Hi All

Here is an overview of our week at Nursery School:

Wow experience – This week the children have had the chance to make porridge linking to the story of ‘Goldilocks and the Three Bears’. The children enjoyed naming, measuring and mixing the ingredients together and then choosing a topping from a selection of fruit and flavours. This initiated conversations about individual likes, dislikes and preferences.

Indoor focus – The children enjoyed incorporating a range of natural materials into their play this week such as painting and making collages with natural materials. They explored and identified minibeasts in the sand tray / soil, this got the children talking, where they asked lots of questions and compared the different minibeasts as they were imaginative in their play. We had a dinosaur swap in the water area with information displayed, the children had fun creating different scenarios in their small world play. A big hit this week were the belly boards, where the children had to use their core strength to navigate around the classroom. We also had some fun with drumming where the children experimented with sounds and rhythm. We also added natural herbs to the playdough area – mint, lavender and rosemary, this allowed for the children to use their senses, think about where herbs come from, what we use them for and to be creative within their malleable play.

Outdoor focus – The weather definitely played its part this week, but despite the rain, wind and cold the children got outside and had a great time embracing the opportunities, collecting rain water, splashing in the puddles, painting the fences, building sandcastles thinking about capacity / comparing different quantities and sizes, making Autumn collages and discussing the colours and shapes of the different leaves, filling containers / cups with shaving foam and making pretend smoothies along with practicing fundamental skills such as aiming, throwing, catching and kicking.

Forest School – We again had an open Forest school session on Thursday, where the children could come and explore the area. They continued to look for minibeasts and were super excited to find different stages of the life cycle of a ladybird – the larva, pupa and ladybird stages. Some children asked to make more bird feeders as the ones they had made last week had been eaten. We will start more formal forest school in term 2 – small groups every other week, I will let you know which group your child is in and which week.

Maths focus – This week we have continued to work on cardinality and counting, the children enjoyed group time activities / games such as ‘show me’ where each child rolled a dice or were shown a numeral and then had to identify the number, then choose an action such as clapping or jumping and then everyone represented this number by showing the correct number of actions to match number. During another group time we played a game where we pretended a soft toy was off on an adventure and needed some help to gather different amounts of things to take with them. The children really enjoyed identifying the numeral / pattern of each number and then going off and getting the items required. Maths is not only restricted to group times, it is everywhere and supported in play and our routines.

Phonic focus – This week the children have continued to explore environmental sounds, we have had fun matching animal sounds to the correct animal on a game called ‘Welcome to the zoo’ here is the link – https://www.phonicsplay.co.uk/resources/phase/1/welcome-to-the-zoo.  We also had to use our listening ears when exploring sounds of items hidden in socks, the children could feel the items and then had to guess what was inside – we discovered leaves, pebbles, shells and some crunchy, crackly paper.

Core Song – I Can Sing a Rainbow – we introduced some sign language to go with this song which the children enjoyed, see if they can remember any?

Poem – Leaves Are Falling

Leaves are falling, leaves are falling,
One fell on my nose.
Leaves are falling, leaves are falling,
One fell on my toes.
Leaves are falling, leaves are falling,
One fell on my head.
Leaves are falling, leaves are falling,
Yellow, Orange, Red.

*They liked physically pretending to be the leaves falling in this poem 😊

Reminders / Information

– One of our termly learning objectives is around ‘Autumn’, if you go on any walks this weekend if your child could take a little bag and collect some leaves, conkers (if ready), small sticks, pinecones to bring in that would be great. We will display them and use them in provision.

– Please do look out for individual memos about when your child is focus child. It is really important to us to get your input so we can look at current interests, what they already know and what they need to know next in all areas in their learning. It’s also useful for us to know if anything at home is impacting a child (remember, you can also talk to us at any time if you need our support you do not have to wait until your child is a focus child). You can speak to us at drop off / collection times or send a message to us via the messaging feature on tapestry or contact the office or me directly at zoe.wakefield@cnacecentre.co.uk

– Voluntary contributions of £10 for this term are now due, you can hand an envelope into the office or send a payment via a bank transfer to:

• Account name: ACE Centre Nursery School Special Purposes Account
• Account number: 30269247
• Sort code: 20-03-84

We use these donations towards cooking ingredients, playdough ingredients, to enhance areas of the environment and to top up snack if needed throughout the term.

– Thank you SO much for your cooperation in the parking situation. The drive way leading up to the back of the school is owned by our neighbours and only staff, health visitors and those with a disability badge have access to the car park – this is to safeguard everyone. If you do use the drive way to walk / access school, please take care when walking up the drive and use the gate provided. Our caretaker Martin and staff will continue to regularly monitor the parking situation. As I have said previously, we understand our parking situation is not ideal but it has to be the same rule for everyone to ensure the message is clear, this includes breakfast club / Ace Extra drop off and collections.

Have a lovely weekend and we look forward to seeing you next week

Kind regards

Zoe

 

Hi All

Last week the children continued to settle back into Nursery School, for some children settling in happens quickly and for others it may take a little longer. If your child is unsettled at drop off or throughout the session we will work with you on an individual basis to ensure that we support you and your child in the best way we can over.

Overview – ‘All about me’ and ‘My favourite things’.

Group times: The children enjoyed coming together for group times with their key person, throughout the week we were introducing new members of the group, getting to know one another’s names through discussions, games and songs. We were talking about the weather, days of the week and counting how many children were in their group each day. The older children were great at helping to show and support our new children with our routines and behaviour expectations at Nursery School.

Enhancements:

Our ‘Wow’ activity: If the children wanted to they had the chance to make fresh orange juice with Marlena last week, they talked about where the oranges come from, the process from orange to juice and their personal favourite juices. The children took it in turns to use the juicer and used their senses to to describe the experience using new vocabulary they had learnt from the activity.

Inside: The children were busy been exploring the art workshop and creating their own masterpieces, using their imagination in the role play areas, using their fine motor skills to use tweezers in the sand, experimenting with measure in the water tray, reading, experimenting with the musical instruments and being creative with the playdough.

Outside: The children had fun creating ball / water runs, setting up and completing obstacles, painting, drawing, taking turns on the bikes / scooters, constructing with the large wooden blocks, climbing, balancing, exploring and playing games.

Poem of the week – Chop Chop

Chop, Chop, Choppity Chop.
Cut off the bottom and cut off the top.
What there is left, we put in the pot.
Chop, Chop, Choppity Chop.

– Ask you child if they can remember the actions.

Reminders:

– Thank you for those of you who have already sent in family photos, if you have yet not had chance please do as the children love to share their photos and explain who is who and what they are doing.

– Snack: Any weekly snack donation is welcome on any day of the week. We ask for any fruit, vegetables and savoury snacks such as crackers, bread sticks or rice cakes.

-Look out for memos for your child being a focus child as we are starting this from this week and really value your input. We have 3-4 children a week as focus so your child will have a week either this term or next. Then again in the Spring and Summer term. The week after your child has been a focus child your key person will arrange a parental call with you to have a catch up to discuss how your child is doing and look at next steps.

We look forward to seeing you all tomorrow.

Best wishes

Zoe 😊