In preparation for Nurseries visit to the Farm tomorrow we have read the story ”What the Ladybird Heard”. We have also been learning about farm animals, their key features and the sounds that they make. We have played observation and description games and listening games. We’re looking forward to our visit and seeing the animals in real life.
Nursery children have had an absolute ball today! Taking part in fun physical sessions led by Kixx coaches Josh and Ellie. Last week we were Pirates…. ooh arr! This week we have been Swamp Monkeys. The children moved in a variety of ways, whilst pretending to be monkeys swinging from branches. Listening and observation skills were a must. Utilising all of their gross motor skills manipulating balls that were crocodile eggs. It was a challenge not to break them, the skill was egg-stravagant!
One of the children from morning Nursery found a dead spider today in the playroom. They brought it to me and asked me to look how beautiful it was. We spent a little while admiring the spider and its markings along with its long legs. I questioned the child what do you think happened to the spider? ”I don’t know, maybe he got poorly and died?” they replied. The child then shared their own experiences of death linked to a family pet when they were a baby. I invited the other children to come and see the spider and they sat patiently as the child carefully put the spider into a little cup for them to see. He then passed it around his peers.
In Nursery this week we have been thinking about how to help keep our brains healthy and how to show kindness. We have taken part in various crews on sharing, kindness, exercise and our feeling monsters (zones of regulation). The children brought in their own teddies to share with their friends in a circle game. Every other child had a teddy and they sang a song called ”Pass the Teddy”. The aim of the game was to bounce the bear on their knee and then when the music stopped they had to pass the bear to the child next to them without a bear/toy so that they could have a turn too. All of the children were very gracious and kind to share their bears and they were very understanding that not everyone was holding a bear without feeling left out or possessive over their teddy.
Today the children thought more about the range of emotions they may feel via the feeling monsters (zones of regulation). We made stick puppets of the monsters. Nursery recognised that each emotion needed different facial expressions, such as a smile, frown, scowl or excited face. The children used amazing cutting skills to create the faces of the emotion they wanted to explore. They used googly and sticky eyes and drew on the appropriate mouth/ expression. We were were very proud peacocks of our final results!
As part of Children’s Mental Health Week, Nursery have taken part in a special dancing crew to show how exercise can lift their mood and make them feel happy. We did a comparison of before and afterwards to see if they felt any different. Most children said they felt happier.
Last week Nursery children celebrated the Chinese Lunar New Year. They watched a video about the celebration and learned about the importance of various symbols within Chinese culture, such as the colour red, fireworks and the animals that represent each year within the Chinese zodiac calendar. They also learned about traditions within the culture that are carried out in preparation for the celebration.
The children experienced some real Chinese decorations and artefacts gifted to us by one of our community members, who spoke about them proudly in Crew. All of the children listened carefully and were very interested to look at the materials.
All Nursery Children then explored Chinese New Year further within provision. They were Go for it Gorillas using fine motor skills to manipulate chopsticks to pick up woollen “Noodles”. Some created a Year of the Rabbit, bouncing rabbit, others painted beautiful pictures of Dragons and Chinese symbols used to represent numbers. We sculpted dragons and noodles using play dough and experimented with traditional Chinese dress in the role play area. We even tried Prawn Crackers with Sweet and Sour sauce too at snack time. I think everyone had lots of fun and brought themselves lots of luck for the Chinese New Year.
Today in Nursery we tried a variety of vegetables the colour of a rainbow, as part of our expedition on “How do things grow and change?” Most children were very brave and adventurous trying some vegetables for the first time and others that they are more familiar with. They were asked to choose three as we are practising counting to that number this week. The vegetables included; Cucumber, Red and Yellow Peppers, Radish and Carrot.
Nursery have been thinking about Remembrance Day this past week to honour our British Values. The children have learnt about what a poppy is and why we wear poppies; to remember and honour the fallen, the veterans and the serving soldiers and armed forces around the world. Here’s our contribution… Just look at our beautiful work!
Nursery had a great time building bear caves as part of our expedition on How we care for the bears. We all used great listening, teamwork and problem solving skills as we constructed bear dens in small groups. We tested our bear dens suitability for shelter by mimicking the weather using a watering can for rain and blowing on the dens for wind. We were very proud peacocks!
Nursery found a hedgehog this morning asleep in our playground. It was far too cold and dangerous to leave him there, so we offered him warmth and shelter. The children really enjoyed meeting the creature and researching what hedgehogs eat and how we could look after it. The children found out that hedgehogs shouldn’t be out at that time of day and that it will soon be the time that they need to hibernate for winter in warm autumn leaf piles. We had a hedgehog story and watched a fact file for young children about British Wildlife. A day well spent we’d say! We are learning to be kind and get smart too.
