Take a look at our Sway below which tracks how our learning and play has developed over the weeks here at Bathgate West Nursery. We are currently following the children’s interests in bees and other insects and mini beasts to develop our planning and activities over the next few weeks. If you and your children discover any interesting information about mini beasts at home please share it with us at nursery and we can add the information, pictures or photos into our floor books. As always, we welcome any comments or feedback on our blog, so please feel free to leave us a comment below.

The benefits of outdoor play on a child’s development are huge and here at Bathgate West Nursery we recognise, value and promote this using our fantastic outdoor environment daily and in all weathers.

Outdoor play promotes better mental health by improving better moods. In terms of physical health it provides more opportunities for movement and development of fine and gross motor skills. Cognitive health benefits with more opportunities to make decisions, problem solve and allow creative thinking. Emotional and social health benefits include increased self esteem and higher levels of sharing, co-operating and help with increased social interactions.

Play is so much more than just Play. Take a look at some of the ways we have been playing outdoors this week, including painting, mark making, den building, climbing, making ‘mud soup’, digging, building together, throwing and catching, growing and planting.

Our outdoor area is vital for your child’s development and we are always looking for ways to develop it further, so if any parents or grandparents are happy and willing to get involved in helping us spruce up our outdoors, help children plant and grow fruit and vegetables or have any sports/craft skills that they could come in and share with the children we would love it if you could let us know.