St John's Nursery

Unfortunately as some of you may be aware on Thursday 6th July we will be closing permanently.
Tomorrow we will be heading to Hazelwood recreation park (children's play area) between 12:30-2:00 to have a meetup in the park. We would love for any past parents and children to come over and say goodbye.
It is meant to be a warm day so make sure you bring plenty of water.

You've got this! 💪 Multilingualism shouldn't be a barrier to learning language - it should be an asset ⭐️

Today's setup from the small hall

We've enjoyed getting back into the swing of things since returning from the Christmas break!

Halloween fun 🎃👻
The children loved drawing on the pumpkin before cutting it open.

Diwali 🎆
We hope everyone had a lovely Diwali.
The children loved learning about a new culture and how people would be celebrating Diwali.

Small hall are really enjoying their own room and have been super busy!
Their favourite things are messy play and cars!
Luckily we've lots of both

Small hall children having fun in the garden digging, building and exploring 🔎

Another busy week in the big hall, with the seasons changing we used leaves, sticks and conkers to add to our play-dough 🍂

Mark making in the big hall using new techniques and resources

Risky play!!
Teaching the children how to take risk but how to look at the dangers and to make it safe.
Together we came up with the idea of putting cushions under the climbing frame. Talking risk is so important for children to learn how to use equipment safely.
They also came up with rules with using the equipment such as only one child in the tire

Numbers are everywhere
One child decided to make numbers 1-9 out of play-dough 🎉
To make play-dough at home follow the link for an easy recipe
https://www.bbc.co.uk/tiny-happy-people/homemade-playdough/z4tdd6f

We've had a visitor to nursery 🐶
Reggie is Natasha's dog and has visited the nursery for the children to interact with him.
They have loved walking him and we all spoke about how we can be careful around dogs
We may have to make it a regular thing because the children have asked to see him nearly everyday since!

Books, books and more books 📚
We got some new Julia Donaldson books and the children have loved them, by the end of the day they had remembered key parts of the story.

First week at nursery

We love mixing real food with role play. The children loved listening to the different sounds the food made 🐯🦒🐘

The children have been practicing washing and drying their plates and cutlery after fruit time. They’ve loved having the responsibility of washing their stuff 🍽🧽

We’ve been looking at airport/ holidays this week. 🏖
The children have loved exploring the airport role play using the passports, suitcases and beach towels.
They have also loved learning about all the different countries we come from🌍

We made fresh juice this week. 🍏🍎🍊🥕
They loved being involved with the process of cutting the fruit and watching it turn to juice.
There favourite was the apple juice but many also liked the carrot juice

Red, white and blue everywhere 🇬🇧🇬🇧
We spoke about why we're using these colours and what the Platinum Jubilee means.
The children loved preparing for our Jubilee tea party, they're making cheese scones in the pictures. They tasted great and the children loved trying something new.

We hope you all had a lovely half term and Jubilee weekend 🇬🇧🇬🇧
We were super busy before half term preparing for the Jubilee, we hope you enjoy seeing some of the activities we got up too!

We have been looking into early phonic sounds with the children heading to school. They have loved exploring them independently as well as some focussed group activities.

Pizza 🍕
We made pizza baguettes last week, the children practiced many life skills including using a cheese grater, cutting vegetables and spreading the tomato sauce.
Even though it wasn't the pizza they were used to it was still a big hit.

Lifecycle of caterpillars 🐛
We looked into the lifecycle of a caterpillar last week through artwork and videos!
Most of the children had a good understanding of this through books we read including monkey puzzle and the very hungry caterpillar. It was great for them to learn in more detail the process.
We cant wait to get our caterpillars after half term!

Fruit time with a twist! 🍏🍍🍌🍉
At fruit time last week we added skewers so the children could make their own fruit skewers. Earlier on we had been to the shop to collect fruit including mango, pineapple, and watermelon.

As well as growing basil, we've been growing spring onion. These sprout quickly and it has been a great learning tool for the children to see how vegetables grow.

We accidently made slime!
We added some shaving gel and play jelly together and the children made slime.
We also looked at floating and sinking with objects in the water play.

We've been making our own play-dough recently and the children have loved being involved with the process.
We also made our own sensory bottles where the children chose what they put in their bottle.

Chia seed swap 🐛🐜🦎
This is an easy activity to do at home, all it requires is chia seeds, food colouring and water. Leave it in the fridge to thicken up for a few hours and you've got endless opportunities.

So many lovely Spring activities 🌸🌻
The children have loved all the Spring activities recently, we've also been discussing what happens to flowers and animals during this season.

We cant wait to see how our basil plant grows🌱
The children got to decorate their plant pot before planting their basil seed. So many children spoke about their parents using herbs at home.

We love messy play
The children had a lot of fun through messy play last week. We painted on clingfilm and washed and re-dressed the babies.

Please will the sun come back out! 🌞
Hazelwood recreational Park is such a lovely park we have access to. It allows the children to explore the area safely while taking risk on bigger equipment.

Some of the activities we've had in the tuff trays this month!

How interesting does our snack time look?
One of the children mentioned she likes broccoli so we went to the shop to buy some and then cooked it at nursery.
The children loved trying the broccoli and we even squeezed some lemon on top! 🥦🍋

Our new outdoor mark making area🖌
This has been a massive hit with all the children and they're loving painting outside using the environment for inspiration. 🌸
There are so many benefits of painting standing up including developing there core strength and muscle's in their shoulders. This all supports them with writing through school.

Photos from St John's Nursery's post