Welcome to our August Newsletter

School leavers

The whole staff team would like to wish all the children and families leaving us on Friday 23 August our very best wishes for the future. 

This time of year is always an emotional one as we say goodbye to families, who in some cases, have been at the Pre-School Centre for many years. We feel privileged to have been part of your child’s journey and to see each child’s personality and individuality develop and grow, and we send them our best wishes as they begin their new and exciting adventure. Please do remember to call and see us in the future, it is always lovely to have visits from our Alumni.

Baby Room

The babies really enjoyed exploring mud on International Mud Day. We stood them up in the mud and then they walked across the paper leaving their footprints behind.

After using their feet to explore the mud, we stripped the babies down to their nappies and let them use their hands to feel the texture and consistency of the mud. This sensory activity was very tactile and enjoyable.

We also made some edible mud out of blended cereal, the babies really liked exploring the different textures and eating the different varieties of cereal, having new tasting experiences.

Crèche 1

The children have enjoyed exploring a tuff tray which contained blue gloop, sand, shells, rocks and sea creatures.

We noticed that when we have gloop out, some of the smaller children couldn’t quite access the full experience. With this in mind, we decided to put a large tuff tray on the floor containing gloop so all the children within the room could access it. This also meant the children had the new experience of sitting in gloop, engaging in sensory play in new ways. The children really enjoyed this activity, mixing both the sand and gloop together and exploring the textures, as well as trying to move the different sea creatures in the gloop.

This helped support the children’s physical development, with both fine and gross motor skills being used, as the gloop stuck the sea creatures down. The children had to adjust their grip and use their gross motor skills to get them free.

To develop this further, we will be introducing more messy play activities on a floor level to offer the different sensory experiences whilst making it accessible for all children within the room.

Crèche 2

We have been exploring our senses, extending our playdough activities by adding herbs. We have also made sensory herb bags for the children to continue to explore their sense of smell, the children were very engaged in this activity.

The younger children felt the herb plants and the older children were able to follow instructions on how to fill the bags. We observed them as they tried to match the bags with others of the same scent. They also developed their pincer grip as they opened the tie handle on the bags to place them on the hook tree.

We put some of the finished sensory herb bags in the sensory area, the children noticed and came over touching, feeling and smelling the bags. We incorporated new words for the children to learn in this activity too.

Nursery 1

We have created our own rainbow fish. When planning to this activity, we identified that some of the children in our room were increasingly excited about new stories. We chose ‘The Rainbow Fish’ story to encourage sharing with our friends.

We read story in small groups and the children listened carefully and they were excited when the rainbow fish shared his shiny scales. The children told us the other fish felt “happy” when rainbow fish shared.

To continue the interest and to also link it to the children’s fine motor development, the children were given pipettes and coloured water to dye cotton pads to create fish scales. Some children struggled with the concept of using pipettes to begin with, but persevered and by the end of this activity the children were confident in how to use the pipettes. The children enjoyed watching how the fish had a variety of colours and doing this activity on a large scale.

We found there was a large variation of opportunity for development in many areas through this story, including physical development, literacy, and PSE.

Nursery 2

We have been for a sibling walk. This really helped to settle a baby who has recently joined us. On the walk we stopped to look at the ducks and spring flowers. We visited Teddies Club and the siblings spent time together playing.

We have also been exploring colours. We have mixed different prime colours together, to see what happens. The children were all eager to join in, to see what would happen. Some of the older children made a guess at the new colour, and the younger children just enjoyed the splashing, stirring and pouring. The children then decided what colours should be introduced and mixed them in different ways using spoons, funnels, jugs, and brushes etc.
To follow on from this, we will explore coloured playdough, and see what happens when we mix two colours together!

Pre-School 1

Following the children’s interests, Pre-School 1 decided to have an insect themed week, the children were really engaged in the activities sharing their ideas and experiences. The children showed awareness of each other during conversations, listening to others, taking turns and asking questions.

After looking at pictures of real spiders the children created their own representations. During this activity the children talked about the colours and patterns of the spiders and mixed their own colours to paint with. It led to talking about different types of bugs that we see in our gardens, and their similarities and differences.

During the week various activities took place from looking at children’s books about bees and creative activities, to making a millipede and searching for bugs in the garden.

Pre-School 2

The children were all very excited to see the vegetables and strawberries growing, after they had planted them as small plants or seeds. They have lovingly tendered them making sure they have been watered and have inspected them on a regular basis, waiting to see if anything was going to grow! Something has been nibbling the strawberries and the children wondered if it could have been a mouse or a bear! We have covered them over now so hopefully nothing else comes for a nibble! We really enjoyed tasting some of the produce at snack-times.

Here are just a few of the things we learnt about: how to plant seeds and care for growing plants, understanding the key features of the life cycle of a plant and an animal, beginning to understand the need to respect and care for the natural environment and all living things, how to explore the natural world around us and describing what we could see, hear and feel whilst outside.

Pre-School 3

We really enjoyed a walk to the Eco Hub to find some wildflowers. We also explored herbs and tea bags in the water tray and decided to add some flowers from our walk. When we were on our walk, Joanne also spotted some redcurrants and blackcurrants for us to explore and mash up to do some painting with. We displayed our nature treasures on our still life drawing table, talking about colours and looking closer at each different type of flower in detail. Finally, the flower arrangement was used in the home corner.

Use the link below to identify any wildflowers you see on your walks.

Reminders

Pre-School website and newsfeed

We would like to remind parents that you can access regularly updated information from our website and on our Twitter and Instagram feeds.

Funding

A reminder that parents in receipt of working families funding need to revalidate their eligibility every three months from the date of issue. Failure to revalidate your code will result in a loss of funding.

Important dates

Please note that the Pre-School Centre is closed on Monday 26 August and Friday 6 September 2024.

Autumn term 2024 commences on Tuesday 27 August to Monday 23 December 2024 inclusive.

Invoice dates

Autumn 2024 term

27 August until 27 September 2024

30 September until 25 October 2024

28 October until 22 November 2024

25 November until 3 January 2025