Congratulations
Category: 2016-2017
Learning With RSPB
As promised, here are the afternoon children enjoying the RSPB activities with Kirsty. We are now looking forward to keeping an eye out for all the birds visiting our garden over the next few months.
RSPB Visit
Since we had our canopy built last summer, the birds have been slowly getting a little more confident to visit our garden and the children get very excited if they come to sample some of our bird food.
This week we had a visitor who helped us learn more about the birds we might see and what they like to eat. Kirsty from the RSPB let us hear what different sounds each bird makes and we had great fun playing a game to see if we could remember their sounds to match them to the correct picture. The children got their fingers nice and sticky making fat balls for the birds using lard and seeds then they tried out the binoculars in the garden to see if any birds were close by although a little help was needed to get the binoculars the right way round. Kirsty also showed the children three different nests and talked about the birds that would use them so everyone left feeling very enthusiastic about our local birds and how to look after them.
Here are the morning children enjoying their activities. Photos of the children in the afternoon will be posted soon.
Fantastic Time
Quinn’s family has been looking at some of our photos. Quinn has been telling them about her recent visit to Tesco:
“Quinn had a fantastic time and has told us all about it at home. I asked if it was fun and she said “awesome”. The chocolate pancakes sound good and she loved scanning her shopping. Xx”
They did all enjoy scanning the cereal boxes and the pancakes seemed to taste even better because we saw them being made. Quinn’s family also enjoyed last week’s Family Learning activity:
“We had a great time making easter crafts. Its a great idea and we enjoy doing it especially when Isaac can come and play with Quinn. Xx”
Eileen will be delighted to hear that you enjoyed the Easter crafts. It is lovely that we can have little sisters and brothers joining in. Eileen’s next plan is to offer the PEEP sessions starting next term – everyone has a letter in their trays explaining what they are about so we hope that some of our families will be able to take part.
Active Lifestyle
As part of our ongoing work on SHANARRI, we looked recently at how the children feel that they are active as part of a healthy lifestyle. It seems like there are lots of different ways for Nursery children to be active. Here are some of their thoughts.
Isobella: take my dollies for a walk.
Eli: do Highland dancing.
Priya: go on my balance bike.
Kenzie: do push-ups in my bedroom or the living room.
Tom: go on my black bike.
Neve: running, jumping and going on the scooter.
James: I like digging.
Enid: skipping.
Peter: I do swimming. I ride my horse and feed him and muck him out.
Meris: swimming with Dad.
Halle: I go to gymnastics. I do cartwheels.
Joshua W.: Tiger Cubs – Taekwando
Callum: I go to swimming. Mummy takes me. I listen to my teacher.
Reuben: I go to rugby. It’s outside at Violetbank.
Olivia: I go in my pretend car. You need to push your feet along.
Theo: I go swimming with my Dad.
Isaac: I run with my big brother Dylan.
Summer: I go running with Mummy, Daddy and Cara.
Joshua M.: I go to football. It’s at the swimming pool hall.
Maxwell: I go swimming with Mummy.
Danielle: I go to football.
It seems that most boys and girls in Nursery are very active with their families. This is just a selection of activities that they told us about so they must be keeping very fit and active.
Block Play and Construction
Block play and construction provides many learning opportunities such as problem solving, increasing spatial awareness, developing an understanding of 3D shapes, developing fine and gross motor skills, playing co-operatively, decision making, learning to play safely while managing risk … and so much more. Lately lots of children have shown super skills in this area of Nursery and have demonstrated great teamwork showing themselves to be successful learners, confident individuals and effective contributors.
Here is a taster of the children at work in the construction area. These constructions were a complicated multi storey car park with different entrances for different types of vehicles and a tunnel to let people get into the castle from the princess palace without the “baddies” seeing them. Great work boys and girls!
Click then click again for a clearer view.
Thank You
Enid’s Mum has been looking at the photos of Eileen’s recent Family Learning craft activities:
“Lovely as always to come in and do crafts, taken away some good ideas to do at home. Thank you Eileen.”
Thanks to Eileen from us too for providing more opportunities for the children to work with their families.
Get Your Red Nose Here
On Friday 24th March Primary 4 will be performing at assembly on the theme of Red Nose Day and they have suggested that children in school and Nursery could wear something red that day. They have also organised for red noses to be on sale for £1, if the children would like to contribute, and a box of red noses is now available in Nursery. Thank you to Primary 4 for your help. We hope that you raise lots of money for this worthwhile cause.
Top Tips for Buddies
Primary 6 pupils have been visiting Nursery for some time now and good relationships are being built which will help to support those children moving to Primary 1 at Hecklegirth in August. You may have noticed some of the photos of the P6 buddies and Nursery children playing together on our transition board. We thought we would share some of the thoughtful comments of P6 as they were asked to write about top tips in their role as buddies.
First you need to get to know them. You can get to know them by playing a game or two.
Be kind. If you use unkind words they might copy.
Be patient. Little ones take longer to make a decision.
Be loyal. Don’t abandon them, they wouldn’t like that.
Don’t just play, help them play.
You need to be friendly. Have you tried making them laugh? You should as it helps with bonding.
Be responsible and sensible. You have to have a good attitude and good behaviour.
Don’t let them get away with everything. If you do so they might misbehave.
Nursery kids are a lot more sensitive than you or me so always pay attention to what they’re up to.
Always listen to their opinions and decide together what to do.
If you see your buddy by themselves or upset, go over and cheer them up.
Have fun but make sure to still help and teach them a thing or two about going to Primary 1.
“Sugar coat” – sometimes you have to tell a little white lie to protect their feelings.
Be kind. If they make something like a drawing, say something nice.
Every Nursery kid loves a good story but one problem, they can’t read so read it to them.
You must help your buddy to learn or, when they get older, they’ll struggle.
Tell them a bit about you. Tell them your name, age and many more things.
Be kind to them because if you’re bad or mean, they’ll grow up to be bad or mean.
As you can see, the older children have thought carefully about their buddy role and take it seriously. We look forward to more fun times ahead with the buddies.
Easter Crafts
A few more families joined Eileen, our Family Learning Co-ordinator, on Friday to make Easter crafts and they seemed to have good fun, just like those earlier in the week. Here you can see them busy making Easter bowls and pop-up bunnies. Thank you, as always, to Eileen for a great family activity session and to all those parents and grandparents who took part.
