Welcome to Nursery!

Each week we'll be keeping you up to date with our weekly blog. In addition to this, please read our half-termly curriculum map to find out what will be happening in nursery. 

Important information

Please keep checking Tapestry to find your child's observations and information about their key worker. 

Nursery doors open at 8:55am. If you are coming into the school grounds earlier, please do not use any of the resources or equipment that have been set up. It is important our outside area is ready for a day of learning. 

Books

You will be able to change your love of reading book from our lending library basket every Wednesday. The basket will be available at pick up and drop off for you to choose and swap your books ready to enjoy and share at home. If your child accesses our wraparound, we will support them to choose a book to bring home. 

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Summer 2

Week 2

This week we have had a very exciting visit from Librarian Kate from Frasley library! She also brought us a library card for our class and has let us borrow some books all about adventure, we are very excited to read them! We have also been counting to 5 and singing songs such as five little speckled frogs to help us see one more and one less when counting. We have been making the most of the good weather being outside, and have been testing lots of different vehicles on our ramps outside! 

 

Week 1

This week Nursery have settled back into our routines brilliantly, and we are excited for our visit from Librarian Kate next week! We have been focusing on starting to practise for Sports Day and have been balancing beanbags, and practising races with our friends! We have also been retelling our story The Train Ride with actions, and the children have absolutely loved making their own train rides in our small world train track area. Despite the sunshine and showers, we have still been enjoying our outside learning, and have noticed lots of baby ladybirds in our outdoor area! We have discussed what changes they might go through and where they might live.  

 

Summer 1

Week 1

This week in Nursery we have been learning all about Easter and we have been doing egg hunts, learning about the meaning behind why Christians celebrate Easter. We have also been re4ading the story Five Little Easter Buns and repeating the story together. In Maths we have been learning to subitise to 3 and the children have been listening and counting sounds, they have done so well with this! 

 

Week 2

This week at Nursery we have been enjoying the sunshine and have been outside as much as possible! Please can we remind parents to send children in with sun cream labelled and water bottles, and to apply before they arrive at Nursery. We have been looking at shapes in preparation for our shape hunt next week, and in phonics we have been focusing on differentiating the initial sound between "s" and "m". We have also read the story Dear Zoo by our focus author and retold the story using actions. The children have been busy making crates in our workshop for the different animals.

   

 

Week 3

This week in Nursery we have been very busy celebrating VE Day, making shape print pictures, and drawing animals from our Dear Zoo book. We have made bunting and hung it up in our classroom, and have talked about why we celebrate VE Day. We have also drawn some lovely animal pictures for our gallery wall, some children drew lovely giraffes and monkeys! We have been focusing on physical development with our open session and we really enjoyed seeing all the parents playing and learning with the children. 

Week 4

This week the nursery children have been learning to orally blend words together in preparation for Reception. We have used CVC words to begin with and the children have been finding these in our classroom and blending the sounds with adults and their friends. We have also had a very exciting visitor from Lion Learners on Monday, who brought in so many exotic animals for the children to hold and learn about! We held tarantulas, lizards, guinea pigs and tortoises, and the children were all so brave and had a go! 

Week 5

This week we have had a lovely last week at Nursery before the holidays! We have been making the most of the nice weather by playing outside on the bike track and climbing area, and some children even made sunbeds and have been telling us all about the different holidays they are going on next week! We have been retelling the poem Under a Stone using actions, and we have been learning all about what a vet is and how they help us to look after our pets. Have a lovely break nursery and we will see you in June!

   

Spring 2

 

Week 6

This week in Nursery we have been enjoying being outside more in the sunshine! We have been very busy using our chalk to draw wavy lines and crosses like we have found in our Hungry Caterpillar Hide and Seek book. The children drew caterpillars and made some interesting marks! We have also been busy matching Numicon plates and checking in our caterpillars to see if they have emerged yet, we hope they do before Friday! 

 

   

 

Week 5

This week we have been very excited to see our caterpillars change into chrysalis! We are hoping they transform into butterflies before the Easter holidays next week. We have also had a caterpillar hunt outside after we read The Very Hungry Caterpillar's hide and seek story book. We really enjoyed searching for butterflies and caterpillars! In our fine motor and small world areas we have enjoyed exploring more materials linked to Spring, with wood and flowers being threaded into different patterns. We have also had a special visitor this week - the dentist! Every child has been given a tooth brushing pack so please do bring the chart back once it has been completed for a small prize. 

