HWB Advice and Support using MIndfulness

Good morning I received an email this morning from the West Lothian Health and Wellbeing Hub and thought it was  a good one to share with you all. There is some lovely advice for parents to support your children during these times using a mindfulness approach on the Stop Breathe and Think Kids App.  You’ll need to download the app to access the links below.  Thank you to the West Lothian Health and Wellbeing Hub for sharing.

EMAIL BELOW :

With schools temporarily closed and many of us hunkering down at home with our kids, we thought it’d be helpful to feature a series of recommended mindfulness activities for the entire family.

Here are several ways you can practice mindfulness to bring more kindness and compassion into your home during these swirling times!

Just like the grown-ups in their lives, your children will likely experience some big emotions during this time. The activities recommended below are ideal for children ages 4 – 10, and can help address a specific emotion to work through these feelings — together.

These activities are available in the “For Kids” section of the All Ages app, with premium tracks now free for the next 60 days!

Feeling Anxious

  • For a lot of our team members, we’re feeling the anxiety rising, especially as parents.  We’ve had kids describe anxiety as a sense of butterflies in the stomach, or having a hard time falling asleep because the mind can’t stop thinking. Rather than get caught up in worried thoughts or feelings, kids can focus their attention on something they can do to address their emotions, like these activities here:

Feeling Restless

  • Being stuck at home, kids may have a lot of energy they just don’t know what to do with! Here are two ways for everyone to use their bodies and all of their senses to work off some energy:

Feeling Angry or Annoyed

  • If your child is feeling frustrated by someone or something, they might want to scream or yell or lose their cool. When big emotions come up, these activities can help kids cool down:

Feeling Gratitude & Kindness

  • Whenever we are having a hard time, there’s always something we can do, like remembering a few good things that make us feel happy and grateful or practicing kindness. Here are a few recommendations to focus on the good stuff:

Having a Hard Time Sleeping

  • With so much going on, it can be challenging to put kids down to bed or create an environment for them to get a truly restful slumber. These activities are especially great at the end of the day:

Remember, when practicing mindfulness with kids, it will almost never go as planned. That’s okay! Here are some tips that might help things go more smoothly:

Check in every day with yourself and your family.
Encourage your family at meal time or before bed to share how they are feeling mentally, physically, and emotionally. You can even use our app to check-in with how you’re feeling together.

Allow your kids to experience mindfulness their own way.
We recommend that you encourage your children to try meditation or mindful games, rather than insisting or forcing it.  Doing these activities with them is a great way to inspire participation. Whether your child is being uncooperative or distracted, or if they’re fully engaged and happy to be playing a mindful game, either way, allow them to experience their own journey.

Approach the activities with openness and curiosity.
While it might seem like there’s a “right” way to practice mindfulness, the good news is that there’s actually no way to get it wrong! The experience is different for everyone. Notice how you feel in the moment without necessarily trying to change anything or judge what you observe. You may feel more settled after an activity; you also may not. Both are normal and okay.

Learn to be with whatever’s happening.
With mindfulness, it can be tempting to “fix” a problem, yet we’re here to remind you to “let go” of any agendas or goals. It’s actually more supportive to learn how to be kind and compassionate with yourself – especially with whatever thoughts or feelings that come up – and the more you can accept whatever is happening wholeheartedly in moments of mindfulness, the more you can bring that approach to all experiences in your life.

As parents ourselves, we’re here alongside you in learning how to navigate all the ups and downs of being human.

We can do this,

The Stop, Breathe & Think team

P.S. We’re offering ongoing opportunities to connect LIVE via our Facebook channel—using this time at home as an opportunity to dive deeper into mindfulness practices to keep us healthy and at peace.

  • Every Tuesday at 12pm PDT/3pm EDT, we’ll host a live guided meditation led by your favorite narrators from our app.
  • Every Thursday at 10am PDT/1 pm EDT, we’ll host a live family mindfulness activity parents and children can do together.

Nursery News

The first week of November!! Children have had a great time outdoors in the cooler temperatures as Autumn sets in. The groups walked to the library on Tuesday and had the experience of storytelling from the librarian.

No welly Wednesday this week, but lots of outdoor opportunities were had in the garden. Thank you to all our parents who attended our first parent consultations of this session. It’s a great opportunity to get to chat about your child’s’ progression in nursery and share their experiences with us.

Emotions were discussed on Thursday, we are concentrating on 4 emotions; Happy, Sad, Fear and Anger. We will be concentrating on one a week. The first being happy. We would love it if you could take the time to talk at home about these emotions. How they feel, how they look and what would make them feel that way. Please share the learning with us in the nursery.

