Home Link – Christmas holidays and fairy tale stories
Home Link Activity
- Remember to send us photographs of your holiday adventures and Christmas or New Year celebrations.
Over the next few weeks in Nursery, we’re going to be listening to a lots of traditional tales. What is your child’s favourite fairy tale story?
Please write your child’s favourite story onto the children’s interest board in the entrance of nursery.
It would also be lovely to see some drawings, paintings or collages of characters, castles or scenes from their favourite story. We’d love to brighten up our corridor and will display them on the Home Link notice board for everybody to see.
Thank you.
Welcome back to nursery 2018!
Welcome back to nursery. We hope that you had a lovely break and enjoyed the Christmas and New Year celebrations. We were really pleased to see so many happy and excited children on their first day back last week. It’s lovely to know that children enjoy coming to nursery and that they feel happy and safe, and have formed good friendships with their peers and staff.
Children were keen to share their news about Father Christmas and to tell us about some of their holiday adventures. However, two weeks is a long time for a 3 and 4 year old and they often forget! We’d love it if you could send us some photographs and a short description of something that you did in the holidays. It could be how you spent Christmas day with family, an outing to the seaside/theatre/park, playing in the snow (for the morning that we had some!) or anything else that your child would enjoy sharing with us. The nursery email is scholesf1@spherefederation.org Having a photograph to talk about that your child can really relate to, helps to boost their confidence and provides a great opportunity for them to talk about their own experiences. We often find that children who may be quite shy and reluctant to talk, often have lots to say when they can see a photograph and remember something special that they have done. We look forward to a full inbox this week!
We had lots of fun returning to nursery, building robots out of Christmas boxes, drawing around each other to create a large gingerbread man, using the remote control cars to navigate around nursery and taking part in throwing activities, where we had to reach the targets throwing the beanbags in different ways.
Last week, we spent time settling back into nursery routines and we introduced children to the popular traditional tale, The Gingerbread Man. Children really enjoyed listening to the story and are already beginning to join in with some of the repeated refrains “You can’t catch me…” We will continue to enjoy re-telling the story this week and we may even have a go at baking our own gingerbread men if we can catch them before they run away! Of course, there’ll be lots of counting opportunities too; children will be counting out buttons for the gingerbread man.
You can read the story of The Gingerbread Man on-line and there’s also a link to a game at the end of the story where children can match the correct number of buttons to the numeral on the baking tray.
This week, staff will be visiting the new children at home before they join us for a “Stay and Play “session on Friday afternoon. The current nursery children will be able to show us what fantastic friends they are by welcoming the new children and helping them to play and settle into nursery. This is a great opportunity for the children to demonstrate how much they have matured since they started nursery in September and how confident and independent they have become.
Happy New Year!
Happy New Year! We’re looking forward to seeing lots of refreshed, smiling faces this week and we can’t wait to find out all about your Christmas excitement and holiday adventures. Don’t forget to e-mail us some photographs and let us know what you have been up to over the last two weeks. The children love to share their photographs with their friends and it’s a great opportunity for them to develop their speaking and listening skills.
Before the holidays, children really enjoyed counting buttons onto a gingerbread man on the interactive whiteboard. This led to discussions about ‘The Gingerbread Man’ story which is one of our nursery favourites. Some children were familiar with the traditional tale, whilst others hadn’t heard it before. This week, we’re going to enjoy listening to the story of ‘The Gingerbread Man’ and will hopefully be able to use the small world story props to re-tell the story.
You may even be able to smell something delicious cooking over the next two weeks…
If you have the story at home, you could read it together this week to help familiarise your child with the story.
Home Link – Christmas celebrations and holiday activities
Home Link….for after the holidays!
We’d love to hear all about your Christmas celebrations or about any fun activities and visits that you do over the holidays.
We look forward to seeing and hearing all about your Christmas celebrations and other adventures. Remember you can e-mail us, too.
Thank you.
We wish you a Merry Christmas
Our Nursery Christmas celebrations are well under way! The children have loved using the large construction area in their play. They have taken on the roles of busy elves making and wrapping ‘presents’ before building Santa’s sleigh to deliver them. We were especially pleased to see so many children engaging in all manner of mark-making activities: writing lists to Santa, writing gift tags and cards and even invitations to their own pretend Christmas parties!
Thank you to all of you who came to the ‘Stay and Decorate’ sessions. We hope you enjoyed coming into Nursery with your child and having the opportunity to make some lovely decorations. For those of you who were unable to attend, rest assured that all children will have the opportunity to make the crafts over the next week, should they wish.
Our long awaited dress rehearsal on Thursday was a huge success. The children looked fantastic in their costumes and sang beautifully. You’re certainly in for a treat, so tissues at the ready for the performances this coming week. We were very lucky on Friday when Father Christmas himself came to school to read stories to the children in a beautifully decorated grotto. The children were very quiet and on their best behaviour as they told him what they had put on their Christmas lists!
What we’re learning this week
We’ll continue to play using the enhanced provision to enjoy all the ‘awe and wonder’ of this festive period. Our performances will, of course, be at the heart of this busy week. The children have done a wonderful job of learning the songs, actions and elements of the Christmas story.
We expect lots of excited children on Thursday when it’s not only Christmas dinner day but also our Nursery party in the afternoon. We’ll be playing lots of party games and of course having some festive party food which we expect will last until Friday!
Home Link – We wish you a Merry Christmas
Most of our Christmas performance songs will be a lovely surprise…
Just to help us along, please enjoy singing the song ‘We wish you a Merry Christmas’ together.
Also, if you’ve any old Christmas cards, envelopes, wrapping paper, gift tags, bows, ribbons etc… please bring them into nursery. Our busy little elves will no doubt use a lot of these items over the next few weeks as they enjoy writing letters to Santa and wrapping presents in the workshop. Thank you in advance for your donations.
