Getting to know each other
We’ve enjoyed welcoming all of our new children to Nursery this week for their first sessions. It’s been lovely to see our older children helping to show them around and making new friends.
We listened to ‘Little Red Riding Hood’ and re-told the story in the book corner using props. Children tried to remember some of the repeated phrases in the story. “Grandma, what big eyes/ears/teeth you have!”
In group time, we learnt about the number one. We showed one on our fingers, did one hop, one clap and one jump. We found a number one on a domino and looked at a unicycle with only one wheel. Have a look for ‘one’ in your house. You might see one handle on the door or one mirror on the wall. Can you find a numeral one on a house door or number plate?
Welcome back!
It was lovely to see everyone this week and we enjoyed hearing all about your Christmas holidays. It sounds like Santa was very busy delivering presents!
This week, we listened to ‘The Gingerbread Man’ and children loved creating their own gingerbread people with the scented play dough. We counted out buttons and talked about the different sized cutters. This led to some discussions about ‘height’ and language including big, little, tall and short. In group time, we compared our heights to see who was tallest/shortest.
Miss Morris and Mrs Kilburn have been busy visiting all of our new families at home. Look out for some new faces in Nursery next week, and please be patient as we help our new children to settle in.
School applications- September 2023
Have you applied for your child’s school place yet for September 2023?
Children born between 1 September 2018 and 31 August 2019 are due to start primary school in September 2023.
You must apply on-line for your child’s primary school place. Applications must be submitted before 15 January 2023.
If you haven’t received an e-mail about applying for a place, you must contact Leeds City Council .
Leeds City Council recommend choosing five schools to give your child the best chance of getting a place at a school you prefer. Children that attend Scholes (Elmet) Primary School Nursery are NOT guaranteed a place in Reception.
Please visit the Leeds.gov.uk website for more information.
Thank you!
We have been absolutely overwhelmed by your generosity. At the recent Christmas productions, we collected for our school charity, Cancer Research UK. You didn’t let us down and you managed to raise an amazing £266.91.
Thank you so much.
Snowman at Sunset
Thank you to everyone that was able to watch our performance of ‘Snowman at Sunset’. We’re really proud of the children ; it’s quite daunting standing on stage in front of a hall full of people and we thought that they did brilliantly. We hope you enjoyed the songs about building snowmen and snowflakes falling and that it left you feeling in a festive mood. Super singing Nursery, well done!
In Nursery, we’ve been learning about the Nativity story, making Christmas lists, building sleighs, drawing maps for Santa and decorating the trees outside.
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We’re looking forward to our final week of the term and have lots of Christmas themed learning planned. Don’t forget it’s our Nursery party on Monday afternoon and you are also invited to join us for one of our ‘stay and decorate’ sessions where you can read your child’s Learning Journey and enjoy making some Christmas crafts together. Please see the Christmas letter or reminder letter for more details.
A donation pot for your £1 contribution towards our party costs will be outside Nursery this week. Thank you to everyone that has contributed already.
Whatever Next!
A few week’s ago, we enjoyed reading ‘Peace at Last’ written by Jill Murphy. This week, we listened to another of her stories about a family of bears, titled ‘Whatever Next’. It’s about a little bear who went on an adventure to the moon. He used a cardboard box as a rocket, some wellies as his space boots and a colander for a space helmet. He packed some food and shot up the chimney into space. When he got there, he enjoyed a picnic with his friend owl. What would you take into space with you?
Children loved making their own rockets in the creative area using different shaped boxes and bottles. It was quite tricky working out how to attach the different parts together. Some children used PVA glue, some tried a stick of glue and for some things, only cellotape would hold the parts in place. Once the rockets were ready, there were lots of count downs!
10,9,8,7,6,5,4,3,2,1 BLAST OFF!
We loved singing ‘5 Little men in a flying saucer‘ and counting the aliens in our maths corner. At the dough table, we used different tools and star shaped cutters to make rockets, stars and space ships.
Outside, children enjoyed exploring some unusual objects that appeared near our space rockets.
We also had some very special visitors in Nursery at the start of the week. Children enjoyed looking after some Giant African snails and watching them crawl around the tank, eating their cucumber snack. Thank you for sharing them with us.
Reminders
- Please return the Christmas slip to let us know if you can attend one of our ‘Stay and Decorate’ sessions in December. Please see the letter for more details of dates and times.
