I gave the tiger some tea and read a story to her!

Welcome to our new website!

The wet and mild weather which continued more or less throughout the term did not dampen our spring spirits or us because we stayed nice and dry under the new roof! We began our project work by thinking about what we could do at Nursery and at home, to be more environmentally friendly. There was plenty of discussion about reducing the amount of paper, water and electricity we use. We talked about the amount of rubbish that goes to landfill sites or is incinerated and we were all shocked to learn that plastic takes hundreds of years to break down. The children were surprised to learn that warm fleeces can be made from old plastic and that glass can be reused to make roads. Emily told us that her family reuse their plastic bags when they go shopping and Georgina showed us a very attractive pot made from an old plastic bottle that she had brought back from Africa.

Alice arranging a posy of flowers in her vase.

This gave us an idea for a “Mother’s Day” gift. We collected small plastic bottles, cut off the tops and covered the remaining section with colourful tissue paper torn into pieces. We coated it in PVA to seal it and to give a nice varnished finish. The children arranged a small posy of flowers in their vases and presented this very attractive gift to their mums.

Making instruments from junk

Annaliese (our music teacher) found a link to a website where people living close to a Landfill site in Paraguay are converting junk into beautiful sounding musical instruments and this inspired us to make our own instruments from cardboard junk and other bits and pieces. We asked parents to collect boxes, tubs and tubes and to come into Nursery to help the children make a musical instrument. The instruments they produced ranged from drums and rain-sticks to guitars and xylophones and the children and parents had lots of fun making and playing them .  Annaliese also taught us a couple of re-cycling songs to the tunes of Twinkle Twinkle and Incy-Wincy which she found on the internet!

In March we held a coffee morning and daffodil sale in aid of Marie Curie and we raised an amazing £188.

We participated in World Book Day and the children came to Nursery dressed as favourite book character.  Some of the children’s parents came and read stories too.  We read the wonderful story of “The Tiger who came to Tea” and the children enjoyed re-enacting the story for themselves.

Zoolab visited us for our Open Morning and we all enjoyed meeting and learning about some very interesting creatures including a giant snail, millipede, cockroach and Ruby the corn snake who was almost everyone’s favourite (not mine though!)

Ruby – the corn snake

At the end of term we celebrated Easter by making an Easter Garden, telling the Easter Story and going on an Easter egg hunt. We made lovely Easter chick cards and learnt a great song (Spring Chicken) which the children really enjoyed singing and moving to. Our theme for the Spring Horticultural Show was “After the Storm” and the children used water colours to paint rainbows which looked beautiful displayed in the windows of the hall.
Building of the new storage area began at the beginning of March and we managed to move all our spare equipment and materials into a container just in time. Work is well underway and we hope it will be complete by the time we return for the new term on Monday 28th April.

During the Summer Term, we are hoping to renovate and replant our raised beds which are looking very neglected!  We are  looking forward to 3 new children and their parents joining us and to our school trip and Teddy Bear Picnic on the Watercress Line on Thursday 22nd May!