Nursery Class News

Home Link – week beginning 18th June

We’re going to read ‘The Very Hungry Caterpillar’ this week. The caterpillars in nursery were beginning to make cocoons at the end of last week, so we’re hoping to see some butterflies emerging soon.

Here are few ideas of things that you might like to do at home to support your child’s learning:

• Read ‘The Very Hungry Caterpillar’ and talk about the story. What are your favourite types of fruit? Discuss the days of the week. What day is next?
• Paint a picture of a butterfly or make a butterfly print. Talk about the symmetrical pattern on the wings.
• This week we are learning about the letter sound ‘Bb’. What can you find around your house or outside that begins with ‘b’? You could bring it into nursery for our sound shelf.

Ladybirds and bees

Our ladybird and bee activities were popular last week; children especially enjoyed sampling different types of honey and looking at real honeycomb. We talked about how bees make honey and how it is collected from hives. It was lovely to see lots of creative activities throughout the week. Children painted and drew some great pictures of ladybirds with spotty wings and stripy bees. Outside, we used some large rollers to explore painting with different colours and textures. This led to lots of talk about colour mixing as children used the rollers to paint over existing patterns with different colours. At the end of the week, children enjoyed creating a giant race track down the hill using pipes and guttering.

Week 3 – What are we learning this week?

Hopefully, children will have told you that we have some caterpillar visitors in Nursery. Well, we did last week! We’re hoping that they will have been busy making their cocoons over the weekend. This week, we will read one of our favourite stories – ‘The Very Hungry Caterpillar’.

In the maths area, we will make caterpillars with repeating colour patterns and will use loose parts to create caterpillars of different lengths. We’ll learn about symmetry and experiment in the art area with ‘butterfly’ printing and colour mixing to make different shades of green. Our letter sound this week is ‘b’ for butterfly. Please listen to the Jolly Phonics song on-line and sing a long at home together.

Visit this website for a fun caterpillar counting and ordering game or this website for a simple game about symmetry.

Transition to Foundation Two

For those children that will join Foundation Two at Scholes, we have begun our transition activities to help to prepare them for September. Children are getting to know the staff, visiting the classrooms and playground and are beginning to go to assemblies in the hall with the older children. At lunch time, children are learning how to carry their tray carefully to the table without spilling their lunch or dropping their cutlery! They’re doing very well.  We’re talking to children positively about the changes ahead and we hope that this will help them to feel happy and secure about the move to ‘Big School’.

Green fingers? Help needed!

Scholes in Bloom judging day is Monday 6 August this year. If you are available and would like to join the effort for gold, please come and collect a plant from Mrs Myers or Mrs Latham. All you need to do is look after it and meet us at the flower bed outside school on judging day at 10am. If you prefer, you could make a ‘scarecrow’ and bring it on the same day. The theme is ‘all creatures great and small’. Hope to see you there!

Home Link – L for ladybird

This week we are learning about the letter sound ‘Ll’.

What can you find around your house or outside that begins with ‘l’?

Please bring something into nursery that begins with L to put on our sound shelf. Remember to put your child’s name on it!

Minibeast madness!

Week 1 – Minibeast madness!

Welcome back to nursery. We hope that you all enjoyed the half term break. It was lovely to see everyone’s smiling faces on Monday morning; there was a real ‘buzz’ in nursery as children enjoyed chatting and playing with their friends again. This week, we enjoyed looking in the garden for minibeasts. Children spotted lots of different types of bugs. We made a list outside every time we found a new one and used the digital microscope to have a closer look.

Some children had remembered finding some tiny eggs and insects on the leaves before the holidays and went back to see if they could find them. They couldn’t see them, but they did find some ladybirds, including a black one, and lots of aphids. We talked about the lifecycle of a ladybird and how they change when they grow, just like the tadpoles did.

Week 2 – What are we learning this week?

