“Egg-stremely” exciting visitors.

2nd February 2025Sarah Winkley

This week Nursery and EYFS had the most exciting expert visitors arrive at school in their shells! The children have been hooked into our latest text “How does an egg hatch?” By Eric Carle by watching real chicken eggs hatch courtesy of The Happy Chick Company. The children were so excited and completely in awe of seeing the eggs and observing the daily changes of how the eggs have changed and chicks have grown and hatched. A truly magnificent experience met with care, concern and compassion for the chicks from our youngest children.

On the first day the children observed the eggs and made predictions of what would happen and who might come out of the eggs if they were left inside the incubator. Some of the children’s ideas included; “a penguin”, “a caterpillar”, “a dinosaur”, “a chicken”, “a duck” and “a baby chick”. They drew the eggs inside the incubator in our message centre (below).

On the second day the chicks had began to hatch and the children were amazed to witness the hatchlings make their journey out of the eggs using their “Egg Tooth” one of the new words we learnt from our key vocabulary. To consolidate their understanding of the hatching process the children took part in a chick life cycle hunt in our outdoor area. When the children found photos of the key points of development, they brought them to our crew circle and we examined them and ordered them in the correct sequence using key words from our Maths learning; “First, next and then”.

As we investigated the life cycle further Nursery thought about the most important stage of the cycle. Our text explained that the hen makes a nest that is “warm and dry” (more of our key vocabulary) using sticks and straw. The children explored that the eggs we had in school didn’t have a nest or a mummy hen to sit on them to keep them warm, instead they had an incubator to replace those things. However in the wild or on the farm, there probably wouldn’t be any electricity for an incubator, so the children learnt that building the nest as a “warm and cosy” home for the eggs to be sat on, is the most important part of the process that allows the fertilised eggs to grow. The children had lots of fun making their own chocolate coated shredded wheat nests and filling them with chocolate eggs to show the nests significance.

The children observed the changes in the state of the chocolate as it was melted and then again as it was mixed with the shredded wheat and cooled in the fridge to harden again. They thought carefully of the order in which they were constructing the nests, again using our sequencing vocabulary; “First, then and next”.

In provision this week the children have learnt the song “Chick, Chick, Chick, Chick, Chicken”, painted chicks using yellow paint and a fork to mark on their fluffy feathers. They have sculpted eggs, nests and chickens from play dough, taken part in a cut and stick version of the life cycle of a chick practising their cutting skills. The children have also examined and matched mummy and baby animals together in pairs, learning the new vocabulary of the infant animals names eg; Horse and foal, Cow and calf, Duck and duckling and noticing the differences between the young and older animal as they grow and change.

Finally Nursery were super excited and eager to prepare their own chick box in preparation for us to host our own chicks in Nursery, now that they are all hatched and getting stronger and ready to be handled with care.

Truly beautiful work – well done everyone!

Mindful Monday

20th January 2025Laura Parsons

We started our morning with a rose and a thorn check in followed by a talk about why World Religion Day is important. We decided to test our knowledge with a game of dominoes made up with lots of religious symbols. Our check out was what skills we needed to be successful this morning at our game.

It was a lovely crew start to our week,

Mrs Parsons xx

The Very Hungry Caterpillar.

19th January 2025Sarah Winkley

This week Nursery have been storytellers, learning to retell the classic story of “The Very Hungry Caterpillar” by Eric Carle. The children became active learners by using physical literacy actions to embed key vocabulary and events from the story. They used the prompts to help them recall and retell the story.

The children have examined the key character, the Very Hungry Caterpillar and have looked at how he develops and changes throughout the story. The children have used models to paint and sculpt their own caterpillars. They have used loose parts to represent the variations of the character as both a caterpillar and a butterfly.

During their Tranquil Tuesday Crew, Nursery sequenced the story events and talked about the kinds and amounts of food the caterpillar was eating. They thought about the emotions the caterpillar experienced in the story looking a picture cues and their own experiences. They modelled these faces to each other.

After gaining a good understanding of the key character the children followed an online tutorial to help them draw the Very Hungry Caterpillar.

In provision we have also painted fruits from the story using toy fruits as inspiration.

During our Maths inputs the children have been learning to count using “careful counting”. This is touching and using number names for each object they are counting. The children became problem solvers as they began to investigate how they could find out; “How many of each fruit were in a basket?”

First it was demonstrated to the children how to carefully count using touch and number names for each piece of fruit and then they modelled to their peers, leading their own learning.

In our Thoughtful Thursday Crew the children thought about the cocoon that the caterpillar wrapped himself in and we likened it to being inside a sleeping bag or wrapping ourselves in our coats. The children practised the life skill of zipping their own coats using their fine motor skills.

Finally the children finished the week by thinking about the Very Hungry Caterpillar at the beginning of the story and comparing him to the end of the story. They used some of the physical literacy prompts to help them recall the stages of the caterpillar and key sentences from the text. They drew the caterpillar at the start of the story as either an “egg on a leaf” or a “Teeny, tiny caterpillar” and then as he appeared at the end of the story as “A big, fat caterpillar” or a “Beautiful, colourful butterfly” as they began to further understand the changes which the caterpillar goes through in preparation for when they become Scientists next week.

