy week we have had in Nursery.

All of the children have planted a sunflower and we were very impressed with what the children knew about what the seed would need to grow. The afternoon children wanted to see whether the seed would grow with just water and no soil. Theo and George were wondering whether the seed would grow with lemon squash. George B thought it would because 'it has water in it'.

We had a fantastic time at Stockwood Park and Discovery Centre. The children were all very well behaved and listened to the adults carefully. The children went on a bug hunt and listened to a story about Neville the Squirrel. They then made bug masks. We enjoyed exploring the park, the gardens and riding on the tractor. Ross said 'I really enjoyed running around.' Pat enjoyed 'looking for the squirrel' in the big Oak tree. Thank you to all the parents who gave up their time to help.

Next week we will be learning about the life cycles of different animals. We will be having some visitors in Nursery over the next few weeks and observing how they change.

Next week our sound of the week is 'v'.

Night and Day

For the last couple of weeks we have been learning about day and night and continuing with our space theme.

This week the children have been learning about the sun and why we have day and night. We also had fun playing with our shadows. The children were able to explain what made a shadow. Georgia explained 'The sun made a shadow.' George B. explained that the tree was making a shadow 'because it is blocking the light.'

This week we have been learning how to use the outdoor woodwork area safely. We have used the hammers to bang in nails. This has helped with our fine motor skills.

We were really pleased to see how well the children danced for the May King and Queen celebrations. After weeks of practising 'In and Out the Dusty Bluebells' the children performed brilliantly, remembering their steps and dancing with rhythm.

We hope you have a relaxing half term holiday.

Please remember we return to school on Tuesday 7th June as Monday is an INSET day. We are looking forward to our trip to Stockwood Park and Discovery Centre on Friday 10th June, where we will be exploring nature. We will also be looking at plant growth and planting our own seeds.

In Letters and Sounds the sound of the week will be 'v'.

Space

What a busy week we have had!

We enjoyed reading Whatever Next! and using the role play area to imagine going into space. Some of us had a picnic on the moon but we had to be careful the food didn't float away!

We also enjoyed going down to the Forest School this week. We had great fun hunting for bugs and managed to find snails, slugs, millipedes, woodlice and spiders. We were very careful to put them back where we found them or we placed them in the bug hotel. We also collected lots of natural objects to make paintbrushes next week.

Next week we are continuing our Space theme, but also looking at Night and Day. We will be exploring shadows and hoping that the sun shines for us and sorting things that happen at night and things that happen during the day. Please talk to your child about their day and night time routines.

Our rhyme of the week next week is 'Wee Willie Winkie'.

Trains, Planes and Cars

This week we have been learning about trains, planes and cars. We read the Train Ride story and looked at the different places the train travelled through. In Maths we enjoyed sorting the vehicles based on the number of wheels they have. Some of us talked about different places we have been on holiday and how we got there.

We used instruments to tap a rhythm to 'In and Out the Dusty Bluebells'.

Next week we will be having a Space theme. We are going to read the story Whatever Next! by Jill Murphy and use our imaginations to go up into space. We will also be composing our own space music.

Please remember that Forest Schools is on Wednesday next week and the children will need wellies in school. If it is hot they should also bring in a sunhat.

We look forward to seeing those of you who have signed up to do work shadowing.

Our song of the week next week is 'Zoom Zoom Zoom (We're going to the Moon)'.