Welcome back to the second half of the Spring term.
Please ensure you look at the term dates and holiday clubs at the end of this letter.
Holiday forms are attached and need to be returned by Friday 3rd March.
Below is the topic each room is exploring this half-term and the exciting activities your child/ren may be involved in. If you feel you can help in any way towards the topic/activities please see Linda, Bernadette, Louise or Debbie.
Field mice room: Pre-school children
The topic is – Toys! week 1 –my teddy , week 2 –St Piran, week 3 – toys with wheels, week 4 – toy animals, week 5 – dinosaurs and week 6 – Easter.
Personal, Social & Emotional Development: Over the next 6 weeks the children will be learning the dance for St Piran’s day and working together in pairs. Discussions will be held about being kind to each other and exchanging of gifts at Easter time. Following on from last term where the children looked at baby photos of themselves and the differences this term they will be looking at animals and how they are different. Elmer the elephant will be discussed, how he is different but still the same and how he may feel being different. The children will be encouraged to try out new activities, concentrate and persevere at them.
Communication & Language: The children will talk about Easter and St Piran and the history behind our celebrations. New words will be introduced such as ‘patron saint’. Letters will be written to Elmer and small world toys incorporated into discussions about everyday situations. The chorus of ‘Trelawney’ will be learnt and ‘Kernow bis Vyken’ (Cornish for Cornwall forever).
The children have been looking and learning their phonics ready for school. They will be looking at C/K, E, H, R, M and D this term – one letter a week except for C & K which are looked at together. If you would like to continue this at home your child will have been discussing and thinking of words which start with the nominated letter, forming the letter in the air before then writing it down several times on a piece of paper. Please be aware if you are left handed and your child is right handed (or vice versa) when it comes to crossing letters such as f/t/x/E/F/A/J/T/X the direction of the letter crossing would be R-L for right hand writers and L-R for left handed writers.
Physical Development: The children have been learning the dance for St Piran’s day and if you would like to practice at home it is a walk of 1 2 3 steps and then a hop (details of the parade are at the end of the letter). Additional gross motor skills will involve moving like animals and across obstacle courses. Fine motor skills will be developed through the formation of letters, threading, small world equipment and constructing with small parts.
Literacy: The story of ‘St Piran’ and ‘The Easter story’ will be read and discussed. The tray game will be played where there are a range of objects and the children find the ones which begin with the particular sound of the week. ‘What’s in the box?’ will be played where a practitioner will describe an object and the children will try to guess what it is.
Maths: During small world play the children will sort objects/animals into sets, count them and then place them into different shaped fields whilst using positional language. During week 2 the children will look at different flags, symmetry and colours and then paint their own. Shapes will be looked at including – oval for Easter and circles during week 3 (wheels).
UTW: By looking at maps of Great Britain the children will chart the travels of St Piran from Ireland – Wales-Cornwall. During week 5 the children will be encouraged to bring in toys they had when they were younger or toys they have now or toys from an older sibling or from a parent. These will then be sequenced into toys I liked as a baby, what I like now and what I may like when I’m older. The remote controlled cars will be explored and the interactive screen utilised using the pre-writing programme.
Expressive arts and design: Using a range of media the children will create a large Elmer, Easter cards and eggs, print circle pictures, flags and puppets.
Free play: Within the water tray there will be assorted boats and water wheels, fishing games and pouring equipment. Whilst the sand tray contains dry sand; wheeled toys, sieves and jugs will be used. When the sand has water added; shells, pebbles twigs and dinosaurs will be added. The role play area will become a toy shop where the children visit and ‘buy’ a toy. A till, money, catalogues, stickers and pencils will be available for the children to incorporate into their play. There will be scented playdough, clay, gloop and other tactile experiences for the children to experience.
Rising threes:
The topic is Spring; week 1 – how we grow, week 2 – baby animals, week 3 – life cycles, week 4 – Plants, week 5 – insects, week 6 – Easter.
PSED: The children will discuss how we grow and the healthy food, exercise and sleep we require to aid this. They will further discuss unhealthy foods and why we should not eat too many of them. The theme of positive behaviour and being kind and helpful to each other will continue through the term.
C&L: ‘5 little speckled frogs’ and ‘Little Arabella Miller’ will be learnt and sung along with ‘5 little pears’. Whilst looking at different insects in the garden the children will discuss why they are good for the eco system. During week 2 they will pair and learn the names of animals – lioness and cub, cow and calf……
Lit: Whilst looking at growing things the children will write labels for parts of a flower and look at how tall Jack’s beanstalk grew. Easter cards will be made and the children to ‘write’ their names.
Phy: To promote fine motor skills the children will manipulate playdough into nests, make clothes peg birds and use these to pick up ‘pipe cleaner ‘worms, complete tracing activities and chop fruit for a fruit salad.
Maths: During cooking activities the children will use scales to weigh out ingredients, count a given amount and sort the vegetables they like into groups.
UTW: The children will take part in a spring walk around the field – ‘what can we see growing’? will be asked. The lifecycle of the chicken will be discussed ready for next term when some eggs will be hatched and they will continue to check the hen coop for eggs. Birds will be made using different media and magnifying glasses used to look for insects in the garden.
EA&D: Using different mediums the children will paint their hands and create chicks, create egg box daffodils, paint flowers using vegetables, create a handprint rainbow and make musical instruments.
Dormouse Room Spring Term Part 2.
