Christmas

We have had a lovely couple of weeks in Nursery. We were very proud of how the children performed in their Sharing Assembly. They all spoke so confidently and sang the songs beautifully. We hope that you enjoyed it.

 

Morning Nursery have been lucky enough to go into the staff room to have some Christmas stories read to them. One of the stories was read by Mrs McCormick. While we were in the staff room this week we had a very special visitor. Father Christmas came to see us, The children were very excited and sang their Father Christmas song to him.

 

Afternoon Nursery were lucky to have him come and visit in the Nursery. The children loved seeing him.

 

Treetops Club got to have a special Christmas lunch in Treetops. They listened to Christmas songs and wore the party hats they had made.

 

All the children have been loving the snow in the water tray and both Morning and Afternoon Nursery have been building towers and structures from 3D shapes.

 

We had a Maths problem solving week this week and the children had to find different objects to fill the different sized bags. We talked about which bags were the biggest and which they thought would hold more. We found out that it depended on the size of the object we put in the bags.  We have also been practising our positional language, moving Santa and his reindeer into different places in the house.

 

If you have not yet applied for a Reception place, please get your applications in. The deadline is 15th January.

 

We are finding that our coat hooks are getting rather full as some children have backpacks on their pegs. If your child does need to have a bag for spare clothes, please can you put the items in a drawstring bag which takes up less room and allows coats to fit on the pegs properly. 

 

We are looking forward to the Christmas party on Monday. Please send your child in school uniform as they have made hats to wear. Please remember term finishes on Tuesday, and Afternoon Nursery and the children who attend Treetops Club need to be picked up at 1.30.

 

Wishing you all a Very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

Christmas Sharing

Christmas started in Nursery this week with the beginning of advent and starting to practise for our sharing assembly. We have been reading the Nativity story and some of the children were very surprised that Mary and Joseph couldn't go in a car to Bethlehem and stay in a hotel!!

In P.E. we danced to 'Twinkle Twinkle Little Star' using the scarves to make big movements with our arms.

We have been very busy learning all the songs for our assembly and deciding what parts we want to do.

We have been thinking about what we would like for Christmas and started writing our own Christmas lists.

We all got to choose a decoration to hang on the Christmas tree in the hall today which was really special. It looked really beautiful with the lights on it too.

We've been fascinated by the ice outside this week. Some of us thought it was glass so we put water in the freezer to see what happens to it. We've learned that it smashes like glass if we throw it on the ground.

Please remember on Wednesday 7th December it is the Nursery Sharing Assembly.

Our sound of the week next week is 'n'.

Woodlands

We have had a busy week in Nursery this week. On Monday the Morning Nursery went to Woodlands in the wet weather and looked for signs of footprints. Nathaniel thought he even saw the Gruffalo's footprints. We really enjoyed jumping up and down in the muddy puddles. We were also looking for textured objects so that we could print them in a clay tile. Some of the leaves made some lovely patterns.

 

The Afternoon Nursery managed to go into our outdoor area, despite the pouring rain. They collected objects to print into the clay tiles inside. The holly leaves made a pretty shape.

 

We spent the week learning how to share and take turns when playing a game. We had to wait our turn and remember not to shout out when it was someone else's turn.

 

We made some Christmas Tree decorations to sell at the Christmas Fair, using lolly sticks and sparkly sequins and glitter. We had to concentrate to wrap a pipe cleaner around the stick to make it look like tinsel. If you didn't manage to get to the Christmas Fair you can bring £1 to the classroom and they will be on sale next week.

 

Next week our sound of the week is 'i'. We will be starting to learn a number of Christmas songs ready for our sharing assembly on 7th December.

Cinderella

This week we have been reading the story 'Cinderella' and have been talking about the characters, events and settings in the story. This linked in very well with 'Kindness Week' as most of us thought that the Ugly Sisters were being very unkind to Cinderella. We thought that the Fairy Godmother was kind though because she gave Cinderella a lovely dress to wear.

We have been busy creating Pumpkin Carriage artwork and have been practising our scissor skills cutting around a pumpkin shape. We have also been exploring what happens when we mix different coloured paints together.

The children liked wearing spots and stripes for Children in Need on Friday and enjoyed bringing in their teddies with eye patches.

