Happyhansel Early Years

Mrs Geddes has two children at home who always want to take some of the blank lottery slips home from the supermarket to play with so she decided to see what everyone at nursery thought about them.

Turns out we love them –  and it was a good way for everyone to talk about numbers and see if we could spot them and colour them in.

We also spoke about our favourite numbers (lots of us like three, four or five funnily enough!) and it was fun to just colour them in too.

Does anyone play with different things at home which might be of interest to other children at the nursery? We have one pupil who brings in lots of leaflets to show us from the bank – there are lots of nice pictures, letters and numbers to talk about on those leaflets. Please bring in anything from home that might be fun for us, thank you.

You will all have got a letter home about Parents’ ‘Evening’ which we are holding next Thursday and Friday:

Please remember to come in on Monday and choose your slot – they are on a first come first serve basis but come and chat to us if you can not find a time which suits.

We have an open door policy at Happyhansel so we do not expect all of you to want or need to make an appointment, but it is a good chance for you to have a more formal chat away from the hustle and bustle of the welcome area.

There are slots available both before and after the session on both days, and there is also a chance to come to a short information session about this blog. It will be delivered by our local Glow blog expert Stephen Renwick and he can help answer any questions you have as well as share ideas about how we can develop the blog further if we want to.

We hope to see as many of you there as possible.

We have had such a busy day today!

We started off with something a bit different at Together Time – sharing news. We will be doing this more starting next week. Luckily today two of us had brought in some very exciting things for everyone to see.

First of all Immy had a picture of her dog Skye and her three new puppies. They were just born last night and mum and babies are doing well. Immy has had a busy time with babies recently as she has a very cute new baby sister too.

Next Reubyn showed us his bumble bee. It wasn’t alive when he found it so it was safe to put it in a jar and take it in to show everyone.

We spoke about bees, what colours they have on them and what they do and make for us. Mrs Geddes said they were very important for helping things to grow and we all agreed they are probably much more afraid of us than we are of them as we will be like giants to them. We might have some honey at snack time next week. Later on Reubyn and some of his friends put some extra bits and pieces in the jar to make it a bit more homely for the bee.

We got a chance to have an inside play and some of us made some lovely pictures and models. Here is Kara with her drawing of rain:

As it was such a nice day we managed to get outside for a play before assembly, which was a bit later today. Mrs King came over for a visit too which was nice as we had lots of things to show her in our outdoor area. We made a brilliant oval course out of our bits of wood and had fun using them as stepping stones and practising our balancing.

There was a lot of exciting things to see at assembly but we will keep one part of it secret as we were so impressed with a project the school has been doing that we think we might do something similar too. Watch this space!

We watched and clapped as some of the children in the school got certificates for their hard work and achievements:

Then it was our turn! We all got certificates for taking part and trying our best at Sports Day.

There are so many of us it is difficult for us all to smile and look at the camera at the same time…!

Dougie and Miss Simpson also had a brilliant walk in the middle of all of this. Here they are when they got back to the Early Years:

We stayed to support the primary children at Sports Day for a while but it was far too nice to head back to the nursery so we decided to head to the park. We even took our snack there too!

If you are passing with younger brothers and sisters and see us in the park, please come in and join us. It is a great way to get future pupils used to being in a nursery setting in a place already familiar to them – and with mum, dad or other carer there!

We are making the most of all this sunshine so we are glad to see everyone remembering their suncream, hats and even sunglasses. Thank you.

We have had a wonderful day of weather for sports day – almost too hot at some points so we are glad everyone remembered to wear their suncream!

Everyone tried their best and joined in for at least one race so well done to everyone.

We had a running race first and you could tell we had been practicing in the hall during the week. We all zoomed along!

Up next was some balancing – it was tricky to go fast and keep the beanbag on our heads.

Next we did the tattie and spoon race. There were some good tactics seen in this one!

Finally the beanbag throw…

Thank you to everyone who came to support us. There will definitely be certificates handed out at assembly tomorrow!

We have been finding bugs everywhere at Nursery today!

“Look! A spider behind here!” “Put him outside.” “Don’t squash him.”

“He has four legs.”

“This is my slater we found. His name is Slater Spider Long Legs.”

Just a peerie reminder that there is NO nursery on Friday 25th May or Monday 28th May. We hope the weather is lovely and that you all have loads of fun on your extra days at home. We are looking forward to hearing all about it when we see you on Tuesday.

This is also a reminder that we have sports day on Thursday 31st May – the Early Years will be starting their events at 9.30am and would like as much support as possible so please come and watch. We will be staying to cheer on the children in the school afterwards for a peerie while too. Keep your fingers crossed for good weather – and remember the suncream if it is sunny 🙂

We have been using story stones again in the nursery and are starting to create our own too. Story stones are just pebbles which pictures have been drawn/painted or glued to, and which you can then use to help you make up or tell a story. They are brilliant for all types of imaginative play.

“There is only one little monkey jumping on the bed!” We use the stones to sing and count too.

We already have some brilliant Jack and the Beanstalk ones made by Elsah’s mum when she was in the nursery, but we have added some new characters to the basket this week and have had a good talk at Together Time about what we all want to put on our own stones next week.

Can you recognise any of these?

If you want more information on story stones or want to make your own, there are lots of ideas online. Here is just one: https://artfulparent.com/story-stones-ideas-storytelling-rocks/ It’s a good use for the pocketful’s of pebbles most of us end up coming home from the beach with! We’d love to see any that you do make at home so please do take them in. We have some very creative parents!

We were really lucky to have Ann Marie Anderson here to read us some of her books about the Peerie Ooricks. She brought in peat and ‘oo’ as well so we could see some of the things from the stories.

Afterwards we all made our own peerie Oorick wife and a ram too, using real ‘oo’.

Here are the finished products:

We also got to have a go at carrying a kishie. It was quite heavy with the peats in it.

We all listened really well and asked some good questions. Thank you for coming Ann Marie.

We have been getting on so well with our junk modelling that we have now started to look at some new building materials – wood!

We were very lucky to get some wood free of charge from Hay and Company (Buildbase) in Lerwick and some sanding pads donated by A.C Paintshop in the Toll Clock so are starting out very slowly and carefully by just sanding the wood first. Preparation is very important for safety and for making it look good.

We have done lots of talking about splinters and the sharp edges and how we need to be very careful with both the sharp bits of wood, and the sanding pads. The experts in A.C. Paintshop advised us that the pads are kinder to little fingers and we have found that to be the case.

We also have safety glasses and face masks to stop us getting any sawdust in our eyes, noses or mouths and we always have to have a grown up with us when we work with the wood to make sure we are safe. We are working up towards using some tools before the end of the term so keep an eye on the blog to see how we get on!

If any parents are good at DIY or woodwork in particular please get in touch if you would like to come in and share some tips – we love have visitors and helpers from home.