Nursery

22nd April 2024

A fantastic week in Nursery, the children had a fantastic day at Tweddle Farm. It started with a meet and greet from the farm worker where she let us know what we would be doing on our visit. Our first stop was the animal barn where the children had the opportunity to feed some of the baby Lambs, Calfs and Goats. I think all the children loved having a hold of the Rabbit and Guinea Pig. 

Next we went on a little walk to the field where the tractor was waiting to take us on a little adventure ride around the farm. The children were brilliant sitting and spotting lots of animals as we passed them. When we got off the tractor we were lucky to be able to have a little ride in Barrels, the children got fastened in tightly and off they went. There was lots of laughter, as they went round and round. 

All the fun made us quite hungry, so off we went back to the barn where we started for a spot of lunch. the children and grown ups loved their packed lunches. Our last adventure at the farm was a little different but lots of fun. Mrs Atkinson led the way as we followed her to another barn where we thought we were going to see some more animals, but we were surprised to see a large soft play area. We lots of fun, climbing and sliding down the slide into the ball pool. Before we headed back to nursery to see our grown ups. 

In Maths this week we have been working on Length- measurement. The children have been comparing height to their friends, they have compared shoes. Some of the children have been working on big and little. where they have been grouping animals into groups by size. 

In PE this week the children have been working on their basic ball skills, catching and kicking. all the children were great at this. The children added some of their own moves into their play as they bounced the ball then caught it, they worked together in pairs as they passed and caught the ball. 

15th April 2024 

Welcome back everyone, and a huge welcome to our new children who have joined us. We have had a fabulous first week Back. All the children have settled in great making friends. 

We have had lots of fun in the garden where we have made soup for our friends in the mud kitchen. We have been doing lots of DIY with the tools, fixing the cars and bikes, making sure the slide and obstacle course is good. The children have loved getting creative in the mark making area, our new painting area. We have lots of building going on in our construction area where some of the boys have been getting creative building with bricks. 

We have loved reading our story this week ' Sam plants a sunflower' the children have enjoyed exploring the compost where they have joined in planting some flowers. We have had lots of discussions around growing our own sunflowers where the children have shared their knowledge of what we might need to help our seeds grow. In Maths this week we have been matching the correct number of bears to the numeral. the children have been working very hard to subitise to 5. 

We have been working on Big and Little in Early Talk boost where the children have been measuring their friends then comparing who was the tallest in our group. the children worked really hard placing the farm animals in groups of big and little. We went on a little hunt around the room looking for things that were big and little. 

11th March 2024

This week we have loved getting busy with a variety of Easter activities. The children have participated in a Egg Hunt in the school hall. They were so fast finding all the eggs, where they were exchanged for a small chocolate egg. 

We have been really busy getting creative decorating carboard eggs with dry pasta and painting them, designing our own Easter eggs with a variety of materials as we collaged. We have explored the playdough making our very own playdough chicks. The children participated in making a Easter card for their loved ones. 

Outside this week the children have loved taking small risks as they worked as a team to create their own obstacle course using crates, wooden planks. It was fantastic hearing the children talk to one another and sharing their ideas before helping one another create their ideas. Some of the children found new ways to get down the hill by using the large vehicles, they loved sitting on them to ride down. Some children used the large pipe to create a slide. 

This was a great way to end the spring term. 

4th March 2024

This week has been very exciting for the children and the staff in nursery. we had a special delivery from Living eggs. The children loved having a look and sharing their ideas pf what might be in the eggs. We had dinosaurs, chickens, snakes, hedgehogs. 

When the children arrived back at nursery one morning they were greeted by some baby chicks. We were very lucky that Mrs Atkinson had caught them hatching on camera so we could watch it together on the screen. The children were very excited and eager to go and see them. 

When the chicks were ready we were very lucky to be able to have a hold of them. We were lucky to have them stay in our room for a couple of days so the children to spend time with them. 

