Author: Reception Team

What a colourful week it’s been……

We’ve had another busy week in Nursery as we shared our bonfire adventures with our friends. There were lots of wonderful paintings and pictures inspired by the fireworks that everyone saw. We thought about the different sounds we heard and used our voices, instruments and streamers to recreate them. The children absolutely loved creating the huge firework paint pictures outdoors, which included getting very messy indeed! Such large scale activities are brilliant for helping to develop the children’s physical skills as they make ‘big movements’ with their arms. As we talked about bonfires, we thought about how hedgehogs sometimes hibernate within them. We decided to make our own playdough hedgehogs and tell them not to hide in the bonfires (all whilst using our counting to put on matchstick prickles of course!). The children really extended their vocabulary of capacity as they played in the blue water this week. Filling the different sized containers and using the piping attracted lots of different children into the water area which also allowed new friendships to develop.

 What we are learning this week?

After lots of interest in fireworks and rockets, talk naturally led us to outer space and the moon! We’ll be using the book ‘Whatever Next’ as a stimulus throughout our areas of provision. We shall be re-telling the story using the book, pictures and small world props to develop our speaking and listening skills. In the large construction, there will be lots of space and moon themed resources to inspire our very imaginative children in their play. We’ll use our counting skills and ‘fiddly fingers’ to add craters to the (playdough) moon and thread pipe cleaners carefully into the holes of colanders – after reading the story, the link will become apparent! Our challenge, set by the children, is to make the water ‘even darker’ and then together, we will all think about what ‘space’ inspired objects we need to add and how we can make our own colanders for water to trickle out of.

Next week is a nationwide ‘Nursery Rhyme Week’ developed to encourage the sharing of nursery rhymes in settings and in the home. Sharing such rhymes and songs is very important in helping early language development and is, therefore, something we do continually within our activities. The focus rhymes this year are ‘Bobby Shafto’, ‘Lavenders Blue’, ‘Hickory Dickory Dock, ‘Wind the Bobbin Up’ and ‘Old King Cole’. These will be sung within key workers sessions along with lots of our other favourites.

We’re sure that you’ll see and hear lots of fireworks this weekend as some people celebrate Bonfire Night.

Talk to your child about the different shapes, colours and noises that the fireworks make.

Can you create your own firework picture or model?

You might want to use paint, draw, collage or make something using boxes. It’s up to you – be as creative as your child (and you) would like!

We can’t wait to see your firework inspired artwork and models!

What fun everyone had during the half term holidays.

Thank you for sharing all your half term fun with us! It was wonderful to hear about all the different activities and adventures the children experienced. We love to share news, photographs and souvenirs during group time. It provides an excellent opportunity for developing your child’s speaking and listening skills and of course, helps them to gain the confidence to talk to their peers. There was a delicious smell coming from nursery this week as we made pumpkin soup. The children helped to chop the vegetables and picked different herbs from the outdoor area to flavour the soup! There were some very creative potions made in the water and sand as the children explored capacity, colour and let their imaginations run wild with some very horrible looking ‘recipes’. Outdoors, some very observant children found the biggest worm on the grass which grew and grew before our eyes as it wriggled under the soil. We began to discuss length and use lots of different words to describe and compare the size of the worm. “It’s enormous…the longest worm I’ve ever seen!” The children have loved making their own obstacle courses in the large construction area. There was lots of cooperative play, mark making and number play as we awarded prizes for 1^st, 2^nd and 3^rd places!.

 What we are learning this week

Leading on from the Guy Fawkes weekend fun, we will be having a bonfire and firework theme as we incorporate all the wonderful colours, sounds and shapes into our provision. Outdoors, we look forward to using the ribbons and scarves to dance and move like fireworks. We will be getting very messy as we create our own firework art on a large scale using the powder paints and some very interesting paint flicking techniques – please see this week’s reminders! We shall be talking about the children’s own experiences and continuing with the safety messages highlighted at this time of year relating to fire. This of course leads into creating a ‘firefighter’ small world area to reinforce learning across so many of the areas; language, creative play and making relationships to name a few. By using bubble wrap, we hope to not only recreate the ‘popping’ sound of their fireworks but also strengthen our fingers in preparation for the super mark making (early or ‘developmental’ writing) we do during our play. We will continue to use number skills as we count out objects from a larger group and learn another number song about 5 firefighters!

