Nursery

This week in Literacy we have started a new book – Dear Zoo by Rod Campbell. The children have loved immersing themselves in all things zoo and animal! We have learned lots of new skills including predicting and reasoning, remembering why each animal had to be sent back. “The giraffe is too tall!” “The lion is too fierce!” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UywEnHKTMXk

We took our Literacy into the hall for PE, where we were learning to use the space and travel in different ways safely. Here we are having immense fun stomping like an elephant, slithering like a snake and hopping like a frog! Can you think of any other ways to travel like an animal? Some of us were really kind and helpful towards our new friends that joined Nursery in January by partnering up and showing them some ideas.

Maths

We have been consolidating our number recognition, as well as counting and representing numbers on our fingers. Some of us are quite creative when we say “show me 3 in a different way”. We really enjoyed playing a sorting game, where we had to put our number in the correct hoop!

Art

On Mondays, we start our week with some mindfulness art activities. This term we are learning about the artist Yayoi Kusama. She is from Japan and loves all things spotty! Have a look at some of the work we have created this week – we are really practising our fine motor skills. We think they look fab! Keep an eye out for more creative things from us soon! You can find out about Yayoi Kusama here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IG_8vNTAXbY

How you can help at home:

• Check your child’s belongings are all labelled, including spare clothes, PE kits and wellies
• Talk to your child about the story Dear Zoo – you can watch it here. What is their favourite animal? Can they tell you why?
• Play a game of ‘Where’s the teddy?’ Practise prepositions with your child – the bear is in front of the chair. The monkey is behind the sofa.
• Begin to talk to your child about many and few. Can your child identify the set of toys that has more/many and the set of toys that has fewer?
• Get creative at home! We’d love to see some of your creative skills – you can share them on Tapestry or send them into school in your child’s book bag. You might want to do something spotty, just like Yayoi Kusama!

This week, we have been continuing with our class story, ‘Each Peach Pear Plum’ by Janet and Alan Ahlberg.

The story is beautifully illustrated and has given us many opportunities to talk about some well-known  nursery rhymes and story characters: ‘Cinderella is walking up the stairs’ (Theo).  ‘Little Bo Peep is sitting on the well.’ (Anaya)

During our Exploring Time, we have been doing a range of activities related to the story. One of our favourites has been using the masks and hats and dressing up as some of the characters!

At the end of the story, all the characters meet together and have a picnic. One of our role play activities was to set out a picnic in Nursery. We had to think carefully about making sure we had enough plates, knives and forks for all our friends.

During an art activity, we created paper sandwiches for our picnic. We thought carefully about the shapes and colours that we could use to represent the different picnic foods. We also used apples, pears and carrots to print and we talked about the patterns they made on our paper.

We noticed that a lot of fruit and vegetables appear in the story illustrations and this led to a Maths activity  where we had to find the right number of fruits/vegetables and match them to the right colour!

The Three Bears are some of the characters in Each Peach Pear Plum, and our small world and construction activity was using coloured wooden blocks to create houses for the Three Bears and their friends.

How you can help at home:-

• Encourage your child to talk about what makes a healthy meal – what food should we eat more/less of?
• Ask your child to count out the right number of plates/forks/knives/spoons to help prepare the table for a meal.
• During our phonics sessions this week, we have been looking at the sounds ‘s’ and ‘a’.  Go for a walk around your house or outside and see how many things they can notice starting with these sounds.

Happy New Year to all our families! We hope you enjoyed the festive period and are recharged ready for a new term in Nursery!

We had a very exciting start to the new year with the visit of snow! This prompted much excitement and conversation from all the children. We suited ourselves up and went straight outside for some fun in the snow – we even had to add a new picture to our ‘weather window’ chart! Here we are exploring during our morning exercise.

Later in the week we went to the forest and loved exploring how the snow and weather had changed and affected things in there. We thought it looked very pretty!

