Nursery and Preschool

Welcome to Nursery and Preschool

Autumn 2

Welcome to the Nursery and Preschool class page

Dear Parents,

We hope you all had an enjoyable and restful half term. It has been lovely to welcome your children back to Nursery and Preschool. We have been very proud to see how well they have settled back into our routines. Just before half term, we had some exciting news - Mrs Robinson has had her baby boy! We are sure you will join us in congratulating Mrs Robinson and wishing her all the best during her maternity leave. 

Staffing in Nursery and Preschool this half term is:

Mrs Morris (Class Teacher)

Mrs Ubaid (HLTA)

Miss Iqbal (TA)

The Nursery gates are open at the beginning of the session 8.30am-8.45am and 12.15pm-12.30pm. Please be on time to ensure your child does not miss out on valuable learning time. At the end of the session the Nursery gates are open between 11.15am-11.30am and 3.00pm-3.15pm. Please be on time to collect your child as some pupils can become upset when they see others going home.

Please make sure if someone we have not met before, is collecting your child, that you have informed the school and they know the password. Without doing this we cannot let your child leave. We understand this can be frustrating, but we are always vigilant at home time to make sure pupils leave safely. With this in mind, we encourage all children to hold an adult’s hand all the way home, or all the way to the car.

We encourage outdoor play in all types of weather, so please make sure your child is wearing suitable clothing and footwear to school. If possible, please send your child with a spare pair of wellington boots (wellies) to keep at school.

Curriculum and Learning

This half term our topic is ‘Snowy Days and Starry Nights’. Please see the knowledge organiser for the list of stories, songs and rhymes we will be using to support our learning as you may be able to share/practise some of these at home. 

Personal, Social and Emotional Development

The safety and wellbeing of our pupils are at the heart everything we do for our pupils. Last half term, we focused on settling in and establishing routines. This half term we will be learning about feelings and encouraging pupils to gain more confidence in expressing their thoughts and ideas.

Key targets for Nursery pupils this half term include, to thrive as they develop self-assurance and to play with increasing confidence on their own and with other children, knowing that their key person is nearby and available. Preschool pupils will be encouraged to become more outgoing with unfamiliar people (such as special visitors), in the safe context of their setting and to show more confidence in new social situations.

Communication and Language

Our curriculum is language rich and based around books and rhymes. Please see the knowledge organiser for a list of the stories, songs and rhymes we will be using this half term.  

We want pupils to know many rhymes, to be able to talk about familiar books, and to be able to tell a long story. We will provide lots of opportunities, both indoors and outdoors to retell familiar stories using masks, story props and puppets. Staff will encourage pupils to speak clearly and to take turns when having a conversation.

Our learning environment is designed carefully to encourage pupils to follow their own interests and express their own ideas. The variety of resources both indoors and outdoors provide ample opportunities for children to practise new vocabulary and develop their language and communication skills. Staff model, stimulate and extend children’s interactions by asking open-ended questions. Alongside this, visual cues are used to aid language development and communication.

Physical Development

Staff provide lots of different resources for pupils to grasp, hold and explore such as playdough, collage, finger paint, spoons, brushes, tweezers, pegs, shells, etc, to develop and strengthen their fine motor skills. Pupils will have daily opportunities to develop their gross motor skills using the bikes, large outdoor equipment and large mark making equipment. They will be learning to move confidently in a variety of ways such as running, jumping and climbing using the play equipment. This will help your children to develop core strength and strong bodies.

Specific targets this half term include going up steps, or climbing apparatus, using alternate feet; and to be increasingly independent in meeting their own care needs. In particular, this half term begins the daily teeth brushing scheme. It is important to stress that this is not intended to replace tooth brushing at home. Our aim is to help support and reinforce what you are already teaching your child. It is still important that your child’s tooth brushing is supervised by an adult at home, in the morning and last thing at night before bed. Brushing before bedtime is especially important, to prevent plaque and food particles remaining in contact with the teeth throughout the night.

Literacy

Early Literacy skills are very closely linked to Communication and Language skills. Children need to communicate effectively if they are going to read and write. Stories are shared daily and left for children to access independently within our cosy and inviting reading areas. The books, stories and rhymes are carefully chosen to expose pupils to a wide range of vocabulary. Resources within provision provide pupils with opportunities to use this vocabulary in their play and conversations with others.

We strongly advise that you regularly share stories with your child at home. This is key to supporting their communication, language and speech development, and is also a wonderful bonding experience which supports their personal, social and emotional development.

Maths

The children will be supported to access maths in lots of exciting and practical ways. We will use number and finger rhymes in maths as a way to familiarise pupils with the numbers 1 to 5, when counting both forwards and backwards, and encouraging pupils to join in. This will then be supported through the use of games and activities such as playing hide and seek, or rocket-launch countdowns and within provision.

Specific maths targets for Nursery pupils this half term include being able to climb and squeeze themselves into different types of spaces, beginning to understand and use some positional language. Preschool pupils will learn to recite numbers past 5 and develop their counting skills by saying one number for each item in order (1,2,3,4,5), knowing that the last number reached when counting a small set of objects tells you how many there are in total, and showing numbers to 5 on their fingers. A further target for our preschool pupils is to understand position through words alone e.g., “The bag is under the table,” – with no pointing.

Understanding the World

Understanding the World is about how children get to know about other people, the place where they live and about all aspects of the environment.

This half term, will provide lots of interesting learning opportunities. Pupils will learn about autumn and winter, animals linked to our stories (owls and bears), and religious celebrations including Diwali and Christmas.

Expressive Art and Design

Pupils are provided with a variety of opportunities to develop their imagination and encourage creativity both indoors and outdoors. Our resources include drawing, painting, role play areas, songs, musical instruments, construction toys and junk modelling.

This half term, pupils will rehearse for our Christmas singalong.

If you would like more detailed information about the early years curriculum at Brookhouse for the 2 year-old, 3 year-old and 4-year-old children, please visit the Early Years section on the curriculum page.

Mrs Morris, Mrs Ubaid and Miss Iqbal.