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We are now well underway with our school transition preparations in Olive Class. A selection of activities and class discussions are being planned for with all the children. Contact with children's new schools has been made and some teachers have already come for a visit to meet the children in class. This can be a very exciting time for the children but also a time for worries to set in as they begin to understand that their nursery journey is coming to an end and a new adventure awaits. The class team are extremely mindful of such emotions and are available to explore these feelings with the children when they arise. If you have any concerns about your child's transition to school, please come and speak with your child's key person.

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The last book of the half-term is Jack and the flum, flum tree. The children are really enjoying getting on board with going off on an adventure to find the magic flum, flum fruit which will cure Granny from a case of the moozles! However their quest is full of problems to solve, they just have to remember to keep calm, carry on and don't get their knickers in a twist!!!!

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Jack and the FlumFlum Tree  | READ ALOUD | Storytime for kids

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The first core book of the half-term was Supertato. This book provided the children will plenty of opportunities to explore superhero roles/responsibilities as well as sorting and describing different vegetables. At parliament time we learnt some new and unheard of vegetable names! Have you ever heard of a dragon carrot or a snake gourd? No! neither had the Olive-ettes and staff team.

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Supertato - Books Alive! Read Aloud book for kids

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Selfies in the sun.

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A quick pop to the shops for some ice cream!

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The sun was shining all throughout the half-term. We enjoyed plenty of water days and giggles.

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The children had many opportunities to see and hold the ducklings up close. All the staff were so proud of how kind, gentle and caring the children were during these times. A few children were naturally apprehensive about stroking the ducklings. However their worries soon disappeared when their friends gave them words of encouragement and reassurance.

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Their very first swimming lesson!

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Science week encouraged plenty of curiosity from the children as we performed a number of experiments. From Volcanoes to rain making, colour changing sweets and dissolving egg shells it certainly was all-go in Olive Class!

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We shared the story of We're going on an egg hunt with the children; counting all the eggs we found along the way. Once finished the children collected their special Easter baskets they had designed and we ventured out into the jungle garden to see how many chicks we could find. If the children were lucky enough to find a chick then they were rewarded with a special chocolate egg as a prize! Happy Easter little olive-ettes X

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WE'RE GOING ON AN EGG HUNT | Martha Mumford | Read by Miss Ellis 💛

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Emilia makes sure that our new friendly giant is sitting comfortably. He still requires a few nip and tucks, possibly a facelift then he'll be good to go. The plan is he will guard our beautiful flower garden and scare the birds away!

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Dressed in our finest pyjama's we all shared our favourite stories for World Book Day! Peppa Pig was the favourite choice for both morning and afternoon children!

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The class acted out the story with some children taking on key roles. Audience participation was on point as all the children helped contribute and prompt the characters. Special thanks to our wonderful Director Leanne; definitely a BAFTA with your name on coming your way soon!

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The children tried hard to create their own bridges using shaving foam, sponges and straws. An activity that proved very tricky and sticky!...

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The children planted real beans and studied the life cycle of a bean. New vocabulary was introduced to the children such as:

root

sprout

stalk

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Designing their own beanstalks using different materials.

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Whole group story-mapping- multiple authors!

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Whole group story-mapping!

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Bravo Aidan!

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Alice found convincing evidence that the Easter Bunny had been in our garden!

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Creating 'henna' patterns using loose parts.

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Decorating glass jars with mosaic tiles- thankyou Anisha for leading a beautiful activity.

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Sharing the book amongst friends.

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The final core book of the term is Goldilocks and the Three Bears.

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Goldilocks and the Three Bears Fairytale with Mr Tumble | CBeebies

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The first core book of spring 2 is Jack and the Beanstalk.

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Jack and the Beanstalk Fairy Tale by Oxbridge Baby

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The children have been designing their very own castle out of cardboard boxes.

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Pancake Day!

Olive class had great fun flipping pancakes today. The children thoroughly enjoyed counting back from 10 before each adult had a turn at tossing their pancake. Some adults were better than others but the children were the real stars of the show!

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All the children carefully designed and decorated their own pancake for snack.

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Shelly was due a clean, so the Shelly supervisors stepped up and got to work sharpish. They worked together as a well oiled team and delegated each other some jobs; scooping out the old bedding, refreshing her water and food supply, laying down new bedding and gently giving Shelly's shell a good brush. Bravo team!