Topic: Nursery Rhymes:
5 little ducks /Zooming to the moon & Twinkle twinkle little star /5 Little Men in a flying saucer
5 Little Speckled frogs /5 Little monkeys Hot cross buns & 5 currant buns
PSED: For our younger children they will be exploring the nursery rhymes through our treasure baskets which will be filled with objects from each nursery rhyme.
C&L: We will be reading, singing and hearing lots of language as we teach and encourage the children to sing along with us. We will use visual props and aids to help them to learn our new songs.
PD: We will be exploring the different ways we can move around: looking at how to swim as we cross the pond, taking big and slow footsteps as we walk across the moon, moving sideways as we fly through space, how we can hop like a frog and how we can jump up and down on the bed.
Literacy: Each nursery rhyme will have a book related to it which the children can look at individually or we will share as a whole group.
Math: All the nursery rhymes that we will be learning will involve the numbers 1-5. We will be using and repeating them throughout our play, our singing and when communicating. They will be reinforcing them around the environment so the children will feel confident about numbers and use them and number language in their play.
KUW: We will watch some of these rhymes on our big interactive screen and the link will be put on our Brambles Facebook group so you can sing along at home with your child. We will also use this opportunity to look at the celebrations which happen at Easter.
EA&D: We will be supporting and encouraging the children to use their own knowledge of the songs. They will be further encouraged to link this knowledge into the environment around them as they investigate and explore all the activities relating to the nursey rhymes.
Staff:
Sarah has taken over the lunches for this term as Pam had a family bereavement. We hope to see Pam again at Easter. Sarah will continue at Brambles after Easter as bank staff.
News:
Our next trustees meeting is being held on Monday 6th March at 3pm @ Brambles. If any parent is interested in joining the trustees please see Debbie.
If your child has just joined Bernadette and Lindsey in the Rising 3 area they will be eligible for 15 universal hours of funding from the beginning of the autumn term. Debbie will give out EY2 forms just before the summer holidays and will then need to see a passport or birth certificate to validate the children’s details. If parents both work 16 hours or more (or if you are a single parent and working 16 hours or more) you should be eligible for an extended 15 hours. Please visit www.cornwall.gov.uk website, search for 30 hour funding and complete the forms to see if you are eligible. You should then be given an 11 digit number beginning 500 which Debbie will need to validate on the funding portal. Once you have a code you will receive an email every 3 months where you need to go back to the .gov website and revalidate your details. Please be aware this email can go into your junk mail! If the code is not revalidated it stops and will only reactivate when you reapply.
DUCK RACE:
It is almost time for our annual duck race! This takes place at Kenidjack Valley in the river (about half way down). Duck tickets are attached to this letter- if you could sell them to family and friends it would be appreciated. Once the tickets have been sold please return them with the money to Debbie. If you would like a hard copy of the tickets please see Debbie. If you would like more ducks please print as many sheets as you require or ask Debbie for more. Once all tickets are returned they are placed in a container and then 20 are drawn – these go into race 1. This is continued until all the tickets are used and we have our races. Each race is run and the winner of each race is entered into the final. Winner of race 1 becomes duck 1 in the final…….so all finalists know which duck to watch!
Each race winner has a small prize and the final race has a 1st 2nd and 3rd prize.
There will be teas, cakes, burgers, raffles…..being sold and any donations of cakes or prizes for the raffle will be gratefully received.
The provisional date for this is Sunday 30th April @ 10.30 am.
ST PIRANS PARADE:
The pre-school children will be taking part in the parade on Friday 3rd March. We have been practising our 1 2 3 hop/jump with Marna who has kindly been in and played the music for us. We will be meeting at the Primary school at 1.20 pm. We will be leaving the school at 1.30 pm, parading through the town before finishing in the Plein where we will take part in the singing and have cake!
If you are watching the parade and take any photos of the children please email them to Debbie at manage@brambles-nursery.org.uk so they can be printed and added to the children’s journals. It is not always possible to take photos when you are dancing!!!
If your child does not attend but would like to take part please meet us there. They will need a parent as a partner. Please let Debbie know if you will be joining the parade so extra sashes can be taken along.
Please ensure the children are wearing a suitable coat for the weather.
MINACK TRIP:
The pre-school children have been invited to an educational session at the Minack on Wednesday 8th March. We will be leaving Brambles at 9.00 am and will not be able to wait for any late children. We have been able to hire 1 mini bus which takes 15 children therefore we will need parental help to transport some children and for supervision. If you are able to help with either of these please see Debbie.
If you have training for mini bus driving through the Council please see Debbie!
Please ensure the children have a warm and waterproof coat as well as a hat (maybe gloves?) as the Minack is exposed to the elements and it can be very cold there.
We will be back at Brambles by 12 pm for lunch.
LUNCHES:
If you are providing grapes in your child’s lunch box please ensure they are cut into quarters. Grapes are the 3rd highest choking hazard in young children. I know it can be time consuming but at lunch time practitioners do not have the time to cut up grapes/blueberries … when they may have up to 7 other children to supervise.
Term dates:
03-14.04.2023 Easter holidays but we will be CLOSED on Friday 7th and Mondays 10th for the Easter bank holidays.
PLEASE FIND ATTACHED A HOLIDAY FORM
17.04.2023 is the start of the summer term.
Thank you.
Easter holiday
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Day |
Start time |
Finish time |
Lunch |
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Monday 3rd April |
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Tuesday 4th
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Wednesday 5th |
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Thursday 6th |
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Tuesday 11th |
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Wednesday 12th |
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Thursday 13th |
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Friday 14th |