We have loved celebrating World Book Day, the children came in dressed in their favourite book character or their pyjamas. We loved sharing some of our new books that are available in our school library with our grown ups that came to our reading cafe in the hall. We loved spending time with them sharing some of our books and talking to them about some of the books that we share together at nursery. 

26th February 2024

Our focus book in nursery this week has been 'Under my hood I have a hat'. as a whole group we have discussed what the girl is wearing, why would she be wearing all those layers of clothes. Did the children think it was hot day, cold day. 

After we had read the book the children designed their own hats drawing pictures, we talked about the colours their hat might be, the patterns that their hats might have. At the end of the week we went on a walk to Hetton with some of our parent helpers to St Benedicts Hospice Charity shop where the ladies in the shop were very helpful and kind. They let us all have a look around the shop and purchase a variety of hats to sell back in our hat shop in nursery.  The children loved taking on the role of the shop keeper in their play as they sold a variety of hats. 

In Maths this week the children have been learning and discussing shapes. we have looked at Squares, Triangles, rectangles and circles. As a group we looked at how many sides and corners the shapes have. We loved going on a shape hunt in nursery to see how many shapes we could find. Some of our children were keen to draw some shapes on the interactive board during their play. 

12th February 2024

What a busy week it has been in nursery. It has been a very messy and exciting week as we have made our own pancakes for Shrove Tuesday. We had some Strawberry and Golden Syrup to chose from for our toppings. The children had a go at making their own pancake mixture. We were fantastic at remembering the ingredients, it was fantastic watching and talking to the children about what they were doing and how the texture felt. The children showed excellent team work as they worked together in a group communicating throughout with each other. 

Our next celebration was Valentines Day. the children decorated biscuits with Red icing and sprinkles which we had at snack time. We had Rose potions in the water tray which the children loved. Some of the children loved wrote notes to their loved ones on heart post it notes. 

5th February 2023

What a busy week we have had in nursery. We have tried some Chinese food, Chinese writing, dragon dancing. This was all related to us celebrating Chinese New Year.  The children loved learning and listening to the story of the animal race for the 1st Lunar.  After learning all about the animals having a race and the year been named after the animals in the Chinese calender, we had our own race. The children had animal masks and had a moved like their animal. We also watched a a little video of how Chinese New year is celebrated in China. 

In Maths this week we have recapped on shape. the children were keen to share what they remembered from last week as we discussed the names of shapes and what they looked like. The children loved going on a shape hunt around nursery and finding a Square, Rectangle, Triangle and a circle. we used the interactive board to draw some of the shapes that we found in nursery to share with our friends. 

When reading our book of the week the children were fantastic at shape spotting in the pictures. All the children were able to point out and tell me the name of the shapes that they had spotted. 

In Launchpad this week we have been looking at Auditory Discrimination. The children worked really hard as we discussed and played a few games with pictures that had the same sounds for their names.

Week Beginning 29th January 2024

Our book this week was ' Whatever Next'. We have loved sharing the book together as a whole group. The children have loved learning all about space. We have looked and discussed what the moon looks like, we asked the children "if we could go to the moon for a day what would you do and who would you take?" it was fantastic hearing all the fun things the children would do. 

We have enjoyed exploring our planets made out of cereal and porridge oats. The children discussed if the planet would feel like this if we got to visit in a rocket. We have been learning that if we went to the moon we would float as there is no gravity.

The children have loved using there gross motor skills to draw stars in the garden, pretending they are spacemen on the moon we had fun walking as if we were on the moon. 

We found a large box, some wellies and a helmet, so we packed a picnic of cupcakes we made and headed to the moon in our rocket for a picnic it was great fun. We also made some rocket kebabs using a variety of fruits. we had them for snack they were yummy!

The children went on a visit to Year 1 where they met Miss Purdham where we retold the story 'Whatever Next' Miss  Purdham was so impressed. 

22nd January 2024

This week in Launchpad we have been focusing on visual memory. We started with some jigsaws of two pieces. The children looking at the picture and describing what they could see and then finding the missing other half. As the children became more confident in the two piece jigsaws we introduced a variety of jigsaws. The children were fantastic at having a go at some of them. 