Have a fantastic weekend everyone !! from the Nursery Team xx

NEXT WEEK IN NURSERY

MONDAY – GROUP PHOTOS IN THE NURSERY AM and PM

TUESDAY –

WEDNESDAY – WELLY WEDNESDAY, PLEASE ENSURE YOUR CHILD IS DRESSED FOR THE WEATHER CONDITIONS.

THURSDAY –  CHILDREN IN NEED, COME TO NURSERY IN YOUR PYJAMAS TO RAISE AWARENESS FOR A WORTHY CAUSE.

CAN ALL SPONSOR FORMS BE IN FOR TODAY PLEASE.

FRIDAY – PEEP SESSION WITH MRS BEATTIE.

 

 

Nursery News

What a busy week for St Ninian’s nursery!

Our boys and girls are really embracing our new word boost words and trying hard to understand them. There have been lots of lovely thoughts and ideas of what words mean and how they sound, this is growing week by week! The word boost words for this week were;

CREAK

DISCOVER

GIGGLE

SHIVER

Please support your child’s learning at home by using these words regularly and encouraging them to be adventurous with their vocabulary 🙂

 

Moving on from the word boost work this week – the children showed interest in making words and letters out of wool. Some children even moved on to using the sounds they know to spell out the word ‘LUV’ – fantastic ways to experience and experiment with early phonics!

 

Our welly wednesday was a focus on finding signs of spring on the back of the very UN-Scottish weather we have experienced this week (which has been a welcomed delight!).  We found lots of green shoots and some pockets of colour that made us very happy! We also had a chat about picking flowers after seeing some had been picked and left lying.. we decided to rescue them and bring them back to nursery to put them in water! We seen a duck wandering through the trees which sparked lots of questions; what is it doing? Where is it going? More than all of this – we continue to learn to be responsible in our local environment on Welly Wednesday – taking opportunities to keep ourselves and others safe.

 

On Thursday we had a great time working with P5 in gym where we were learning to make baskets with our hands to catch a various assortment of items. We love working with P5 and learned a new term ‘underarm throw’, when we threw things back to our friends in P5.

 

Friday always comes around too quickly – but we went to the hall and had fun being dingle dangle scarecrows, using our bodies in different ways to flip, flop and wobble.

 

PEEP class this involved meeting our new puppet – an old lady (not Mrs Beattie…) who was telling us all about her eating habits! Swallowing spiders, flies… sounds yummy, no? We learned a Spring song and banged a big drum in time to share with everyone how special we are and our own name. We love PEEP – Bang, Bang, Bang!

 

Have a lovely weekend!

NURSERY NEWS

What a wonderful family wellbeing week we had as our Parents came back to play and find out more about their childs experiences in nursery. For this come back and play experience we wanted to include our values. Each day the children explored what each value meant as we discussed these in a child friendly way with parents too.

Monday was LOVE, where children painted their hands and we discussed “who they love”. Some parents got in on the action too!!

Tuesday was KINDNESS day, Children were asked “what is kindness?” their voice were recorded and are on display on our values wall.

Wednesday was FRIENDSHIP where we promoted the importance of friendship and looking after each other on our Welly Wednesday Walk, and discussed who were our friends in nursery.

          

Thursday was HAPPINESS day, the children were to think of what made them happy and to think about feelings. Some children painted pictures of themselves “happy” and these are now in pride of place on our Values display in nursery.

There was no PEEP class on Friday, but this will be back this week coming on Friday 22/2/19.

 

NEXT WEEK

MONDAY – HOLIDAY

TUESDAY- IN SERVICE DAY

WEDNESDAY – ALL RESUME, WELLY WEDNESDAY PLEASE REMEMBER WATERPROOF COATS AND FOOTWEAR

THURSDAY –

FRIDAY – ASSEMBLY AND PEEP STARTS BACK \0/

Our P1 transition programme is beginning this month with a visit to the P1 class for World Book Day, the 28th and 29th of February. This will involve all the children listening to a story read by the P1 teacher to the children. A transition booklet and letter is to follow with all the details and dates you will need for your diary.

Hope you have all had a lovely holiday weekend!!

from the Nursery Team x

Nursery News

Our week began with 2 P7 boys cooking their award winning egg and ham pie with the children. The children had a great time preparing and weighing the ingredients and the best part was the tasting. Thank you so much to Lewis and Lucasz you two are stars of the future!!

We also began a Big Garden Birdwatch this week. The children made bird cake and bird houses for our garden birds. We have tick sheets and an iPad beside the window to record birds that visit us.

The weather was so cold during the week that we decided to go out and look for signs of Winter. I think we lasted 15 minutes before coming back in, but everything was covered in the most beautiful crisp frost.

