Our Solar system

I can’t believe the learning that has been taking place in nursery this week. We have started to learn about the planets in our solar system, and wow I am amazed1

Click here for the solar system song

Click here for the planets song

We have written a poem map about the planets. We were inspired by Pie Corbett’s ‘Talk for writing’ concept. In talk for writing Children learn to tell a story off by heart. They tell the story with expression and actions. Once a story is learnt the children are encouraged to adapt it to make it their own, for example by changing the characters or the setting. We have very nearly learnt our poem off by heart.

Now we have our ‘map’ we are going to write an alien story next week. Watch this space! Be prepared for us to scare your socks off!

Key Person blog

Wow, what a rate our brains have been grown at this week! Our astronauts have boarded their rockets and crash, banged into our Solar System. We have listened to and learnt poems and songs and used this planet knowledge to create a super display in nursery. We are such a creative bunch!! More rockets have been made, (continuing to spot our 3 primary colours!), sparkly stars have been glued and glittered, and some of us have even started to design our very own planets. We have also continued to develop our scissor skills by giving some aliens a hair cut…a great one to try at home!

Outside we have been playing box monster, making aliens with stretchy blue sand and launching asteroids across the garden. Tin foil wrapped around a small soft ball, (with streamers dangling off!!) was perfect for practising our over arm throw!  

We have danced again to ‘Cherry Tots’ and met ‘quiet and mad’ this week. Can you remember how we moved to these pieces of music?

Worship- I am special

This week we have continued developing our understanding of the importance of valuing ourselves and others. We played the ‘I am special’ game. We had a golden box and inside there was something so special that there is only one in the whole wide world!

We looked inside the box to discover what could be so very special. Can you guess what we saw? Mmmmmm…you will have to ask your child to find out what it was!! Take a look at our pictures.

Throughout the day we all tried to be a little bit more like Jesus and to fill our hearts full of love for everyone.

We also visited the chapel again on Tuesday. It is fast becoming our favourite place.

We are still finding out about shapes in our environments. Here are a couple of games to try at home.

Click here for the shape pattern train.

Click here for the symmetry shape game.

Lastly, could we say a big thank you to you for supporting your childs learning at home. You are fantastic! Have a good rest this weekend but don’t forget Purple Mash, there is work set for the children to do!

See you all on Monday

Barbara

This week....

The children’s learning at the moment knows no bounds. We are all amazed at how much we have found out about space travel and the moon!

Did you know?

There is nothing but stars and darkness all around in space.

It takes four whole days to reach the moon.

When the astronauts get there they have to climb into a little spaceship.

To go outside the astronauts have to put on a special suit.

The spacesuits carry are so they can breathe.

The Moon is silent and dusty.

There are huge mountains and big holes.

There are no trees, water, animals or people on the moon

On the moon, you feel very light and floaty, when you walk around you take big bouncy strides!

Astronauts sometimes go exploring in Moon buggies. They collect moon rocks to bring back home.

You can see our world from the Moon.

Our Wow space words include:

Gravity

Asteroids

Craters

Oxygen

Shooting star

We have also found out about the new James Webb telescope sent into space in December. It’s looking for the oldest star.

Click here to see a rocket launch!

Key Person’s blog

This has proved to be another amazing week here at Nursery. There have been lots of discussions about space and the children have asked many questions asked including.... what do Astronauts eat? How many astronauts can fit into the space shuttle? How wide is the capsule? We discovered that it is 2.7 meters wide and we measured it out on the floor using masking tape. It was a squash and a squeeze for three people!!! How do the astronauts manage???? 

We have created rockets using a variety of materials and many space puzzles have been completed including pictures of planets, space shuttles, moon buggies and the moon. The children have all decorated and cut out their own rocket for our super display. Using their existing rocket knowledge some children accepted the challenge to create a replica rocket using only certain materials. This included the three primary colours....can your child name them? Click here to watch the video we liked!

The children created their own obstacle course in the garden, and we have also been practicing our throwing skills using ‘Moon Rocks’ instead of balls! There has also been some hopping, jumping and Alien splatting! What a busy week! 

Hope you have a lovely weekend. 

Michelle, Frances, Colette, Hannah, and Justine. 

Here is a small collection of this weeks learning at nursery!

We have started to look at shapes in our environment. We sang the shape song and then went on a shape hunt!! We really did want to find a dodecagon!!!! Perhaps you could go on a shape hunt at home this weekend. Click here for the shape song.

We have also been focusing on the sound ‘n’ with Geraldine Giraffe. Click here. How many things can you find at home that begins with ‘n’?

Next week we are starting to find out and be curious about the planets in our solar system.

Worship

This week focused on helping the children learn that they are uniquely created by God and special because they are made and loved by Him. We explored our uniqueness and what that means. We celebrated difference as well as individual gifts, talents and abilities.

Click on the button below to see the slides.

Finally, I have a few words from Michelle and Justine. They have had a fabulous couple of weeks getting to know the children and yourselves. Thank you for being so welcoming.

The have written a few words about themselves for you to get to know them better.

Hello everyone,

I am so excited to be here at Our Lady Star of the Sea Nursery with all your wonderful children. I’ve seen some of you this week but I thought I should introduce myself properly.

My name is Michelle and I have many years experience working in local nurseries. I have been a Preschool Room Leader, a Childcare Manager and a Nursery Manager and I hold Early Years Professional Status, a BA Honours degree in Early Childhood Studies and an NVQ Level 3 in Early Years Care and Education.

I live in St Annes and I have 2 grown up children. In my spare time I enjoy listening to live music, eating out and trying to tame the wilderness that is my garden.

I am passionate about ensuring children have the best possible start to their education and I am really looking forward to seeing your child grow and develop into the best version of themselves.

Michelle

Hello, my name is Justine and I am enjoying being a member of the Nursery team at Our Lady Star Of The Sea. Both the nursery and school have such a lovely, friendly, welcoming and hardworking ethos and I feel like a member of a huge happy family.

