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!
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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! We have been thinking about what makes us feel happy and have created some collaborative 'Happiness Art' inspired by Spring flowers! One of them will be given to the residents and staff at Lymehurst Rest Home and the other will be displayed in the Nursery. We hope that they make you feel happy when you look at them! To celebrate World Book Day the children were each given a special book token to use for a new book, we brought them in to share . . . And then designed lovely book marks to use in them! Perhaps you could design your own book mark - what would you put on the front? We went for a walk to have a look at some of the lovely daffodils that are growing in our school grounds Here are just a few of the comments made by some of the children: Parker - "They were good, they were all everywhere!" Bootsy - "They're like the sunshine!" Amelia - "They look lovely!" Jess - "I liked them because they're pretty" Bella - "They're growing together" "They're like stars, they're the same shape" Have you got any daffodils growing in your garden? Which other spring flowers do you like? After reading about Kipper's birthday we decided to have our own special party for him! The children decorated party hats to wear and we had colourful balloons hanging from the ceiling. And of course we all sang 'Happy Birthday' to Kipper as he blew out his candle and made a wish! Kipper had a wonderful birthday!
We would love to hear how you celebrate your special day - post us a comment and let us know. We have been thinking about what we would need to have a good birthday party and after sharing our ideas made a list of the three most popular suggestions . . . We then read the story of 'Kipper's Birthday' and discussed our favourite part . . . Ayla said "I love about the story the birthday cake" "It's got candles on it and its got icing on and it's got jam inside" The cake was also Megan's favourite part of the story - "I loved the birthday cake, it was so sweet" Evelyn told us "I like the balloons, they're so perfect. They've got colours on them, they're so beautiful" Evelyn was very excited when a red balloon arrived in the Nursery for Kipper!
On Tuesday it was Safer Internet Day and the theme was 'Want to talk about it?'. This week, after discussing some of the different types of technology that the children use at home, we shared the online story of 'Hanni and the Magic Window' which is about speaking out and getting help when required. We created our own 'Magical Window' and the children shared their ideas of what magical worlds or experiences they would like to see when they looked through it . . . We also talked about what we could do if we saw something we didn't like before then
playing a board game - 'Can you help me please?' - helping the children to practise asking for help in a range of different situations. This week we have been looking at a variety of toy pictures created from a range of different shapes. The children chose their favourite from a rocket, train, rabbit or clown . . . Some of the children also had a go at printing their shape picture! Evelyn's train You could have a go at creating your own toy picture - which shapes would you use?
How would you describe their different properties? Perhaps you could try and make a robot, or maybe a teddy - let us know how you get on! We have been having fun outside on the playground as we explored some of our number related games such as the giant snakes and ladders and hopscotch! Which numerals can you spot in the photographs? Have you got a favourite number game that you like to play outdoors - we would love to hear what it is! This week we have been having lots of fun designing and making our own wooden spoon puppets! Perhaps you could design and make your own wooden spoon puppet. What would you base your design on? Which resources would you use? We would love to hear about your ideas!
We have been finding out about Chinese New Year and after sharing the story of the Chinese Zodiac we held our own animal races, it was exciting watching to see which order the animals were going to be in . . . 2023 is the Year of the Rabbit! We were feeling hungry after all of that racing - so it was lovely to be able to enjoy some Chinese food when we went back inside! We had rice, noodles and sweet & sour sauce - which would have been your favourite? Will you be celebrating Chinese New Year?
We would love to hear from you - post us a comment and let us know! This term we have a new focus author and will be sharing lots of books written by Mick Inkpen. We all enjoyed the story of Kipper's Toybox and found out what happened when he thought that one of his toys had come to life! Afterwards the children shared some of their favourite parts from the story . . . Stanley - "Mouse was in the sock and wriggling" Amber - "The mouse made the hole in the toybox" Bella - "The dog saw the mouse's nose" Jess - "The mice nibbled the basket" Farrah - "More mice nibbled Kipper's toybox" As a follow-up activity, we used our own Sock Thing and toybox to help develop understanding and use of positional vocabulary such as 'on top', 'behind' and 'inside' etc. The mice had nibbled a hole in the corner of our toy box too!