Following on from our children’s interest in ladybirds, we will continue with this theme this week. In maths, we will count the spots on ladybirds and find ladybirds that have one more or one less number of spots. We’ll enjoy playing this ladybird counting game on the Smartboard.

Children have also been asking lots of questions about bees when they’ve seen them flying between flowers in the garden. We’ll enjoy finding out about how bees make honey; at snack time, we’re going to make toast and enjoy sampling some honey. If you don’t want your child to take part, please speak to a member of staff.  

 In the creative areas, we’ll experiment with different printing and drawing techniques to create spotty and stripy patterns. Can you make some spotty or stripy pictures at home? Please remember to encourage your child to mark make (draw) in lots of different ways.  Children will enjoy listening to ‘The Flight of the Bumblebee’ – we’ll talk about what the music reminds us of.

In literacy, we’re going to read ‘The Bad Tempered Ladybird’ and use pictures and props to re-tell the story. Please continue to play eye-spy games with your child to help them to hear the initial sounds in words. This week’s letter sound will be ‘Ll’ for ladybirds. Click on the link to hear the Jolly Phonics song. What can you find around your house that begins with l?  

Scholes Gala and Scholes in Bloom

Please come and support our Skipping Crew and WUSU Crew at Scholes Gala this Saturday, 9 June 2018. We would also like as many children as possible to visit the planting stall. Children can take them home, look after them and then bring the plants and join us on judging day for Britain in Bloom on 6 August 2018 at 10am outside school. Scholes in Bloom are going for gold this year!

Home Link – Minibeasts

Royal Wedding Celebrations

We had  a great day celebrating the Royal Wedding. Here are a few photos from our wedding and castle themed activities.

Home Link – Royal Wedding

We’re sure that there’ll be an interest in weddings, castles and royalty after the events this weekend. On Monday 21 May, can you find something red, white or blue to wear to nursery?

For this week’s home link, please talk about the Royal Wedding. Here are a few things that you could do…

• Make a crown or tiara
• Decorate/paint a wedding dress
• Bake a wedding cake or some buns
• Look at family photographs of weddings. Have you been to a wedding? What happened? How do people celebrate weddings?
• Look at Windsor Castle. Have you been to a castle? Who lives in castles? Do you have any stories with castles in?
• Read a story about a wedding, castle or prince/princess.
• Look for objects that begin with ‘c’ for castle, crown and cake!

There are lots of different opportunities for discussion around this topic! What interests your child?

Worms and minibeasts

Week 5 – Worms and minibeasts

Children enjoyed hunting for minibeasts at the beginning of the week. Some children chose to use the clipboards to write down what they found. Their lists included slugs, snails, spiders, worms and butterflies. Whilst searching for caterpillars on some leaves, we found a group of tiny eggs and little insects. We used the digital microscope to look at them closely; we think that they were ladybird eggs and ladybird larvae.

We’ve enjoyed learning all about worms. On Monday, Miss Backhouse and her group of helpers went outside to create a wormery.  First, they collected leaves, sand and soil and put them into a tank in layers. The next part was the most fun: they went digging for worms!  In group times, we read ‘Superworm’ and we compared the length of toy worms.  Children put the worms in order of length and measured them using Numicon pegs. We talked about which worm was the longest and shortest.

At the end of the week, we had a special ‘wedding’ lunch menu and we began to talk about the Royal Wedding that will take place at the weekend.

Week 6 – What are we learning this week?

We’re sure that many children will watch or see photographs of the Royal wedding this weekend and that some of you may even be going to a party to celebrate.  On Monday 21^st May, we’re going to have a mini wedding celebration in nursery. Children are invited to wear RED, WHITE or BLUE clothes.  We’ll watch some video footage of the wedding and see what the children are interested in learning more about… castles, weddings, kings and queens?

Keep encouraging your child to hear the initial sounds in words by playing eye-spy games. This week’s letter sound will be ‘Cc’ for castles, cakes and crowns! Listen to the Jolly Phonics ‘c’ song and sing a long at home.

What can you find around your house that begins with c?