I have worked with children of all ages for over 23 years being a Teaching Assistant and also a Family Learning Mentor, but my favourite setting of all is by far working with the Nursery children.

My family and I moved from Manchester to sunny St Annes in 2010 and love living in such a beautiful little town so close to the sea. My husband is a keen kite surfer and I enjoy the more relaxing paddle boarding with my 2 children, (I say children but they are now 21 and 22, but they are ALWAYS your babies!)

I also enjoy playing golf, travelling, swimming, art, gardening, and going on lovely long walks with our dog Bluebell.

I’ll make an effort to wave and smile at you all (albeit from behind a mask, but trust me I am smiling) and just want to say thank you for having such adorable, funny and incredibly bright children that make our jobs an absolute pleasure.

Justine

It just remains for me to say, have a restful week and we will see you all on Monday to start learning about the planets!!!

Barbara

Happy New Year!

A big welcome back to nursery everyone. I hope you have managed some rest over the festive period.

This week we welcome a new nursery lady, Justine. She will be working alongside Hannah as a support key person. The children think she is wonderful! When you see her at the gate, introduce yourself and say a say a big hello!

The children have all come back to nursery ready to grow their brains. This week have been ‘finding out’ about Space, and working and thinking like a scientist. We have found out about the Hubble space probe, astronauts, space travel and the moon. We have even written our own song about aliens, (to the tune of ‘The Animals went in Two by Two’).

An alien came to visit you,

He roared, he roared,

An alien came to visit you,

He roared, he roared,

An alien came to visit you,

His head was green and his nose was blue,

You could hear him roaring

Did he frighten you?

NO!!

Here are our plans for January. We are going to be so busy!

Key Person Blog

Wow what a week to blast off with! We cannot believe the children have returned this week, so calm, focused and eager to learn. They have enjoyed telling us about their time at home over Christmas and drawing pictures of what presents they received.

Our new learning thread has well and truly launched itself with a bang. The children all had the opportunity to share their thoughts and ideas in small groups…giving us nursery ladies plenty food for thought! Our discussions have given us some amazing wow words and the excitement has been evident all week—we have all been buzzing!

We have talked about and read the Cape Ability story about Tommy Turtle...a scared and shy character who needs to face his fears. This has in turn helped us all and we have had plenty of ‘Have a Go’ moments ourselves… rocket making; (including plenty of astronaut role play!), moon rock exploring and painting and drawing our own stars!

Thank you children for such a lovely first week back.

Colette, Hannah , Justine and Frances

This week we have started to explore the number 4. Click here to find out more. If you fancy a challenge here a Number 4/ Learn to count video. Click here.

We also looked at the sound ‘i’ with Geraldine the Giraffe. Click here to watch.

Worship

God made Me, God made you.

Created and Loved by God explores the individual. Rooted in the teaching that we are created by God out of love and for love, it helps the children to develop an understanding of the importance of valuing themselves as the basis for personal relationships:

We learnt a new song called God made Me, God made You, and a new prayer. See if your child can remember them.

Next week we are planning to expand our knowledge of the moon and space travel. Perhaps the children can find out some facts to share?

We would also like the children to make their own rocket. Could each child please bring to nursery a named tube to start us off. Thank you in anticipation.

In the meanwhile here are just a few photos to give you a flavour of our learning this week! Lots more next week!

Next week, Michelle our new nursery deputy will be joining us, she can’t wait to meet everyone!

Please have a restful (and fun) weekend and we will see everyone on Monday. Don’t forget to check Purple Mash for more learning! Enjoy!

Barbara

Sing and Dance for Joy

At last the moment you have all been waiting for, our Christmas Nativity. We hope you enjoy it.

I’m sure after watching the children tell the story of The First Christmas there is not a dry eye in your household. All the nursery ladies (and the whole school staff) were emotional after watching it.

We must say a big ‘thank you’ to Clare and Colette who worked so hard to produce such a wonderful Nativity. Another thank you to Mrs. Gregan who built the video.

As you are aware we are saying farewell to Clare today, we are all very sad to see her go but we wish her well in her new job. She has been such a big part of nursery for such a long time she will be sadly missed.

We have two new nursery ladies joining us in January, Michelle and Justine. We are looking forward to welcoming them to Nursery.

Clare has written a message to everyone and has asked if I could share it. Here goes…

Fond farewell from Clare

I have been so blessed to be part of Our Lady’s family for over twenty years and what very happy years they have been!

To leave the nursery was such an extremely hard decision to make and took lots of prayers!

I am hoping to make the new nursery as special a place as Our Lady’s nursery is!

You will still see me at school from time to time as I will be continuing to be a school governor here at Our Lady’s.

I want to say a huge thank you to you all for the trust, kindness and for the opportunity to work with your families and your beautiful children. Each day the children give joy, love and hope. Just what we all need at the moment!

Much love and a Happy Christmas,

 Clare

It just remains for us to wish everyone a Happy and Holy Christmas and a Peaceful New Year. We will see you in 2022!

Barbara, Clare, Colette, Hannah and Frances

Let's party!!!!

We thought you may want to have a peek at our Christmas party! We all had a fabulous time…we are all exhausted!!

Didn’t we have fun!

Don’t forget tomorrow is Nativity release day!

See you in the morning.

It's the most wonderful time of the year.....

It has been all systems go at nursery this week. Filming of the Nativity is now complete and has gone off to Mrs. Gregan who is very kindly editing and compiling it for us. Thank you Mrs. Gregan.

We have finished our Christmas cards and a special surprise. Everyone is completely exhausted! Some of the children at the end of the day have struggled to stay awake. This is in addition to all our usual learning at nursery.

As last weeks quiz was such a hit, the nursery ladies have put their creative thinking caps on and come up with another fun quiz called ‘Guess who came to nursery?” Look at the pictures in the gallery below and ask:

Who came to nursery and why?

What do you think Father Christmas was cooking in the home corner?

