health and wellbeing – Page 109 – Hecklegirth Nursery

Scottish Celebrations

We would like to remind you that, as part of building an awareness of Scottish language and culture, we will celebrate Burn’s Day on Tuesday 24th January. This will take the form of some fun games and a small “Burn’s Supper”.

It would add to the occasion if the children were able to wear something tartan but please don’t worry if your child does not have anything as this is a fun, informal event. We are looking forward to Primary 1 joining us in the morning and Primary 2/1 in our afternoon celebration.

Next Friday will provide the opportunity for families to come in to hear us sing our Scottish songs and see some of the work that all the Early Years classes have been doing as part of our Scottish celebrations. Details are in Miss Wilson’s recent newsletter. We look forward to a busy and fun week.

Settling In

Already we have had our first full week of the new term and, as always, we’ve had lots of fun in our learning. The ice cave has been very busy: furry rugs and sleeping bags, maps, hot water bottles and flasks seem to produce lots of imaginative role play. In the garden Jack, Finlay and their team have been making lots of plans to build a tunnel to the Forth Road Bridge. They were having problems with their maps tearing outdoors but they seem to have resolved the problem so good progress is being made. We’ve produced a wall display of winter collages and paintings and have been scientists testing raincoats for teddies and finding out about what happens to ice in different temperatures. We even had a visit from a lady who was teaching us about money.

Our new children have done so well settling in to our busy Nursery and are beginning to follow the rules and routines. We hope that they continue to grow in confidence and have lots of fun in Nursery. As you can see here, some of them are looking very settled.

Happy Christmas

The end of term seems to have gone in a flurry of activity, ending with our party. The children planned what they would like to do and eat at the party and we did our best to provide it although we did draw the line at fish and chips. Dancing, circle games, lots of party food and, of course, a visit from Santa are great ingredients for a Christmas party and everyone seemed to have a good time. The children’s behaviour was excellent and it was lovely to see the morning and afternoon children playing and dancing happily together. We hope you all have a very happy Christmas and look forward to seeing everyone in the new term. The photos below give you a taste of our party. Don’t they all look wonderful?

Click on an image to make it bigger.

Polish Christmas

We have been learning about Christmas in Poland this week. Hannah’s Mum (a.m.) and Sara’s Mum (p.m.) have talked to us about the traditions in their country at Christmas time. We learned about putting some hay under the tablecloth, about the twelve dishes at their meal, the empty place at their table and that Santa visits Poland too. We were even able to taste the nativity wafers that they have on Christmas Eve.

Christmas wafer — Tasting a nativity wafer.

It was interesting to find out that much about Christmas in Poland is similar to Scotland but that there are also several important differences. Thank you so much to both Hannah and Sara’s Mum for helping us to learn about their culture.

Polish Christmas — Lots of us tried the nativity wafer.

Concert Congratulations

Congratulations must go to our children for a fantastic performance at our Christmas concert. They looked and sounded wonderful and all who took part should be proud of their achievement.

We would like to thank all parents who provided the outfits for the children and we would like particularly to thank Conner’s Granny for making us some of the cute little net skirts. We were also delighted that Sara’s Mum was able to help our Polish children learn a Polish Christmas carol to add to the concert: it was wonderful to see some of our Nursery children perform this with older Polish children who attend our school.

We greatly appreciate all the very kind comments made by so many parents about the children’s performance. Like you, we feel very proud of them all. The photos below show some of the children prior to their performance.