When out and about in the school grounds we have been trying to spot different shapes in the environment and then once back inside we have created 'shape' pictures of either our house or someone special to us . . . Perhaps you could create your own shape picture - which different shapes would you use? Post us a comment and let us know!
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Over the past couple of weeks the children have been enjoying their first Forest School session. Whatever the weather, as you can see they had lots of fun! This week we have been singing 'Heads, shoulders, knees and toes' and have been naming the different parts of our body. Afterwards we went out onto the playground and used different parts of our body to explore some of the apparatus, as well as having fun chasing our shadows! This week we have been continuing with our induction sessions and as you can see the children have been familiarising themselves with some of the activities available . . . During our adult led activities we have also been busy and have been learning our circle time skills and talking about the importance of washing our hands really well. Alongside this, with a change in the weather we practised putting our coats on - before going outside to have fun dancing in the rain! It has been lovely to welcome all the new children that have joined our Little Conkers family this week for their first induction sessions. As well as getting to know each other, they have been having lots of fun exploring some of their new surroundings - as you can see below! We are looking forward to a lot more exploring and the creation of some lovely new
friendships when the children return for their remaining induction sessions next week. Hopefully there will be just as much excitement and just as many happy smiles! The rain had unfortunately led to our original Sports Day event having to be cancelled, so as you can imagine we were disappointed to wake up to heavy showers again on Monday morning. Thankfully however, there was a change in the weather and we were able to go ahead with our garden themed races in the afternoon! We were so proud of all the children, and it was great that so many loved ones were able to come along and cheer them on too! We then congratulated everyone and awarded them with a special certificate
as a lasting reminder of their day! This week we have had an exciting immersive story telling session where the children listen through headphones and respond to the instructions of the narrator, taking on the roles of different characters and acting out the main events. Puppet John also enjoys these sessions and likes to join in! For this story, we found ourselves at the seaside and meeting a pirate who had been shipwrecked and had lost his treasure. As the story unfolded we found ourselves promising to get the treasure back for him by going under the sea and having an adventure of our own. We not only met, but became the pirate, a fish, a jellyfish, a crab, an octopus and a wave. On our travels we also met a seal, a deep-sea diver and a surfer whilst learning some great new songs to sing! We have been sharing another lovely book written by our focus author, Ruth Galloway. Nipper hates his huge clumsy claws. They're no use at all - they just get in the way. He'd much rather have tickly tentacles like Octopus and Jellyfish or flippety fins like Turtle and the fish. But one day, when he's playing with his friends, Nipper finds his claws are very useful after all! Here are a few quotes from the children after we had shared the story together . . . Jess - "They were catching the bubbles and the bubble popped because the crab had snappy claws! The crab rolled down the hill, he got stuck in the sand" Megan - "The jellyfish got stuck in the sand" Luna - "The octopus was stuck in the seaweed" Amber - "The crab had pinchy things and the crab saved him" Parker - "I loved when the crab saved the octopus; he snapped his claws with the seaweed to get the octopus free!" Farrah - "I liked it when he pinched the seaweed, he got the octopus out" Which part of the story did you enjoy the most? We have been very creative this week with our 'under the sea' focus and have explored a variety of techniques during our Arts Week activities - we have had lots of fun! Using mark making tools to represent the scales on our salt dough fish before painting them Marble rolling on our sea creature templates Designing stained glass window effect sea creatures Creating colourful glittery fish And finishing off the week with our dangly jellyfish! Visit us in the Nursery during our School Open Evening and see
some more wonderful creations! As part of our new 'Under the Sea' focus, the children have been selecting from a range of 2D shapes to design their own 'Shape Fish'! Can you name each of the different shapes that they have used? How would you describe their properties? Perhaps you could design your own 'Shape Fish'! This half-term we are having a focus on story books written by Ruth Galloway. Octopus has eight twisty tentacles and he loves using them to tickle the fish, but one day his tickling causes Oyster to drop her precious pearl and we follow him on his adventure to try and get it back, meeting a fierce eel along the way! As we went through the book, the children commented on what was happening in the story . . . Ada - "The octopus tickled and the oyster pearl jumped out!" Bootsy considered how Octopus might be able to get it back - "With his tentacles, grab it!" Octopus managed to push his rubbery body through a tiny gap in the ocean floor Sofia - "He's so happy cause he's squashed down to get the pearl" But then he met the eel! Ted - "He's going to eat him! He's going to eat the octopus" Jess - "It's green, it's scary" She suggested Octopus should "Swim away really fast!" Bella - "The octopus will drop that (the pearl) if he goes really fast, he will have to find it again and squish down again" We won't spoil the ending by telling you what happened - you can enjoy reading the story and find out for yourself! We have been having a lot of fun playing 'copy cats' ! The children each had a percussion instrument and they looked and listened carefully to see which one had been selected to play. If they had the same, they would 'copy' the sound that had been made. We explored playing our instruments in different ways such as by tapping or shaking
them to see how it changed the sound produced and whether we could make either a loud or a quiet sound. We also compared the difference between fast and slow! This week we have been sharing the story of 'The Disgusted Dragon' as part of our focus on the new 'Big Feeling' for this half-term, 'disgust'. As a follow up activity, the children thought about what would make them feel disgusted like the dragon had been, and then what would make them smile again.