Reminders

• If you have any old adult shirts could you please send them to nursery to protect clothing during our firework art activities. We do have some but possibly not enough to go round everyone.
• Please check the entrance area towards the end of the week for signing up sheets for Parents meetings. These will take place W/C 20th November and be held over several days and at various times as to provide as much choice as possible.
• If you would like to share any none urgent information with us please get in touch using the nursery email scholesf1@spherefederation.org

Thank you for your continued support.

Thank you to everyone who has e-mailed photographs and details of your activities in the holidays or to those that have sent in leaflets.

One of the most popular activities was pumpkin picking at Farmer Copley’s pumpkin festival, Piglet’s Adventure Park or Canon Hall Farm. It looks like you all had a good time scooping out the slimy insides and  carving some very elaborate designs into them. (What a talented group of parents and carers you are!)

You told us all about…

• Discovering dinosaurs at Temple Newsam.  Mrs Long thought that she could hear some strange noises when she was hanging washing out in her garden!
• Trips to museums and finding out about space.
• Learning to swing without being pushed.
• Eating pizzas at Pizza Express – mmmmm!
• Shark spotting at The Deep.
• Mark making, drawing pictures and writing letters.
• One lucky person even got to go camping…in the Moroccan desert and met a magician! Lawson told us all about his trip to see the magic man and toasting marshmallows on the fire.

We have enjoyed sharing the photographs with the children and it has been a lovely opportunity for children to tell us all about their adventures. It really helped them to remember what they had done during the holidays; children often forget to tell us about home, just like they forget to tell you about their day in nursery!

Children were excited to see their photographs on our iPads and they were eager to share their experiences with their friends. It provided lots of conversation, even with some of our quieter members of nursery.

Thank you for taking the time to e-mail us and please continue to keep us up to date with your child’s learning and new fascinations and interests.

It’s not too late to send us your holiday photographs if you haven’t already. We’ll look forward to seeing some more.

What did you do in the holidays?

Can you bring a souvenir or leaflet from somewhere you went in the holidays?

It may be a trip to the park, a farm or maybe the seaside. We’re going to share our adventures during the first week back and encourage children to tell their friends during group time.

You might want to draw a picture or send a photograph to our nursery email – scholesf1@spherefederation.org

What a super half term we’ve had at nursery!

We can’t believe it’s the end of our first half term together. We’re amazed by how well the children have settled and really begun to forge some lovely friendships with old and new faces. A big thank you to everyone who has contributed to the ‘interests’ board. ‘Paw Patrol’ has been mentioned several times by the children and parents alike. So much so, that we decided to turn our large construction area into a Paw Patrol look out tower! This has provided fantastic opportunities for the children to develop their communication, imagination and number skills-all whilst ‘just playing’ of course! Outdoors, several children really enjoyed creating ramps and slopes for different vehicles to use. We made predictions about which cars would travel the furthest, tested our guesses and then made marks using chalks to compare the results. Lots of super language: “The green truck will go the furthest, look it’s going down the very steep ramp.”

We enjoyed learning about Diwali, too; we listened to the story of Rama and Sita and found out about the Festival of Lights is celebrated. Some of our children told us all about the fireworks they were going to see on Thursday evening.

It’s nearly good bye… Miss Logan has worked closely with Mr Gledhill over the last few weeks to ensure a smooth transition for the children in green group. Miss Logan will be returning to school to work her remaining four weeks in Year 1 (so she can sit down a little bit more!) However, we’re lucky to have her back for her final day in nursery on Tuesday 31 October to say a final goodbye!

What are we learning after the holidays?

We’ll have a Halloween theme throughout nursery upon our return with a focus on pumpkins as we enjoy the story ‘Pumpkin soup’ in key worker time. We shall be getting messy in the sensory area, squishing and squashing the flesh and looking closely at the insides. Best of all, we’ll be making a delicious and healthy pumpkin soup! There will be lots of opportunities to develop our creative sides as we make glittery playdough spiders and explore capacity in the ‘magic water’ with different sized bottles and containers. Outdoors, the mud kitchen will be a real hive of activity as we explore what happens when we use vinegar and bicarbonate of soda in our spells! We hope someone remembers to write the magic potions down on the notepads so we can talk about them afterwards (and develop our mark making skills!)

Have a super half term holiday!

Can you make a picture using different shapes?

You could make a house, vehicle, pattern… Be as creative as you like!

Remember to talk about the names of the shapes you use.

For this week’s activity, please write any vocabulary your child uses as they make their picture. For example: ‘It’s a circle, like a wheel’ or ‘The house has a triangle for a roof’. This important feedback from home link activities helps to inform our assessments and plan the next steps in the children’s learning.