Father Christmas is on his laptop in one of the photos, what was he writing ( I hope he wasn’t adding Colette to the bad list!!)

Which story was Father Christmas reading?

Father Christmas was having a good look at our emotions wall, how do you think he feels?

Why was Father Christmas washing his hands ( I hope he made a hundred bubbles!)

Why was Father Christmas in the nursery office?

What is Father Christmas having a drink of?

What colour remote controlled car is Father Christmas playing with?

What colour bauble is Father Christmas looking at on our tree?

Click here to listen to the story ‘Santa Needs a Wee’

ENJOY!

On Friday (and throughout the week) the children and nursery ladies have been wearing their finest Christmas outfits. Here are just a few!

If you fancy some Numberblocks, click here for their Christmas Special and on the button below for a 1-5 cut and stick activity.

Well done to everyone who completed the Purplemash activities. I will set some more! Keep watching!

I hope you all manage some down time this weekend, time to recharge your batteries before the festivities begin at home. We will see you all for the last week of term on Monday (don’t forget school and nursery closes at 2pm on Friday). It is an even busier week culminating with our Christmas party on Thursday and the Nativity going live on Friday.

Barbara, Clare, Colette and Hannah

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas.......

Phew, such a frantic week. We have started to prepare for Christmas, the children have been making Christmas surprises, singing (lots of singing) and acting out the Nativity (you are all in for a BIG treat, it’s FABULOUS!). Most of our children are just 3 years old and they are performing like it’s a West End production. They have reduced the nursery ladies to tears with their portrayal of the Christmas Story.

If your remember I said we had redesigned nursery last week and that we would endeavour to produce a walkthrough video… I’m afraid to say we have failed in our quest but think we have devised something better!! I will let Clare, Colette and Hannah explain!

Clare, Colette and Hannah’s blog

We have been busying away in Nursery rehearsing our Nativity and doing lots of Christmas crafts (all Top Secret!). What a lovely week it has been, e are all getting very excited.

As the Newsletters have gone out this week...and not wanting to spoil the surprise ahead of the Nativity video going live on the website (Friday 17th December), we have decided to upload a Nursery Quiz to do at home this week instead of the usual photos!

Where will you find this beautiful angel in nursery?

What is this lovely sparkly , twinkly addition to Nursery?

What decorations are on the tree?

Which area of the classroom is this photo taken?

Who lives on this shiny silver web?

What are these little numbered pockets for?

Can you remember the special word getting ready for Christmas?

Pick a colour...how many items can you see on the shelves in that colour?!

Can you name everyone in this special scene?

It’s red and it sparkles...but what it is?

Which Christmas book have you read this week?

Which is your favourite?

Who is this visitor to Nursery and where is he peeping out?

 We hope you could answer all the questions? Next week watch out for our Christmas Taskmaster activity sheet, keep checking your child’s bookbag.

Clare, Colette and Hannah

As you know Friday (and nearly every other day too!) was Silly Sock Day. Thank you to everyone who joined in and made a contribution to Brian House. Here are just a few photos.

Don’t forget:

On Friday 10th December ( it may have said Thursday the 10th on the Newsletters, sorry) will be the second of our Charity events. It is a Christmas themed clothes day, e.g. jumpers, dresses, t-shirts or Christmas colours.

Don’t worry if your child is not in nursery on Friday just choose another day to join in the fun!!

Our Christmas party is being held on Thursday 16th December 9.30 am -11.30 am. Party clothes and dancing shoes are a must!

All children are invited to this event, but if it is not your usual session please bring you child at 9.30 am collect promptly at 11.30 am.

May I thank everyone who has taken the time to return our annual Parent Questionnaire. We have been touched by your kind words and the unconditional support that you give to nursery. Don’t worry if you haven’t returned the questionnaire yet we still have two weeks left before the end of term!

Lastly, it is never easy when we lose members of the nursery team and sadly following Christmas our lovely Clare will be leaving Nursery for a new opportunity she couldn't resist taking. Clare has worked at Our Lady's for over 20 years and has touched the hearts of so many children and parents. It is hard to imagine her not being beyond the Nursery door, but I know she will take everything she has learned and will inspire others the way she has inspired us all here at Nursery. I know you will all miss Clare as much as we will, but that you too would like wish her every success in all she does.

Sarah has also made the decision not to return to Nursery from maternity leave, she has decided to be a full-time mum. She is very sad but knows this is the right decision for her family. Sarah will again, be greatly missed in Nursery and we wish her only happiness and lovely times with Jude.

We hope you all have a fun weekend and enjoy the picture challenge! If the weather is cold and wet why not snuggle down and listen to this Christmas story. We read the book at nursery this week and the children love it. Click here for Laura’s Star

Barbara

And so Christmas begins.....

Helping Others

As you know, an important aspect of our whole school ethos is to support the vulnerable through our almsgiving and charity work. Over the years, working together, we have raised an enormous amount of money which has supported so many people and various charities. Over the last year this work has been more difficult and yet the need has never been greater. The children recognise this and are aware that so many people are struggling and need support. A charity close to all our hearts is Brian House; the children’s hospice up in Blackpool. Staff there work tirelessly, helping very poorly children and their families in what can be deeply distressing circumstances and do so with such love and laughter and deep compassion. It always fills us all with great warmth when collecting for our charity at the end of our KS2 church Nativity service, to find that everyone has been so generous, wanting to help and support.

After great discussion as a whole school community the children have agreed that if every family donates £5 per family, we will be able to raise a large sum to present to Brian House. To do this, they have planned two themed Fridays, the first on December 3rd – a Silly Sock or Terrible Tights Day (worn alongside their uniform). Make your socks or tights stand out! Customising (within reason!) is allowed. The second themed Friday is on December 10th – a Christmas themed clothes day; a jumper, a t-shirt or simply Christmas colours, bright and cheerful. Don’t worry of your child isn’t in nursery on these days just choose another day to join in the fun!