Welcome to our new starters. The nursery children have been wonderful at welcoming their new friends and have been taking on the job of being excellent role models very seriously! They have been great at teaching the rules of nursery, reminding everybody how to play in all our areas. We have had a big focus on the golden rules and particularly listening out for good manners – using ‘thank you’.

Phonics

We started our new term with phonics lessons this week. Previously we have been playing listening games and rhyming games but we are now getting ready to start learning the first few sounds we need to help us with our reading! This week we have learned the sound S. We know this is a stretchy sound – ask your children how we say this sound. Can they remember anything that starts with this sound? Can you play a sorting game at home – which items start with S, which ones start with another sound?

How you can help at home:

• Talk to your children about things happening at home or changes in the weather – encourage them to ask questions and speak in full sentences. Repeat their sentence back to them with an extension e.g  child- “It is cold”. Adult – “Yes, it is cold and there is frost on the ground.”
• Bring maths into your everyday routines – counting the stairs, checking the clock  for bed time or dinner time, laying the table
• Read with your child everyday, discussing the story and feelings of the characters
• Check all clothes, hats, gloves, wellies etc are labelled with your child’s name
• Practise listening games such as I hear something that ticks….
• Look for items around your home or on the way to school that link to our sound of the week

This week has seen Nursery take part in their first show at school! Nursery worked very hard in rehearsals and were great at sitting beautifully whilst they watched the rest of the show. They sung beautifully and did a brilliant job adding the actions. We are so proud of them and sure you all are too! Here we are looking gorgeous in our costumes and hand made hats:

We would like to say a big thank you to Friends of Merry Hill this week for their wonderful organisation skills. We had a great Winter Fair and much fun was had by all. Nursery also thoroughly enjoyed taking part in the Creation Station where they got to decorate a special gift to bring home.

How you can help at home:

• Celebrate your child’s success in the show
• Practise playing games that use the language of ‘in front of‘ and ‘behind‘ such as hiding a toy and asking your child to say a sentence to describe where it is (the frog is in front of the chair)
• Encourage your child to talk in full sentences – modelling this everyday when you speak to them. Try repeating their sentences back to them with extensions e.g child – The bike is big. Adult – Yes, The big bike is leaning against the gate.
• Talk about the weather or other simple comparisons e.g. it is sunny today. It isn’t rainy or My coat is brown. It isn’t red.

We have a new Nursery member! Take Home Ted has already visited two of our Nursery families and has had some exciting adventures. We are so proud of the children that have already had fun with Ted – they are building up their confidence as well as developing their communication and language skills!

Each week, the Nursery staff send Ted home with a child who we have observed trying hard to follow the golden rules. Nursery children are all really good at being able to explain what the golden rules look like: “helping our friends”, “look after things”, “tell the truth”, “listen to everyone”.

How you can help at home:

• Talk to your child about the golden rules
• Encourage your child to speak in full sentences by modelling and extending e.g your child says, “The dog ran.” Adult replies, “Yes the brown dog ran through the field.”
• Talk about good manners and praise your child when they show good manners – table manners, please and thank you

This week in Nursery we have started to look at our new book, The Train Ride by June Crebbin. In the story, a little girl travels by train through different scenery and notices all sorts of things as she looks out of the window!

You can listen to the story here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KMmO7QNd57Q

In our learning this week, we thought about the things she might see and some of us set up our own train track and our train chugged past a zoo, a town and a farm!

We have also been exploring  the track patterns made by the trains as they move through our playdough. We noticed that we could make straight and wiggly lines!

This week was very exciting at school – we had snow! Lots of us came to school talking about the unexpected weather so we decided to embrace it! Here we are having lots of fun exploring the snow and ice.

The children have been discussing the change in weather, thinking about the colour of the sky and the temperature – many of the children said how cold their hands were from playing in the snow!