You could always email us a photograph and any comments to our Foundation One email: scholesf1@spherefederation.org

We had great fun making delicious currant buns, carefully weighing the ingredients and stirring the mixture together. The smell was amazing! They were, of course, decorated with a cherry on the top! The children really enjoyed extending their play into the ‘playdough’ baker’s shop and even into the maths area where they used the balance scales to weigh different ingredients. Last Wednesday, we had a wonderful ‘wellie walk’ around the school field. We collected a huge bag of leaves, sticks and feathers which we enjoyed sorting by shape, size and colour. Some children were sure we would find fairies in the big tree trunks! No luck this time but maybe we need to think about how to attract them into the nursery area… watch this space!

What are we learning this week?

We’ll be extending our play and learning about 2D shapes by going on a shape hunt and using shapes in our creative areas. The children have absolutely loved using props as they sang the currant buns song; this week we shall be using the rhyme ‘5 little speckled frogs’ to develop number and language skills.

The frog theme also links in nicely as we begin to prepare for all things magical at the end of October. Watch out for magic potions, spiders and spells in the water area!

We shall be reading ‘Room on a broom’ by Julia Donaldson in our key person groups. We will use the story as a stimulus for small world play using props to retell the story. There are some fun activities available to download on the Room on the Broom website, including a memory game for you to play. You could also watch the story on line if you don’t have a copy at home.

Nursery children enjoyed listening to the ‘We’re going on a leaf hunt‘ story before we went on our own hunt around the school grounds. We thought about the things that we might find and took a big bag with us.

It was very muddy so we wore our wellies to walk through the squishy mud. Squelch, squerch, squelch, squerch! We found colourful autumn leaves of all different shapes and sizes, twisted ivy around tree trunks and we spotted a squirrel gathering some acorns. We even found some mushrooms that we knew not to touch!

Afterwards, we took our autumn treasure back to nursery and sorted it using our senses.

Welcome

We’d like to begin by welcoming Mr Gledhill to our Foundation One team. He has already been joining us during the day and has been busy getting to know the children. Mr Gledhill is going to be covering Miss Logan’s maternity leave and whilst she isn’t leaving just yet, she will soon be moving to Key Stage One for the remainder of her time at school.  Miss Logan and Mr Gledhill have been working together during group times as he will become the Key Person for green group.

What are we learning this week?

The children have continued to enjoy singing ‘Five currant buns in a baker’s shop’, so much so, that we’ve decided to make a bakery role play area. This will provide lots of opportunities for children to communicate with each other, write receipts and count pennies to pay for their currant buns. You may even notice a lovely aroma in the rainbow room next week… Can you guess what we’re going to bake?

Autumn is really upon us now; we’re always talking about the changes that children can see in our nursery garden. On Wednesday, we’ll be ‘going on a leaf hunt’ to search for more signs of autumn in our school grounds. Don’t forget to send wellies (named) and a waterproof coat!

Many children have shown an interest in rolling things recently, from balls to trucks and apples. As a result, we’ve introduced some ramps to our vehicle area and we’ve used apples that have fallen from our tree to create apple runs using the guttering and stands. We’ll also be rolling conkers next week to create some autumn art work. Look out for it in our art area soon!

Home Link

Thank you to everyone who enjoyed completing the Home Link activity last week – we can see a few stars starting to appear on children’s handprints but we’d love to see some more! This week’s activity, is to read one of our favourite stories, ‘We’re going on a Bear Hunt’. We have a small world area linked to this story in our outdoor area and children are enjoying re-telling the story using the props. Swishy swashy… Squelch, squerch… Hooo wooo…

If you don’t have a copy of the story, you could visit the library or watch Michael Rosen telling the story online- it’s great! www.jointhebearhunt.com

Interests

Hopefully, you will have noticed our current interest notice board as you come into nursery each morning. We’ve added some of the things that we have noticed that the children are interested in and we’d really love to find out more about what your child loves at home at the moment. Please take a post-it note from the board and tell us – don’t be shy! It’s there for all parents/carers to use and allows us to continue making learning fun and relevant to children.

Alternatively, you could e-mail us: scholesf1@spherefederation.org

Reminders

• Please ensure to collect your child on time from nursery. We finish at 3.00 on Mondays and 3.15 Tuesday to Friday. We always have a member of staff on the door 15 minutes before this time in order to allow a calm end to the day and to enable us to speak to you.
• Remember to check your child’s folder for accident letters, changing notes and other information each day.