EARLY YEARS 

NURSERY

Wow, what a start to our final half-term of the year it's been! It feels like only yesterday we were waving goodbye for half-term, and now we've already launched into our exciting "Journeys" topic with a fantastic start to Space!

We've truly gotten off to a flying start. The children absolutely loved meeting the planets through our new storybook, leading to so many wonderful discussions. We've explored what an astronaut is, and had endless chats about what space is like. Imaginations soared as we pondered if we'd like to go there ourselves and, of course, what essential items we'd pack for a space adventure!

Indoors, we've been super busy. We've exercised our fine motor skills by making lots of playdough, enjoyed dressing up for imaginative role-play, and honed our social skills by learning how to play Snap and take turns in a larger group. Creativity has been buzzing too, as we've made some fantastic flying saucers that we just had to test out, spinning them around our outside playground.

Finally, you might have noticed a hush of secret activity – we've been working incredibly hard creating some very special cards for a special person this Sunday!

It's been a vibrant and engaging few weeks, and we're so excited for what the rest of this half-term holds!

RECEPTION

What a wonderful and busy start we have had to the last half-term in Reception! We have been absolutely captivated by some incredible transformations and celebrated individuality in vibrant ways. 

At the end of last term we celebrated Elmer Day with great enthusiasm! The children looked fantastic in their brightly coloured clothes, reminding us all about the importance of celebrating our differences and recognising the beauty of individuality. Our outdoor areas were buzzing with creativity too, with children making delightful and colourful mud recipes in the mud kitchen using beautiful flowers. In the water area, we became little scientists, exploring the magic of colour mixing. The children were amazed to see red and blue water transform into a vibrant purple – a truly fascinating discovery!

One of the most exciting events was witnessing our lovely caterpillars transform into beautiful butterflies! It was truly spectacular to observe their full life cycle unfold. We even had the joy of holding some of them gently before they fluttered off to explore the world.

The half-term kicked off with a truly out-of-this-world event: the arrival of Beegu, our friendly, mischievous lost yellow alien! Beegu crash-landed right here in our playground, leading to a fortnight of exciting adventures. We've had so much fun searching high and low for Beegu around the classrooms. Jet class even discovered that Beegu had been busy playing and messing up the classroom over the weekend, and all the children became super detectives, visiting the "scene" to look for clues! We have been busy creating colourful lost posters, describing what Beegu looks like and asking people to contact us if she's spotted. Finishing the week putting our engineering skills to the test, designing brand new rockets to help our new friend get back home.

We also had an important assembly from the dental team, reminding us about the importance of oral hygiene, and in class, we practiced tooth brushing techniques using the giant teeth models – great fun!

In Maths this term, we are busy consolidating all our early maths learning from the year, focusing on the key concepts of composition of number. We are having fun exploring our number bonds to 5 and 10, and this week we have been busy using the rekenreks to help us understand these important concepts. 

During the warm weather, we have been making the most of our outdoor areas. Our little engineers have been busy creating fantastic transport vehicles like cars and trains. We have also had a blast building sandcastles and having fun with bubbles.

Our overarching topic for this term is journeys, so join us for more fun learning as we blast around space and travel around the country on the train and bus!