Nursery
8th July 2022
Are you ready for hot weather? With the sun shining upon us, our days are spent mostly outdoors apart from a lunch break and quiet time. Thank you for all the sun cream applied in the morning, sun hats and sun cream in the bags. Our Creepy Crawly topic officially began this week as we went on a hunt for them at the beginning of the week and discovered their hiding places! It was fun to try and take each and every one to the Bug Hotel – I wonder if you have one at home in your garden? We have shared a story about a Lazy Ladybird as part of our Communication and Language session and sang Creepy Crawly songs with Incy Wincy and Little Miss Muffet; changing the name of the bugs that sat next to Miss/Mr Muffet. In Maths, we have played games with our beanbag ladybirds as we subitised the spots and were able to say its name e.g. I have a 2 3 ladybird, you have a 1 2 ladybird. We have also all enjoyed a BINGO themed week this week as we have played Summer bingo for our Listening game, met a new character called Bingo (am sure you all know her!) and sang a song about her. It was fun to replace each of her letter names with a clap as part of our Music session. Apologies if the song made it home, it really is a hard one to remove from your head. Outdoors we have enjoyed Theo’s dough disco with a classic S Club 7 track, Reach. Enjoy - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=50kP4S0peAs Next week, alongside our Creepy Crawly topic, we are planning on having a Computing week. We are learning about “how things work” by using toys with moving parts, technology. Would you be able to send in one toy from home on one day (we have 26 to get through potentially!) which uses technology to make it move, light up, make sound? Choose the toy, choose the day and let the Show and Tell fun begin! Get the paddling pools out this weekend everyone! Have fun! Mrs Mander, Mrs Allen, Mrs Franklin, Mrs Thomas X |
1st July 2022
Happy July! Three more weeks to go and for the first year ever, we will be saying goodbye to all of you as you head off to big school. For those of you who are off to Red class in September, story club is on Thursday 7th July 8.35-9. If you do not usually attend on a Thursday, come and join your friends with a normal drop off and we will take you back to grownups at 9am. Another non-dough disco week as we have revisited a classic thanks to Aahil and Sammy – Baby Shark. Enjoy - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XqZsoesa55w Our Bear Hunt on Monday was a huge success as we explored all the classrooms in school and found each and every one. We hope your pictures made it home and you got to share them with your family. Can you remember the name of them all? Miss Muddy Boots, Redmond, Olive, George Cadbury, Lionel, Nightingale. Lunch in the hall completed our morning as we learnt some of the new routines facing lots of you in September and even took some back into the cabin with our own lunch routine. The rest of the week has mostly been spent outdoors, exploring signs of summer and playing outdoor circle time games. A favourite circle time game was “Muddy over the ocean” in our Music session as you had to sing and move around the circle to the beat of the song, being ready for if Muddy landed behind you. Another highlight was a Mrs Allen outdoor craft activity as you talked about and made some jelly fish using some super fine motor skills. A message for parents – we hope to see you all at the summer fayre tomorrow on the playground and field between 12:00-2:00. Please come and find us on the “produce” stall where you are able to purchase something the children (and Mrs Allen) have worked hard to make. Have a lovely weekend everyone! Mrs Mander, Mrs Allen, Mrs Franklin, Mrs Thomas X |
24th June 2022
Happy Friday Everyone! What a week of glorious sunshine we have had – so much fun outside and am sure you have returned home every day quite messy from all that outdoor fun. Bobby chose our dough disco this week which led to lots of conversations about the heart and its job. Enjoy this clip over the weekend – My Heart Goes, Becky Hill. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fseQRnEV9BQ . Try and teach your family the three different actions to work those fingers, wrists and arms. With all of the outdoor Play and Explore time, we have also had time to play some circle time games with the ball – Silent Ball and Hot Potato. In Maths we have been creating the boy/girl pattern and playing against each other to see who could spot the mistake first. With summer being our topic, Mrs Allen has been busy making a special summer flower ready for you to sell at the Summer Fayre next Saturday (2nd July). Please do come along between 12pm and 2pm and find the teachers’ stall! Summer is always a fun season to explore and we have had a lot of giggles as we have been learning about which parts of our body we can use to explore summer things. Can you remember the five parts of the body you can use to explore? Next week, we are going to have some fun with our own senses wheels. A message for parents – with the whole school off on their summer trip on Monday, we will be going on a Bear Hunt and following our maps to find all the Blackwell Bears in each of the classes. Can you remind the children on the weekend of the five different class colours – Red, Green, Purple, Yellow, Blue to support them. Have a lovely weekend everyone! Mrs Mander, Mrs Allen, Mrs Franklin, Mrs Thomas X |