Literacy

We have continued our learning with the book ‘We’re Going on a Bear Hunt’ and have been creating scenes from the book. We used our fine motor skills to scrunch, cut and tear different collage materials to create bears, caves, forests etc. We have been strengthening our finger muscles by rolling playdough to create scenes from the story too!

“I made the wavy grass”             “Look! Snowballs!”

To build upon our communication and language skills, we have been rehearsing speaking in full sentences. We have been describing our friends:

“She has a red coat”

“He has shiny shoes”

“She has a stripy hat”

Maths

This week we have been learning how to use 5 frames to represent different amounts of objects. We know that you can only place one item in each box. We have also been representing numbers using our fingers.

Road safety week

This week is road safety week. We have talked lots about how to keep safe when out and about, including how to cross the road safely. We know that we must always hold a grown ups hand, look and listen and always walk across roads. We practised crossing the road when playing with our small world toys.  Some of us even made road signs and posters to help us remember! The toy cars had to stop at the signs we made to let the pedestrians cross the zebra crossings!

How you can help at home:

• Talk to your child about the changes in the weather and the different seasons.
• Ask your child to retell the story ‘We’re Going on a Bear Hunt’
• Use language of position with your child – e.g. under, over, next to
• Encourage your child to describe things they can see on your walk to school, at the park – e.g. the brown leaves are on the ground! Daddy drives a red car.
• Talk to your child about road safety and practice how to cross the road safely, holding hands at all times

This week is Nursery Rhyme Week, so we have been singing and practising lots of our favourite rhymes! Nursery rhymes are so important to help children  hear patterns in language which in turn will support them when practising phonics and learning to read.

We sing nursery rhymes everyday and it is wonderful seeing the children beginning to join in with the words and actions of their favourite rhymes. You might like to learn some at home too: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iyIDg6m4gA0

Maths

This week in maths, we have been learning all about subitising. Subisitising is when “we say how many we see without counting”. The children have been loving this and have had fun practising independently during explore time! Here they are subitising some of the toys and then showing the number on their fingers.

Literacy

We are continuing our learning about We’re Going on a Bear Hunt this week and have loved exploring some new activities linked to the story. We are all trying hard to join in with the repetitive refrains in the book, as well as learning some actions to help us remember what happens next. This week we tried to think about our own journey, going on a bear hunt through our school! We have had lots of fun!

This week we also spent some time thinking about Remembrance day. We talked about the special flower that we see around and that this is a symbol of people remembering. We even did some poppy art activities where we used different techniques to help develop our fine motor skills.

How you can help at home:

• Talk about the book We’re Going on a Bear Hunt
• Make your own animal hunt around your house or garden – using vocabulary of over, under and through (prepositions)
• Link maths into everyday life – how many plates do we need for dinner? Can you match the socks into pairs?

This week we have been learning about Divali, which is the ‘festival of lights’ and is celebrated by Hindus and Sikhs.

We began by watching this video, which tells the story of Rama and Sita and explains why Divali is celebrated.

We then looked at how Hindus and Sikhs celebrate Divali at home. We found out that they decorate their houses with special lamps called diva lamps. They also wear special clothes and make lots of delicious food to share with their friends and families.

Music and dancing are an important part of the Divali celebrations and we were very lucky to have a parent visitor, Mrs Khanderia, who came into school and taught us some Divali dancing! We would like to say a special thank you to Mrs Khanderia as we had a fantastic time!

How you can help at home:-

• Watch the Divali video with your child – what do they remember about the festival?
• Talk about any festivals you celebrate at home – if you have any photos, we would love to see them on Tapestry!

As part of our continued work as an Inclusive School we frequently refer to  the difference between equality and equity.

Equality means that everyone has the same chances or gets the same treatment. Everyone is treated equally.

Equity means that everyone has the same chances – just like equality – but equity also means considering different people’s situations so that they really are treated fairly.

If 3 children of different heights went to watch a sporting event but found that they couldn’t see over the fence, what could we do to give them a fair chance of watching the event?

