Summer Concert & Graduation!
The pre-school children have been extremely excited on the big build up to their graduation show. The concert was based on the story book ‘Rumble in the Jungle’ and each of the children had an animal to act out. Each day Eloise would ask, “How may sleeps until my mummy and daddy can come and watch me?” Henry told his friends, “My mummy and daddy are going to come and watch me too, and I’m going to snap all of my friends because I’m the very hungry crocodile!”. Shyla started to laugh and said, “But I’m a monkey, it’s me that you need to snap!”. The children soon got their stride with their new animal roles and day by day were becoming much more confident to say their lines out loud when they were practicing the play. Some of the children even sang the songs at one of the swimming sessions to their swimming teacher!
The day of the play was such a very exciting day for the children. They had one final practise and had a picnic tea with the whole nursery to celebrate the graduation. All of the pre-school children helped to get the room set up ready for their families to come and watch. Ezmie, Joshua and William helped to create the animal art work whilst Emma, Jessica, Riley and Monty set to work hanging the decorations and helping to make the tree. Leo came in from playing in the garden and gasped in amazement, “Wow, it looks like a real jungle in here” and went and asked Zachary and Jasper to come and have a look too.
Well what a fantastic concert and graduation is was and the children all did extremely well. They confidently said their words out loud and sang along to all of the songs. The special part was when the children received their certificate and ‘starting school’ book. Ada even stayed behind in her seat to look through her book before going off to see her mum and dad!
We wish all the preschool children the very best for the future - you will be missed!
Picnics & People Who Help Us!
This week the toddlers have been looking at ‘people who help us’. Each day, the children have been taking on a new role and working to help each other in any way possible. On Monday, the toddlers became police officers, making their very own police badge using different shaped card and decorating them with jewels, paints, cellophane and more. The toddlers learnt to say “You’re under arrest” which Sadie and Rowan said particularly well. On Tuesday, they were firefighters and quickly learnt that fire is very hot and that it shouldn’t be touched. Reegan learnt “Put water on fire to put fire out!” which he told his friends and parents at pick up time. On Wednesday, the toddlers became doctors and took on their caring role very seriously. They were able to dress up and use thermometers, a syringe filled with pretend medicine (water) and plasters on their poorly patients. Flo enjoyed pushing the medicine out of the syringe into her babies mouth saying “Here! Your medicine baby, get better soon”. Ada stuck plasters all over her baby because her “Baby is not feeling well and need plasters to be better” she said. On Thursday, the children became transport drivers and enjoyed venturing out of nursery to spot different modes of transport. Emily spotted “Tractor”, Sophie spotted “Cars”, Blake shouted “Horsey” and Zack saw a “Bike”. The toddlers then sat down on the grass with a clipboard and selection of mark making tools and were asked if they could draw any of the modes of transport that we had seen on our walk. To finish off the week, the toddlers became postman, where they sat down and wrote a letter to the person of their choice. Daniel choose his teddy called Bear, while Lana choose to write to her Daddy. Later on, all the toddlers were able to post their letters and hope they were delivered safely.
Outside, the toddlers have been playing with different textures from the book of the month ‘We’re going on a bear hunt’. Ada enjoyed jumping in water shouting “Splash splosh”. Caiden and Rafferty laughed away as they threw white pompoms and cotton wool round the garden during a snowstorm, while Finley shouted “Hoooo Woooo Hoooo Woooo!”, which he had remembered from the book. Tommy and Luna ran through the forest trying not to trip in case they woke up the bear, Luna said “This way Tommy, shush don’t shout the bear is sleeping”, Tommy replied “Not wake the bear up” as he tipped toed past the tree house. Suddenly, the toddlers shouted “Look! There’s the bear” and turned to run away. Chloe shouted “Run away, don’t want to go on a bear hunt again!”, quoting the end of the book.
The under two’s have been enjoying different art activities and having fun outside. They have been looking through the colourful sensory mirrors, and Luciano looked up towards the lights while looking through the coloured mirror and Esmé watched him and began to copy. As she pulled the mirror away from her face she was smiling, Kelly said “What can you see?” Esmé replied “Wow pretty!” and smiled again.
They’ve also been enjoying cereal play, squeezing squashing and crunching different cereals between their fingers. Sophie and Cecilia enjoyed tasting the cereal, Sophie grabbed a handful bringing it to her mouth saying “Mmmm mmmm”, Sebastian laughed as he squashed the cereal against the messy tray, enjoying the crunchy sounds it made.
On one of our walks around the beautiful grounds, the children enjoyed their morning picnic snack whilst sat on a blanket under a beautiful tree. Margot kept looking up at the tree as she could see the leaves moving, and saw two squirrels that were chasing each other around the branches and pointed up towards them. Freddie and Sophie saw the squirrels as well and they laughed as the squirrels ran around the tree. After their picnic, the children ran around the grass trying to chase the butterflies in the air, Kitty kept shouting “Butterbye! Butterbye!” which made Margot point up into the air again. They then took a walk over the bridge to see the ducks that were sitting on the banks, Sophie pointed and shouted “Duck! Duck!” which made Kitty squeal with excitement. They fed the ducks some bread and the children watched as they wandered back to the water.
During our time in the garden, the under two’s had fun splashing in the big builders tray filled with water. Sophie came to over to investigate and sat down in the water splashing, while Sebastian thought it was funny to fill a plastic pot with water and get the staff team wet. Sebastian began to laugh, finding their reaction hilarious and Margot kept putting her toes in. Margot soon found it fun splashing around making the water go everywhere, Otto then joined Margot and both were jumping and laughing together, enjoying the moment.
Fresh Harvest & Fun with Ice!
The pre school children have recently been helping out with our growing patch. A couple of months ago, the children sowed the seeds and have helped with the daily watering and weeding around our vegetables and plants. They have closely observed week by week the changes that have been happening in the growing areas. Fabian noticed that the carrots, "Have fluffy hair" whilst Ezmie found a sugar snap pea and told her friends, "This looks just like the green beans I have on my dinner". Finally the time has come for some of our vegetables to be ready to be picked, including sugar snap peas, green beans and kale, which has been a very exciting time for the children. William, Eloise, Salvador, Joshua and Ezmie could not wait to get involved, knowing that we were going to be using the kale to have with our roast dinner that day. Carefully picking the kale and placing it in to the bowl, Salvador reminded everyone, "We must wash it first to make it nice and clean for all of the children to eat". The children were so proud of their own vegetable picking that they were all willing to even try the kale with their dinner, Monty even told his friends, "This is nicer than the kale we usually have".
In the warm weather, the children have taken part in many activities to keep cool and one of the favourites was definitely ice play with trucks and cars. The children were challenging themselves to see how long they could hold a piece of ice in their hands and laughing when it was becoming quite cold. Vivienne noticed some of the water dripping between her fingers from the ice cube and asked Rowan, "Do you know why there is water dripping?" When Rowan said no, Vivienne then explained to her, "It's because the my hands are warmer than the ice cube and it's making the ice cube melt". The conversation carried on to how ice cubes are made and Ethan told everyone, "We need to put them in the freezer to make some ice because it's very cold in there". Some of the children were then rubbing the ice cubes along their arms, Tristan saying, "Ahh, it's so nice and cold".
