Today Nursery hosted their very first Celebration of Learning to draw our expedition to a close of āWhat do stories tell us about Autumn?ā Both Morning and Afternoon Nursery shared their learning through a series of photo slides and interaction. They sang songs to their parents and then added decorative touches to complete the final product with their parents, making the whole project a community affair. Our Bird Boxes look beautiful and are now ready to go their new homes. The children also shared their learning journeys, show casing all of their beautiful work so far! Well Done Nursery you did a great job!
On Monday we created artwork inspired by the story The Leaf Man written by Lois Ehlert. The children used natural resources found in our outdoor area to create the own leaf men, creatures or animals. Look at their beautiful work!
Nursery have been taking part in Maths Week England. Starting with todays challenge of making Triangular Art. Each child decorated their own triangle, thinking about the shape of a triangle; how many sides it has, how many points it has and that it is a 2d flat shape. The children did careful counting to three to check these key features.
Our second stage of the challenge was to make larger trianglesā¦ I wonder how many of our small triangles will we need? The children had a go at arranging the shapes to make a triangle. I then modelled, if we use three, we can make a larger triangle. The children followed instructions and copied to help make a larger piece of floor art.
Can you guess what we have created using triangles?
Great work Nursery, you have been Exploring Elephants, Persevering Parrots and Challenge Chipmunks today! Bring on the next challenge.
This morning in maths we reminded ourselves of what a Rangoli pattern is and why we see them around Diwali time. They are to welcome Lakshmi, the Hindu goddess of wealth.
We then used our 2D knowledge to analyse some patterns before completing them.
Over the past week Nursery have also been learning about the Hindu festival of Diwali, celebrated as āThe Festival of Lightā. We had an Expert Visitor come into Nursery to read our key text āChapatti Moonā by Pippa Goodhart and model how to make Chapattiās with the children after our first attempt to grapple with chapatti making didnāt quite go to plan – it is harder than it looks! The children had lots of fun making their chapatti with Mrs OāDonnell and used their listening ears to carefully follow instructions.
Just look at our beautiful workā¦.
Nursery were also immersed in lots of different provision throughout the week to demonstrate how Diwali is traditionally celebrated. We learned lots of new vocabulary, such as Divaās, Rangoli, Mehndi, Nann, Poppadoms and Spices. The children had lots of fun exploring, experimenting, tasting and creating.
Brilliant learning Nursery, celebrating other traditions and cultures! You have been Go For It Gorillas, Persevering Parrots and Teamwork Tigers.
On Friday 10th November Nursery learned about and celebrated the tradition of Remembrance Day. They watched a short video about the meaning of the day and why we wear poppies as a mark of respect and remembrance. The children learned that the poppies were the first flower to grow on the fields after the war. Teachers modelled how to make our own poppies using loose parts and also how to create a field of poppies, using paint and an apple to print in provision. Just look at our beautiful work!
For snack we also made our own Poppy toast. We used our fine motor skills to spread the jam. The children were encouraged to think about the shape of the toast and why we were using Strawberry jam to decorate it? Some of the words the children used were; āBecause itās redā, āBecause itās red like a Poppyā, āsame colour as the flowerā, ābecause itās yummy!ā
To draw our celebrations to a close we read a story called āThank you for the Little Thingsā by Caryl Hart to inspire and encourage the children to be thankful for the duty and service of the fallen and our current serving servicemen and women. Finally we watched a beautiful, poignant and child friendly animation about the tragic effects of war lived through the eyes of animals, which the children empathised with and received well. Some of their words were āSadā, āUpsetā, āScaryā, āTheyāre hidingā, āFrightened of the bangsā, āLike fireworksā, āFoggyā, āCloudyā, āPoppies growā, āSoldiers hatā, āHappy againā and āitās safe nowā.
