What are we doing in Sea Turtles this month?

For January to February we will be having an enhanced focus on vehicles and transport. Many of our children are really obsessed with the vehicles we have for them to play with and also all the books to do with them too. They love to explore, talk and read about vehicles so we will be having a big focus on them.

The activities this month will be based around the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) areas of learning:

KUW- exploring the different types of vehicles there are and talking about what they do. Exploring speed.  PSED-  Working in groups with vehicles, sharing, turn taking. MD- size, multiples, shapes, CLL learning new nouns, making noises to model the vehicle noises, talking about what they do. PD large motor skills role playing driving vehicles. Fine motor skills manipulating small vehicles to do what they want them to do.  CD- exploring with vehicles through arts and crafts, making vehicle representations, tyre painting.

Some of the activities we will be doing this month will involve:

• Manjit will supporting the children to in making some train track paintings and car track paintings using card and corrugated paper.
• Sara will be making circuits outside for the children to race around pretending to be vehicles or using the toy vehicles.
• Ella will be supporting the children in making car shaped biscuits and icing them.
• Sarah G will be helping the children to make some salt dough vehicle shapes to decorate.
• Sarah G will be supporting the children in making a big red bus using red paint and black tissue paper an vehicle collages.
• Sarah Louise will be supporting the children to make hot air balloons, paper boats and aeroplanes.

Some ideas to support your children at home:

·         Find a busy but safe patch to watch traffic from. Names the vehicles, colours, comment on sizes and speed.

·         Sing some vehicle songs with your child…’The Wheels on the Bus’, ‘Down by the Station’, ‘Twinkle, Twinkle, chocolate bar…’

·         Get some books on vehicles. Trucks often draw children in especially and they love quite complicated ones at a young age. And you will learn something too. It is amazing that a truck is not just a truck.Notice and point things out to your child. They probably noticed them already as you drive down the road  but giving them language to go with their d

What are we doing in Dolphins this month?

From January to February we will be having an enhanced focus on books

Story times are a very special part of Dolphins day. We have story times three formal times a day and each child attends at least two of them. However we also have spontaneous story times with small groups of children or individuals throughout the day as guided by the children. Over the next month, we will be focussing and referring to types of books; science, information, stories, made books, bought books, free books, authors, illustrators, caring for books, favourite books, etc. We want the children to be involved in creating books and bringing special books of theirs in to share with the group.

The activities this month will be based around the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) areas of learning:

KUW-Learning new things about the world through information books PSED- feeling good about their preferences for books and sharing them with peers.  MD- Looking at the numbers on pages, size of books, shapes of books. CLL Learning new words such as author, illustrator, fiction, non-fiction, etc. PD Fine motor skills in mending books, handling books, turning pages, etc.  CD- making up their own stories, poems, illustrations, books.

Some of the activities we will be doing this month to support this will be:

·         Jenny will be taking groups of children to the Library to talk about what Libraries are for the children to learn how to use them and respect them properly.

·         Laura W will be talking to the children about different ways to use books to enhance the story experience, such as Story sacks, listening posts, acting out stories, etc.

·         Cristina will be talking to the children about how books are organised with words and pictures, how they are made and how to respect them.

·         Laura Z is going to be making books with the children; creating their own story and illustrations.

·         Rachel G will be helping the children to act out some stories and present a play.

·         Christine H will be introducing new stories to children to listen to on the listening post.

·         Laura J will be setting up the home corner as a library for children to role play using the library.

·         Lan will be getting the children to select books that need mending and creating a mending station for book mending.

What you could do to support your children at home:

·         Take them to the library. Become a member if you are not one already and get them to treasure their first library card. Teach them about its value and how to respect people, services and books.

·         Make a story book with them. Invent a story, illustrate it and even share it with the nursery.

·         Bring in your favourite book from home.

·         Make a photo album of events that your child  been a part of, write a story about what happened.

December 2011