Christmas reminders
Reminders
- Christmas ‘Stay and decorate’ sessions will take place on Tuesday 05, Wednesday 06 and Thursday 07 at 8.30-9.30am. We’ll need to finish the Thursday session promptly as we have our first dress rehearsal for the school shortly afterwards! Thank you in advance for being understanding with this.
- Please can all costumes be in school by Tuesday 05 December.
- ‘Story time with Santa’ is on Friday 08. If your child does not usually attend Nursery on this day they are welcome to come into school via the main reception at 10.00am. Please inform a member of staff.
- As you may be sorting out your Christmas bits and pieces, please donate any tags, wrapping paper, or cards to use in our elves’ workshop.
- Please use the Nursery email to forward pictures or non-urgent information to us: scholesf1@spherefederation.org
Let the festivities commence!
It’s the first of December so that means Nursery will have a very festive feel for the next few weeks. We embrace all beliefs and religions and as such, enhance our areas of provision with many different elements associated with Christmas. From snowmen to Santa Claus, Christmas trees, reindeers and the story of the Nativity. The children have been very engaged in general ‘counting’ activities this week. They’ve been using their developing number skills to count out a selection of objects from a larger group and use vocabulary including ‘more’ and ‘the same’ to say what they have. There has been lots of creativity as we began to make our lovely Christmas cards and salt dough stars for the forthcoming ‘stay and decorate’ sessions.
We’ve been practising our Christmas songs and took our ‘rehearsal’ into the hall for the first time on Thursday. Although the stage has not yet gone up, it was certainly exciting to be singing together with F2!
We still love working together to complete jigsaws! If you have any unwanted jigsaws at home, please send them in. They’re great for promoting team work, conversation and taking turns.
The story ‘Laura’s star’ gave us with lots of opportunities to talk about our feelings and the things that are ‘special’ to us. One very caring child said: “I would look after the broken star because it was sad and lonely”. They then went to the creative area and put a ‘bandage’ around a cardboard star decorated with lots of sparkles to make it feel better!
What we are learning this week
We’ll be sharing the Nativity story in key worker sessions and using the small world area to retell the story with our friends. In the home corner, we’ll patiently be counting down the days to Christmas using the advent calendar and decorating the Christmas tree with lots of baubles and tinsel.
The construction area will become a hive of activity as we take on the roles of ‘Santa’s helpers’ to make and wrap presents in the Elves workshop. Prepare to receive some very well wrapped and decorated ‘presents’ at the end of each day!
Our dress rehearsal takes place on Thursday where we’ll be watched by a small audience comprised of siblings from other classes in school. The children will be dressed in their costumes as we make any last minute adjustments before we perform to our families! We look forward to welcoming parents and carers to the ‘Stay and Decorate’ sessions where there will be lots of Christmas craft activities for you to do with your child. Please ensure you have returned the slip so we know how many people to expect on each day!
Home Link – What can you see in the sky at night?
Can you make your own night time picture?
You can print, stick, paint or draw a picture for our home link gallery. Be as creative as you can!
From the moon to the stars…
From the moon to the stars…
It was lovely to meet with all parents and carers last week at our parents’ meetings. We hope you found them informative and reassuring. As ever, the door is always open and we absolutely value your feedback. We’re very proud of all the children who have settled in beautifully and amaze us every day with their increasing skills and independence.
Following on from our discussions, please remember to:
- Let us know when you have completed a Home Link activity. They are really important and help your child to make links between learning at home and nursery.
- Share those ‘Wow’ moments with us! Grab a WOW observation sheet or simply e-mail us if it’s easier. We love to hear about how your child is progressing at home, too, and we use the information to help us plan your child’s next steps.
- Have a look at the ‘What to expect, when’ document if you’d like to find out more about the Early Years Foundation Stage.
The children have really enjoyed all of the ‘Whatever Next’ activities and as usual, initiate their own learning opportunities as they play. There has been some fantastic collaborative play in the small world and large construction as the children became ‘Rocket fixers’ when their rockets broke down leaving baby bear stuck on the moon. We’ve been thinking about what might happen if we were on the moon and the other things we might see on our journeys. After using tin foil to make shiny moon rocks, we thought about other ‘shiny’ things we might see in the sky and, of course, we remembered the stars.
We found playing a selection of games and puzzles with key workers to be a real success in learning to take turns and share. Once the adults moved away, many children continued to play and organise the games and were sharing independently. Despite the changeable weather, we’ve had lots of fun outdoors. The grass can be especially muddy so we have been transporting wheel barrows full of bark chippings to the bottom of the garden to help create an extra, ‘mud free’, area where children can play. If your child has any waterproof trousers, these are a great idea for them to play out in. It saves several changes of clothes in one day!
With Christmas fast approaching we have begun to sing our Christmas songs in preparation for the ‘Sing-a-long’. Every child should have received a costume letter. Please let us know if you’re having difficulty sourcing any item of clothing.
What are we learning this week?
We’re going to use the story ‘Laura’s star’ as a stimulus for our learning and playing this week. The book has a lovely message about caring and friendship. Using the ‘star’ theme, there will be lots of opportunities to practise our counting as we find hidden stars in the areas of provision and fish for stars in the water. Each child will make a salt dough Christmas star to decorate at the ‘Stay and Decorate’ sessions. Please look in your child’s folder for further information. Each time we cook or bake, we do of course use it as an opportunity to talk about counting, measuring and weighing the ingredients. We’ll also be exploring the ‘cold’ by adding coloured ice cubes to the water tray and investigating what happens. How long will it take for our ice to melt and what might be hidden inside the ice?
If you’d like to listen to the story, you can watch it here.