Week beginning 20.1.20
Dear all,
Well done to everyone for making this week successful, through wind, rain and cold and what is, let’s face it, a tough time to keep spirits up after Christmas, but we did it! A special mention goes to our new children who are settling in really well, overcoming worries about not seeing parents till the end of the session and learning how to feel safe and happy at Nursery School. We are happy you are here and we are enjoying getting to know you.
This week
This week the children have been cardboard box creating, planning and executing their designs and ideas, including making a dog house and some excellent monsters. We have also explored different feelings, both in group time and ongoing discussions, introducing more words such as proud, afraid, frustrated, amazed and excited.
We have continued to build our repertoire of poems from our Poetry Basket collection, we repeat each poem three times for children to become confident with the words and actions. This is the latest poem:
Mice
I think Mice are rather nice
Their tails are long, their faces small,
They haven’t any chins at all.
Their ears are pink. Their teeth are white.
They run around the house at night.
They nibble things they shouldn’t touch.
And no-one seems to like them much.
But I think mice are nice.
Forest Friday
This week children got better at putting on waterproofs over their clothing so that they could really stay outside, sit on the ground and enjoy their experience without getting wet and cold. 
Some of us made shelters for mice and many children remembered the Fire Circle rules from last week and tested themselves, modelling walking around the outside of the fire circle, if they needed to get something. We sang and recited some poems and discussed the flames and how we felt. It was a small circle of calm in a windy rainy day. We have attached our Risk Assessment for having fires in Nursery School, for you to read through. Please ask if you have any questions about any of our developing forest school provision.
Wellies – It is great to see so many children are bringing in their own wellies. Can we please ask from now on you leave your child’s wellies under their peg. Then we know that the wellies left on our stand are spares. This has understandably caused some upset this week when children have come to put their wellies on and they have not been there. We will also support and remind the children of this new change. Please remember to clearly name your child’s wellies.
Medicine
Please be aware that children should not have sweets, snack, toys or medicine in their bags. If your child needs permanent or temporary medication at school, it must be kept in its original box it was dispensed in from the chemist and then kept in correctly labelled Tupperware along with the paperwork which gives us permission to administer it. This must be written and signed by yourself and a member of staff and kept in the kitchen cupboard along with the medication.
It is your responsibility to ensure that your child’s medicine is in date.
Writing folders
Some of our children are beginning to become very inspired by learning to write. We would like to support their enthusiasm by collecting their mark-making and beginnings of letter formation in a writing folder. So, if you think this would be supportive and motivating for your budding writer, please bring in a narrow ring binder in which they can collect their work and see progress as they go on from here to the end of the year. We predict that others will follow suit and want their own folders and are hoping we are starting a craze for writing! Don’t forget that at this stage of learning, pushing for correct letter formation, as if that is all that matters, is a mistake. Instead, celebrate marks, model understanding what is written and use “writing” in play as much as possible.
Focus Children
An important part of our planning revolves around 10% of our cohort being focus children each week. The full process for your child, when they are our focus, is for you to complete and return our shared planning sheet; then, to enjoy looking at the focus observations and discussing these with your child and looking at their next steps, finally, we really appreciate you to complete a feedback form and hand it back to us, whilst keeping the coloured A3 observation for yourselves. Please help us help you by being as actively involved in this process as you can.
Have a great weekend and we look forward to seeing you all next week for more exciting learning experiences!
Best Wishes
The Nursery School Team
