What a lovely week it has been exploring for minibeasts in the garden and pond areas. I have spotted children out with their clipboards and tally sheets enthusiastically searching for little creatures and getting so animated when they find them! Minibeast models and clay tiles with insect imprints have been created, and some lovely paintings of these little creatures have been done.  Language has been developed with the children learning about the head, thorax and abdomen sections of an insect’s body.

Nursery and Transition classes have been practising for Sports Day, are getting faster week by week and, oh joy, they seem to be staying within the track rather than running across the field!

Transition children have had a very busy week looking at a whole range of minibeasts. They have identified the parts of an insect, have observed their caterpillars turn into chrysalises and are eagerly awaiting the next stage of development. Butterflies have been made to hang from the ceiling and a variety of minibeast masks made, as well as playing with spaghetti worms and plastic creatures in slime.

At the time of writing the boys transferring in September to our Junior Boys site, Ridgeway, have just returned with Miss Green and seem to have had an enormously happy time meeting their new teachers, seeing the rooms and outside play space and making decorated biscuits and kites. The girls transferring to our Junior Girls upstairs are singing their hearts out with Mrs Challis and about to return to their new classroom with Mrs James and Mrs St. John with smiles on their faces. I have to say that both girls and boys seem so at ease and relaxed about their new experiences and that is down to the nursery staff who build their confidence so well.

PLEASE SLIDE THE BOLT SHUT ON THE METAL GATE WHEN ARRIVING AND LEAVING THE NURSERY

With the topic of “Planting and growing” this week it was wonderful to hear about Mr McGregor’s garden when Peter Rabbit visited the Nursery yesterday. RBWM Libraries began by reading ‘The Tale Of Peter Rabbit’ by Beatrix Potter to all the children, as well as a lift-the-flap board book, ‘Peter Rabbit: Where's Peter?’, which had all the children laughing and entertained whilst they tried to discover where Peter Rabbit was hiding through following clues and unfolding flaps. The children then had the opportunity to cuddle Peter if they wished. I am certain that you all love reading to your children anyway but have sent home the leaflet about the top 10 tips for reading with your child which Peter Rabbit gave us.

The growing season has started well and the nursery classes have been busy planting sunflower seeds, cress and grass to make Grass Heads. They have created some amazing paintings of sunflowers, the cress is growing in long egg box sections and is beginning to look like caterpillars crawling along the window sill and the grass will soon be looking like hair! The children have made sandwiches linked to the story of “The Little Red Hen” with the growing of wheat so it has been a very busy week as always. The children are really enjoying the strawberries which they are harvesting on a regular basis.

Transition children have been busy exploring different life cycles, have cut out and sequenced pictures of frog life cycles, have loved discovering tiny frogs in the tank and playing the frog sequence game. As always their vocabulary has been expanded and their learning has taken another leap. The caterpillars arrived this week so we are really looking forward to their development and being able to release painted lady butterflies into the environment. To support the topic the children have been learning about symmetry when creating pictures of ladybirds and looking at their life cycle.

NO NUTS ARE ALLOWED WITHIN THE NURSERY OR THE GARDENS.

We have children within the Nursery and School who have life threatening allergies so you can imagine my horror when I was alerted to an opened snack pack box of nuts littered on the Nursery hall floor at the midday pick up time on Thursday. The area was cleaned immediately to reassure people but this should never have happened. Leave all nut products at home and be considerate of others.

In the three nursery rooms the children have been looking at life cycles of frogs and have created some lovely frog masks, puppets, life cycle charts and displays, and hopped around the rooms pretending to be these jumpy creatures. The pond is alive with water life and the children are fascinated by all the movement and development of the tadpoles, newts, water boatmen and dragonfly nymphs, to name but a few.

Transition children have been learning about the different parts of a plant and the uses of these. They set up an experiment with carnations, celery and coloured water and observed how the plants changed colour. They went on a “spot the plant challenge” in the grounds, recording those they discovered. Bean seeds were planted in jars and they made a Mr Grass Head so it will be lovely to see these develop over the coming weeks. Pictures of flowers were created using a variety of shapes so it has been a very busy week.

The term’s topic of “The Great Outdoors” could not have had a better start with the wonderful weather and the children all outside enjoying the garden, pond and playground areas. The sound of laughter and having fun has been lovely these last three days and the new children seem to be adapting to their new environment very well.

Miss Green tells me that the Transition group have been observing the growth of the tadpoles in their room, talking about what they can see outside in our garden area and about the outdoors environment at home. The children all bounced back into the room and have had a very good start to the term.

The week commencing 23 April the Nursery children will still be settling in and Transition children will be learning about the plants and growing and the letter i.