Shrinky Dink

18th January 2025Claire Goodyer

What a great way to end our week, we added our first vegetable to our keyrings. After a week of learning all about spinach, critiquing and redrafting our outwork we were finally ready to transfer our final drafts onto the shrinky dink paper. It was so exciting watching them shrink in the oven and adding them to our keyrings.

Family Learning

16th January 2025Laura Parsons

We were joined by lots of grown ups this afternoon. We were really busy planting cress heads to observe in our classroom. – I wonder who will have the craziest cress hair! We also made a pop bottle green house to take home and watch grow. We filled in the first part of our seed diaries too. We can’t wait to see the photographs of what you have grown on ClassDojo!

Thank you to everyone who came and joined us.

Mrs Parsons and Miss Tinker xx

Studying Spinach!

16th January 2025Laura Parsons

We have tasted it, looked at it and researched it. This afternoon we have been drawing it, critiquing our art and redrafting ready to transfer our final draft onto shrinky dink!

The concentration and resilience shown in class five has been incredible!

Mrs Parsons xx

Hook Week!

12th January 2025Sarah Winkley

This week has been a very exciting start to our spring term expedition “How do things grow and change?” The whole of EYFS have been exploring the story “How do you grow a Dinosaur?” By Caryl Hart. In the text a little boy named Albie is asked to help his mother with the gardening. Little did Albie realise, that the seeds were in fact dinosaur seeds!!! Nursery have had a lovely time painting their own imaginative creations of what they would grow, if they could grow anything from a packet of seeds.

We have also had an exciting visit from an expert visitor “Albie” the Ranger, from Animal Club, who brought with him some of his reptiles, insects and furrier animals to share with us. The children learned lots of interesting and exciting facts from Albie and were able to touch and experience most of the creatures close up, such as; a hissing cockroach called Bob, a black beauty stick insect named Del, a giant African snail, a horned frog, a tarantula, a monitor lizard (closest to a dinosaur) and a tiny furry mouse. Albie shared with the children how the animals change as they grow and how they are specially adapted to survive in the wild.

Our final hook was a lovely visit from our Kindness Elves, who kindly brought us some Jelly Beans to try, which they had harvested from their Jelly Bean Tree – just like in our story! Nursery played a game, where we covered the bowl of Jelly beans with a paper towel and had to slide our hand underneath to get a surprise flavoured Jelly Bean. We then talked about what kind of flavour they thought the coloured jelly bean would be? Some of the ideas were “Lime”, “Apple”, “Milk”, “Snow”, “Orange”, “Carrot”, “Raspberry”, “Strawberry”, “Blood”, “Lemonade”, Banana”, “Custard” and “Yellow Pepper”. They were very yummy and we all had quite a few chances to try the different flavours, for some of us this was our first time eating jelly beans.

Christmas Catch Up

12th January 2025Sarah Winkley

Nursery were very busy over the festive period and created some beautiful work to close our Autumn Expedition; “Be Kind, How do we show we care?” Our final two texts we stories that were centred around love and kindness.

Our first festive text “Little Robin Red Vest” by Jan Fearnley told us of a main character, a little robin who wore knitted vests each day of winter to keep him warm. However, whenever he encountered a friend along his journey, suffering from the cold or snow, he gave them his vest to keep them warm. Nursery designed their own vests for Little Robin Red Vest as he eventually ran out of vests for himself. We decorated them with repeating patterns as the children had been learning all about these in maths. Here is some of our beautiful work.

Our second festive text was the traditional Christian nativity story, titled “The First Christmas” by Rod Campbell. The children explored the journey of Mary and Joseph, who fell upon the kindness of an Inn Keeper, who allowed them to shelter in his warm stable. The children enjoyed learning about the birth of baby Jesus and the important role which the Angels played in delivering God’s messages to the world. They also learned the difference between a fairy (something which lives in woodlands or at the bottom of your garden) and an angel (someone who lives in heaven with God), as many of the children at first sight called the angels, fairies, associating them from their experience, with what some people use to decorate their Christmas tree. As a celebration of the peace and joy the story brings, Nursery crafted their own angels, using a photo of their faces and their own handprints for the wings. These beautiful Christmas decorations will be enjoyed for years to come and serve as a legacy of the first time that the majority of the Nursery children heard the story and God’s message from Reverend Andy (our expert visitor who came into school to share and teach the children about the celebration also). Just look how beautiful our little angels are!

In our message centre the children retold the story using a cut and stick stable. They thought hard about the characters from the story and worked hard to colour and place them in the stable. Most of the children were able to recount the story and name key characters with confidence.

Our final week reflected how many of us celebrate Christmas now with a modern text “Dear Santa” from the same author Rod Campbell. This text explored the perfect Christmas present wished for by boys and girls. We were lucky enough to have a visit from Santa during our Christmas parties! He brought us all gifts…. How kind of him.

Finally we partied and celebrated with a lovely Christmas buffet and traditional party games. We were all kind and compassionate about winning and losing and played nicely with our friends, like the Crew we are. Such a beautiful Christmas time!

Shrinky Dink

6th January 2025Laura Parsons

What a fun afternoon in class five! We spent the afternoon exploring and playing with shrinky dink paper. We worked hard to figure out how it works (and how it doesn’t!). We are really looking forward to seeing how it will help us with our final product.

We created some great pieces already – take a look.

Mrs Parsons xx