2-3: The Discovery Hub and 3-4: The Investigation Hub at Deckham

We have had a very busy week this last week to the term and have enjoyed engaging with special events and experiences.

Play and Exploring

Fay joined us again this week to lead another great yoga session with the children. This week we reflected on the poses we had learnt last week before trying out some new ones. Fay brought a balance beam with her this time and the children had a go with walking along the balance beam, placing their arms to the side to try and keep their balance. Fay commented on how well the children engaged with the session and followed the new poses.

Some of the children, showed an interest with making a puppet show. It started with two children showing an interest in the puppets and looking at the iPad to see other puppets. They then commented “I have a plan” and it was to make a puppet show stand. Staff helped the children to follow through with their plan, helping to find the resources they wished to use. More children showed an interest with this and joined the exploration. The children then took turns to make snips in the box and to add decoration to the stand. The next morning, children continued exploring and developing the puppet stand as they commented “tomorrow we need to add a boat because we have a crocodile puppet”.

Outdoor Learning

This week, we have been exploring planting seeds in pots. We looked at the various packets of seeds and discussed the different colours of flowers that would grow. The children explained we needed a pot first to then add some soil in before sprinkling the seeds (thinking about the sequence of steps needed to be taken). We looked at the seeds and discussed the similarities and differences of the seeds such as the colour and size. After covering the seeds, we took the pots inside to water and find a warm, sunny place to put them. The children noticed the sunflowers we had planted a few weeks ago and commented on their progress. “They are so big now”, “it’s big like a beanstalk” and “they had lots of water to make them grow”. Over the next few weeks, we hope to see our seeds continue to grow before repotting them.

Following the children’s interests, we added some diggers into the outdoor environment and the children have loved exploring with them. The children have commented on how they have different purposes “this one pushes the soil” “it picks it up”. There has been some lovely turn taking and sharing with the diggers as it has been very popular, so popular we needed a bigger tray!

Active Learning

On Monday afternoon, the Fire Brigade came to Nursery to show us the fire engine. We talked about our own experiences seeing fire engines and hearing the sirens. They then showed us how to use the hose to spray water when they put the fires out. The children then took turns to have a go spraying the water to clean the fire engine and they showed us where the water comes from in the truck. We then had the chance to look inside of the fire engine and some of the children had a turn sitting in the fire engine and trying in the helmet. The firefighters were very impressed with the children with how engaged and interested they were, commenting “I think we will see a few of you in 16 years to become a fire fighter”.

Our Investigators have been showing great concentration as we have been exploring creating marks to represent numbers. The children have been exploring counting a given number of resources and then created lines or circles for each item. Some of our children have been showing an interest to challenge themselves and had a try with writing the numerals alongside. 

Parents as Partners

This week our song of the week has been 5 green bottles. 

Thank you to everyone who joined us at the Fun Run today. It was a lovely experience to join along with all of the other schools in Gateshead. We are very proud of all of the children who took part in the Fun Run as they were excellent!

Just a reminder we will be closed for the May Half Term Monday 26th May till Friday 30th May. Nursery will reopen on Monday 2nd June.

School will also be closed on Friday 20th June for a staff training day.

We hope you have a lovely week and we would love to see observations of during the week.

The Nursery Team