17th June 2022
Happy Summer Everyone! Welcome back after the final half term and welcome back to our final season – summer. With the weather being so settled, we have all been enjoying a longer morning session outdoors as we have headed straight into the Forest School as soon as you have arrived. Thank you to your grownups for putting that sun cream on before you arrive and providing sunhats, sun cream in bags. Without these, Forest School isn’t quite the same with the small shady space you are safe to play in. We have completed two weeks now and are having a final push to strengthen our hands, wrists and arms with our dough disco. Last week, Eleni chose a classic song by Sister Sledge, We are Family https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oMVe_HcyP9Y and this week we have had our silliest song this year chosen by William; What does the Fox say? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jofNR_WkoCE Without technology in Nursery we aren’t able to watch these video clips so would love you to watch at home over the weekend if you can? Make sure you teach your families your foxy fingers and am sure they would enjoy hearing some of the sounds a fox makes….. We have taken all of our other learning outside as we have been creating repeating patterns with natural objects in Maths, talking about and sharing Daddy stories in our C&L outdoors story area and creating sunflowers with Mrs Allen as part of our Art topic. In Music we have been learning how to move our bodies to the music with our songs Old King Glory and Lost my Partner. A message for parents – when your pick up times change day by day, please can you ensure that you let us know at drop off in the morning the time you will be collecting and make it clear to the children as well. Messages from 3 and 4 year olds are not always accurate. Happy Father’s Day to all of our Daddies. We hope the card makes it safe and crease free to you! Mrs Mander, Mrs Allen, Mrs Franklin, Mrs Thomas X |
Nursery news
27th May 2022
Happy Half Term Everyone! Didn’t they do a super job at Sports Day today. Thank you for coming to watch and cheer them on. After years without an audience, it was fabulous to have everyone back together again. Long may it continue. Evie’s dough disco choice https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VQ4qrcHyYj4 of Gold by Spandau Ballet certainly inspired us to get to the finish line first! As part of our C&L, we have enjoyed many discussions about the Queen. At the beginning of the week we were unsure who the lady was in the photo and we finish the week, with a bank of facts about her. My funniest moment was Emily’s comment – “she is even older than my mummy”. We hope you are sharing some of these facts at home and hope you get to take part in the celebrations next weekend. Look out for those horses Carly! This half term has flown by and we cannot believe we have only one more half term with the children before they move on to their next chapter. We hope you all enjoy your holiday and the children recharge ready for the final half term of outdoor fun!
Have a lovely break everyone! Mrs Mander, Mrs Allen, Mrs Franklin, Miss Turner X |
20th May 2022
Happy Friday! As we continue to be intrigued by the lifecycles of our caterpillars, who have now spun their cocoons and are ready to be transferred to their net, we moved on to a new topic – Sports. In the cabin we have been talking about and trying to recreate a piece of artwork by Joan Miro, “Running Man” and outdoors, our Sports Day events practice has begun. We are looking forward to taking part in the whole school event next Friday at 10.45am – meet you on the school field. Cyril Squirrel has had us laughing once again during Phonics as we tried to play bingo with him – not that easy when he says all his words wrong. We then enjoyed playing with some of Cyril’s squirrel friends with the Music game of “Let us Chase the Squirrels” where the squirrels had to escape from the old oak tree. Erin chose our Dough Disco song this week – Havana, Camilla Cabello https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uSMA_4lhWeM (skip to 2 minutes in for the actual song). We have been circling our arms up high and taking our dough around the globe to meet Camilla in America. I don’t know about you but my arms are aching this week, surely my handwriting will have improved! Next week, Evie’s choice which is perfect for our sporting event. In Maths we have been learning all about the triangle – can you tell your families this weekend about what you know about the triangle? There is one thing I know, they are very tricky to find outdoors so we made our own and played a game of hide and seek with our friends. In Forest School Mrs Allen has been having fun teaching you how to play “What’s the Time Mr Wolf” and a throwing game with hoops and beanbags, alongside practising our three races for next Friday! A message for parents – please ensure you take the time this weekend to look at messages on parentapp. Alongside sports day, there is a lot happening and organised as a whole school for the Queen’s Jubilee. Look out for the clothing (Wednesday and Friday), coin (all week) and food (Friday) requests. Have a lovely weekend everyone! Mrs Mander, Mrs Allen, Mrs Franklin, Miss Turner X |
