Knightsridge Early Years Centre
To foster Kindness, and Encouragement ensuring all Young learners achievements are Celebrated
We had the pleasure of a special visitor “Mrs Angus” who came along on both Monday  morning and afternoon to play her bagpipes. This was an exciting experience for all the children, with some of the children not knowing what to expect from the instrument. The children when asked, guessed the colour of the bagpipes and counted the three pipes. The children described the bagpipes as, noisy, loud and sounding like a car horn!
The Nursery are learning and celebrating the life of Robert Burns. Children are experiencing the sounds of Scottish poetry, music and songs. The sounds of bagpipes are being played daily and the voices of children learning songs such as,  Three Craws, Ally Bally, You cannae shove granny and The Midgies, can be heard from the Nursery. Children are sampling tartan and looking at photographs of kilts. This week children are exploring how to make tartan and creating some tartan with paint and variety of collage materials. Children will have the opportunity to engage with a variety of Scottish fiction and Non Fiction stories.
Next week:
We will be exploring our senses as we look, smell and taste…Oatcakes, cheese, porridge, Haggis, Neeps and Tatties.
We are also very excited to announce that we will be fortunate enough to have a special visitor on Monday 25th January to play us some traditional bagpipe music both in the morning and afternoon nursery sessions.
This year some of the nursery children took part in National Galleries of Scotland art competition. Over 7000 children from across Scotland entered the competition and we were delighted to be informed that two of our children had won an award in the nursery category. Congratulations go to Owen Davies who won 3rd place and to Katie Ewesor who was awarded a special merit.
As part of Owen’s prize the nursery was given an opportunity to attend the Gallery for a special tour and a practical workshop.
We went on the bus and were welcomed by the staff. We were taken around the Gallery and learned about some of the pictures. We then got messy! We made our own pictures using paint, glue, pens and crayons and produced lovely flowers in vases. We had a great day out. We will display our paintings in our own gallery next week.
Katie and Owen will attend an awards ceremony at the gallery to receive their awards and then their pictures will be displayed in the gallery until October when the full competition exhibition will then travel around various venues in Scotland.
A big well done to Owen and Katie and thank you also to the National Galleries of Scotland for the great opportunity which we all enjoyed.
We recently took part in the Marie Curie Mini Pots of Care fundraiser. Mini Pots of Care is a fun and creative way for children aged 3 to 11 to learn about science, nature and the work of charities. While we were learning we raised money to help Marie Curie Nurses care for people with any terminal illness. We planted our daffodils in November and helped to care for them and water them. Once they were ready we decorated our pots and took them home. We raised a fantastic £137.46 Thank you to everyone who made a donation and well done.
We have been learning about Fairtrade and Foncho the Fairtrade Banana Farmer and can now recognise Fairtrade products by the symbol on them.
We ate Bananas all week at snack. Banana Smoothies, Banana Sandwiches and homemade Banana Cake it was delicious.
We decided to have a Fairtrade Coffee Morning and made our own posters to advertise our event.
On the day we helped to serve our parents and carers tea, coffee and cake and retold them the story of Foncho.
We celebrated our learning at the primary school assembly last Friday morning by telling the boys and girls of Foncho the Banana Farmer.
Last month our learning focused on developing our story telling and rhyme reciting skills during our Story, Rhyme and Song time. We have been listening to traditional tales such as The 3 Little Pigs, Goldilocks and the 3 Bears and The Gingerbread Man and have participated in retelling the story using role-play costumes and puppets. We have been learning and reciting different nursery rhymes and songs including Old MacDonald, Hey Diddle Diddle and the Row, Row, Row your Boat.
During our Scottish Week focus we learned many different Scottish words to describe our clothing, including our semmit, breeks and bunnet and used our art and craft skills to design our own tartan kilts. We held our very own Burns Supper where we tasted Haggis, Neeps and Tatties and entertained our parents and carers with an impromptu Scottish Singalong with songs including Wee Willie Winkie, Yi Cannae Shove Yir Grannie, and the children’s favourite, The Midge.
Home-Link activity sheets and booklets supporting the children’s learning in Nursery Rhymes, Traditional Tales and Scottish Songs are available in the cloakroom.
Group Time activities take place at 9.30am and 1pm where the children engage in key learning opportunities to develop their listening and talking skills through sound matching and rhythm games or activities such as cutting, drawing, throwing and catching to develop their gross and fine motor skills.
A small snack is served mid-session. We have introduced an opportunity for the children to practice their fine motor skills using a knife and fork as well as offering tasting sessions for the children to try different foods.
We have also been learning to cook and have really enjoyed making our own Krispie cakes.
We have been very busy in the nursery learning about all things Christmas. We used our painted hands to make Christmas cards and a variety of a paint and glitter to create the perfect tea light candle gifts.
The Christmas tree was put up and decorated and shiny paper chains made to decorate our party room. Many Santa letters were also written. Hopefully we will get what we are wishing for.
Last week we really enjoyed having a Christmas dinner of turkey, sprouts, sausages in bacon, stuffing and roast potatoes, it was lovely and most of the children tried it.
We have been learning all about the Christmas story and the children have worked really hard to learn their lines and perform their version of the Nativity. Everyone has a role, whether it be an actor or a member of the angel choir. Our Bethlehem scenery was created by the children using their drawing, painting and cutting skills and I’m sure you’ll agree it looks fantastic. Well done to everyone.
We will return after the holidays on Tuesday 7th January 2014. Have a lovely holiday and Merry Christmas and Happy New Year from all the staff at Knightsridge EYC.
We have been learning all about Autumn. We have been talking about the change in the weather and how all the leaves are now turning red, green, orange and brown and falling from the trees. The children even made an autumn tree with their painted footprints which was very messy and lots of fun. The children have been making Autumn pictures with glue and tissue paper. They have enjoyed going on a walk and collecting lots of leaves which they had great fun playing with in the garden. The children have also been exploring conkers in a large tray using scoops and tongs to help improve fine motor skills. Some of the parents and children made scarecrows at home as Sam our scarecrow was feeling lonely. The results were fantastic and well done to everyone took part and made our Sam very happy.
This week in the nursery we helped to celebrate West Lothian Walking Week. We invited our parents, carers and families to join us in the nursery to listen to The Very Hungry Caterpillar story and to participate in some craft activities. We then made a human caterpillar and went on a wriggly wiggly walk around the nursery. After all the activities and walking we all had a healthy snack and tasted some of the healthy foods that helped the caterpillar turn into a beautiful butterfly. We were learning about healthy foods and that walking and being active is a healthy way to be.
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