This week the children have shown a great interest in Pirates throughout their play. Following on from this we introduced a pirate ship into the small world with added dressing up costumes. All the children loved dressing up, joining in with imaginative play as they searched the sand pit for hidden treasure. we were all shocked when we found some shiny bracelets and necklaces hidden deep. 

We loved making some pirate pizzas as a whole group. We planned what we were going to have on our pizza by discussing what toppings we would love to have. After sharing our favourite toppings together we agreed on cheese, pepperoni, peppers. We had a idea of making the pizza into a pirate face. 

The pizza was a great success as we all had a little slice at snack time. 

15th January 2024

We have had a wonderful time in nursery this week, our class story has been ‘Stick Man’. 
The children have loved making cake stick men, using chocolate rolls, matchmakers and edible eyes. 
We have loved exploring the playdough as we used a variety of materials to make stick men. We had lots of discussions about what the stick man looked like, was the stick man long, short?
It has been fantastic seeing and listening to the children retell the story using props. Story sequencing has been great as we looked at printed pictures taken from the book for the children to sequence in order from what they remembered.  The children loved sharing their thoughts with the class discussing the book and their favourite parts of the story. 
 

Welcome to Nursery!

Mrs Garside and Mrs Atkinson are your children's key workers and Mrs Fearby will be supporting with planning and assessments - we are a happy team of staff and children and we love learning together, and being part of our Hetton Primary School family!

Week commencing 8th January 2024

Welcome Back everyone! We hope you all had a lovely break over Christmas. It has been wonderful hearing the children talk about what they all their adventures over the holidays. 

All children have settled back into nursery well, enjoying spending time with their friends and staff. 

Maths

As we settled back into Nursery this week we have been subitizing to 3. The children loved using the saying "use your eyes and think quick" from the song by Jack Hardman subitize to 5. this helped us as we joined in with our maths sessions.  We are getting quicker subitizing,  we have loved playing some quick maths games to help us along the way.  

Launchpad 

This week we have been focusing on our visual skills and memory skills. The children have blown our socks off by showing us how well they can retell the sequence of objects from memory, identifying what had been taken away too. It was great to see the children playing this mini game during their play with friends throughout the day. 

11th -18th December 2023

The last few weeks before we break up for Christmas, what a fun packed few weeks it has been. We have practising and have performed our Nativity fir our friends in the whole school and for our families. 

Our story in Nursery this week has been, 'One Snowy Night'   the children have really enjoyed listening and sharing their ideas about what they like to do in the snow with friends. As a group we have been talking about the seasons in the year. We talked about the changes that happen in the environment throughout the seasons. We spoke lots about what kind of clothing we might wear in the seasons as the weather changed. The children loved singing along to the season song.

In Maths this week we have been learning about 2D shapes the children have been fantastic recognising the shapes, Square, Rectangle and Triangle. we have enjoyed looking around the indoors and outdoors for objects and items that are these shapes. The children are becoming very confident in spotting these shapes. We have also been learning a new song. 

As we approach the end of the term the children have enjoyed getting creative making lots of Christmas crafts to take home. We have loved our Christmas party with lots of dancing and games. We even had a special visit from Santa. 

27th November 2023

Wow! what a week we have had in nursery. Our story of the week was the Gingerbread Man, we loved sharing the book together and discussing what kind of person he was with him running away from people.  We have Participated in a variety of activities linked to the Gingerbread man including cooking biscuits. As we got to know the book so well, the children decided to share their own ideas on a poster of what might have happened if the fox hadn't eaten the Gingerbread man.

The next day when we arrived at nursery we noticed and found a video letting us know that  there had been a visitor before we got there. the Gingerbread man had snuck through the window with his friends leaving a mess along the way. he also and causing chaos in the school office with Mrs Hamilton and Mrs Gardiner. The children got their detective heads on to find out where he had gone. We followed the trail to find Mrs Gardiner and Mrs Hamilton were chasing him around the office as he was running everywhere. When we got into the office we found that they had eaten him all up. 