The week ended with a celebration of a very important Scottish man, Rabbie Burns. The children discussed his life and who he was, we then listened to some of his music and tried to keep the beat. Some children made the Scottish flag to symbolise this event.

Have a lovely weekend everybody!!

From the nursery team x

NEXT WEEK

NOTHING TO REPORT JUST MORE FUN EVERY DAY

 

 

Nursery News

What a wonderful fun packed week we’ve had as the children learn through play. As you can see we are adopting the Frobelian principle through out the nursery setting and the children are learning importance life skills and self regulation each day. Eg:

Natural resources were found by the children to complete a number table as we discover the numbers 0-10.

Each number has the corresponding number of items beside it. The children can then identify the number and recognize that they each represent a quantity.

Block play lets them discover shape and size as well as symbolic play, as Zuzzana found as she built a house for the teddy bear.

Mathematical skills and intellectual development are observed here as they use these abilities to plan and create inner images to outer objects.

   

Children are exploring clay and it’s properties as they create props or shapes in the world around them. 

This develops fine motor skills in preparation for writing as well as language and imagination as they discuss what they are creating with their peers.

Have a fantastic weekend everyone!! If the snow appears be prepared for your child sledging and outdoor play.

from The Nursery Team x

NEXT WEEK

MONDAY – P7 children visiting us to make their award wining Ham and Egg pie AM and PM.

TUESDAY –

WEDNESDAY – National Eye Screening AM and PM children. Welly Wednesday in the garden.

THURSDAY –

FRIDAY – PEEPS IS BACK  \O/   Beginning of a 3 week block. Please see the sign up sheet in the nursery or Mrs Beattie for further details and spaces available.

 

 

Nursery News

What a lovely start to Advent in the nursery this week. We have been busy decorating our room and learning about the story of Christmas. Nativity is soon and we are so excited to show you all!!

Children decorated the Christmas trees themselves. We shared the  St Ninian’s Nursery tradition of reading the Dick Bruna story ‘ The Christmas Book’ and characters are displayed depicting the Nativity scene.

Literacy was being developed through the excitement of writing letters to Santa.

Mathematical skills were observed through loose parts and natural resources as we tried to complete the number line 0-10.

And finally lots of Health and Well being as friendships are built and selfies taken on Mrs Mushet’s iPad !!

who can’t smile looking at that picture??

NEXT WEEK

Monday – Nativity full dress rehearsal 10am and 2pm (children  only).

Tuesday –

Wednesday –

Thursday – Nativity performance for parents and family 10am and 2pm.

Friday – Christmas Jumper Day.

Nursery News

It was our SPORTS DAY this week!! And what a sports day we had! There was cheering, screaming, running, jumping, giggling and falling over… and that was just the staff – heehee!

 

Our boys and girls have spent the week rehearsing for sports day – changes to routines and patterns in the nursery can be difficult for little minds to understand so the staff team took time to explain to them what sports day would include and let them practice, practice makes perfect after all. We also made wonderful coloured banners to lead our teams in with – green, yellow, red and blue teams, with some children managing to wear their team colours! Unfortunately, the weather was not on our side on Thursday – but our contingency plan worked just beautifully…

 

We came roaring in to the cheers from the crowd as we did a lap of the hall for waves and smiles, before we got down to business and started racing. There were a few ‘cheat-abix’ moves on show – I’m talking to you Mrs Beattie 😉 but that all entered in the spirit of the day, where our boys and girls showed off their wonderful sporting talents in front of their parents, grandparents and friends. After all the hard work was over, the boys and girls received their medals as a huge well done for taking part in a fantastic day! Then we made our way back to the nursery where ice poles were awaiting us, to cool us down after all the physical exertion! A huge thanks to the crowd on the day for making it special for our children with their encouraging cheers, words and smiles – we couldn’t do it without you all!

 

In addition to Sports Day, this week we have taken on board a very exciting idea for our Welly Wednesday session next week… A few of our parents have made us aware of a ‘movement’ in West Lothian called ‘WEST LOTHIAN ROCKS’ – the idea behind it is that you find a rock, paint it and hide it somewhere outdoors, for others to find! You can then re-hide it for someone else to enjoy 🙂 once explained to our boys and girls they were super keen to take part! We went on the hunt for some rocks, and the PM group painted some for us to hide next week! If your child finds a rock they’d like to paint over the weekend, bring it to nursery on Monday to be painted in time to be hid on Welly Wednesday!

 

We also got a quick peek at the new baby signets on the pond – unfortunately one of the nine signets had to be taken away by one of the SSPCA officers due to having a poorly leg.

