Birch AM

Welcome to Birch Class. Here you will find a brief overview of Nursery and there will be updates about all the wonderful things we do here on a daily basis. Enjoy!

 

 

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Autumn 1

We have been continuing to settle in with our new friends and getting used to the nursery routine. Our learning has been focused on nursery rhymes. We have been finding out what happened to Humpty Dumpty and why he fell off the wall. Our very own Humpty Dumpty fell off a wall in the garden! We helped build a stronger wall for him using blocks and bricks of different shapes and sizes.

                    

The children also made Humpty Dumpty models which all look fantastic!  

We have been learning the words and actions to other nursery rhymes such as Baa Baa Black Sheep, Incy Wincy Spider and Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. Story time is one of our favourite times of the day and in October we welcomed our parents and carers to nursery to share books with the children.

As the weather has been kind to us, we have spent time in the garden collecting items from nature and creating some wonderful transient art - what else might we find as the season changes?

                                  

 

Autumn 2

Since half term we have been creating firework pictures using the computer; investigating the inside of a pumpkin and learning about Diwali celebrations including hearing the story of Rama and Sita and creating our own rangoli patterns.

Our learning has been focused around the following core texts:

                     

The children have been retelling the story of the Bear Hunt using small world objects as well as creating a story map.

As the Autumn Term comes to an end so does 2023. What a wonderfully festive end to a very busy half term! The children were absolutely amazing in their nativity performances. I can't stop wriggling!

Spring 1

Happy new year to our nursery families! Wishing you all a wonderful 2024.

As we settle back in to the daily routine, we turn our attention to our new topic :

Where Do The Wheels On The Bus Go?

Our core texts for this half term are:

     

We will be looking at different modes of transport and using our listening skills to identify vehicles by the sound they make. During carpet time we have been finding out how each of us get to nursery each day and using this information in our Maths learning. This week we received a mystery package...we unwrapped it slowly and carefully and inside we discovered....a little red bus! We think it might be the Naughty Bus from our book!! I wonder what adventures it might go on?

The cold weather we have been experiencing has presented the perfect opportunity to investigate ice! The children have suggested the words "melt" and "freeze" to discuss the effects that warm and cold environments have on ice and water. Brrrrr!

Following the cold weather and linking to our book "Up, Up, Up!" our conversation during carpet time turned to things that fly in the natural world and what some birds do in the Winter when it is cold. To help look after the birds the children collaborated in teams, independently chopping some apple, scooping bird seed and carefully mixing together the ingredients to create hanging bird feeders for the nursery garden.

What an exciting day! Nursery were fortunate to see a real fire engine up close when the London Fire Brigade from Sidcup came to visit our school. The children spotted the long ladder on top of the fire engine, the many hoses on board and asked lots of questions about items they spotted on the fire engine.

Lunar New Year 2024 - The Year of the Dragon

We thoroughly enjoyed hearing the story of The Great Race and how the Jade Emperor organised a race across a river in which all the animals took part to see which year would be named after each animal. We acted out the story using props and puppets and talked about the order in which the animals finished - the Rat arrived first and the Pig arrived 12th. This year, 2024, is the year of the Dragon. Find out more about the Great Race and why cats and rats are not friends to this day!

Spring 2

Welcome back to nursery after our half term break.

Our new topic is Is It Safe To Go Into The Water? and our core texts for this half term are:

                    

We kick-started this half term with the story of The Rainbow Fish and what it means to share. The children are enjoying the under the sea theme within the classroom and are making the most of the mermaid-inspired home corner/role-play area. Lots of imaginative play is happening and the children are keen to share their knowledge of various sea creatures.

Well it looks like Spring has finally sprung and we have been enjoying looking for signs of Spring in the nursery garden. There are lots of big trees surrounding our outside space and we are patiently waiting for new buds and leaves to appear, as well as crocuses and primroses in the lawn.

One of our core texts is Where The Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak - after listening to the book and acting out the movements of Max and the Wild Things, the children were able to retell the story to produce a story map. They were so engaged some children even went on to draw pictures of their own Wild Things!

As a school we celebrated World Book Day by dressing up as our favourite book characters. There were so many fantastic costumes and I want to thank parents and carers for your support in making it such a wonderful day.

We were fortunate to be invited to a story telling session run by a theatre company. The children went on a minibeast story hunt and came across The Very Hungry Caterpillar, Incy Wincy Spider, bees and bugs. They all paid attention beautifully and showed off their fabulous listening skills. Well done Nursery!

To end our topic this term the children had a fantastic last week all about pirates! They used telescopes and maps to look for treasure. They even had to find Bob and Betty Bear by following clues that the pirates had left for us - AAARRRGGGHHHH!

Summer 1

 Welcome back to Nursery after what I hope was a restful Easter break.

The new topic for this half term is: What happened to the dinosaurs?

Our core texts are:   

 

Our learning objectives this term will include understanding 'why' questions, like: "Why do you think the caterpillar got so fat?"; solving real world mathematical problems with numbers up to 5; developing phonological awareness, so that we can count or clap syllables in a word. We will be making the most of the warmer weather and our outdoor learning will include planting seeds and caring for them as well as developing our gross motor skills using the garden equipment.