Please send your kind donation in a named envelope to the nursery office. Please know that we appreciate that times are tough and every single donation means so much, thank you. Each and every donation given with love is a true blessing and if anyone can’t manage to donate, please say a prayer for peace and love in lieu which will mean a great deal.

Following this we will be heading into school’s very own Christmas week when each class will enjoy a party day on Thursday 16th December and will have the chance to wear their own choice of partywear. On the same day, Jacqui and her team will be cooking our Christmas lunch, something we all look forward to. If your child doesn’t normally have a school lunch they can order a special Christmas Lunch. Please click here. We need to know numbers by Monday so please complete this form over the weekend and in time for the office to pass on the numbers to Jacqui at lunchtime.

If you have any queries drop me an email.

Barbara

This week....

Such an exciting week!

The nursery ladies have been watching carefully and noticed that a large group of our children are great builders, some love a cosy moment in the book area whilst other enjoy the home corner. With this in mind, one night after school the nursery fairies decided to rearrange nursery! We now have a huge construction area, an even cosier book corner with cushions and rugs and our home corner, wow the children LOVE it!

It is our plan to give you a guided virtual tour, hopefully next week! Hannah is on to it, fingers crossed and watch this space!

Can I highlight that next week our monthly newsletter will be sent out. It is full of Christmas events that are happening over the next few weeks. Be sure you don’t miss out on the festive fun! If you have any questions just give me a ring or drop me an email.

Clare, Colette and Hannah’s blog

Wow...we are indeed a musical lot this year! A few of the children were enjoying finding different objects around nursery and garden to see what sounds the objects made. Within minutes we had our very own band as numbers had multiplied and we had a plethora of wonderful sounds! This musicality is hopefully going to shine through when its Nativity time!!

Perhaps you can practice our songs at home? Click here for a new version of Away in a Manger (only the first verse please) and here for Sing and Dance for Joy (we are singing ‘dance’ instead of shout for joy etc).

We have had more fun in the hall this week,  - our new favourite is ‘The Circle Song’! Might be a tricky one to practice at home but our group was super at following the moves! Here is the music if you fancy a go!

The three little pigs made another visit with our friends the Numberblocks this week… the children love this story in any form and enjoyed the maths game many of them played alongside it. Perhaps have a go at home at drawing house number one with one window, number two with two windows and three with three windows? Send them into nursery next week and can display them. Good luck!

Clare, Colette and Hannah

Lastly, with the start of Advent fast approaching (yes, it’s next Wednesday!) the children have been planning where we will put our tree and how we should decorate it! It’s all very exciting! We also thought we could recreate the stable in Bethlehem and ‘Christmasify’ (I’m not sure that’s a word) all the areas of the continuous provision. We will take lots of photos to share with you all next week.

We hope that everyone has a calm and restful weekend, not too much Christmas shopping! We look forward to an even busier week at nursery next week!

Barbara

This week...

A fabulous week of learning at nursery. The children are growing each week in confidence and taking more challenge in their play and learning. We are proud of each and every one of them.

One of our number two challenges this week was to sort and pair socks and wellies, but guess what, we can’t find our sock box anywhere. Can you help? If you have any old socks of different sizes and patterns we would be most grateful for donations. Thank you in anticipation.

Clare, Colette and Hannah’s blog

This week we have continued to thank God for all the amazing animals on the planet! We have drawn even more interesting animals and we even had a vote for our favourite animal. Alongside this, we just had to learn an animal song too! Click here to watch the song ‘Animal House’

The Autumn winds have blown lots of leaves around Nursery garden…on Wednesday it was so windy that it looked like it was raining leaves!! We had lots of fun exploring the different kinds of leaves and looking at all the beautiful colours on the ground. We even discovered one or two wiggly worms hiding at the bottom of the pile of leaves.

We have been continuing to look at the Number three and have been continuing to practise our m, a, s, d and t sounds with our lovely Geraldine the Giraffe. Why not get wrapped up warm and head out on a lovely Autumn walk to see if you can find anything that starts with one of our sounds? There is usually a few things at the park beginning with ‘S’. Or try the sound quiz on purple mash… Click here

As we mentioned in last week’s blog we have begun to organise our Nativity play. We have been sharing the Christmas story with the children and they have been asking lots of questions (as they always do!!). Everyone has been getting excited about their role in the Nativity.

Now for the photos!

Next week we will be learning the songs for the Nativity and also our lines in readiness for filming. Costumes are ready, cameras are set, it’s all systems go… hopefully. The play will go live on this blog in a few weeks time, I will let you know the date as soon as I can…watch this space.

Have a lovely weekend everyone and wrap up warm, apparently it’s going to be cold…brrrrrr!

Barbara, Clare, Colette, Hannah and Frances

Such a busy week!

Phew, this week has been really busy! We are all so tired!

We started the week by finding out why all the nursery ladies were wearing poppies. We watched a beautiful and evocative animation that sees war as experienced by animals in a WWI battlefield. We all found it very moving. This inspired us to look closely at the poppy flower and to paint our own version. The children created the most beautiful poppy pictures. Look out for them in your child’s book bag! If you would like to watch the video click here.

We have started to explore the number three. We watched the number 3 Numberblocks and then investigated our number 3 sack. Click here to watch Numberblocks. See if you can find three objects at home….Can you tell something that is the same about your objects? Can you tell something different about your objects?

Everyone has been practicing our m, a, s, d and t sounds. We have explored our sound bags and founds lots of resources in nursery starting with the corresponding sounds. Have you watched Geraldine the Giraffe yet?

Click here for m

Click here for a

Click here for s

Click here for d

Click here for t

Why don’t you see if you can find objects at home beginning with these sounds. Have fun!

On Thursday we had a BIG mixing colour day….it was FABULOUS! We his the paint under huge blobs of shaving foam then we started the magic mixing. First we mixed with our finger, then two fingers three fingers and then our whole hand!!! We found out that by mixing two or more colours together that we could make a new colour!!

Also on Thursday we made an orchestra. We got all the instruments out and played and sang. It’s the Albert Hall for us next!!

