The Raindrop Room has chosen ‘rules’ as their “Word of the Week” as they help our new children to settle in and understand our expectations and routines. The Rainbow Room will be focussing on the word ‘winter’ as they talk about the changing season.
Great Time
James’ family has been looking at our photos of the children settling in to the new term:
“James said he had a great time and he loves playing on the keyboard.”
It’s good to hear that James is settling in happily. Thank you for taking the time to leave us a comment.
Having Fun
We would like to share a gallery of our first couple of days back in Nursery. Everyone is enjoying meeting up with their friends and joining in with a range of activities.
Welcome
It was lovely to see so many familiar faces today and to begin to get to know our ten new children and their families.
We are able to share photos here of some of the children on their first day in Nursery. Once we have blog permission slips returned from all our new children, we will able to share more photos and examples of their work here. We hope that you will find this a valuable insight into the life of our Nursery and that you can use the blog to add comments about your child’s experience.
Simply click on the word “comment” under the title of each post if you wish to leave a comment. Please be aware that these will not appear immediately, as they are monitored by the administrator before publication, but you should see your comment within a day or two.
Peep Learning Together
Eileen, our Lifelong Learning Co-ordinator, would like to draw your attention to her PEEP sessions which will start on Thursday 16th January between 9.00 and 10.00. Please see details below. We hope that lots of our families will be able to join in with these fun sessions. 
Confident Bakers
Here are more of our bakers busy making gingerbread just before Christmas. The children are becoming increasingly confident to be involved in food technology as their knowledge and understanding of the processes and health and hygiene rules develop.
Start Of Term
Tomorrow, Wednesday 8th January, will be the start of term for our children and we are looking forward to seeing everyone again, along with the ten new children who will also be getting ready for their first day. We hope that they are excited to be starting Nursery and are looking forward to making new friends. No doubt everyone will make them feel welcome and we hope that this is the beginning of a happy experience for the children and their families. We look forward to seeing you from 8.00 onwards depending on your chosen hours.
Learning At Annan Academy
Having visited the Music Department at Annan Academy several times and had exciting visits in Nursery from a Science teacher and STEM Ambassadors, we were delighted to be able to arrange a visit by some of the Raindrop Room to the Technical Department at Annan Academy towards the end of last term. This was a fantastic opportunity for our children to experience model making at a whole new level and to learn how to safely use tools that we do not normally provide in Nursery.
Mr. Paul Johnston, Principal Teacher of Technical Education, and several of his senior pupils modelled how to use a range of tools then showed great patience to help our children make spinning tops. Each child used a ruler to mark the centre of their wood and donned safety goggles as the senior pupils made a hole in it for them. Mr. Johnston and his pupils showed great patience to teach our children how to hold the wood safely and supported them to use the electric sander. We were so proud of our children who showed super listening skills and concentration to be able to use the sander safely.
Once the spinning tops were complete, the children enjoyed using the coloured pencils to decorate their tops and some were even supported to sharpen the pencils with Mr. Johnston’s tools.
This was a fantastic opportunity for our children, experiencing learning in Numeracy and Mathematics, Technologies and Health and Wellbeing and we greatly appreciate the kindness and patience of Mr. Johnston and his pupils on this visit. Thank you also for the off cuts of wood which are being put to good use in Nursery. We have loved our visits to Annan Academy and hope that we can continue to learn from you in the future.
Congratulations
Here are our award winners from the end of last term with their certificates. Very well done both of you! I wonder who will get a certificate this term?
Volcanoes
With a small group of Rainbow Room children showing an interest in volcanoes, they decided to investigate a little more to see what they could find out. We looked at videos and photos of volcanoes on the internet and visited the school library to see what we could find out. The children who did the initial investigation were then able to share their findings with the rest of the children and soon lots of them were interested, even playing imaginatively in the construction area to depict an erupting volcano.
The next stage of learning was to move outdoors to create volcanoes using papier mache and then, once dry, they were painted to make them look more realistic. By this time nearly all the children were involved and excited about their volcanoes so we decided it was time to create our own volcanoes based on two different sets of materials (Coke and mints/vinegar and bicarbonate of soda). The children showed themselves to be super scientists, observing and comparing closely the difference between each eruption. The experiment was carried out several times and everyone was very excited to discuss their observations.
Once the experiment was completed, the children used pooters to empty their volcanoes and they turned their papier mache creation into a snowy village for their animals and Duplo figures so the children’s hard work was put to good use. It can be surprising what develops from a few children asking about a volcano but we think that these children led a super learning activity.