We are looking forward to joining Kipper and his friends for lots more adventures. Have you got any of his story books at home? We would love to hear about your favourite one, post us a comment and let us know. The children have been taking part in a variety of Christmas related activities, including creating cards and decorations to give to loved ones . . . Here are a few of the completed ones . . . We have also been creating repeating patterns with a Christmas related theme! Megan chose to use the trees, repeating the sequence of decorated followed by un-decorated. She used the size-related vocabulary of 'enormous' and 'tiny' to describe them. Bootsy chose to use both the stars and the Christmas trees to create her pattern, repeating the sequence of a tree followed by a star. When describing the size of each, she used the vocabulary of 'big', 'medium' and 'small'. On the last day of term, we had a very special visitor . . . He brought some lovely presents for us all to share, the crocodile rocker was a definite favourite! We are also looking forward to exploring the wooden farm, the wheel garage with a car and the caterpillar rainmaker when we return to Nursery in January. On behalf of everyone at Little Conkers, we would like to wish you all a very
Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! We have been supporting Save the Children's Christmas Jumper Day! Thank you to everyone that made a donation This week we have been so proud of the children as they have taken part in our Early Years Foundation Stage Nativity 'The Lonely Little Sheep' There were sheep and shepherds As well as angels and stars It was lovely to see so many of you joining us for each performance, and I'm sure that you would agree the children were absolutely wonderful! The children have been excited to see our Christmas tree decorated and lit up in the Nursery this week and they have been busy practising with the Reception classes ready for our two performances of 'The Lonely Little Sheep'. We have been talking about the story of baby Jesus and the children have enjoyed making the link between the characters that they are playing themselves in our own Nativity such as sheep, shepherds, angels and stars. For those of you that are able to come and join us for the performances next week, we hope that you enjoy them! This week we have been enjoying 'The Gruffalo's Child' by Julia Donaldson . . . The Gruffalo said that no gruffalo should Ever set foot in the deep dark wood As we shared the story together, the children excitedly predicted which character would
be revealed next as the Gruffalo's Child went in search of the Big Bad Mouse! They also enjoyed hearing what each of them said the Mouse would be doing such as eating gruffalo cake or gruffalo pie and drinking gruffalo tea! Last week we had had fun making shadows linked to the story of Night Monkey, Day Monkey and this week we came across another shadow - this creature was big, bad and strong. He had a tail and some whiskers that were terribly long, his ears were enormous and over his shoulder he carried a nut as big as a boulder - can you guess who it was? Throughout the story there were different prints in the snow - as the weather is getting colder we might have some snow of our own soon! Perhaps you could wrap up warm and go outside to make some different trails for your family and friends to follow! We have been taking a closer look at some of the autumn leaves this week and have sorted them according to their size. Although we used the labels 'big', 'medium' and 'small', we talked about which other size related words we could use such as 'little', 'middle sized' and 'large'. When Parker picked up his first leaf he said "Big, it's very big!" He then found one which he said was "Small" and then one which he decided was "Medium". Parker found a smaller leaf which he told us was "Small, it's very small". Ted picked up his first leaf and said "It's really big!" before picking up another one and saying "It's nice and smaller". Ted described one of the other leaves as "Pointy" and when asked about its size, decided it was "Medium". Picking up his final leaf, Ted said "It's small". As Amelia picked up her first leaf, she said "That's a big one!" which was followed by finding a "Little one" before picking up another and saying "That's really big!". Amelia matched a leaf to one she already had - "That goes with that one" and when asked about its size, she said "It's medium". Amelia decided that the last leaf she had chosen was "Small". Perhaps you could collect some leaves to sort too - can you think of some other size related vocabulary that you could use? Post us a comment and let us know! This week we have been sharing another Julia Donaldson book that we have hanging on our tree in the book corner - Night Monkey, Day Monkey! In the story we joined the two main characters as they learned about each other's opposite worlds alongside learning to be the best of friends. We commented on different parts of their adventure as we went through the story with Bella telling us "Frogs say ribbit"! and when Day Monkey thought there was a banana in the sky, she laughed and said "It's a moon". As we got to the part of the story where there were some butterflies Bella told everyone "My mummy likes butterflies" and when asked why, Bella replied "She likes the colours". In another part of the story we talked about how the shadows of the two monkeys had been created, then after we had finished the book, we had lots of fun creating our own shadows on the whiteboard! The children really enjoyed this story - we hope you do too. We would love to hear about your favourite part, post us a comment and let us know! We have been having fun with Gruffalo and Pudsey Bear today! After a range of activities focussing on the letters 'o' and 'p' the children thought about whether they preferred the Gruffalo's orange eyes or purple prickles, and if they thought that Pudsey should have orange or purple spots on his new bandana. They then wrote a message for each of them to find which we took outside to hang on the tree! What would you have written for your message?
Post us a comment and let us know! Gruffalo has been enjoying spending time in the nursery and he would like to go for another walk in the school grounds but he is a bit worried that he might forget the way back. He asked the children to use some of his autumn treasures to create a repeating pattern for him so that he could follow it and get back to us! Gruffalo enjoyed taking a look at all the different trails that had been created by
everyone - which of the autumn treasures would you have used? Today we have been talking about why some people wear a poppy at this time of year. After watching an animation based on the experience of some animal inhabitants of a WW1 battlefield, we created our own collaborative poppy picture using a variety of media, materials and different tools. Once we had created the background, we waited for it to dry before choosing what we would like to use to make our poppy and then adding it to the field. At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them This week we have been thinking about Autumn! As we shared the children's current knowledge, Bella told us "When the wind blows the leaves fall off" before going on to say "They get yellow". We went outside for a walk in the school grounds to look at our trees and see how they were changing before using some of the leaves and twigs to create our own collaborative autumn tree! The Gruffalo also enjoys going for walks in the wood during this time of year and he brought us in some of his autumn treasures for the children to explore. Ada enjoyed telling us about each one: Pine cone - "It feels spiky under there. It feels a bit cold" Conker - "It feels bumpy" Leaf - "It's crunchy" What do you enjoy the most about Autumn? Post us a comment and let Gruffalo know! We have been talking about keeping safe on Bonfire Night and after sharing a number rhyme about 'Five Little Rockets' we had a firework fitness session where the children had lots of fun waving streamers to represent the flames of a bonfire and then exploring different movements as they pretended to be a sparkler, rocket, banger and a Catherine wheel! We also shared the children's own previous experiences of bonfires and fireworks . . . We talked about making sure that pets and animals were also safe and that everyone should stand well back from a bonfire, with children being supervised at all times.
Please remember that you should never give sparklers to children under five, and for those children that are five and over, ensure that they wear gloves and when finished, put the sparkler in a bucket of water. We hope that you all enjoy a SAFE and happy Bonfire Night! |
AuthorWelcome to the Nursery Class at Greenfields Archives
November 2023
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