Week 4

This week we have really enjoyed celebrating Red Nose Day! We have had lots of fun activities throughout the week and on Friday we celebrated a special day with all our friends. We learnt what Red Nose Day raises money for, and we helped by having our own cake sale. We are excited to see what our grand total is!

Week 3

This week we have been learning all about what a caterpillar is, and how they grow and change over their life cycle. We have also been drawing beanstalks from our story Jasper's Beanstalk, and have been watching how our caterpillars in their special home are getting bigger and bigger! In Maths we have been focusing on matching colours with numbers, and ordering correctly up to 5. The children have been doing really well with this and wanted to keep going up to 10! 

Week 2

This week has been a very exciting week at Nursery with Pancake Day AND World Book Day in the same week! We enjoyed making Eric Carel's bear with our handprints, flipping pancakes and retelling the story of Mr Wolf's Pancakes, and with the weather being so lovely we have enjoyed lots of time outside. The children have been busy planting beans and retelling Jasper's Beanstalk outside, and we are hoping we will be able to look for giants next week! We have also been looking for signs of Spring such as plants growing, the weather being warmer, and some of us have shared that we have visited the farm and seen some baby animals! We look forward to another fun-filled week next week!

 

    

 

Week 1

This week in Nursery we have been looking at our new author Eric Carle's books. We have retold Jasper and The Beanstalk using actions, and have begun to retell more independently with our partners! We have also been making lots of silly soup in Maths, subitising numbers 1, 2 and 3 with different objects and dotty plates! Can you try this at home? With the we4ather brightening up, we have been hunting for signs of Spring outside, with the children noticing there are some plants starting to grow, and more sunshine! 

 

 

 

Spring 1

 

Week 6

This week Nursery have been very busy with lots of Valentine's activities! We have done a love heart hunt, talked about people we love and why after reading "My Dad is Brilliant" by our focus author Nick Butterworth, and made some love heart collages in our workshop area. We have also been discussing how to play safely and how to stay safe at school, using lots of discussion and stories to help us understand how rules keep us safe. We have also been making lots of obstacle courses after talking about positional language in our carpet discussions.

 

Week 5

This week at Nursery we have been learning the traditional tale "The Three Little Pigs", and the children have been retelling the story using actions and different props. We also read an alternative tale called "Blow Your Nose, Big Bad Wolf!" and learnt how to properly blow our noses and wash our hands. We have also been counting to 3 and showing 1 and not 1 in our Maths area. It has also been Children's Mental Health Week, and we have looked at ways we can calm ourselves down if we feel angry or sad.

Week 4

This week nursery have learned about number 5. We have counted up to 5 using five frames, and different objects. We also made a dragon and dragon masks to celebrate Lunar New Year, and learned the makaton sign for this as well as learning about the traditions that people follow. We learned that red and gold are lucky colours! The children were also fantastic at telling us what makes a bird: feathers, wings, a beak and laying eggs! We looked at birds from the UK and also looked at some interesting birds from New Zealand and Africa!

 

Week 3

This week nursery continued to learn about number 4. We looked at how 4 can be made in different ways, using a range of objects. We enjoyed using musical instruments to play along to nursery rhymes. We continued to retell Snow Still using actions and a story map to help us. Our artist this half-term is Joan Miro. We practised drawing lines and shapes to create our own piece of artwork. With it being windy, the children made their own kites to fly outside. It was so much fun!

Week 2 

It was another busy week in nursery. We enjoyed the snow last week but we are glad it warmed up a bit so we could play on the bikes. In maths, we have been learning all about the number 4. We sorted objects into 4 and not 4. We started to read Snow Still with actions to help us remember the story.

Week 1

What a snowy and icy week we have had! Nursery children enjoyed playing outside in the snow, making snow balls and snow men. The children that started this week have settled in well and enjoyed exploring the different areas. 

 

 

Autumn 2 

Week 7

It has been an exciting week at nursery. We enjoyed the Christmas party, had a visit from Santa ate party food and played games. Outside, we went on an elf hunt and looked all over the outdoor area to find the hidden elves. We hope you have an amazing Christmas and look forward to seeing you in the new year.

Week 6 

This week in nursery, we made Christmas trees in the playdough and used different decorations to make them look realistic. We enjoyed making Christmas cards to send home, adding sequins and glitter to the trees. In the workshop, we practised our scissor control by wrapping presents and cutting ribbon. Outside, we built the North Pole express train using crates and wooden blocks.

