Hecklegirth Nursery

An Entertaining Burns Celebration

Carmen’s Mum has commented how much she enjoyed our Burns celebration:

“First I would like to say very well done to all the children. The singing was great. It was very entertaining. Secondly it was lovely to see the children in Tartan. This was Carmen’s first time wearing a kilt, she loved it.
Lovely photo. I’m going to send a copy of this photo to Carmen’s uncle who lives in Italy. He will show and explain to his sons why we celebrate Burns day, and what a haggis is!! Carmen loved tasting the iron brew. Might have to let the boys taste some Ironbrew when they come over!”

It’s lovely to hear that we’ll be helping Carmen’s family in Italy learn about Burns Day. They could always see the photos here on our blog if they have internet access at home. Maybe they could leave a comment to let us know what they think?

Burns Day

On Friday we enjoyed a great celebration for Burns Day with shortbread, oatcakes and cheese and, of course, our toast with Irn Bru. Some of the children were disappointed that we didn’t have a birthday cake for Robert Burns’ birthday so we will have to keep that in mind for next year.
We appreciate everyone making a super effort to provide the children with ‘a touch o’ tartan’ as it added to the occasion. Thank you also to all the family and friends who came to hear the children sing their Scottish songs. It’s so important for them to have an appreciative audience and you certainly helped to make it a great occasion for them. Thank you, as always, for everyone’s support and lovely comments.
Please click on the photos to make them bigger.

Primary 6 In Nursery

Children from Primary 6 have been coming to Nursery to play with our children since before Christmas and Nursery children have absolutely loved their visits. The older children have learned how to relate to young children and have built good relationships with them to the extent that some are chatting in the garden at school break time even when it’s not a day for visits. It’s also been lovely that we have had some Primary 6 children who have been able to talk to our Polish children in their native language which has added to their experience.
Thank you to all Primary 6 children who are involved in Nursery. We appreciate that you have volunteered to come to play with our children, sometimes in your own break time, and hope that you will continue to visit us. Thank you also to Mrs. Johnston and Miss McAuley for encouraging Primary 6 to take on this important role.

We Loved Our Snowmen

Some of our families have enjoyed seeing their children’s home activity on our blog:

“Bethany loved making this snowman picture but she was most upset there was no ‘big sister’ snowman and so added her own!”

“Carmen loved this task. She likes to cut and stick things down. As you can see her favourite colour is purple and pink ha ha”

Thank you to all our families for helping the children with their snowmen at home. It’s lovely to see so many of you taking part.

Rain, Rain, Stay In Nursery

Which child doesn’t enjoy the opportunity to jump in a puddle? Well, we certainly had a big enough puddle for lots of jumping this week in Nursery when our garden area became waterlogged. As well as a mini pond in our mud kitchen, we had water stretched from one end of the pathway to another. It certainly brought home to children that winter weather is not all about Jack Frost and snow.
We had ducks and boats out which produced some valuable discussions about floating and sinking as well as lots of pouring and measuring to develop numeracy skills. The children worked so well together and enjoyed investigating their ideas in a real context. Great fun was had, for example, experimenting to see if a boat would sink if they filled it with water.
It may have been a little inconvenient for adults to use a different entrance to Nursery but the children took full advantage of conditions that were very exciting for them.

Super Snowmen

We have been so delighted to see all the wonderful snowmen that you boys and girls have done as a home activity. Not only have you managed to design your snowmen and put them in order of size, as we suggested, but some of you have even added your own writing which is fantastic. Well done everyone who has taken part in this activity. We love your work.
To get a closer look at some of the fantastic snowmen, click on a photo then click again for a better view.

Learning About Winter

It sounds like Carmen is enjoying learning about winter as her Mum commented:

“Carmen is enjoying the winter topic. She loved designing her snowmen at home. She says it great fun. When we are about to set off for nursery in the morning I ask her what’s the weather like today Carmen and she tells me. When she saw the floods on the TV Carmen sayed to me ” mummy I wish I could help those people” I said and how would you help them Carmen she sayed ” mummy they could all come and stay at ours and have a sleepover until there house has dried up”. Aw how cute! So she understands how the bad weather affects people and that she cares!”

How kind of Carmen to think of others. We did talk about the floods and were pleasantly surprised by how much the children understood about them. We have also enjoyed seeing all the different snowmen arriving in Nursery and will hopefully put a few photos on the blog soon.

Winter

As part of our learning about winter, the children have been experimenting in the art and craft area to create a range of pictures. They had lots of different ideas of how to depict winter but we hope that you enjoy this selection.

Settling In

After the first week of term, our new children are beginning to settle in to Nursery life. They are learning where everything is, are becoming familiar with the routines and are enjoying trying out a range of activities, as you can see from our photos. We hope that our new families enjoy using our blog to get a feel for life in Hecklegirth Nursery. If you have not yet returned our permission form and would like to appear on the blog, please bring your form to Nursery next week.