Worship

This week we are thanking God for his wonderful gift of animal life!

Together we made a list of how many animals we could name. The children real impressed the nurseries because they named 85 different animals, with only the minimum support from the nursery ladies!  How blessed are we to live in a world so full of interesting animals. You may want to make your own list at home as a family, I think you will be surprised just how many different animals you can count.

A group of friends drew animals to place into ‘Our friend Jesus book’, another group made a spectacular animal home for the small world animals in nursery and others drew animals outside with chalk.
Together we all thanked God for his gift of animals.

We watched a couple videos all about animals. Afterwards we named as many animals that we could think of… we named forty animals!!!!

Click here to watch the animal video. We also enjoyed the camouflage animal video. We have learnt a new word too! Click here

And now for you favourite part of the blog….the photos. We hope you enjoy them.

I’m sure you will agree, it’s been a very busy week in nursery! Try and have a good rest this weekend because next week we are starting to organise the Nativity!

Barbara, Clare, Colette and Hannah

Welcome back....

A huge welcome back after the half term holiday, I hope you all managed to get a rest. Click on the button to see this months planning.

We have started this half term with a bang by exploring the world of colour. As Bonfire Night is upon us it seemed sensible this as a way to find out about colours. We discussed which colours we liked the best and why? We had a whole rainbow of suggestions!

We then listened to a song all about colours. Click here to watch and listen. Here’s another song for you to listen to at home…the children haven’t seen this one, I hope they enjoy it! Click here.

Everyone thought it would be a good idea to find out about the firework colours we might see on Bonfire Night, but first it was important to know how to stay safe. We talked about staying with mummy and daddy or a grown up if you were going to a big firework display because it would be very busy …and dark (you may want to take a torch!). We also discussed that we must not touch or go near either a bonfire or fireworks, they are VERY dangerous, even sparklers. Click here to watch the ‘Firework party’ video.

We were then ready to get the paints out and start our firework paintings! We splashed and splattered the paint making firework sounds. We noticed that fireworks are noisy! Look at our fabulous display!

Wow!!!!!!!!

We have also made a colour table with lots of objects to help us explore the world of colour, we even put different coloured covers over our torches!

Click here if you want to watch the Numberblocks Firework Night video.

After all that hard work we made a huge firework art attack picture. Everyone helped. Check this out!!

Clare, Colette and Hannah’s blog

It was lovely to see the children again after their half term break  looking so relaxed and eager to return.

We found out something about our bodies this week, we found out that inside our bodies we have a skeleton!

We learnt that we have 206 bones in our body, the largest bone  is in our legs and the smallest is in our ears. We noticed that our bones do not bend and that they help us to hold our bodies up, move and protect the inside of our bodies. We enjoyed dancing and feeling our bones moving.

We also have been learning how to stay safe with fireworks and discussing what are good choices when near fireworks. We enjoyed a story about going to a firework display and the classroom was then filled with dazzling, glittering, sparkles as we painted firework pictures making the noises as we painted lots of bangs, crackles, whizzing and screeching!

Outside in our garden we had a wonderful surprise the playground was filled with beautiful yellow, brown , red and orange leaves!

We had great fun collecting them and even making a leaf pond, that we could jump into and throw the leaves, watching them then dance to the floor.

As you can see we have had a wonderful week full of exciting learning and enjoying being with our friends again!

We have loads of photos of our learning to show you, we hope you enjoy looking at them.

Hannah, Colette and Clare

Worship

This week we have been thanking God for the gift of plant life. We have examined the trees in our garden, feeling the bark, looking at the shapes of the branches and feeling the leaves. We have looked similarities and differences and noticed no two trees are identical, just as no two people are exactly the same!

We think the trees and plants God has given us are so beautiful!

Next week we will be moving on to number 3, painting Remembrance Day poppies and continuing our exploration of colour. We will be getting very messy as we mix colours together! We can’t wait!

We hope you have a lovely weekend and if you are going to a firework display or having a firework party at home, remember to stay safe. Ask your child, they know how!

Barbara

This week.....

Thank you for all your positive feedback on the Sticky Kids activities we posted last week. The children have asked if we could post some more this week, in particular the dinosaur song! I hope you have lots of energy!!

Here goes…click here for the dinosaur song.

You may also enjoy zooming to the moon. Click here

If you are exhausted and need a rest you can cool down with this nice relaxing song. Click here

Key persons blog

We cannot believe how much the children have packed into this week, they have been so busy growing their brains during this last full week of learning before breaking up on Tuesday—well done!

There have been parties (or should we say banquets?!) in the outdoor house and so much lovely role playing with one another. Everyone has really played so well taking turns to share the resources during this game; it was lovely to see! Your imaginations were wonderful when we needed to get more food from the shop and then cook/bake things before serving it to our friends!

This week we have introduced the sound ‘a’- can the children think of anything beginning with this sound? It is a short, bouncy sound—why not have a go at practising with Geraldine the Giraffe. Click here to watch

Some of us have a real thirst for doing jigsaw puzzles at the moment and it is great to see the giant floor puzzle pieces spread out as we work together to complete them. We can see brains thinking about where pieces go and how to make them fit, the children have shown great resilience to get the job done! Perhaps that resilience has shone through after reading about our new friend Sadie Spider?! Sadie had to work so hard and think of different strategies to weave her webs and we are embedding her motto to help us too; “try, try, try to catch that fly” and indeed she did. We will keep hearing about Sadie Spider and perhaps even more of her friends over at Cape Ability too!

We have also been continuing to hunt for ladybirds in the garden. We are finding quite a lot of them, some are red with black spots and some are black and orange. We have even discovered that Ladybirds can hibernate during the winter time. Click here to watch the video.

 Have a lovely weekend everyone!

Clare, Colette and Hannah xxx

I’m sure you will agree it has been a very busy half term. The children are now beginning to get tired!

Nursery closes for half term on Tuesday; we hope that you all have a fun (and restful) holiday. When we return it will be even busier, especially with the run up to Christmas.