We've been describing and naming simple shapes and enjoyed listening to 'Shape Song 2' on You Tube. We've also been spotting shapes in pictures. The ice chunks we put outside have prompted a lot of discussion and questions such as 'what happens if we put the ice in water?'

Next week our sound of the week is 't' and the rhyme of the week is The Grand Old Duke of York.

On Monday we will be going to Woodlands so please remember wellies and waterproof suits if your child does not already have them in school.

Nursery Rhyme Week

We have got really good at singing our Nursery Rhymes this week and have enjoyed changing the words in some of them.

We used instruments to accompany Dr Foster and showed that we were really good at playing loud and soft, fast and slow.

In P.E. we had a go at throwing and catching the balls to partners. We had to remember to watch the ball and then pull it into us when we had caught it.

We have explored lots of different sizes and shapes of magnet this week. We found that some things stick to them and some don't. Some of us noticed that they push and pull each other too. We also enjoyed using torches to help us look in dark places and to explore the effect of light on prisms and mirrors.

On Friday Morning Nursery went to see Maple Class do their Sharing Assembly. We showed excellent listening skills. At 11am we stayed silent for a whole minute while we thought about the soldiers from long ago. Afternoon Nursery went to the Celebration Assembly and also did fantastic listening. We talked about Poppy day too and listened to some special music called 'The Last Post'.

Next week we will be reading Cinderella and talking about the characters and events in the story.

Our sound of the week is 'p' and our rhyme of the week is Hickory Dickory Dock.

We have moved our Woodlands session to Monday 21st November. Please let us know if you are able to help.

Each Peach Pear Plum

The children have all come back into Nursery after the half term break ready for learning.

This week we have been revisiting Each Peach Pear Plum and the children drew pictures of their favourite characters and told us why they liked them.

We have also been practising our mouse skills this week which most of us found very tricky. We had to click on objects and move the mouse to move the objects. This was helping us to develop our fine motor control. If you would like to practise a bit more at home we were making 'Scary Spuds' from the Crickweb website. http://www.crickweb.co.uk/Early-Years.html

We've done well at recognising and saying our sound of the week and all particularly enjoyed making some 'silly soup' using objects beginning with 's'.

We've talked about Bonfire Night and how to keep safe around fireworks.

We've found a new way of keeping the sand out of our shoes in the sandpit by wearing disposable covers over them. This is making it much quicker to get ready!

Rev Tim came to visit the Afternoon Nursery on Friday so he can get to know us a bit and find out how we learn. We really enjoyed telling him about what we like doing at Nursery. Afternoon Nursery also went to celebration assembly this week.

The children enjoyed our first book browsing session with the parents. On a Wednesday at drop off you are welcome to come in with your child and share a book with them and if your child would like to take one home we will sign it out for them.

Next week is 'Nursery Rhyme Week.' We will be singing Incy Wincy Spider, Doctor Foster, Two Little Dickie Birds and Baa Baa Black Sheep.

The sound of the week is 'a'. Please feel free to bring in any objects for our sound table.

Russia

All the children really loved our focus on Russia for Cultural Week. In P.E. we listened to 'Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy' and responded in our own way to the music. Some of us had very gentle arms and careful tip-toes.

 

For special snack we had beetroot and we were very proud of the way nearly all of the children were prepared to taste it.

 

The children worked really hard to create their models of Saint Basil's Cathedral, learning how to use the tape dispenser and glue spreaders to fix pieces together.  Lydia recognised the picture of Saint Basil's Cathedral and told us that it is found in Red Square. She had picked up this knowledge from an episode of 'Go Jetters' so we all watched it to find out more about Russia.

 

We saw some fantastic work in Maths too with the children ordering the Russian dolls according to size and stacking them in and out of each other.

 

We all went over to the 'Treetops' classroom and used the djembe drums to play along to the Russian song 'Kalinka'. The children enjoyed playing fast and slow according to the music. We loved some of the attempts at Cossack dancing we saw during Learning Through Play.

 

On Thursday morning the children experienced their first fire drill and the morning Nursery coped really well, walking calmly and sensibly to the playground and then back.

 

After half term the sound of the week will be 's'. The number of the week is '4'. The rhyme of the week is 'Old Mother Hubbard.'

We hope you all have a lovely half term.