As part of our on-going expedition of āWhat do stories Tell us about Autumn?ā Nursery have continued to learn about autumn life and animals, as well as celebrations that happen in late autumn. This week through our story āIt Was a Cold, Dark Nightā by Tim Hopgood, Nursery have explored how Hedgehogās hibernate through the winter. Ned, the Hedgehog in our story was looking for somewhere to live and hibernate. Check out our story via this linkā¦
Nursery were encouraged to explore and investigate how safe the place Ned finds to live, really is? We were thinking about the traditions and celebrations that happen around Bonfire Night. Many people or organisations build bonfires in open spaces, which Hedgehogs might think are a good place to hide and hibernate under the bonfire wood piles. It is our job as a community to check for the Hedgehogs before lighting fires to save the creatures who are just trying to stay warm and cosy.
This led to further thinking about what bonfire night is. Nursery learned all about Guy Fawkes and that that we celebrate the 5th of November to remember the foiling of the Gunpowder plot. Words the children used to explain this were ānaughty Guy tried to blow up housesā, āGuy was going to explodeā and āGuy got caught by police, put him jailā. To bring the historical figure to life the children made Guy sock puppets. We stuffed socks with straw, glued on goggly eyes, drew on his moustache, face and hat. They did a great job!
As part of our Wise Wednesday Crew Nursery investigated ways in which we can keep ourselves safe during bonfire night by watching a short video of Blippi and exploring a feely bag of protective clothing. They learnt the catch phrase āFireworks are great, stand back and give them spaceā.
As part of our Thoughtful Thursday Crew the children passed around and investigated an unused Sparkler. They described it as āPointyā, āRoughā, āsmoothā, āhardā and ābendyā. The teachers then modelled how to safely hold and dispose of a lit sparkler outdoors. There were quite a few of Nursery children who had never seen a sparkler before. It was an exciting experience for them.
Next we all tried a traditional bonfire night food āParkinā. The children used these words to describe how the parkin tastedā¦. āToo saltyā, āToo Sourā, āStickyā, āChocolateyā, āLike Gingerbread menā . Everyone tried it, which was great as it is always nice to try new things.
The childrenās homework was to take home a Sparkler to enjoy and experience with their parents and to send in a photo along with any words the children had used to describe their what they saw, heard or felt. Here are the resultsā¦..
Words used to describe their experience were; āgoldenā, āyellowā, ācoolā, āsparklingā, āsparklyā, ābrightā, ālike fireā, ālike starsā, āfizzyā, āpshhh!ā(when it extinguished in the bucket), āwhiteā, ādangerousā, āburnyā and glitteryā. Awesome learning Nursery and everyone was very Fire safety conscious too – Well Done!
On Thursday 12th October, Nursery celebrated their first Harvest Festival. We have been learning about religious celebrations in Autumn time, as part of our on going expedition āWhat do stories tell us about Autumn?ā We recently made āGruffalo Crumbleā using autumnal ingredients which have been harvested and began our explorations from there. The Children watched a short programme explaining what Harvest Festival is, during their āThoughtful Thursdayā Crew. Nursery parents very kindly donated food to help us celebrate Harvest Festival and we looked at the different kinds of foods that grow in fields and are made from harvested ingredients.
Nursery then read a couple of pages from a non fiction text titled āFestivals through the year – Autumnā by Anita Ganari. This text told us that traditionally Christianās donated food to decorate the church and feed people who didnāt have enough food. We also found out that there is an ancient farmers tradition, where people would make Corn Dollies with the last pieces of corn from the Harvest. These dollies would be hung in barns and farmers kitchens until the end of the winter and then replanted into the fields the following season as seeds to make more corn and bring good luck. Nursery had a go at making their own corn dollies.
Finally as our celebrations drew to a close, we talked about how we would donate all of the food we had collected to the local food bank in Askern, to help local families within our community. We are very proud of our efforts and grateful for the huge generosity of our families – Thank you for helping us to make this possible. Just look how much food we āharvestedā to donate!