Please keep safe and we will see you all on November 1st.

Barbara

This week....

Another fabulous week at nursery. We are learning more and more each week…our brains are getting full of knowledge!

A story that has quickly become a firm favourite this week is Going on a Bear Hunt by Michael Rosen. We read the story (lots of times) then acted it out in the garden, it was great fun! If you would like to listen to Michael Rosen telling the story click here.

Perhaps you could go on a bear hunt this weekend…or even a tiger hunt! The children love to introduce new (and scary) animals!

It has come to my attention that there is some confusion as to when we break for the half term holiday. If you click on the button below you will find the holiday dates for the whole year.

Key persons blog

After great thought we have decided to compile a collaborative blog from all the nursery key persons. Clare, Colette and Hannah have all contributed and added photos of their groups children. We hope you enjoy it. Here goes….

Wow Nursery...what another fun and busy week we’ve all had!

We introduced our new friend ‘Number 2’ this week. Click here to Meet Two, 2 is one more than 1. In the video One discovers it’s tricky to play tennis when you’re the only block in the world. She bumps into a magic mirror and meets Another One and they join force to make Two. Enjoy!

After watching the number 2 video we each went to find one object in nursery and then paired up with a friend to make two objects!

We have also revisited the sound ‘m’. Can you go on a sound hunt and perhaps find two things starting with ‘m’?!

In the hall for PE we have loved doing the ‘Funky Monkey’. Click here for the Funky Monkey music

‘Lets Go Walking’. Click here for the Let’s go Walking music

…and our favourite ‘Stir Up The Porridge’ Click here for Stir up the Porridge

Why not see if your child can remember any actions and have a go together!

There was some fabulous role play when we got the hairdressing box out on Thursday, such lovely turn taking. We all had enormous fun styling our friends (and the nursery ladies) hair, then relaxing in the chair ready to be beautified!

Worship

This week we thanked God for the gift of water. We talked about how blessed we are to have clean water and prayed for people who don’t have any. We then relaxed to some soothing water music. Click here to listen and relax at home.

We talked about how we need water to live and all its uses. We then wondered about where water came from. This led us to the ‘water cycle’. We talked at length about the water cycle, we also learnt a new word… ‘evaporation’. Click here to watch a video all about water and evaporation. Please ask your child and see if they can explain what evaporation means.

Throughout this week we have been very mindful of the beautiful gift of water.

Here’s a weekend challenge in case you are at a loose end. It’s a chance to notice the natural world change outside our window or in our back garden, the National Trust are challenging us to experience the small moments of joy nature brings us in five different ways.

Let us know how you get on!

Click on the button below

Finally, we are missing a small ‘fox’ snack box. Could I ask you to take a look at home in case it has been sent home by mistake.

Have a fabulous weekend everyone and see you on Monday.

Barbara

A rainy, blustery week!

A funny sort of week at nursery, the weather has definitely taken a turn for the worst. We better start thinking about wellies and winter woolies!

Nonetheless, the children have been undeterred to brace the elements. Our outdoor sand pit is now a mud kitchen, we think it is even better now!

This week has seen the launch of the new ‘What to Expect, when?’ document for parents. The purpose of this booklet is to help you as a parent/carer find out more about how your child is learning and developing during their first five years, in relation to the EYFS.

Children develop more rapidly during the first five years of their lives than at any other time. This booklet has been written to help you as a parent know what to expect during these vitally important years by focusing on the seven areas of learning and development which are covered in the EYFS. Click on the button below to find out more.

The children have been loving an old favourite story, Little Rabbit Foo Foo. As promised on the newsletter here is the link to watch the video. I bet the children will be able to join in! Click here for Little Rabbit Foo Foo.

…and now for your favourite part of the blog…

I am pleased to say that Colette will be back at nursery next Wednesday, in the meanwhile Clare has been compiling photos of Colette’s key children.

Clare’s (and Colette’s) blog

This week we have been deepening our learning on our emotions. We each took a group of photos acting out each emotion and discussed when we experience these emotions. These photos are on this blog, see if you can work out which emotion is which! You may want to play acting out each emotion with your child.

Clare

Hannah’s blog

Some very rainy days have given us the chance to explore more of our lovely nursery classroom this week whilst we couldn’t play outside. It has been nice to watch the children be creative with different things! We have had skeleton jigsaws to piece together, magnet creations that crossed the whole length of the nursey when linked up and some fast cars whizzing down ramps that we have built. Lots of us managed to identify that fruits and vegetables were indeed healthy in our shopping basket game, but were a little more puzzled when it came to deciding if fish fingers and ice creams were healthy or treat foods! This has been such a fun game to play with the children whilst we share ideas about which foods are sugary and might not be as good at helping our bodies grow big and strong! We did spot that brushing our teeth is really important too, along with exercise and a good night’s sleep!! Well done everyone on another fun filled week at nursery.

Hannah

The children look so happy and are eager to try lots of new activities.

Worship

This week we have been thanking God for the gift of our oceans. Together we thought of sea animals that live in the ocean and came up with 29 different creatures! You may want to see how many you can name at home.

We also asked the children why Earth is called the blue planet? Please ask your child, as I know they would love to tell you why. We then watched a short video full of sea creatures and thanked God through prayer for his wonderful gift of oceans. Click here to watch the video at home.

Next, I have just a few snippets of important information for you.

Firstly, could we ask that you do not park close the corner of Kenilworth Road junction at drop off and collection times. It makes it difficult for cars turning in and out of the adjoining roads as well as putting children crossing the road at risk. I fully understand that these are busy times and parking is difficult but please help us keep our children safe.

Secondly, this year Tempest photography will be taking individual photographs for all classes (including nursery) on Wednesday 13th October. Unfortunately we are unable to accommodate family groups or children who do not attend nursery on that morning.