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Some wonderful spring cleaning and and a new lick of paint made the outside walls much more colourful. It certainly brightened up the dull, grey January days of late!

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The children helped to rescue the farm animals from the big freeze that took hold of the nursery one evening. Various techniques and methods were used to help defrost the ice and speed up the thawing process. Such methods used were:

Paintbrushes and warm water,

Hammers and small wooden sticks,

Shaking the tins that enclosed the ice and finally wrapping the ice in fluffy towels.

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This term we start with the traditional story of The Three Little pigs. During our literacy sessions we will be teaching the children the main characters, where the story is set and recalling the big events that occur throughout the book. Alongside this, in the classroom we will be exploring different materials such as bricks, sticks and straw- are these materials good for building houses and if so why? We will also be looking at different homes and habitats of woodland animals.

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The Three Little Pigs – 🐷🐷🐷 Read aloud of the classic tale about the value of hard work!

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The children designed their own pigs from play dough and used loose parts to add different effects to the dough.

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All the children have been practicing writing their own names. We have displayed them in class and staff can already see the progression made from when the children last did this activity in the Autumn term.

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The children have been learning how to care for babies and the reasons why babies cry. Ivan has recently been promoted to 'big brother' so this activity was perfect for him and came at the right time for him to share all his new knowledge about life at home with a newborn.

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The second core book we have been sharing with the children is the story The Three Billy Goats Gruff. The class have enjoyed sequencing the events in the story and acting out the different characters.

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Елена Элизбарян

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Maple and Olive Class Morning session Christmas 2024

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Maple and Olive afternoon session Christmas 2024

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Wow's are held every week, morning and afternoon (allocated time slots are 11am and 3pm). These sessions are where you can engage in different activities with your child/children. Anisha and Flora will be on hand to support the activities.

Activities are fun, messy, creative and natural.

We look forward to seeing you there!

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Making some festive sticks.

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Writing letters to Father Christmas was a hot topic in early December. It also proved a great opportunity to practice our mark making skills.

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Baking Christmas shortbread biscuits was good fun. The whole class joined this big bake-off. Once baked, the children took time to delicately decorate before enjoying them while watching The Snowman on the laptop.

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Exploring Volcanoes was an interest that came from Parliament time. We explored different ingredients, equipment and methods to learn what created the most effective volcano in the shortest time.

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During our Maths Teaching sessions, the children have been learning about shapes. Some of the children created their own 3D shapes using cocktail sticks and midget gems.

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The Olive Christmas Party is always a big event in the classroom. Plenty of delicious food and games; a truly special day was had by us all. Thankyou to all parents that kindly donated food and drink.

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Pass the parcel....

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Father Christmas took time out from his very busy work schedule in order to visit the children in nursery. He listened carefully to what was on the children's lists and really enjoyed our beautifully tuned voices as we sang him some songs from our concert.

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We were sure to write him a thank you letter.

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The children worked hard to write their own letters/pictures to Father Christmas. As a special treat, the whole class went out and about to personally post their letters. We even had time to pop into the park while we were out. Well done to all the olive-ettes that worked so hard. Also apologies to Royal Mail who have had to sort through 50 letters addressed to the North Pole!

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Selection of wind-up toys are a fun and exciting way for children to practice the skill of pinching something small and twisting their wrists to wind-up the toy to make it work.

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Attached is the song list for the upcoming Christmas Concert. We look forward to seeing you there! If you are unable to attend then we will be pre-recording one of the rehearsals and will upload the video on here for your own viewing pleasure.

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A small group of children were very busy making lemonade for their friends. The refreshment team were confident in using a range of tools, equipment and some very slippery ingredients. Need less to say the staff team were not left thirsty for more and were very well tended too!

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"A tortoise like Shelley; this one is bigger than Shelley; i think it's really old," Ivan made a great observation when meeting the tortoise.

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With all the trees now bare for winter, the children wanted to fill them up with light, bright and beautiful decorations. Upcycling some cd's will do the trick!

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Talking boxes

Is an intervention to support EAL children and those children who would benefit from speech and language support.

Our talking box groups are led by Kristina.

