Welcome back to those who returned this week and thank you again for your continued support during these uncertain times.

The Oaks would like to welcome back their friends James S, Oliver B and Oliver G. They have all settled back well and were pleased to see everyone again. Happy birthday wishes are extended to TJ and James who both turned 4 on Tuesday whilst Imogen turned 3 the same day.

This week, the Oaks have been busy making their very own puppets to accompany a variety of stories, depicting the many characters which help form the storyline. The children took wooden spoons and attached images of the people or animals they were able to identify from books such as “One Snowy Night”. As an adult read the text, the children listened intently until their characters appeared and either mimicked the animal sound (as appropriate), or, if they knew the words to a familiar story, would recite them. This has helped the children to become more aware of how books are structured and how writing is read from left to right. To extend this, the children will be creating story sacks and will be rehearsing several ‘plays’ to enhance their role-play, enabling them to perhaps add narratives to their own role-play scenarios.

The children have been practising their own version of ‘Sporty Stars’. As some children do not attend the weekly session on a Tuesday, we have recreated the goings on throughout the week during our garden time. The Oaks set out four cones, all different colours, their task to dribble around the cones, (ensuring they did not cut corners) listening for commands to stop at a particular coloured cone. One snag encountered was full assembly as the children flocked around one cone which led to a jam so the children used their problem-solving skills and worked out a strategy: by marching backwards whilst shouting, “move back” this allowed free movement and a clear view. The children took part in other exercises such as running on the spot and jumping jacks finishing with a cool down to slowly stretch out their muscles. Reflecting on our recent discussions about how physical exercise affects the human body the children placed their hands on their hearts and felt for the beats to see if there had been any change to the normal rhythm. Alba said that she could feel her heart beating “very fast” and James stated that it was beating fast because we had been running around. The children will be examining this further next week, exploring how our heart pumps blood around the body enabling our body to function in various ways.

This week the Saplings welcome back Killian, Felix, and Matilda, but also welcome Ava who is settling in with us from the Seedlings group.

In order to continue the theme of people who help us, the Saplings have been exploring and learning about the roles of Doctors, Nurses and Dentists. Hassan and Theo particularly liked using the stethoscopes to listen to their hearts. Some of the children have even made their own ‘Doctors bag’, using their fine motor skills to cut out different shapes. With adult support, the children practised holding scissors properly and were very proud when they were able to make snips in the paper. Joshua and Felix focused intently on the task at hand. Following on from this, the Saplings have been using their gross motor skills to make marks using various ambulances and small cars. Dipping the vehicles into red paint, the children were encouraged to manoeuvre the cars over paper, creating track like marks with every movement. To extend this, the children have been using familiar shapes such as triangles, rectangles and squares to create ambulances. They used their fine motor skills to cut and stick down the pieces, noting the positioning of their vehicles. Annabelle was particularly engaged during this activity and very proud of her creation.

Circle times have proved to be quite fun for the Saplings this week. The children have looked at various stories which relate to their theme and have also learnt some new songs to add to their repertoire. James M.T. particularly liked “999 Emergency” and enjoys singing it all around the nursery. The children had a special visit from a puppet called “Roger” who travelled all the way from the Oaks room in order to show the children how to brush their teeth correctly and how to care for their teeth. The Saplings used their gross motor skills as they grasped the toothbrushes and made large and wide strokes across paper.

This week, the Seedlings have continued taking part in ‘Elmer’ themed activities. The children enjoyed playing with ‘small world’ elephants and helped to create a watering hole, using different materials such as shredded paper, stones and pasta. Encouraging children to get involved in creating this environment allowed them to begin to think creatively and critically about ways in which they can complete such tasks. Following this, the children spent a considerable amount of time playing with the elephants, stomping and trumpeting elephant noises.

To extend this, the children were tasked to find hidden elephants in colourful rice. The Seedlings strengthened their fine motor skills as they used their thumb and finger to pick up individual grains of rice as well as using different everyday items such as a pastry brush or spoons to unveil the hidden animals.

The Seedlings have also had a lot of fun playing in the home corner as they cooked with pasta. Sebastian showed skill as he washed the pasta in the sink and then cooked it in the oven, carefully turning the dials as he set the timer.

The seedlings have also enjoyed “baby yoga” as they learned to stretch their bodies up high to “touch the sky” and down low to “touch our toes”. Oscar found this exceedingly funny as he continued lifting his hand up saying “up high” throughout the day. They stretched out wide like an elephant and made themselves as thin as a stick. Sofia was able to open her hands and stretch as wide as a house.

Next week the Seedlings will explore ‘growth’. We will study different plants, grow our own seedlings and using the Reggio Emilia approach, will photograph the process of our “growing project.” We will also create a timeline, which will help us understand the activity and the process of growing spring flowers and vegetables such as lettuce. The children will be ‘hands on’ as they work with soil and therefore may get muddy.

This week the Acorns have been focussing on colours. We dyed mouldable foam pink and the children enjoyed using their hands to push it around the tray. Adding warm water and bubbles served to alter the textures and the children enjoyed the sensation of the water swirling around the tuff tray. Using paint dabbers to explore different colours, the children used a palmer grasp as they spread the paint across the paper. The children explored paint presented underneath clingfilm using their fingers to squish the paint beneath the film. When feeling the squishy texture the children vocalised with “ooo” and “ahhhh” to show their excitement.

Whilst in the garden, the children have enjoyed playing games of catch using different sized balls. During this game, the children developed their use of single words by saying ‘’ball’’ and ‘’catch’’. When the ball rolled away, a child said ‘’where ball gone?’’ Whilst in the garden the children used their kicking skills to kick a large ball across the garden. Showing signs of achievement, the Acorns clapped their hands when the ball went really far.

Moving their whole bodies to music, the children enjoyed showing off their impressive dance moves, bopping up and down. Whilst we sang nursery rhymes the Acorns accompanied their band playing musical instruments very loudly!

To develop their recall, the children were involved in a colour association game using a variety of common objects, coloured card and paper delighting at the sounds they made as they tore paper into shreds (as an aside.)

Stars of the week:

Oaks – Hugo – for being more confident talking in front of his peers and for being willing to try new foods.

Saplings – James M.T. – for settling into the Saplings room so well and adjusting to the new routine.

Seedlings – Oscar – for using more single words and for showing true determination to communicate more.

Acorns – Adrian – for settling well during his first week at nursery and making lots of new friends.

Enjoy the week to come.

Yours sincerely

The Broughton team.