Lastly, as you will know all parts of society are struggling with supply and delivery and school catering has not been immune. Over the past two weeks Jacqui, our cook and her team have tried to problem solve as deliveries have been late or have not arrived and I have to say they have done a fantastic job keeping everyone well fed despite the disruption. Going forward Lancashire catering have now introduced a temporary menu until the situation eases. Within school we have decided to try and keep as much variety as we can, including that well loved roast dinner. We will create weekly menus depending on our deliveries. We are so sorry for this inconvenience but please rest assured all children will be fed with tasty food lovingly prepared by our cook Jacqui and the team.

We hope you manage to get out and about this weekend without getting too soggy or blown away. Whatever you have planned stay safe and well and we will see you all on Monday.

Barbara

This week....

A lovely sunny start to the week, but by Thursday there has been a definite Autumnal chill in the air. The leaves are changing colour and beginning to fall from the all the trees in the nursery garden, a bit faster than we can sweep them up some days!

The conkers have also started to fall from our Horse Chestnut tree, the children were very excited about opening each one to reveal the conker inside, some were big, some were small and one or two were really tiny! We have collected them in a large bowl so that we are able to count them and order them according to size.

If you are going for a walk this weekend why not take this leaf spotting checklist with you. Click on the button below.

Our Fabulous Friends display is completed. I am sure you will agree that everyone has worked very hard!

Worship

This term we are celebrating creation. Thanking God for our beautiful planet Earth, which God made as a home for everyone.
This week we have been thanking God for the gift of air. Together we have been taking deep breathes, feeling the air as it tickles our noses. We then thanked God for this wonderful gift.
 You may want to breathe in our lovely clean air with your child and thank God together.

Clare’s blog

This week we have been so very busy.

We decorated our key person books and made it very colourful. We are now excited to fill it full of our learning. We have continued to look deeply at number one, so that we can really understand its value, the children collected one toy and then they took one photo of it all by themselves
We have been rolling balls, balancing, even making a bridge. We enjoyed dressing up as doctors and have also been reading lots of books, your children really love stories!

Clare

Hannah’s blog
 

The children have been busy growing their friendships this week and playing beautifully with one another. A lovely sunny week (in the main) has meant we have had the perfect backdrop for challenging our bodies with lots of climbing and balancing on our obstacle courses. The children have set up the equipment themselves and love the satisfaction of getting from one end of the nursery garden to another! I have enjoyed our story times and the songs we have sang together this week, we really are growing our listening and joining in skills! Lots of super recognition with our friend ‘Number 1’ and many of us have had a look at the sound ‘m’ – have a look at the sound mat that has been sent home … can you remember what the sound looked like?

Have a lovely weekend everyone!

Hannah

Colette’s blog

Sadly, Colette has not been at nursery this week. I know you have missed her as much as we have but don’t worry she will be back on Monday.

The children in Colette’s group have been working closely with the rest of the nursery team. Rest assured they have been loved, cared for and have continued on their individual learning journey, as you can see in the photos.

Lastly, it remains for say, have a lovely weekend and we will see you all on Monday for another busy week.

Barbara

This week....

Another fun week at nursery. We have been reading ‘The Colour Monster’ story to try and understand our feelings and emotions. Everyone loves the story, you may have even heard your child saying that they feel yellow or red! Click here to listen to the story and help your child to self- regulate their emotions using colour. Maybe, the children could draw how they are feeling using the corresponding colour…I hope they are all yellow or green!

You will have noticed that we have send home everyone’s Purple Mash log in details this week. Purple Mash is a cloud-based platform for primary-aged (and early years) children. It contains a wide range of age-appropriate, creative software tools for writing, drawing and activities across the early years curriculum. Click here for more information on how to log in. You will notice that I have pinned a quick tutorial video to help you navigate the virtual classroom. I hope you enjoy using it t home. Also, watch our for any activities your key person may have set!

Enjoy!

The children have started their key group ‘Learning together’ floor book. They have been drawing their pictures and have begun to record all the learning they have been doing at nursery.

Some of our families have been asking about Read, Write Inc. Click here to find out more. Please note that in nursery we will be introducing Set 1 speed sounds. Watch the video to see how we pronounce each sound. Also, Alphablocks is a good resource. Click here to watch the Alphablocks song!

Next week we will send home a Read Write Inc sound mat. Keep a lookout for it in your child’s book bag!

And now for the Key person blogs, your favourite bit I expect!

Clare’s blog

This week we have been looking closely at ourselves and talking about our emotions.

We helped our friend the Colour Monster to sort his emotions, he had got them all in a muddle.

He was feeling happy, sad, angry, scared, calm and love all at the same time!

So we connected each emotion with a colour to help him. You may want to ask your child to act out each emotion but be careful as they are very good at the angry emotion!
Over the next few weeks we will be working with the colour monster to better understand our own emotions.

We also painted our own portraits, first we looked at ourselves in the reflection of a mirror, noting all the details we could see, then we set to work painting. The portraits are completed and they are fabulous and we hope to display them soon, we will post a picture of the display here on the blog next week.

The children are all still being wonderful, loving making friends and doing lots and lots of important playing.

Clare

Hannah’s blog

What another wonderful week at nursery! The children are continuing to settle in beautifully and make friendships as they explore the nursery environment. We have been lucky with more lovely sunshine meaning we can enjoy our learning and playing outside. The children have done so well recalling all the mixed up emotions in the story of The Colour Monster and have been recognising these emotions in themselves as we continue to talk about how we feel. It really is so important to understand our feelings and begin to think about how we can then help ourselves and one another if we need to with sad, angry or scared feelings! We have also done some great work with our Numberblock friend ‘Number 1’ and have started to explore healthy eating choices and how we can look after our bodies!

Have a great weekend everyone!

Hannah

Colette’s blog

What another great week in Nursery! The children have been entering Nursery with smiles on their faces, it has been so wonderful to watch them.

We have been very fortunate with the weather too which meant we were able to enjoy that beautiful sunshine whilst we played. The children have been making and building in the garden, we have made some houses for the three little pigs but the big bad wolf was able to blown them down! We better look for some stronger materials next week and make sure they are wolf proof!