In PE this week we have been thinking of new ways to move around, the children came up with the ideas of hoping, skipping, running and crawling. We loved using these ideas to move to the different coloured cones in the hall. 

WB 13.11.23

Star of the Week - Teddy - For super use of story language

Dojo Champion - Olivia

Within Maths this week we have been looking at subitising. This is where you look a quantity and you know how many are there without physically counting the objects. We are focusing on groups up to 3! Next week we will begin to add numerals to this and work on matching numerals to quantity.

During one of our physical sessions, we were sneaky and had a go on our brand new school trampolines! We love to bounce and jump to "Crocodile Rock!"

We rounded the week off by raising money for Children in Need! We decorated biscuits, created spotty crowns in the style of Pudsy and then supported the whole school in making a copper trail! 

Another wonderful week Nursery!

WB 06.11.23

Well done to our stars of the week! 

Dojo Champion - Indieanna

Star of the week - Oscar and Hope for their amazing independence skills when putting on their coat. 

Hetton Nursery remembered... 

This week the children discussed Remembrance Day and touched upon why this was important. In order to support this, we looked closely at poppies; their colours and features and created our own using peppers and printing. We then created a wreath and Nursery and Reception visited the cenotaph in the centre of Hetton to lay our wreath as a way of remembering the amazing people who have fought for our country. 

In addition to this, we looked at Bonfire Night celebrations and thought about how Bonfire Night is celebrated. The children created some wonderful artwork using paint and cardboard tubes and of course we then added glitter. They were very lucky and created marshmallow kebabs! The marshmallows were ginormous!! The children melted chocolate, discussing how heat has changed its shape so that we pour and drizzle it over our marshmallows. They were so delicious that there were none left for the staff to eat! 

Within our Literacy learning, we are beginning to use Literacy Launchpad to enhance our learning. This is an opportunity where we can develop our pre-literacy skills such as auditory and visual memory, fine motor skills and understanding of vocabulary. In turn, this will support our reading and writing development as we move through school. This week we looked at large scale patterns outside using chalk; zig-zag patterns, wavy patterns, top to bottom patterns, left to right patterns. 

In addition to this, we have looked at a firework poem this week which had some exciting vocabulary linked to fireworks: pop, bang, dazzle, fizz. We worked with an adult to create a story map that showcased our own marks to demonstrate our understanding of some new vocabulary!

We continue to develop our outdoor environment! The children have loved exploring our water channel and have demonstrated great pouring skills - they did get extremely muddy which was lovely to see! Remember, we are always willing to take anything off your hands that could be used to develop our outdoor environment! Please shout if you have anything in your homes you no longer want or need that we might be able to use! "One man's junk is another man's treasure!"

Thank you for being amazing Nursery! 

WB 30.10.21

Welcome back to Nursery! Hope you have all had a wonderful week!

Well done to our stars of the week! 

Dojo Champion - Elsie

Star of the week - Chester for amazing PE skills leaving the apparatus!

This week the children have took part in all things 'Halloween!' 

To kick the week off, we first explored a pumpkin! We cut the top off and looked at all the different parts of the pumpkin; flesh, strands, seeds, stalk, rind. The children were encouraged to scoop out the flesh to make the pumpkin 'hollow' so that it could then be carved! We talked about how the different part of the pumpkin felt and some of us even noticed the shape of the pumpkin was 'round'.

Within maths, we looked at the vocabulary relating to size! We looked closely at the sizes of different pumpkins and compared these. The children thought of some amazing language; big, small, little, huge. Oscar even noticed that one pumpkin was 'middle sized! Later in the week, we looked at comparing length using sticks, discussing how some sticks are longer than others and some sticks are shorter than others! 

As one last celebration, we were lucky enough to attend the Halloween disco! It was great to get dressed up and dance with our friends. We even had hot dogs and juice! 

WB 09.10.23

Well done to our stars of the week this week!