We have been doing talking boxes at nursery for several years and the format has proved successful. These groups aim to support children to learn English in a planned and progressive way.

The groups are held twice a week with a maximum of six children in each group. The sessions run for five weeks each half term.

During this group we sing a Hello song, introduce activities, introduce a book and characters, have an attention activity, read the story and have another activity (related to key words), reward sticker and say Goodbye. The children are also exposed to the key words in the main classroom, so they can make links between their play and what they are learning in the sessions. Homework is also provided so children can continue learning at home. Should you have any questions about Talking Boxes, please ask to speak with Kristina, who will be happy to help you.

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Leanne was our class soup superhero this week, when she rounded up a group of children to work in her soup kitchen outside! The children helped prepare the vegetables, cutting and chopping them to size, before placing them in the magical soup maker. This marvelous piece of equipment transformed the vegetables into soup in under 20 minutes. Once it had cooled down, the whole class sat down and enjoyed a wonderful warming cup of loveliness!

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Funky fingers is a regular activity in Olive Class that focuses on the development of children's fine motor skills but also has many other benefits including:

Encourages communication and language skills

Supports hand writing skills through fine motor strength and control

Highly adaptable

Can fit in with any theme, topic, celebration, interest

Repetitive fine motor skills in a fun way

If changed regularly such as weekly children are excited and intrigued to have a go

Promotes characteristics of effective learning

Allows children to develop the skills they need without causing any confusion around hand writing

Through improving fine motor skills children develop independence in things such as buttoning their own coats or opening their own packets.

Below are just some of the activities that the children have been doing in class.

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Think! Hedgehog Road Safety - King of the Road 1998 UK TV Advert

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All the children have been out and about this week, practicing their road safety knowledge. Aidan reminded everyone to "Stop, look and listen when we get to the road". Back in nursery, the children have been looking at the different road signs you may see when outside. Some children were able to look at the pictures and use their thinking and reasoning skills to help them determine what those signs/symbols could mean? Jacek could recognise the "building men working". Santiago recognised the P for parliament time, but we all agreed that this P was for parking as we don't have parliament time on the road.

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Some helpful tips for parents and carers regarding road safety for children!

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Find out how to keep children safe on our roads with our hub of road safety advice and resources to share.

Road safety fact sheet

It can be hard knowing how best to teach your child to stay safe around roads. Our safe around roads fact sheet helps you to break it down and keep it simple.

Pedestrian safety

Children need help to learn how to cross the road safely. And there's a lot you can do as a parent or carer to support them. Discover top tips for teaching children pedestrian safety here.

Cycle safety

Most children love to cycle, and it's a great way for them to keep fit and healthy. Learn how to help children cycle safely with these tips.

In-car safety

Most car accidents happen close to home. Child car seats can keep your child safe. But not every seat fits every car. Here are our top tips on what to look out for.

Activity sheets

Our activity sheets for children are free for you to download and share.

Do you work with families?

We have lots of free resources to help you create a talking point, run an engaging workshop or provide essential advice to the families you work with.

Session plan

Run a virtual group session with our road safety session plan. Download yours here.

Advice in translation

Download our translated road safety fact sheets to share with families below. For more safety advice in translation on a range of other topics click here.

More resources

Order printed road safety educational resources from our shop.

Visit Brake.org.uk for more ways to teach road safety basics to children

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Road Safety For Children | Child Accident Prevention Trust

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Find out how to keep children safe on our roads with our hub of road safety advice and resources to share. Road safety fact sheet It can be hard knowing how best to teach your child to stay safe around roads.

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Young children are naturally inquisitive, full of questions about the world around them and the drive to investigate how things work. We should take advantage of this innate curiosity and start channeling their enthusiasm for scientific discovery as early on as possible.

Benefits of Early Years Science Education:

It can foster a lifelong life for science

It gives a basic grounding in scientific concepts and thinking

Supports the development of other skills and attributes such as: working with others as part of a team, communication skills, problem-solving skills, perseverance and resilience building.

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Exploring coloured powder paint at our 'potion station'. Sultan declared to the group "look, I made purple; the red and blue got all mixed up and now it's purple!"

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Creating some natural floristry art pieces in the garden. Floris trimmed the flowers and leaves to size, before delicately placing them in a position of her choosing.