Our Graduation Celebration!

This week marked graduation for our school leavers in the preschool room, and what a fantastic performance they put on for all their families! The last few weeks have been filled with lots of practice in preparation for the big day as the children learned their lines and songs. There has also been plenty of excited discussion about the performance and the costumes they would be wearing. Margot said “My Mummy and Daddy bought me a Crocodile costume!” River added “And I am going to be a Lion!” When the big day arrived the children were buzzing with anticipation and loved showing off their outfits and sitting down for their face paint. As their families began to arrive, the children sat with big smiles and waved as the play began. Everybody did a marvellous job with their words and songs before it was time to receive their graduation certificate and starting school book. It was amazing to see such a strong turnout from all who attended and it was lovely to see everyone stay behind to mingle with some food and drinks, and we should like to thank you!

The shows haven’t stopped there however, as the children have continued to recite their lines and sing their songs together as they play, and have even been making a stage with the big wooden blocks in the garden to re-enact their performance. Freddie said “We need a big stage to fit all of our friends!” Esme added one block and said “If I put my block here then I can sit here!” It’s great to see that the children enjoyed their play and we couldn’t be more proud of the show they were able to put on. We wish them all the best of luck as they transition to their schools.

Bocketts Farm Trip!

Over the last couple of weeks, the preschool children have been very excited on the build up to their trip to Bocketts Farm. The children have been taking part in many activities including engaging in imaginative play whilst playing with a farm animal set up. Ollie collected as many wooden blocks as he could possibly carry from one side of the garden to the other and started to build a little den for the animals. Tilly was intrigued and asked Ollie, “What are you making now Ollie?” To which Ollie went on to explain, “I have already made some houses for the horses but these animals need shelter from the hot sunshine, so I need to make a den to keep them safe”. This very quickly gained the attention of many others who all worked together to help make various home for different types of farm animals.

The children have also enjoyed a matching animal game where they were pairing the offspring to the adults. India found the piglet picture and instantly placed it with the pig, whilst Cora correctly identified that the kid was to match with the goat. When the children were satisfied that all of the animals were correctly together, they then enjoyed a phonics session, learning the first letter of all of the animals. When learning that a babies horse was called a foal and pronouncing the sound ‘F’, Francis excitedly called out, “F is for my name and Freddie and Finley!”.

On the day of the farm trip, the children were so excited about the whole day, but mostly about the tractor ride. As soon as the fun adventures of the coach were over, with many songs sung on the way, we arrived at the farm and the children were keen to see where we were going to have lunch. Gabriel straight away asked, “Is it lunch time now?” Which made his friends laugh. The tractor ride was lots of fun for the children, all of them looking around almost in amazement at everything could see around them. When getting to the pigs and piglets, Joseph said to Joshua, “They are so cute and small aren’t they!”. Jasper and Margot loved feeding the goats their animal food and each time the goat licked their hands to get the food, they were giggling away. Sienna was amazed by the baby goats, smiling at them each time they did something funny. The coach journey home was much quieter after a busy, fun packed day, with many children taking a short nap before getting back to nursery and discussing their favourite parts of the day with each other during afternoon tea.

Wet Play & Exploring Smells in the Garden!

The toddlers have been looking at the theme of ‘light and dark’ recently where they explored light play with torches and light up toys, as well as light and dark colours. The children had a range of coloured paint on the table, along with some white and black paint, brushes and plenty of paper. Maddie used her brush to swirl through all of the colours, excitedly point to her creation with her brush, “Mixing”. Elizabeth giggled at this and with a brush in each hand began splatting the different colours, as she noticed them mixing together she pointed to a large spread of paint, “It’s big pink!”. Lucy scooped up a big blob of paint and dropped it in front of her and began mixing in white and black and with a big smile commented, “It’s colours!”.

The toddlers went on a tour of the back of the garden, along the windy pathway and looking into each of the bird houses, bug hotels, habitat crates and planters. As a group of them stopped at one of the vegetable planters Tabitha leaned over for a closer look and saw something crawling beside her, she shouted “SPIDER!” while pointing to signal to her friends where it was. Sebastian replied, “Woah it is a spider…. it’s alright, I like spiders”. Clara pointed to a tomato plant at the back of the planter and asked, “What’s that?”, Jenson leaned in close and tilted his head to the side, looking at it from all angles before stating, “It’s a tree”. Further along the trail, the children pointed out the pictures of a ladybird, worm, snail and slug before ending up at the herb garden. Immediately knowing what to do Skandar, Theo and Evelyn leaned in close and took a deep breath in through their nose. Phoebe joined them and said, “I want to smell it!” as she reached her hand towards a mint leaf. She gently rubbed the leaf between her fingers before letting go and bringing her hand up to her nose to smell, “Mmm it smells yummy!”.