- Remember to send your child’s costume for the Christmas concert to school as soon as possible. Please NAME all items and put them in a NAMED bag. As you can imagine, changing 20-3o children can be tricky; having items named and in a clearly named bag makes things much easier for us. Thank you.
World Nursery Rhyme Week
We always sing lots of rhymes in Nursery, but as it was World Nursery Rhyme Week, we sang even more than usual! Nursery rhymes are an essential part of developing early literacy skills and have many benefits.
Here’s a link to lots of popular Nursery Rhymes – pick your favourite to sing along to at home, or find a new one to learn together. What’s your child’s favourite rhyme? Send us an email to let us know and we’ll make sure we sing it in Nursery. scholesnursery@spherefederation.org
This week, lots of our areas of provision were linked to popular rhymes. We sorted Twinkle Twinkle Little Stars in the maths area and made some simple repeating patterns. Big star, little star, big star, little star... Children carefully folded legs for Incy Wincy Spider and printed Baa Baa Black sheep at the creative table. In the sensory area, children loved making Jelly on a plate wibble and wobble! We also had lots of cups of tea in the water area as we sang I’m a Little Teapot.
On Friday, we enjoyed joining in with some fun, spotty themed activities to join in with fundraising for Children in Need.
Bonfire night
We began the week talking about children’s experiences of Bonfire Night. Children loved playing in the small world area and launching the rocket into the sky. Whooooosh!
We watched firework videos and talked about the colours, patterns and noises that we saw and heard. Outside, we listened to some firework sounds and pretended to be fireworks, dancing with ribbons.
What noise did the firework make? Pop! Bang! Whizz! Crackle, crackle! Fizz!
Children also talked about the bright colours that they’d seen in the sky and enjoyed using brightly coloured paints, to make firework prints and pictures.
In the shallow sand tray outside, we looked carefully at the firework cards to try and create different patterns and shapes. There were crosses, zig-zags, spirals and wavy patterns.
In group time, we’ve been learning to compare quantities using language such as ‘more than’ and ‘fewer than’. E.g. The blue plate has fewer cookies than the blue plate. I have more biscuits than you.
Try and use some of this language at home, too. Children are often familiar with the words ‘more’ and ‘most’ but don’t often hear ‘fewer/fewest’.
Reminders
- Next week, Monday 14 November is ‘Anti-Bullying’ day in school. It is also Odd Socks Day and children and staff are encouraged to come to school wearing odd socks to celebrate that we are all unique.
- Nursery coffee morning – after Nursery drop off on Wednesday 16 November. See our earlier post.
- WATER BOTTLES – Please check your child’s bottle has their NAME clearly marked on.
Nursery coffee morning
Celebrations
This week, we’ve been talking about some different celebrations. Children were very excited on Tuesday when they returned to Nursery; there was a lot of talk about witches and bat costumes and tales of trick or treating in the dark. We also learnt about Diwali, the festival of lights. We watched some short video clips to find out about how some people prepare for Diwali and enjoy celebrating with family. We learnt about rangoli patterns and loved looking at the special sweets that were part of the celebrations.
In the dough area, we made our own Diva lamps by rolling a ball and pushing our thumbs into it to make a ‘thumb pot’. We added patterns with the tools and put a candle inside. In the garden, we created some rangoli patterns on the floor using chalks.
Outside, children helped to tidy the garden after the holidays; there were a LOT of leaves that needed sweeping up!
In phonics this week, we listened to sounds in our environment. We enjoyed reading ‘Peace at Last‘ and hearing all of the noises that stopped poor Mr Bear from getting to sleep. In the Nursery garden, we heard a helicopter flying above us and the leaves rustling in the wind. What can you hear in your house? You could also listen to the different sounds that fireworks make if you go to see any. Do they pop, crackle, hiss, sizzle or BANG?
Finally, towards the end of the week, we began to talk about another celebration that lots of children might take part in at the weekend – Bonfire Night. We talked about how to stay safe and next week, we’ll continue our learning as we’re sure you’ll all hear and see lots of fireworks in the sky this weekend!
If you have joined in with any Diwali celebrations, or are going to take part in Bonfire night celebrations, please send us a photo of your child celebrating for our ‘Home learning’ display. Children love to share their photographs and talk about their adventures. Email us at scholesnursery@spherefederation.org
Have a good weekend and stay safe!