Category: Nursery

Our Nursery pupils did extremely well in discussing their learning with their grown-ups. We talked about things we did well, loved to do  and also what we could get better at. We thought about what we would like to change in the Nursery and anything we would like to do more of.

Ollie plans to play more number games. Anabelle wishes to do more dancing and Amie would like to set up a wee shop. Lots of people are going to try something new or take the tricky option in jigsaws and puzzles.

Lots of people are going to keep up their very good listening and put lots of effort into writing and drawing.

The Mummies and Daddies had big smiles and said they loved to hear about what we plan to do to keep up our amazing learning.

Mia said it was the first day of December. We started to  think about Advent and how this leads us to Christmas. We will count down to Christmas by lighting our beautiful Advent candle and singing The Candle Song.  Each day we hope the candle melts a little bit and we reach the next numeral on the candle. We noticed that the candle was marked 1-24 and talked about what this means.  Archie knew the candle was made of wax and wishes to make his own candles. Next week we will begin to tell the story of The First Christmas, also design and write  our Christmas cards. We are enjoying singing our new Christmas song  together and may ask the Grown-Ups if they would like to join us to hear this wonderful singing.

We are thinking about numerals, recognising and ordering numbers within our play experiences and routines. We can collect “moon rocks” and show the correct amount when an adult or friend gives us a certain number to count out. We had great fun creating a backwards number sequence on our amazing space rocket 10-1 and this has helped us not only to count forwards to 10 and beyond, but backwards too ! We love to take the “Number Challenge” and to put the numeral cards and the number puzzle pieces in the correct order. We are going to make new registration plates for the bikes outdoors, identifying, recognising and matching numbers. Often at toothbrushing time, we squirt out the minty toothpaste in a pattern of ten and can tell you how many more blobs are needed if Mrs. James only does 7 !   Just a few examples of our Numeracy and Maths experiences that help us build our understanding.

Why not have a look at the numbers all around in your street (with a Grown -Up) and see if you can name as many as you can ? What is the number on your front door ?  My door number is a 3 and a 9, thats 39.

At our Meetings in November we will be talking and thinking about the moon, the sun , stars and the vastness of the sky.  Starting off with…

“What do you think you know about the moon ? ”

” What puzzles you about the moon, night sky, darkness?”

“What would you like to explore and how are we going to do this ? ”

We will document our thinking and understanding  through drawing, painting, photos, and adults writing down what we say. Come and see this on our Learning Wall as our thinking develops.

Why not go on a night-time walk with your grown-ups, looking out for the moon and stars ? Why not make your very own telescope ?

After thinking  how yummy seasonal fruits could be used, we tried lots of different jams on crackers, pancakes and toast. We came up with ten different kinds of jam and  have  now set up our own jam -making factory !  When we read ‘Jam ” by Margaret Mahy, we laughed at how the family filled their teapots and vases with plum jam. We plan to use our numeracy skills by collecting information as to favourite kinds of jam and are thinking how to record this information.

At our daily meetings we are talking together about what excites us and what we need to find/buy to make our play even more interesting. We are encouraged to put forward our thoughts and ideas.

” Can we have real tools ?” asked Ryan

” I’d love to have everything to play at shops!”   Riley

“We should have small cleaning things, like brushes, so the children can get busy cleaning ”  Brodie

 

Every morning we gather at our meeting place to welcome each other and talk about what we plan to do. We talk about how we are going to approach our play tasks. We make links to experiences we have had in the past and talk about what we would do differently.

Riley and Ryan remembered making a platform out of crates and jumping to grab the ridge pole of the den, and carefully sliding down. “We want to try this again” they said. ” We want to make it more tricky !” Well lots of people wanted to take the challenge and then everyone helped to build an amazing assault course too.

We wished Miss Dodds all our best wishes for her special event as she leaves tomorrow. She said she would miss all the Moon boys and girls and to keep up all the very good learning.

 

Today, in our garden we used sheets of mirror to see a very different view of our amazing plants, trees and the sky above. We looked very closely and talked about what we could see. We took time to think and to wonder. There were bumble bees on the jaggy teasels and silken spider’s webs underneath the beech hedge. We checked the underneath of leaves for eggs and larva too. Max then set us all a challenge to see who could get through those jaggy teasels without being spiked !  We had to make our bodies very small.  Ms. Thomas failed on all counts !

Well done to the pirate crew who had to redesign their flag , creating a completely different shape. Lots of problem- solving and cooperative learning today in the Nursery Garden.