 

A little reminder, we capture the voices of our children in many different ways.. Now that we near the end of the session please take some time to look over our floor books, planning wall and learning journey wall – these are all tools that we use which are made to be shared with our children and their families 🙂 have a look and let us know which bits your children remember clearly…

Image result for its not what you teach its how you make them feel

 

Keep your eyes peeled for our new school website which will be launching very soon!

 

Nursery News

Well it was a big week for some of our children and their families as the future P1 children had their transition days in St Ninian’s Primary School!

Wednesday and Thursday of this week brought much excitement, and some nerves.. as the preschool children prepared for school by taking part in the next phase of our transition programme – spending time in the P1 classes. Miss Boyes and Mrs Davenport were so excited to welcome the children and had lots of fun planned for them all. The AM staff were lucky to be able to peek in to see how everyone was getting on and we are so proud of how well they adapted 🙂 well done boys and girls! Next week we have our lunch hall experience where the boys and girls will experience school lunches, and their parents will have an opportunity for an informal chat with Miss Boyes and Mrs Davenport.

 

We have started to get ready for our sports day!! This week we have started to talk about what will happen at sports day and have had a shot of trying some of the races and lining up in our colour groups! Everyone is welcome to attend on Thursday 14th. 10am and 2pm – bring your loudest voices to cheer on our sporting superstars! After our busy wellbeing week last week we were glad to spend some time with Mr Mccurdy on Tuesday during our usual PE slot. We had the parachute out and have been practising our throwing skills – why don’t you have a go at home?

 

Our AM session was super quiet on Wednesday and Thursdays transition days! But we still packed in lots of fun.. none more so than our emergency trip to the shop for butter for Mrs Beatties pancakes! A disaster was averted and we had some great discussions about what we could and couldn’t get at the shop and how many pennies we needed!

 

Both sessions enjoyed picnic snacks this week and a welly Wednesday trip to the trim trail! Please keep a look out in our weekly update for details of our final welly Wednesday session.

 

Many thanks to those parents who have agreed to help out with our big clean 🙂 there will be a list in the cloakroom for sign ups, there’s still time to get involved 😉

 

Our learning context for the next few weeks is ‘school’! Our learning wall is for everyone to look at, with our consultative planner added at the top. As with all of our planning, we consulted the children (have a peek in our talking books to see what they said!) and used their ideas to think about possible lines of development (PLODs). This will help to frame some of the activities in our nursery environment in the coming weeks. Some of our children have been talking about ‘homework’ – we are pleased to say there will be a ‘help yourself homework’ box for any and all interested children from now until the last week of term 🙂

 

Nursery News

Wellbeing week has taken it out of us all this week – in the best way!

Monday was a great start to our wellbeing week! Some of our parents and children made it along to Bootcamp with Mr McCurdy at 8am, starting the week as they meant to go on – well done everyone, Mrs Conway still hasn’t recovered! The nursery children had great fun in a session with Star Harmonies. Ask your child if they can remember the ‘Toe – Knee – Chest – Nut…’ rhyme they learned! This session  included singing and dancing.
The wellbeing week continued in the sunshine outdoors on our trim trail. School children demonstrated their caring ways by helping the nursery children to complete the course.
Tuesday brought our first parents for their stay and play and come back and play sessions. Parents were able to join us in a Yoga session in the school. It was very relaxing and zen. Lots of children found the funniest part was talking about filling their sandwiches… sounds strange but led to some good yoga posing!
The P6 buddies and the current P1 classes were down to have fun in our garden at school playtime today for transition fun this week. Parents of future P1 children are reminded that only a small snack is needed at playtime 🙂
Wednesday was a whirlwind of excitement as we had our ‘park picnic’ trip for our ‘Welly Wednesday’ focus, some of the parents were lucky enough to join us as part of the stay and play/come back and play sessions. We also had dancing! Lots of great moves were displayed, and that was just the teachers and parents 😉 the routine was simple but effective! Our favourite part was the freestyling without a doubt! We hope your weekend will be filled with dancing!
Thursday begun with football for the groups – this involved lots of careful listening to the coach… And lots of lovely laughing as we played games together to help us develop our movement, balance and ball skills. The future P1s enjoyed a real playtime in the school playground with their friends from P1! It was very exciting as they learned which areas they were allowed to play in and what happens if you need the toilet at playtime (you don’t ring the nursery bell.. haha!) – this has been a wonderful experience to help our children build their confidence in preparing for school in August!
Friday was a quiet day, we made most of the wonderful sunshine (and enjoyed a story in the shade) before the forthcoming rain and stormy weather!
Please stay tuned to your emails for next weeks weekly update 🙂 transition for P1 on Wednesday and Thursday next week! Have a lovely weekend 🙂
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