There was also time to build an obstacle course, which the children worked together to build. We were able to practise our jumping and landing skills too.

As always, there has been lots and lots of reading inside and outside of nursery, there have been books everywhere!

Hope you have a wonderful weekend together.

Colette.

I must say a big thank you to everyone who took time out of their busy schedule to come along and speak to their key person. It was so lovely to eventually see you in person. Please don’t worry of you have not managed to touch base with you child’s key person yet, just drop them and email and make an appointment.

I have it on good authority (the BBC weather app) that Saturday is going to be a nice day, we must make the most of it!

We will see you all on Monday for another wonderful week of learning.

Barbara

This week...

What a fabulous week. The children are so confident and are accessing all the areas of the continuous provision independently, that’s great!

We have started to introduce the Number 1 . A great resource that you can access at home is Numberblocks. Click here to watch Number 1. At nursery we use the Maths Mastery approach. Maths mastery is a teaching and learning approach that aims for children to develop deep understanding of maths rather than being able to memorise key procedures or resort to rote learning. At this point they are ready to move confidently on to their next stage of maths. So we will be taking our exploration of number slow and steady.

We have also started to discuss and explore healthy practices, starting with healthy foods. Click here to find the NHS Eatwell guide.

This year we are starting a weekly Key Person blog, we hope that you like it.

Clare’s Blog

What an extremely happy start to nursery we have had this year!

The children have been excitedly exploring the nursery environment, keen to play with everything.

Already in the first week at nursery we have been cutting, sticking, painting, lots of painting! Reading so many of our wonderful selection of books, planted sunflower seeds from the flower head. We have made a fairy garden, built ‘Pride Rock’ and have pretended to be firemen, trolls and the Billy Goats Gruff and so much more. The children have had the opportunity to play both inside and out and are already feeling comfortable, confident and secure in the nursery.

The manners and the kind way the children are talking to each other is beautiful, you must all feel so very proud of them all!

Clare

Hannah’s Blog

What a super start to nursery life the children have all made; I cannot believe how well everyone has settled in! There has been so much lovely playing in the garden whilst we enjoy the sunshine and we have all made such an effort to be kind friends to one another. There has been lots of whizzing round on the bikes, splashing in the water and plenty of digging in the sand pit.

I have loved seeing castles and robots being made from building blocks, so many amazing pictures being painted and have particularly been wowed by how many children like to sit attentively and listen to stories! When we have played inside I have seen lots of dinosaur enthusiasts amongst our friends and some fabulous creations with playdough!

Well done everyone on such a super start.

Hannah

Colette’s Blog

The children are beginning to settle in beautifully in to Nursery and are starting to make some lovely friendships.

So far this week we have built a road but then some roadworks appeared…we even had to make our own temporary traffic lights to ease the congestion!

We have read many stories, completed lots of number puzzles (inside and out) and the lovely hot sunshine meant that we could have the big water play out (we did wear our aprons and wellies!)

Have a lovely weekend.

Colette

As you can see the children are all having a splendid time at nursery!

Please note: this week we have emailed everyone to book either a face to face meeting or a telephone meeting with your child’s key person next week. It’s not to late to book an appointment.

Also, a few reminders

• I will require written consent (an email is fine) giving nursery consent to use images on our webpage, I am still waiting to hear from a few of our families.

• Please could you put your child’s fruit time snack in their blue book bag not lunch boxes. Please remember that your child will need one piece of fruit for each session they attend (two pieces for a full day).

• Any items which are likely to be removed during the day should be clearly labelled. The nursery ladies are getting very confused!

Some of our families have been enquiring how to pay for lunches and fees. My apologies it is going to get to next week before the invoices are ready to be sent out. There are not enough hours in the day! Keep checking your emails!

In the meanwhile, if you have any queries please drop me an email or catch me at the end of the day.

I’m not sure if summer has made its final appearance of the year (I hope not) but nonetheless have a fabulous weekend with your loved ones.

Barbara

Welcome to Nursery!

A HUGE welcome to all our children and their families. It has been wonderful to finally meet you all in person.

The children who started nursery this week have really coped well with starting nursery under unusual circumstances. It is such a big ask to expect a small child to come unaccompanied into a new building with nursery ladies they haven’t met in person. I’ve been so impressed with how the children (and grown ups) have dealt with the circumstances. I would not be being honest if I said there hadn’t been the odd tear from one or two of our friends, but they have been short lived and within minutes they were having fun!

As is customary at the being of the year our learning thread will be ‘All about Me’. We will explore families, healthy eating and practices and how our body works. If you click on the button below you will be able to look at the next few weeks planning so you can support learning from home.

As is usual in September are some ‘housekeeping’ reminders, sorry!

• Could all children’s clothing and belongings be clearly labelled. Also, a spare set of clothing would be useful, just in case of accidents.

• Everyone should bring with them one piece of fresh fruit or vegetable for each session attended, for example, a full time time should have two pieces. Milk and water are available at nursery.

• Each child should have an Our Lady’s book bag. These can be purchased from Top Marque on Park St St. Annes. Large back packs make storage tricky.

• Please remember to send your child to nursery in clothing suitable for the days weather. It is also worth mentioning that the nursery is always well ventilated and therefore an extra layer during cold spells would be a good idea.

  That’s all the reminders for this week but I’m sure I will think of more for next week!

If you click on the buttons below they will display the attachments I emailed home earlier this week.

Finally, from next week we would like to start sharing our learning at nursery by using photos of the children at work and play. I will only be able to upload images of your child if you have sent me a consent email. Don’t worry if you have not had time to reply to my email yet, as long as I receive permission by Wednesday that will be fine.

I hope everyone has a lovely week end and that the sun shines on us all! The nursery ladies look forward to seeing you all on Monday bright eyed and busy tailed, ready for fun and learning.

The Nursery Team

Welcome to Nursery

We would like to welcome everyone to nursery!!

See you in September!