Dojo champion - Olivia

Star of the week - Teddy - Amazing balancing and jumping skills during PE. 

WB 09.10.23

This week we have continued our learning around "The Little Red Hen". We began the week tasting different breads (tiger bread, seeded bread and baguettes)... the baguettes were a firm favourite! I think this was because they were warmed. In addition to this, the children practised their physical skills when chopping vegetables; we looked at peppers, onions, carrots, courgettes and sweet potato. These were then roasted and the children were given the opportunity to taste them. We looked at how the vegetables had changed - soft, browned, crispy. Later in the week, we were then showing our understanding of the story through mark-making; we made some fantastic marks to retell the story. 

We have been developing our role-play within Literacy and took on the roles of key characters from the text. The children were fantastic at recalling key language from the text and even tried to add in some actions such as 'scratching around the farmyard'. 

Within Maths, the children practised reciting numbers to 10. We did this using practical methods as well as sang songs. It is really beneficial to the children to sing songs and rhymes to the children. It develops their vocabulary and speech and language greatly.

As a Nursery, we are very lucky to have been donated a climbing frame for outside! The children are ever so grateful for this. They have particularly enjoyed accessing the swings! We are practising how to climb using alternate feet (if you go to the park, this could be something you could practise for us!) 

We access the hall once a week for some physical skill practise. The children this week had to navigate their way across an obstacle course. They demonstrated some fantastic balancing skills and then showed how well they could leave the beams and  horse by jumping and trying hard to land on two feet. 

WB 02.10.23

Well done to our Stars of the Week!

Class Dojo Champion - Callie

Star of the week - Indieanna for amazing maths progress

We had a gold award this week too! Elsie did a fantastic retell of The Little Red Hen and even wanted to write the word 'pig'. What amazing letters Elsie! Well done!

WB 02.10.23

This week we have kick-started our learning around "The Little Red Hen". The children have worked on retelling the story; using story language, identifying key characters as well as key refrains from the text. As a group, we explored some key vocabulary such as 'mill', 'corn' and flour and ensured the children had a secure understanding of these new words. Next week, we will delve deeper into our retell of this text and might even begin to taste some different varieties of bread. 

Within Maths, the children are now working as two groups. One group have been working on their subitising to 5 skills (this is when you can tell someone how many are there just by looking!). They have explored the number of dots represented on paper plates and they have identified quantities from a set. Our other maths group have been working on their counting skills (to 5) using 1:1 correspondence. They have also then practised recognising that the quantity there is identified by the last number in the count. We have some super mathematicians in Nursery. 

We are continuously developing our environment and we love to ask the children to help us in doing so. The children have created some fantastic lanterns that will be hung over our craft area. They became extremely mucky when splatting paint on these and Mrs Garside may have been caught up in the mess! 

The children have scheduled hall time each week and during this time they love to get the apparatus out. They have demonstrated some wonderful climbing skills on the climbing frame! This is something they look forward to each week!

Thank you for working so hard Nursery! 

WB 25.09.23

Star of the week - Hope - For developing lovely relationships in Nursery

Dojo Champion - Teddy

What superstars!

WB 25.09.23

This week we had a new book as our focus "Owl Babies" by Martin Waddell within Communication and Language. Within the text, the owls just wish for mammy to come home and we used this as a focus for thinking about special people in our families and how we can sometimes miss them. We talked about times we have sometimes felt sad and thought about things that can make us feel better.

Within the environment, we added puppets to the reading area and encouraged the children to role-play (supported by adults). The children practised their cutting skills to create their own puppets of the owls - they loved this!! Later in the week, they created owl pictures using sponges and feathers - we definitely have some budding artists within Nursery this year! To round off our learning using Owl Babies, we made biscuits. We learnt new vocabulary; roll, mix, stir, pat, cut. I hope grown-ups managed to try the biscuits sent home before the children ate them. 