If they all got the same number of boxes to stand on (equality), it would not be fair as one child can still not see over the fence.

If they all got the number of boxes that they needed to stand on to be able to see over the fence, they would all have the same chance of seeing the sporting event with their own individual situations and needs being taken into account. Now that really is fair!

We talk to the children about many of the resources and strategies we have at Merry Hill to ensure everyone is included in the classrooms, outside on the playground and at lunch times.  Some of the things we came up with included:

• our mindfulness areas in the classroom
• writing slopes and pencil grips
• fiddle toys and our fiddle boxes
• visual timetables
• scaffolds and prompts to help us achieve something we find tricky
• having a special place in the line, e.g. line leader
• adaptations at lunch time, such as having a different tray or a designated place to sit
• visiting the sensory room and using the resources in our class sensory bags
• prompts in our learning tool kits to help us remember phonic sounds and harder to read and spell words etc.

• Have conversations that celebrate individuals and their differences
• You can listen to the story “Who Are You? by Smriti Halls being read online https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Xp0LEY3YQ4
• Visit the library and see if you can find other books to enjoy that celebrate inclusion
• Encourage your child to recognise what they need to help them be successful at an activity

This half term we have spent lots of time settling in and learning how to make new friends. We have talked about what makes a good friend – being kind, using manners and helping each other. This links in well with the Golden Rules that we all strive to follow at school. Nursery are beginning to remember some of these now and it is lovely to see them trying their best to abide by these rules.

Literacy

We have been learning all about how to handle books carefully, turning the pages one at a time and following the words as we listen. We have tried hard to join in with repetitive language and even added in some actions to help us!

Maths

This half term we have been learning to recognise, count and write the numbers 1, 2 and 3. We have been collecting different sets of objects as well as discussing the colours of these objects. We tried sorting by size and colour. We discussed that maths is all around us and have been noticing shapes, colours and numbers outside in the playground and forest!

Look at all the amazing things we have achieved in Nursery so far!

We hope you have a lovely half term, filled with lots of fun!

How you can help at home:

• Talk to your child about the Golden Rules
• Practise getting dressed and undressed independently
• Visit the local library
• Read every day with your child
• Talk about the signs of autumn you see
• Spend some time outside or doing exercise
• Encourage your child to try new foods and talk about what they like or don’t like, including whole fruits that they learn to peel for themselves (bananas, oranges etc)
• Share your adventures on Tapestry!
• Play some board games or puzzles – talk about counting, taking turns and even losing!

In Nursery this week, we have continued learning the Golden Rules. We are working hard to: Be honest, look after property, listen to people, work hard, be kind and helpful and be gentle. The grown ups have been awarding team points to children that are seen to be following these rules and being good role models to their friends. We collect our points over the week and then the winning team is announced!

Literacy

This week, we have been working on the text Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What do you See? We had a go at creating our own story maps! Look at our amazing work! See if you can tell the story with us! Some of us even had a go at making our own stick puppets to tell the story. This was fun because we were also learning how to hold scissors and move the paper to get accurate cutting – it was quite tricky!

Maths

We are working on 1:1 correspondence. This means we are saying one number name for each object that we count. We are learning to use our finger to point to each item as we say its number name. We are working on numbers to 3.

PE

This week we have been learning to follow instructions. We played a warm up game where we practised colour recognition. We then worked in partners to practise throwing and catching a ball. It was quite tricky, but we tried to put our hands out to catch the ball and bring them towards our chest so that we didn’t drop it! We will keep practising!

How you can help at home:

• Talk about colours and shapes in the environment. Do you notice any patterns? Are the colours in nature changing at the moment – why?
• Practise 1:1 correspondence when counting in daily routines
• Ask your child to retell the story of Brown Bear – maybe use your puppet or even make your own!
• Practise throwing and catching a ball at home or at the park