Over the last couple of weeks, the under 2’s have been exploring the pipe wall in the garden with a range of items including balls, water, and cars! Freya approached and picked up one of the balls, whilst Zavier observed for a short while before also approaching and letting out a little ‘Ooo’ as he curiously watched to see what would happen. Freya stretched up and dropped the ball at the top of the pipes, clapping her hands and watching intently as it began to roll down the tubes. When the ball reached a point where it got stuck, Freya gasped and nudged it forward to get it moving along the pipes again. 

The under 2’s have also loved splashing around in the water to cool off as the weather has warmed up! Lyra ran over and jumped straight in, shouting ‘Splash!’ as she did so, whilst Lydia who was already in the water giggled along with her. Calvin ran over to join in with the fun, laughing as he scooped up a handful of water and sprinkled it over his friends, which made them all laugh. Whilst out exploring the grounds, the under 2’s were very excited to see the ducks come out of the river heading towards them. Lowen clapped excitedly, and began to shout ‘Quack quack’ as they began to enjoy the duck food. Isabella let out a quiet ‘wow’ and then clapped her hands with a big smile on her face. 

Exploring Computers, Making Art & Finding Ducks!

Over the last couple of weeks, the preschool children have been engaged in lots of ICT role play since developing their ICT area within the preschool room. Freddie and Isabelle sat opposite each other, both pretending to type at their keyboards. Freddie looked around his screen to see Isabelle and started to laugh, before asking, “Are you busy doing your work too?” Isabelle giggled and responded, “Nooo, I don’t do work, silly, I’m just a child, I’m finding my name!”. Isabelle was able to identify lots of the letters from her name when looking at the keyboard. Cooper approached to see what his friends were doing and instantly spotted the numbers at the top of the keyboard and excitedly called out, “That’s 3, for me and there’s my C, C for Cooper”, whilst correctly pointing at the letter c.

The children have also been getting creative and using a variety of materials to help make some wonderful creations to display on the preschool display boards. Some children chose to make a 3d patchwork elephant for the Elmer display, whilst others chose the foam to make some bee pictures to develop the summer board. Arlo particularly enjoyed an observational sunflower painting. He was looking at the colours within the picture and carefully selecting the colours he would like to use for his artwork.

Whilst exploring the nursery grounds, Gabriel had seen some ducks swimming and got the attention of Joseph and Francis, “Look, the ducks are swimming, can you see their feet in the water?”. The boys all started to laugh together and tried to copy the ducks leg motions. Tilly looked to see what they were doing and said, “But you’re not a duck, you’re a human and we swim like this”. She started to show her legs and arm motion which made everyone laugh.

Father's Day Tea Party!

Over the last couple of weeks, the preschool children have been very excited on the build up to the Father’s Day tea party. The children decorated a mug for their dads and made a card. Whilst decorating his mug, Otto asked his friends, “Do you remember when it was a special day for our mummies and we made a flower for them?” Phoebe said, “Oh yes, I remember! That was so beautiful too!”. On the day of the tea party, the children were very excited to make a blueberry muffin for their dads. Esmé said, “My daddy loves cakes so I think he will like this one”. Santi cheekily laughed, “I’m going to eat my daddies one!”. When the fathers turned up to nursery, the children couldn’t wait to show them around to their favourite parts of the garden they would like to play and were giving their daddies tours of the nursery garden. The children were eager to show their dads what they had made for them, especially to give their muffin.

The toddlers were so excited for their daddies to come and play, and to have a tea party! Emily shouted “My daddy coming for party!” and  to which Jenson responded, “Yeah! We having a party!” followed by a fist pump and a “Woo!”. As the food was being set up, Cara gasped, understanding that it was nearly time for the daddies to arrive. She excitedly announced, “My daddy, my daddy, MY DADDY!” getting increasingly loud and expressive. Once the Dads started arriving, there were lots of squeals and jolly faces and, after giving their Dads the tour and settling into play, everyone was so happy. Zachary, along with his brother Ethan enjoyed lots of stories with their Daddy in the book corner. While playing in the sand, Leo giggled with glee each time his Daddy pretended to feed him some sand, holding a spoon towards him and saying, “Come on eat it”, causing them both to laugh. Henry took his place in goal and played a game of football with his Daddy, running and diving to try and save the ball. Even a couple of the Dads played football between them! Halle and her dad did laps around the garden, chasing each other round the climbing frames and tables.

The under 2’s loved welcoming their daddies to the nursery for the Father’s Day tea! Isabella quickly sat down with her plate of food and showed her daddy each sandwich and snack she had to eat, before munching away on them! Lydia proudly showed her daddy both the small and big gardens, leading him over to the footballs where she was picking them up and then kicking them across the grass! Just before Lyra’s daddy turned up, she was running around the garden shouting “My daddy, my daddy!”, whilst waiting very patiently. After all the daddy’s turned up, the under 2’s all proudly showed off their room and where to find the toys, as well as exploring the rest of the rooms and the garden!