Nursery and Reception

Summer 2

13/07/22 Topic Celebration 

This term, children have been exploring the topic ‘Great Outdoors’. This week ends our ‘Seaside’ focus and what better way to celebrate than a visit from the ice cream man! 🍦

29/06/22 Graduation 

Reception children had a lovely time at their Graduation this morning celebrating their time in our Foundation Stage. We are so proud of how they’ve all grown into caring, kind hearted and resilient individuals. Well done! 🎓

15/06/22 Sports Day

Nursery and Reception had a wonderful time taking part in lots of events for Sports Day and demonstrated a real team spirit! Parents also enjoyed taking part in a race. 🏃🏼‍♀️🏃🏻

13/07/22 Trip to Windmill Farm

06/06/22 Bootle and Netherton Fire Service Visit

On Monday, children had an informative visit from Bootle and Netherton Fire Officers. Children enjoyed finding out all about their role in the community and exploring the Fire Engine. Children even got to have a go at squirting the hose!

Summer 1

23/05/22 Police Visit 

This week, Nursery and Reception were delighted to have a visit from two Police Officers. This term our topic has been all about ‘Growing’. We have been talking about what we’d like to be when we grow older and exploring jobs in the community. We asked lots of questions and found out all about the job of a police officer then we got to look inside their car. We sat in the seats and learnt all about the car, it’s flashing lights and the siren. We learnt that Police Officers are always there to help us and that they are always there to keep us safe from harm.

13/05/22 Growing Topic 
Nursery and Reception have had another wonderful week continuing our learning around the theme ‘Growing’. We have observed more changes with our ‘Greenhouse’ bean experiment- we can see roots, stem and leaves! The children noticed how the roots are ‘hairy’. We talked about how the roots absorb all the nutrients and water from the soil. We worked together to plant our beans in soil. This week we have started to explore the artist- Georgia O’Keefe and her beautiful flower paintings. Children enjoyed painting their own flowers in the style of this artist using bright and vivid colours. Children have also been learning about the life cycle of a caterpillar and how important it is to eat a healthy and balanced diet. Children have enjoyed a selection of fruits this week linked to our focus texts- Handa’s Surprise and Oliver’s Fruit Salad. 🍒🍉🍓🍇

Well-being 

Nursery and Reception have enjoyed using their senses to explore herbs. We have been talking about ways to relax when we feel anxious. We enjoyed making lavender bags and practising our balloon breathing to inhale the calming scent.

Flower Experiment 
Nursery and Reception have been exploring how flowers drink water! We took part in an experiment to prove that water does travel up the stem. We placed food colouring in the water and waited for the white petals to change colour. Children enjoyed recording their observations. 🌸

5/05/22 Vegetables 

This week Nursery and Reception have been learning all about vegetables.  We voted for our favourite vegetable and ‘carrots’ won with 15 votes! Today, we had a visit from a GIANT Carrot who told us all about root vegetables. We learnt that carrots contain vitamin A, which promotes good vision and is important for growth, development, and immune function. Children helped to act out the story ’The Giant Carrot’ as they all pulled it out from the soil! We then peeled some carrots and all had a taste- They were really crunchy! We decided to make carrot soup and talked about how cooking softens the carrot. We enjoyed dipping crusty bread into the soup. 🥕🥣

29/04/22
Today for our Commendation Assembly, one of our Nursery pupils was awarded Star of the week for his excellent reading! He absolutely loves reading books and spends lots of time with his family sharing stories together. Today he read the story ‘Jasper’s Beanstalk’ to the whole school. He impressed us all with his confidence and expression as he read! What an inspiration! It is lovely to see our youngest pupils developing such a love of reading. ❤️📚

29/04/22

Nursery and Reception have had a lovely first two weeks back exploring our topic ‘Growing’. Children have grown their own cress heads and can tell you what conditions seeds need to grow. They have used all of their senses to explore a range of herbs and made their own concoctions! We have been reading ‘Jack and the Beanstalk’ and even had a visit from the Giant! He needed our help to learn how to grow a beanstalk as his was chopped down! Children made their own ‘greenhouse’ so they can watch their bean seed germinate and record the changes over the next couple of weeks. We have also made a ‘Flower’ shop in our garden area.  🌻🌷🌸🌺

22/04/22 National Jelly Bean Day

This week we have been reading ‘Jack and the Beanstalk. Today, children had lots of fun exploring jelly beans! We dissolved them in water and watched as the liquid changed colour. We used our senses to explore the jellybean juice! Children enjoyed tasting it and describing the flavour. We then tried to paint using the coloured water. We used the coloured bean juice to create new colours! The yellow and red bean juice mixed to make orange. The purple and green mixed to make brown! We also used wooden sticks and beans to create cubes and build a ‘jellybean’ stalk! Children then took part in process art through sensory  exploration as they created ‘jumping bean’ paintings!  Children rolled the beans around the paint and made super ‘movement’ paintings whilst also exploring colour mixing. 🎨

