St. George's Nursery- Foxes
Here at St. George's we have a wonderful Nursery setting.
We believe that children learn best when they are happy and secure, so relationships (both with their peers and the adults in the setting) are the heart of everything we do.
The areas of learning considered to be of the most importance during the Early Years of Education are ‘Communication and Language’, ‘Physical Development’ and ‘Social and Emotional Development’ – essentially, the ability to say what they need, want, think and feel, the physical competence and dexterity to do what they want and to take care of themselves with a growing degree of independence, and the emotional intelligence to work well with others and to build strong relationships.
Our Nursery is an exciting, interesting place where having fun matters. It is filled with the laughter and chatter of the happy children with whom we feel privileged to spend our days.
Key texts - Spring term
Communication and Language
The ability to communicate clearly with the people around us is an essential life skill. The children are encouraged to talk a lot in Nursery – to explain what they are doing, what they need and what they want. They learn to express our emotions. All this is helped by adults modelling these skilsl, using clear language, new vocabulary and offering opportunities to talk together.
At home: Talk as you go about your daily lives; your children are always listening and from you they can learn the vocabulary they need and the way to structure their thoughts in clear sentences. Ask them for their thoughts, feelings and opinions.
Personal, Social and Emotional Development
We are learning to play alongside and with each other, sharing and taking turns. We are learning to take care of our own basic needs with the support of the adults around us. As we are now settled into Nursery, we expect the children to be showing an understanding of the rules by which our little community lives; the reasons for them and the ability to follow them, with a little support.
At home: Help your children learn how to wash their hands, properly, using soap and really rubbing it in. Make sure that they are making progress towards being potty trained, if you’re not quite there yet – do ask us to be your partners on this journey; we’re happy to help and support.
Physical Development
Physical development is considered one of the prime areas of learning for our Nursery children. We will be looking at both their gross and fine motor control and giving them lots of opportunities to develop both of these. All those activities that just look like ‘play’ – well, it is play, but it is also helping them develop all the strength and control in their bodies and hands that they need for taking care of themselves and becoming writers. Once children can use their bodies to run and climb and jump and use their hands to squish and squash and roll and pinch and to snip with scissors, then they will begin to be properly ready hold a pencil.
At home: Begin to help your children learn how to get themselves dressed, including the zips on their coats. It takes longer initially, but it will be worth it! If your child is wearing nappies, consider taking next steps towards potty training – let us know and we’ll help!
Literacy
Learning in Literacy in Nursery, we share stories. We read…a lot. We read to individual children, small groups and to the whole class every day. The children are encouraged to ‘read’ the books with which they become familiar to themselves and their friends, sharing in the language and expression of storytelling. We write often, both for and with the children, showing them the power of letters. They are beginning to understand the magic of being able to communicate in written format and show excitement and determination to own this language for themselves. We are learning to write letters that are important to us and are beginning to write our names. We play lots of games that are developing the children’s phonemic awareness (their ability to notice the sounds that words are made up of, which is the skill upon which early reading is built).
At home: Read. Read anything and everything and let them see that you love it (even if you don’t…pretend that you…you’re doing them a massive favour!).
Mathematics
In maths we will be exploring numbers to 10. We will be practicing the number names in order and then learning to match a single number name to each object that we count so that we become accurate counters. We will learn to recognise small groups of objects (for example, three bears) without the need to count them. We will be using the language of mathematics to compare weight and size (bowls of porridge in teeny tiny, medium and large) and create patterns (like the decorations on a gingerbread house). We’ll explore shape by building, creating and designing. We’ll even be using our knowledge about quantity and number to bake treats…which we might bring home to share with you!
At home: Talk number with your children, notice it. Point numbers in the world out for them: on people’s front doors, on the buses, at birthdays. Count how many steps it is to the front door, how many forks you need to lay the table. Bake with them.
Understanding of the World
We will be learning about all sorts of things as we travel through this half-term. There will be little about worms and how to care for them, and as a result to understand the need to care for all living things. We will be learning to think and talk like scientists, as we learn to make porridge, carefully observing the world around us and asking questions about what we see. We will experiment with using a variety of materials for constructing homes, just like the three little pigs…and then we’ll test our hypothesis by attempting to blow them down like the big bad wolf. We’ll need to find out how various tools work to help achieve our intended outcomes. We are never too young to begin to think and talk like scientists!