Slugs, slime and spiders were mentioned several times! We have been exploring some of the different apparatus out on the school playground . . . How many steps do you think you could have taken on the balance buckets? Can you think of at least three different ways to use the hoop? How many attempts do you think it would have taken for you to catch the ball in the cup? We all had lots of fun exploring and challenging ourselves! After planting our sunflower seeds, we looked at the famous 'Sunflowers' by Vincent Van Gogh, and the children were invited to have a go at creating their own interpretations. Sofia liked the original so much she was inspired to paint
two different versions, both of which we thought were wonderful! This week we have had a focus on sunflowers and have planted some seeds . . .
We wrote a label for each Group's pot
Now we are all going to be patient and show 'stickability' as we look after our seeds and wait to see which Group's sunflower will grow the tallest! We were very excited on Friday when nine baby chicks came to visit! We found out that they were two weeks old and that they are currently living inside a an old Guinea pig cage with a special heat mat to help keep them warm, along with some straw. They huddle together and sometimes jump on each other! Throughout the day the chicks eat special chick food which is mixed with grit and they have lots of fresh water, stretching their necks for it to go down! They will need to remain inside for another 10 weeks before being able to move outdoors. The eggs that they hatched from came from a farm and were placed in an incubator, they were collected from different breeds of chickens which is why the chicks are different colours. We had so much fun watching and handling them - we hope that they enjoyed
their visit as much as we did! We had a busy week in the Nursery preparing for the King's Coronation! The children started by selecting from a range of jewels which were different shapes and colours to create a repeating pattern and design a new crown for His Majesty We made sure that the Royal Castle was ready And then it was time to wear red, white and blue and create our own crowns to
wear at our Coronation party! This week we have been thinking about what our beans will need to have in order for them to grow well - compost, water and sun. We are going to show 'stickability' as we look after them and wait to see if we get a visit from any giants! Bootsy We have also been having fun taking part in an immersive story of Jack and the Beanstalk.
The children listened through headphones as the story was retold, taking on the roles of the different characters and acting out the main events. Puppet John enjoyed watching everyone so much that he decided to have a listen to the story himself - and was last seen climbing up our own beanstalk! It has been lovely to welcome the children back after the Easter break and this week we have been sharing the story of Jasper's Beanstalk We talked about what might happen next at various points in the story and considered similarities with the traditional tale of Jack and the Beanstalk - which we discovered Jasper was reading himself at the end of the book! For our new structured play area we have set up our own Beanstalk Builders where we have been busy constructing castles, tables, chairs and beds for Jasper, Jack and the giant. We have also planted some beans - and are wondering if they will turn out to be magic ones! After acting out a number rhyme about 'Five Easter Eggs in a Chocolate Shop' where the children counted how many eggs were left each time after one more had been bought and taken away, we went out into the Sensory Garden for our own little Easter Egg hunt! We have also been creating some lovely cards to give to our family . . . On behalf of everyone at Little Conkers, we would like to wish you all a very 'Happy Easter'! We have been raising money for Agape and Grayson, the two children that we sponsor at the East Meru Community School in Tanzania. Family and friends were invited to sponsor the Nursery children to explore the school grounds in search of five different spring related items . . . A couple of the items were a little tricky to find, but with good teamwork and great looking skills, they were all found in the end! We would like to say a huge 'THANK YOU' for the incredibly kind and generous donations which amounted to an amazing £168.50 which is absolutely fantastic and very much appreciated. Thank you so much to everyone that contributed. We have been reading 'Wibbly Pig has 10 Balloons' - another great book written by Mick Inkpen Afterwards we told each other what we enjoyed about this lovely story . . . Jess - "I liked the balloon, the teddy bear . . . because I liked it's face! I liked the little pig, I liked it's scarf and it's hat" Alessia - "I loved Wibbly Pig cause the balloon was floating, the teddy balloon was floating away and they was going to pop!" Bootsy - "The balloon, I like it . . . the love heart balloon, I like the colours" Evelyn - "I liked the balloon . . . yellow balloon" Sofia - "I liked the bear balloon cause I like bears" Ayla - "I liked the bear balloon cause it's so very nice!" Stanley - "My favourite part was the balloons, a bear balloon because it floated" Megan - "I liked the balloon, the heart balloon . . . that one was great!" Bella - "I love the little pig cause he had, because he cuddled Wibbly Pig and he had a heart balloon and then it popped and he's sad" Which character or balloon would have been your favourite? This week we invited our Mums and Nans to join us for a special Assembly where we shared the portraits we had created and told everyone why we love our mummy so much. We also made a lovely card to give to them along with some pretty daffodils. What will you be doing to celebrate on Sunday?
We hope that you will be able to take some time to relax, unwind and spend time with your loved ones - enjoy your special day! We have been finding out about the Hindu festival of Holi. This is a celebration of the arrival of spring flowers and when the main crops are almost ready for the spring harvest. The festival usually lasts anything from three to five days and is known as the festival of colour. Part of the festivities include throwing coloured powder over friends and family! After watching some video clips, we had a go at some Bollywood style dancing and the children also had the opportunity to contribute to our collaborative spring display where they had great fun 'splatter painting' the grass and flowers! Let's hope that we have some lovely warm sunshine as we enjoy the beautiful spring flowers - Happy Holi everyone! |
AuthorWelcome to the Nursery Class at Greenfields Archives
November 2023
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