Teddy Bears Picnic

In Nursery and Reception we encourage children to create their own learning experiences and plan activities. This week one of our pupils said, “Let’s have a teddy bears picnic and bring a blanket!” We all worked together to make a list of food for the picnic. Everyone brought their own blanket and teddy and we all enjoyed sharing snacks whilst listening to the ‘Teddy Bears Picnic’ song by Henry Hall. Unfortunately the weather wasn’t great on the day but it was a great practice run for the sunny days ahead when we will be able to have more picnics 🧺 🌤❤️

Spring 2

Space 
Children really enjoyed their visit to the moon! They met ‘Astronaut Davies’ and enjoyed walking on the moon taking big strides! We learnt how the surface gravity on the moon is less than on Earth because it is much smaller. We have been learning so many facts and vocabulary including how the Moon is Earth’s natural satellite! Children had a picnic on the moon as we retold the story ‘Whatever Next’. 

Children have explored how craters on the Moon are caused by asteroids and meteorites colliding with the lunar surface. They conducted an experiment to see if the size and height at which an object is dropped alters the size of the crater that is formed. We found the heavier the object, the greater the impact. Some children made their own craters by pushing various sized rocks into sand in our small world tuft tray. 
 

Children have learnt how our solar system consists of 8 planets which orbit the sun. They can tell you the names of the planets and also some interesting facts! Family members have helped to continue learning at home by completing home challenges and sharing this work either on Tapestry or presenting it in class. We had a wonderful ‘Alien’ themed party to celebrate all the knowledge we have learnt this last half term. 🛸🪐🌏💫

Jackson Pollock 

Children made space themed artwork inspired by the artist Jackson Pollock. We used a paint splatter technique and abstract drip painting to create a space backdrop for a class display. This also linked to exploring gravity as the paint is pulled downwards towards the centre of the Earth. We also used marbles and paint in a box to explore force and motion.  

Constellations 

Children have been learning about constellations- a group of visible stars that form a pattern when viewed from Earth. Children represented various constellations using sticks and marshmallows. 

Internet Safety
To help us to remember how important Internet Safety is, we celebrate Internet Safety Day every year when we take part in lots of activities to help us to learn more about how to keep ourselves safe online.

We read the story about Smartie the Penguin which is an online book and can be accessed below. Whenever Smartie has a problem with his tablet he talks to his parent. We know that to keep ourselves safe when we're using the internet we should be as sensible as Smartie!

3/03/22 Where in the World?

Today we learnt about ‘Italy’ and made our own healthy pizza planets! We looked at Italy on a map and located Rome. We created Italian flags and learnt how ‘pizzas’ were first invented in Naples. Children had lots of fun choosing toppings for their pizzas. 🍕🇮🇹

1/03/22 St David’s Day 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿🌼

Children celebrated St David’s by painting daffodils which are the national flower of Wales. We also enjoyed comparing the length of the daffodils, ordering them from shortest to tallest! 

Earth

Children have enjoyed talking about our wonderful planet and thinking of how we can look after the environment. We have been learning about what it means to ‘recycle’. We looked at recycling symbols on packaging and learnt about the different materials that can be recycled- glass, cardboard, plastic, paper, metal. We read the books ‘Somebody Swallowed Stanley’ and ‘A Planet Full of Plastic’ to highlight the effect of plastic pollution on God’s Creatures and environment. Children enjoyed recycling old junk in the creative area to make new things including space rockets, cars and even a laptop! Children also set to work recycling at home to each make a ‘litter bug’ for our display table. 

We watched ‘A Whale’s Tale’ on YouTube- Under the sea a whale tries to help the smaller creatures who are struggling with plastic waste. On land, a young boy seeks help to clear the sea in his area. But neither the boy nor the whale can succeed in their own. This reinforced the need to work together.  Children were inspired by this story to go litter picking around the school grounds. 🌍

Spring 1

11/02/22 Well-being 

What could be better for our inner peace and well being than a spa session? We set the stage with an abundance of fluffy towels,  cucumber slices and fresh lemon fragrance. Children enjoyed a relaxing foot bath with bubbles whilst listening to calming mediative music.  

8/02/22 Pyjama Day

Nursery and Reception had a cosy day in their pyjamas for our ‘bed time stories’ theme. We made reading dens and snuggled onto cushions whilst sharing lots of stories together! We just love reading books! 📚

 

28/01/22 Visit to Church 

We have been learning about the different types of celebrations in Church. Today, children had a wonderful visit to Our Lady Queen of Peace Syro-Malabar Catholic Church. Father Andrew talked to the children about the different parts of the church and all the artefacts that are part of each mass and celebration. 

27/01/22 Birds of Prey Visit

As part of our ‘Animal’ topic, we have been learning about Nocturnal and Diurnal animals. We have been reading ‘Owl Babies' and children had an extremely informative visit from SMJ Falconry.  We learnt about the different Owl species and we found out lots of interesting facts! We learnt what they eat and how they hunt for their food at night time. One of the owls flew over our heads so we could see its wings and feathers! Did you know that owls with dark eyes are nocturnal while owls with yellow eyes are diurnal and hunt during the day? We also got to hold an owl! What a fun afternoon. 

