Welcome to the
Nursery
Sunshine Page
Welcome
Hello Nursery Friends
It has been so lovely working with you this term.
In the second half of the Autumn term the children will learn about Bonfire Night, Diwali, Remembrance Day and Autumn and as we enjoy some fun activities. As the weather becomes colder, they will learn about the change from Autumn to Winter and then have the excitement of all our Christmas activities.
Grown-ups, we will be available to talk to on a daily basis, at the Nursery door. However, if you need a longer chat then please contact the Nursery Staff, either by phoning the School, or emailing the early years email address.
We look forward to a happy and exciting year 😊.
Mrs Cartwright-Fretwell (Nursery Teacher & FS Leader) Mrs Marsden (FS TA), Mrs Bower (FS TA) & Mrs Walton (FS SALT TA)
The themes for the Second Half Term are Autumn Celebrations (Bonfire Night, Diwali & Remembrance Day), Autumn, Winter and Christmas
The children will learn to use their words to:
- Talk about some aspects of Diwali
- Talk about the changes to leaves in Autumn
- Name red, yellow, green, orange, blue, black, brown and white
- Talk about the Nativity story
- Say what they do to celebrate Christmas
The key texts are:
The themes for the Autumn First Half Term were Friendship, Ourselves and Our Senses
The children have learnt to use their words to:
* Name the features of their faces (eyes, ears, nose, mouth, hair)
* Say what they can see, hear, feel, smell and taste
The key texts have been:
Personal, Social & Emotional Development
One of our key objectives in Nursery is to learn to play kindly with our friends, sharing, taking turns and building on each others’ play and ideas. Some of the ways we learn this best are through role play and playing with our ‘small world’ toys. Here we learn to take turns playing different characters and to share the toys between us.
We also learn to follow our class rules and to understand why they are important for helping us to learn and make friends.
Our class rules are:
Listen to grown ups and each other
Talk quietly
Walk inside
Be kind
How can you help at home?
Spend some time playing with your child, whether it be role play (e.g. playing families, superheroes or even being a dog or cat!) or playing with their toys (e.g. dolls or Paw Patrol figures). Take it in turns to play with the different toys or to play the different characters. Encourage your child to share with you and build on each other’s ideas.
Communication and Language
Mrs Walton’s top tips
Hi, My name is Mrs Walton and I am one of the Speech and Language Teaching Assistants here at Abbey Hill. You may have seen me working throughout the Foundation Stage Unit. I specialise in supporting children with language and communnication difficulties, 1-1 or in a small group.
Working closely with Speech and Language Therapists, I have been fortunate to develop my skills over the years and I am now in a position to offer training to teaching staff to further help support children’s communication and language development.
If you need any advice or just a general chat regarding your child’s language and communication development, talk to a member of the FS Staff and they will let me know 😊.
Talking together
No matter how old I am one of the best ways to help my speech and language development is to have some quiet time with me so we can talk, look at books together or sing nursery rhymes. It is always best to make sure the T.V is switched off and there is little background noise.
- I love playing make-believe games and enjoy it the most when you join in too. Make a pretend cup of tea with me or help make dolly better.
- Now my language is developing, it’s ok if I stumble or make mistakes in my talking, sometimes I’m finding the right words to say. Give me lots of time to talk and try not to draw attention to my mistakes.
- I love looking at books, please read to me and encourage me to join in and say some of the key words. It feels good to ‘read’ all by myself.
- I am learning how to say a variety of words through copying. Say the words to me how you would say them e.g. I say “I buyed the book” you say “yes you bought the book”
- I feel great when you are looking at me when I’m talking, it lets me know that what I have to say is really important. This will encourage longer sentences in my talking.
- Give me lots of opportunities for language by giving choices or asking open ended questions e.g. Would you like pizza or fish fingers for tea? My favourite part of the book was where the little girl finds her lost teddy…What was your favourite part?
Physical Development
In Nursery, we work on developing our “gross motor” and “fine motor” skills.
Gross motor skills
These relate to the larger muscles in your body, and involve larger muscle movements. Using your legs to jump or your arms to throw a ball are good examples.
At school, we try to develop our gross motor skills everyday! Some examples of our activities to help with this are:
Climbing on the climbing frame and balancing equipment, riding bikes, throwing and catching a large ball, obstacle courses (running through cones, jumping in hoops, hopscotch etc.)
Fine Motor Skills
Fine motor skills relate to the smaller muscle groups, such as the ones in your hands and wrists. These help you to use tools and equipment like scissors and pencils and are very important in helping you to write.
At school, we try to develop our fine motor skills everyday too! Some examples of our activities to help with this are:
Using tweezers to pick up small objects, pegging socks onto a line, threading beads onto a string, doing inset jigsaw puzzles, stretching elastic bands onto boards, peeling stickers, using scissors to cut
How can you help at home?
There are lots of things you can do at home to help with your child’s physical development!
You can play chasing games in the garden or park or have different types of races (running, jumping etc.) You can throw and kick a ball to each other or make your own obstacle courses.
Inside the house, you could ask your child to see how many pegs they can peg on to a clothes hanger, or they could help you prepare a fruit salad by cutting soft fruit like bananas. Perhaps they’d even like to make a ‘cereal necklace’ – threading cheerios onto string!
Keeping Healthy!
Washing our hands
For all of us, washing our hands regularly has become so important. At School we teach the children to wash their hands for 20 seconds by helping them count to 20, or by singing a favourite Nursery Rhyme e.g. ‘Twinkle. Twinkle, Little Star.
The song below, also teaches the children the importance of washing their hands and how to do it.
Eating Healthily
In Nursery, we also start to talk about the different foods we have at snack time and the reasons why. They learn about eating fruit and vegetables, and that they help us to grow big and strong.
The songs below are great for sharing with the children.
Literacy
Reading
In Nursery, our key goal is to help children develop a love of stories. We have a “Book of the Week”, which will be related to the topic, but we also read lots of other stories to help introduce children to rhyme and rhythm, alliteration and repetition.
At the beginning of the year, the focus is on listening to and enjoying the stories, and in joining in with repeated phrases or familiar parts of the story.
As the year progresses, we begin to be more aware of the way stories are structured. We might think about key events or phrases, or even suggest how the story might end! Afterwards, we will be able to describe the main characters, events and settings.
How can you help at home?
The greatest way to help your child is to share a book together as often as you can! Just before bed is a lovely time! Take the time to enjoy the story together, looking at all the pictures and making the sounds and noises that appear in the book.
You could also listen to stories online. Cbeebies offer a lovely range of bedtime stories!
https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episodes/b00jdlm2/cbeebies-bedtime-stories
Writing
In Nursery, we build the skills to helps us write once we move into Reception. Our focus in nursery is on mark making and giving meaning to the marks we make.
We do this through all sorts of different media! Pens, crayons, chalks, paints, toys, sticks, even our fingers themselves!
Initially, children like to explore mark marking and might not necessarily give meaning to their marks. That is absolutely fine and all part of their learning journey! But as they become increasingly confident, you may notice that their marks begin to mean something to them. They might tell you that it’s a picture of you, or perhaps your house! Over time, they will continue to develop in their mark making and you may notice that they begin to use lines to enclose space and create shapes. They will often use these shapes to represent different objects or different parts of the picture!
Encouragement and praise goes a long way in building children’s confidence and can really help them to develop and experiment with their mark making.
In Nursery, we encourage the children to begin using the ‘tripod grip’ when they are ready, or ‘birdie fingers’ as we call it at school. Our aim is that by the end of the year, most children are able to hold their pencil or crayon in a similar position to the picture below. We also support the children to start writing the letters in their name.