Within Maths, we continued to work on games that will support our understanding of the final number in the count representing the number in the group. The children really enjoy games whereby the children adult makes purposeful mistakes and they have to correct e.g. when counting objects "1, 2, 3, 4, there are 6!" We would then encourage the children to identify the mistake! 

Throughout the week, we have also really developed our movement skills using ribbons and voiles. Action songs have been really helpful to support this such as 'jiggle your scarf'. 

In a final finish to the week, we celebrated "GREEN DAY"  in order to raise money for Macmillan. We took part in a range of 'green' activities such as exploring green spaghetti in the water tray, decorated biscuits using green icing, made patterns within green shaving foam and explored what happens to depth of colour when more dye was added. 

Another great week! Well done Nursery! 

WB 18.09.23 - Stars of the Week

Dojo Champion - Elsie

Star of the week - Oscar J - For super 1:1 counting skills

WB 18.09.23

This week we have looked closely at the features of our faces; we have used mirrors to discuss the position of our eyes, nose, mouth, hair and eyes and then explored the shape of our face. We discussed vocabulary such as 'round', 'pointed' and compared our eye colour. We then used this knowledge to have a go at creating our own self-portraits using markers for a display in our class. 

Within maths, some of the children are working on their understanding of the last number in the count representing the number within the group, and some other children are working on subitising within 5. In order to support this, we looked around school and discussed where we saw numbers (groups of objects). We also had a sneaky peak at the books in our lovely new library! 

Within the particularly bad weather, we went into the hall and completed an obstacle course! The children demonstrated great gross motor skills! 

Another super week Nursery! 

WB 11.09.23 - Stars of the Week

Chester - Being so brave during his nursery transition

Oliva - Class Dojo Champion

WB 11.09.23

Well we are definitely beginning to see the start of Autumn!

This week the children have explored some Autumn materials using magnifying glasses, discussing the changes in the colours of leaves as well as developing descriptive language to describe the items such as 'spiky conker shells', 'smooth conkers', 'bumpy twigs'. If you're out and about at the weekend, talk to your child about the texture of various objects they may find! This will reinforce what they are learning in Nursery!

They have developed their mathematical thinking when talking about the number of people who live in their home. We used objects to represent our families and counted these. We talked about the importance of touching each object in turn and that that the last number in the count tells us the number of objects. Some children identified when they had the same number of people in their home as their peers and others talked about how some people had more people and some people had less. It would be great if you could practise this at home!

They have shown a keen interest in nursery rhymes and spent a wonderful time singing and dancing to a range of  rhymes whilst on the carpet. 

The playdoh table is always popular! We use a very simple recipe that you can use at home. Please see below for the recipe. Using playdoh is great for fine motor development; ask your child to pinch, roll, squeeze the dough into various shapes! 

Thank you for sending in photos of your families - we are going to continue this further next week!

All of the children are now following the routines really well and are showing that they are ready for some focused learning.

Playdoh recipe

• Two cups of flour
• One cup of salt
• One cup of warm water (with food colouring if you wish)
• A teaspooon of vegetable oil 

Mix all the ingredients together until a dough is formed. 

You can also add essential oils to the dough to add smells! 

WB 04.09.23

What week... and what a scorcher it has been! The children have explored many areas of their environment, both indoors and outdoors. They are very much a class who like to stick together.. if we are outside, then we are all outside! Which is lovely to see! 

They enjoyed painting the wheels of the cars outside and rolling them backwards and forwards to explore the tracks that were made. This then carried on inside where the children who were playing in the sandpit noticed the patterns their feet made in the sand! We might need to introduce a range of animals into the sand to see whether the prints they make in the sand are different from our own prints. 

Next week, we are looking forward to finding out more about our families during our focus group time through which we are developing our listening and attention skills. 

Thank you for a wonderful week! 

First day fun!

What a wonderful first day the children have had in Nursery! They have settled well, explored various areas of their environment and began to develop relationships and follow routines. As a team, we are so impressed with how well the children have started their nursery journey and we look forward to seeing how they learn, develop and grow throughout the year. Well done Nursery!