13th May 2022
Happy Friday! Thank you Savannah for your Dough Disco choice this week – La Bamba, Los Lobos. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g6T85X1ClmI This has been a huge hit and for those of you heading into Red class in September, you will need to know this song for your Wake and Shake competitions. We are starting to see the results of the daily dough disco sessions as we move onto scissor skills for the final term. A big thank you to all those grownups at home that have already taught you how to use safely. In Music, we have been singing and dancing to Jump Jim Joe as we move our bodies to the beat of the song. Our Listening game has been all about Listening to the Words as we played Fruit Salad with real fruit and then pictorial fruit from the Hungry Caterpillar. During Phonics, our tricky rhyming topic continues – this week with rhyming pairs in the wagon. You are beginning to spot when the wagons have been mixed up and the pairs do not match, let’s hope you can transfer these skills to our Odd One Out Rhyming game coming soon. In Maths we have been recognising dice patterns and beginning to make them ourselves. Next week is a triangle week. Spotting these in the outdoors is challenging so if you do spot over the weekend, please email photos in for us to use! For our topic, sharing baby photos with our friends is always a hit and it was lovely to hear how far you have come on your own lifecycle journey already. Comments like “I didn’t have a knife and fork as I ate with my fingers” from Evie and “I couldn’t stand up as my legs didn’t work” from Penelope are filling Mrs James, our school Science lead, with joy. Outdoors Mrs Allen has been showing you how to make salt dough and how you can use this with mirrors to make your own salt dough face. In the afternoons, it has been all about the knots! Practising how to tie a simple knot and how you can use these to connect things has been fun. A message for parents – as per parentapp, the Early Years Jubilee Sport’s Day is on Friday 27th May at 10.45-11.30am on the school field. If your child does not attend on this day, feel free to bring them along to the school field and they can come and join the team. Enjoy the sun this weekend everyone! Mrs Mander, Mrs Allen, Mrs Franklin, Miss Turner X |
6th May 2022
Happy May Everyone! Many thanks to you all for the baby photos – the children are loving seeing/spotting on the cupboard. As we move through the lifecycle topic, the final stop is the human lifecycle where these photos really help to support the children’s learning. Frogs and Butterflies have been on the menu for the last two weeks. Last week Mrs Allen was feeling all crafty as she showed you how to make your own jumping frogs and create a lifecycle plate. Our new friends arrived on Monday, the caterpillars – this is a chance for us to observe the lifecycle happening before our eyes. All they seem to do is eat! They are very hungry! I am sure the children will keep you all posted on their progress over the coming weeks. In the cabin, we are in full swing with our circle times too. Our Listening games have been about revisiting our listening rules as we have been finding hidden music machines using only our ears – it was tricky to Stay Quiet for this game! In Phonics we have moved into our new topic of Rhyming. Our Rhyming chant is a great warm up as we listen and repeat rhyming words to the song Happy. This week, Cyril Squirrel has made an appearance and has needed your help with your names. Every year he is terrible at remembering them and loves playing games with you to help him. As we switch our sessions for the final term, our Gross Motor skills session moves onto the trim trail after lunch (always a huge hit!) and our Fine Motor dough disco session moves into the morning. We have enjoyed moving the dough to Miss Turner’s choice with a song from Encanto (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yp5nPGWWMh4) and this week, Hugo’s choice with a song from Lion King (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0bGjlvukgHU). Last week in Maths we enjoyed exploring the skill of one more as we added one more to our tally marks with a traffic survey outside the front of school. This week, dice are on the menu as we have been spotting our dice patterns and using these to compete against each other in our two player games. A message for parents – as we move into the Spring, we notice the weather warming up. On those sunny days please remember to send the children in wearing a sun hat, sun cream applied and a bottle of cream/spray in their bag if they are staying all day for us to help them apply for the afternoon session. Enjoy your warm weekend all! Mrs Mander, Mrs Allen, Mrs Franklin, Miss Turner X |