We had so much fun celebrating the end of year with a party for our children and we also began our Eid celebrations.
In forest school the children had their end of year party and Eid feast around the fire. They have been learning about risk management and collecting sticks for the fire over the last few weeks. They were able to follow safety rules well and each had a turn at roasting marshmallows.
Our little nursery children have shown an interest in making patterns with the blocks and loose parts - they have been matching blocks to shapes.
In the nursery garden the children found a snail, they were keen to look after him, find him food and make him a safe home. They then made pictures of him to take home.
What a wonderful last full week in nursery before the summer holidays.
The children were so excited to set their butterflies free in the garden. We talked about keeping them safe and making sure they had leaves to eat. The children were really keen to handle them and waved them off as they flew away.
The outdoor studio has been really popular and children have mixed media and materials such as glue, paint, tape, tissue, boxes and ribbon to make their colourful creations.
We are looking forward to our end of year party next week to celebrate the lovely year we have had together... despite the COVID crazy times!
We thank our families for continuing to support the nursery to follow the COVID restrictions.
Wishing all our children, families and staff a happy weekend... we will be keeping our fingers crossed for the football on Sunday 
The children were excited to see that the caterpillars had formed their cocoons, they have busy talking about what they think they will look like when they come back out!
In Outdoor nursery and Forest school the children were cutting up the wood ready to make their fire next week! They are using the tools and following the safety instructions given by the teacher. The children in little nursery continue to love building with boxes and bricks, the teachers added tape and they enjoyed using it to connect them together. They have especially enjoyed wrapping tape around objects. On Friday the children and teachers had so much fun getting lost in the shredded paper!
đ The children were learning all about the life cycle of a caterpillar and observing the daily changes of our own caterpillars. Each day they are excited to see if they have grown!
đ The children have continued to show an interest in people who help us. In particular they have enjoyed role playing firefighters and learning about how they help people. This interest has led to them creating their own fire stations in the blocks, drawing their own fire engines and making their own maps to show the fire engines where to go!
𪹠The children found some worms in the garden and we keen to observe them closely - they looked at the way they moved, talked about how they felt and were keen to measure how long they were. They also showed care and concern for the worms making sure they were put back in safely in the soil.
đ¨đ§ą Our youngest children are loving getting messy with the paint exploring with their marks.They have also enjoyed building towers with boxes and watching as they fall!
đ We are excited for another fun filled week in nursery.
There has been lots of concentration and team work in the block area as the children worked together to build large structures using tape to secure the blocks - a very tall robot and a castle were some of the great creations.
đ¨ more opportunities for exploring paint has been enjoyed both indoors and outdoors - the children have been observed to enjoy making marks with cars.
𦷠We have been talking lots about how to look after our teeth and how to have good oral health. Children have enjoyed practicing on the big teeth.
đ The children continue to be really interested in the gardening, picking their strawberries and also checking on the rest of their plants that are growing nicely.
World Children's Day - Friday 20th November 2020
We celebrated World Children's Day in Nursery by turning our activities Blue and celebrating the rights of children through lots of different fun play and learning opportunities.
As a Right Respecting School we support the children to know about their rights on a daily basis and encourgage them to be confident and independent learners.
UNCRC: Article 1 and Article 4
Hello Yellow - Raising Awareness of Children's Mental health
Every Mind Matters
09/10/2020
We turned the nursery Yellow to support the Every Mind Matters - 'Hello Yellow' campaingn to raise awareness of Children's Mental Health and Well Being.
Throughout the week in nursery the children have had lots of opportunities to engage in Mindfulness activities and have discussions about their feelings and emotions.
At Highfield Nursery School the Well being of our children is a vital part of our core values and we strive to ensure our children feel happy, safe and secure at nursery. We promote a positive and fun approach to learning and ensure the children are at the heart of everything we do.
Thank you to all our families for taking part, dressing in Yellow and donating to such a important cause.
Clay
The children have enjoyed exploring clay in big nursery. They have used a range of open ended materials to add to the clay to make their creations. The children noticed that the clay was hard so they added water to their clay to help them manipulate it, this encouraged new language such as slimey, wet, squidgy, slippy to describle to texture of the clay.
Over the week they have made a number of creations including faces, forrests, elephants and snails.
The children were introduced to a range of clay tools and were able to have a go at using them independently. The children were observed to have an interesst in mark making in the clay using clay tools, sticks and pencils.
Investigating our Sunflowers
The children worked with Sabina to explore and investigate the sunflowers they planted last year in the garden. They were curious to look closely and observe the different parts of the flower and talk about what they could see. Sabina was able to add new language to teach the children the names of the different parts of the flower such as leaf, stem, petal and seeds.
One of the things the children were interested in was the size of the sunflowers. They were fascinated about how tall the sunflowers were. The children laid them on the floor to see which was the longest and which was the shortest. Some children then wanted to see if they were taller or smaller than the sunflower. What a great way to figure our some early matematical concepts by useing the natural resources in the nursery garden.
Children were able to use their hands and fingers to explore the different parts of the flower and also the different textures it offered. To get the seeds from the middle some children chose to use scissors to snip in to it, while others continued using their fingers.
The children have harvested the Sunflower seeds to replant ready for next year and watch the sunflower lifecycle happen again.
Exploring Paints and Textures
The children in Big Nursery have spent time exploring paints with their hands using a mixture of powder paint and ready mixed paint.
They enjoyed using their hands to mix, this allows for them to feel the textures and experience sensory element that paint offers.
The activity allowed them to see how colour changes when mixed together and also how they can use their hands and fingers to make marks.
Leaves, conkers and sticks were then added to mix with and create new marks. The children were free to explore these materials and think of ideas of how to use them.
