Retelling Jack and the Beanstalk

We have loved sharing the traditional tale ‘Jack and the Beanstalk’ - enjoy listening to our retell of it. 

Mass

We have been learning about mass. In provision we have been comparing the weight of two objects and saying which one is heavier and which one is lighter.

World Book Day

 We had great fun on World Book Day, we discussed our favourite books, which characters we like and shared lots of books. 

St. Monica’s Maths Day

Number 5

Chinese New Year 

Safer Internet Day

Developing our listening skills

Number 4

Homes

The Three Little Pigs 

Number 3

Winter

Pattern 

Christmas

Peace at Last

Number 2

Number 1

Baptism

Diwali

On Sunday 12th November the children, families and staff met in Derby Park for an Autumn walk. We searched the park for items on our checklist and will use these to create artwork. What a great morning we had! 

This week we have been sorting items by colour, size and shape. 

We followed a recipe to make vegetable soup. We had to use knives safety to cut the vegetables before they were cooked. In the afternoon we ate it for our snack - it was delicious! 

Nursery Rhymes

The children and their families worked very hard to create nursery rhyme characters using potatoes. Aren’t they super! 

Autumn

Autumn has arrived! After examining the outside of the pumpkins we cut them open and explored the different textures inside. The children picked up the different sized pumpkins and compared the weights, some were heavy and some were light - it took a lot of strength to pick the biggest one up! 

We created wonderful artwork using autumnal items. 

Dear Zoo

We have been sharing that book ‘Dear Zoo’ by Rod Campbell. Each day we learnt about a different animal, developing our language by describing the animals, exploring what they eat, where they live, how they move and what sound they make. Using images of the animals we retold the story. 

Mud kitchen

Playing in the mud kitchen is not only lots of fun it’s a great way to develop our gross and fine motor skills. Would anyone like a mud pie?
 

Retelling known stories

Whilst outside we used our favourite stories a basis to develop a storyline. We went on a bear hunt and blew some pigs houses down - it was great fun!
 

Outdoors

Careers day

On careers day we thought about what jobs we would like in the future and which personal qualities are needed. We have ballerinas, firefighters, princesses, nurses and superheroes, to name a few! All of these careers need us to be kind, helpful and hardworking. 

All about me

Colour

We searched Nursery to find items of a specific colour and gathered them together. 

Sorting items by colour

The children identified a given colour and sorted items into two groups. 

Library 

We love books!
The library is one of the most popular areas within Nursery, the children enjoy sharing books with an adult, their friends and also by themselves. 

Story from Mr Gouldbourne

At the end of our first full week Mr Gouldbourne was so proud of us. We all had a chocolate biscuit treat as he read us a story. 

Our first days

Transition 

We went to The Atkinson theatre to watch The Tiger Who Came to Tea. It was fantastic!

In Maths we have been comparing the weight of animals from one of our favourite stories, Dear Zoo, using balance scales. We found out which was the heaviest and which was the lightest. 

Children in Nursery have many opportunities to mark make using a variety of media. 

Snow days are so much fun! We loved exploring the snow, throwing snowballs, building snowmen, going on sledges and making snow angels. It was the best way to start the day. 

We couldn’t believe it when the farmer delivered an incubator to Nursery. We had to be patient whilst we waited for the eggs to hatch and we were amazed when the chicks were born. Information books helped us to learn how to look after them - what a fantastic experience we had!

During Children's Mental Health Week we explored the theme 'Lets Connect'. We explored the different emotions we feel and named them. At the end of the week we enjoyed a relaxing yoga session. 

We have built up a repertoire of rhymes, this is one of our favourites.  

On ‘St. Monica’s Maths Day’ we opened up a cafe. We discussed how many pennies the food would cost and created price lists. When in the cafe we had to look at the prices tags and count out the correct amount of pennies to pay for the food. 

We have been looking at the different houses that people live in. Our families shared pictures of our homes to use as a stimulus to talk about. We worked together to make models of our homes, outdoors we planned the house we wanted to build and then worked together to make it. On our class map we searched for our streets and placed us on it - we didn’t know that some of our friends lived so close to us. 

We loved learning about how Chinese New Year is celebrated. Thank you to the Hoang family for sharing how you celebrate with your family. We shared the book ‘The Great Race’ and then looked to see which years we were born in - we were born in the years of the pig and the dog. 

After watching dragon dances during Chinese New Year celebrations we decided to do one too. 

We made bird feeders to hang in our school and home gardens. We followed the recipe and carefully cut up the lard - we were very careful when using the knives. We are observing the feeders to see which birds are enjoying the food. 

When making our Christmas cards for our families we used the art work of Banksy as our inspiration. 

Early Years had lots of fun doing our Santa Dash whilst listening to Christmas songs. We ran, walked and danced our way around!

During Advent we lit a new candle on our wreath each week. We counted down until we celebrated Jesus’ birthday and learnt about the Nativity story.  

We followed a child’s interest of sharks in our key carer time. In one session we shared information books. The children used the vocabulary learnt in their discussions with their friends. 

Father Ged baptised our baby and gave her the special name ‘Ruby’. 

The children, families and staff enjoyed an autumn walk around Derby Park. We searched for items on our checklist and marked them off, looked at the signs of autumn and used what we found to create beautiful artwork.
What a lovely way to spend a Sunday morning. 

We prepared our afternoon snack using equipment safely and discussing why we had to. It was lots of fun making it but the best part was eating it! 

We enjoyed learning about Diwali, the Festival of Lights. Look at the rangoli patterns, mehndi designs and fireworks we created. 

We created beautiful artwork using autumnal items we found outdoors, it is great

to work together!

Outdoors we enjoyed mixing together water and powder paint, we then combined the colours together to further explore colour mixing. We were able to make predictions about the colours we would make by remembering our past learning.  

In RE we role played baptising our baby and gave her the special name 'Ruby'. She wore her white shawl whilst we poured water over her head.

We had some special visitors from Marsh Lane police station about how to stay and which number to telephone if we need help. 

As part of our 'All About Me' topic we all brought in three items to

describe who we are. 

When reading ‘Peace at Last’ we discussed our bedtime routines.

We then drew pictures of part of our bedtime routine. 

We could not believe we made new colours when we mixed

together primary colours, it was great to investigate this.

In Maths we have been finding different ways to sort things.

Playing in our mud kitchen is fantastic. We found the best way to transport water to use as an ingredient. Mud pie for tea anyone?

Outside we discovered bark that had fallen off a tree.

We examined it and discussed what may have happened to it.

Next, we used the bark to create artwork.

We have been discussing ourselves. We are looking at similarities and differences between us and then recreating us using a variety of media.

Look how creative we are. We are able to explore different materials

to develop our ideas about what to make.

Learning outdoors is so much fun!

Our first days in Nursery were great, we had lots of fun

exploring the environment and making new friends.