 

 

Week 5

We had another exciting week in nursery. We used our senses to explore hot chocolate making. The children really enjoyed exploring different textures. The advent calendar arrived in nursery. Everyone is really excited to open it each day and see what is inside. We made gingerbread people in the playdough and creative area and added different materials to them. We enjoyed listening to stories from our mystery readers this week. Thank you to everyone that came to read a story. 

Week 4

This week our story was Stick Man and we enjoyed learning actions to the story and joining in with repeated phrases. We created our own stick man outside, using different materials. With the weather still cold, we explored ice and tried to rescue stick man out of the ice.

Nursery worked together as a team to make and build a boat. Different materials were stuck onto the sail and sides to make it more interesting. We enjoyed sitting in the boat once it was made.

It was a very exciting end to the week as the Christmas tree went up. Everyone added a bauble to the tree. We are looking forward to lots more Christmas activities over the coming weeks. 

 

Week 3

We had another busy week in nursery, our focus artist is Wassily Kadinsky. We looked at a range of his artwork, looking at different shapes and colours. Nursery focused on drawing circles and then created their own artwork. The artwork looked amazing!

Nursery were excited about the snow that arrived earlier in the week. We wrapped up and made a snowman. Some children explored the ice and we talked about why it melts.
 

 

 

Week 2

This week was busy in nursery, we started to learn the story Each Peach Pear Plum. We drew a story map and added actions to help us remember the sequence of events. Children picked part of the story to draw, this helped us practise our fine motor skills. It was remembrance on Monday, we explored making a poppy out of loose parts. The children really enjoyed being creative and choosing their own resources. Nursery enjoyed wearing odd socks for anti bullying week. We pinned socks up on a washing line and talked about how some socks looked different.

 

Week 1

This week nursery have been learning about different celebrations. We created diya lamps and read Rama and Sita to celebrate Diwali. Children enjoyed role playing how to stay safe around a bonfire and created lots of firework pictures. As remembrance day is coming up, nursery created a poppy wreath by printing poppies with paint to create a large wreath. 

Week 2

This week was busy in nursery, we started to learn the story Each Peach Pear Plum. We drew a story map and added actions to help us remember the sequence of events. Children picked part of the story to draw, this helped us practise our fine motor skills. It was remembrance on Monday, we explored making a poppy out of loose parts. The children really enjoyed being creative and choosing their own resources. Nursery enjoyed wearing odd socks for anti bullying week. We pinned socks up on a washing line and talked about how some socks looked different.

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Autumn 1

Week 8

This week we have been learning the story 'Room on the Broom'. We have been learning lots of new words linked to the story. We have been making potions and painting pumpkins. We have been learning all about the number 1, exploring how 1 can been shown in different ways. We also have our first 'Mystery Readers' each day a different parent came to share a story with us! 

Week 7

This week we have been learning our Breezy Day poem. We used my turn, your turn and actions to help us learn the poem by heart. Then we used different joining techniques to create windsocks. We flew our windsocks and performed our poem outside. 

On Monday we completed our annual welly walk. We managed to complete 10 laps! Well done nursery!

We have been using songs such a 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, once I caught... and 1 potato, 2 potato... to help us recognise numbers. 

Week 6

What a busy week we have had! This week we have read our new story Rosie's Walk. We used puppet, props and Makaton to help learn the story. We have loved the new addition of Duplo in our construction area. We used our mathematical language of size and colour to describe and compare what we had built. On Thursday we wore yellow to make Mental Health Day a little brighter. 

Week 5

In nursery this week we have been reading Owl Babies and our poem Wise Old Owl. We thought about how the owls would feel when their mummy wasn't there and when she returned. We used our zones of regulation to help us. Then we recapped our circulation motion to draw an owl using two circle. 

We have had an exciting addition to our home corner, a baby girl called Jessica! We have been thinking about how to look after a baby and what she needs.

Week 4

This week we recapped our primary colours and used them to make green and purple. We used the book, 'Mixed' to help us. Then we explored the painting area using our new steps! We have been practising the motion round and round. We have been using scarves during physical development to help us. 

Week 3

This week in nursery we have been learning the prime colours. We have been identifying red, blue and yellow objects, using the colours in our paint area and sorting the colours in our funky fingers gym. We started to use these colours in the book, 'The Colour Monster' to help identify our feelings and emotions. We thought about what our face looked like when we felt those emotions. We are going to start using our Zones of Regulation display in class to identify and show others how we are feeling. 

Week 2

Wow, what a busy week we have had! Well done to all our children for such a positive start to the school year. This week has been very busy exploring the different areas inside and outside and learning our new routine. This week we have focused on using the bike track and the climbing area. We have used lots of physical strength!