Autumn Term 2

The best way to spread Christmas cheer is singing loud for all to hear...

Shape Hunt

 Children enjoyed going on a shape hunt and found lots of different shapes! They looked at how many sides each shape had and whether all of it’s sides were the same length. 

1/12/21 Where in the World?

Children have had lots of fun learning about Brazil from our lovely teaching assistant who was born and grew up in Brazil.  We learnt how it takes 12 hours to fly to Brazil and it is part of the continent South America.  People speak Portuguese and we learnt to say hello- Oi! We also learnt how to count to five- um, dois, três, quatro, cinco. We talked about how 60% of the Amazon Rainforest is in Brazil and it is full of unique animals, millions of miles of trees, and rare species of plants and bugs- some that haven’t even been discovered yet! We compared the tropical climate to our weather.  We learnt about the Brazilian Carnival where there is a lot of music, dancing and people dressed in colourful clothes. We were so lucky to sample some traditional Brazilian cheese bread and carrot cake with brigadiero! What a wonderful morning we’ve had! 🇧🇷

26/11/21 Wedding Celebration

Today children celebrated the marriage of Betty O’Barley and Harry O’Hay from the story ‘The Scarecrows’ Wedding. As part of our ‘Celebrations’ topic, children have used this story to learn about a Wedding celebration and they worked hard to plan the day thinking carefully about celebration outfits, seating plan, wedding rings and a wedding buffet! The wedding guests enjoyed listening to the Scarecrows make their wedding vows and enjoyed showering the happy couple with confetti! We enjoyed a wedding buffet and all raised a glass to congratulate the couple! Children enjoyed dancing and waved Mr and Mrs O’Hay as they drove off on their honeymoon. 

Where in the World?

As part of our ‘Celebrations’ topic, we have been learning about Diwali and the religion Hinduism which originated in India.  We located India on a map and welcomed a special visitor who talked about her time living in India.   She showed us photographs of the Taj Mahal and we shared our knowledge of Diwali- Festival of Lights.  Our visitor prepared an Indian feast similar to some foods eaten during Diwali celebrations. Children enjoyed sampling poppadoms, chutney and mint dips, korma sauce, masala sauce and balti sauce! The children enjoyed experiencing all the different spices and flavours. A big thank you for such an informative and tasty visit!

Firework Safety Songs 🎆🎇

Diwali
We have been learning all about Diwali- The Festival of Light. We have learnt about ‘mehndi’- a body art tradition where intricate patterns are drawn onto the hands and arms. Mehndi is part of the celebration of Diwali, but it’s also said to be a general good luck charm. Children deigned their own mehndi patterns which look great on our ‘celebrations’ display. They also made clay diyas- In Hindu tradition, the lighting of a Diya is an important part of prayer and it signifies purity, goodness, good luck and power. Children also enjoyed making and eating coconut Barfi sweets which are often served during Diwali celebrations. 🕉

Book of the Week
We have enjoyed reading ‘We’re Going on a Pumpkin Hunt’. Children had lots of fun retelling the story outside as we found meowing cats, flapping bats, sticky cobwebs and a scary house! It was a great opportunity to enjoy the autumn leaves by throwing them up in the air and stomping on them to hear the crunch under our feet! We also had a flying visit from the Witch out of the story ‘Christopher Pumpkin’. She read the story whilst making lots of spooktacular spells! 🧙‍♀️

Autumn Term 1

Welcome back to a new school year at Our Lady Queen of Peace Catholic Primary School! We warmly welcome all new and existing parents and children to our Nursery and Reception class. We hope that you will be very happy and enjoy your time with us!

Diversity

We have been reading lots of story books celebrating diversity and inclusion. We’ve been talking about how God made us all different- different hair, eye colour, skin, personalities etc. This week we’ve been reading ‘Big Hair, Don’t Care!’ We’re celebrating being different by having a BIG hair day!

Elmer Day 

Children looked wonderful in their colourful clothes for Elmer Day! 
Elmer Day is a celebration of reading, of elephants and of accepting yourself and others, just like Elmer the Patchwork Elephant, star of the Elmer books by David McKee. What a lovely day we’ve all had! 🐘🌈

Life Cycle of a Butterfly 

For the last few weeks, Nursery and Reception have enjoyed observing caterpillars grow bigger and bigger just like the caterpillar from our story! We have noticed silky webbing in the cup of caterpillars. The webbing protects the caterpillars from any dangers. Caterpillars use the webbing to stick to their plants, as the wind can easily blow them off the leaves. Caterpillars also use the silk to pull leaves around themselves to hide from predators that might like to eat them!

We have noticed that the caterpillars shed their exoskeletons four times while they are eating and growing.  They shed once more after they have attached themselves to the lid of the cup. 

Children were fascinated as they observed the caterpillars change into a chrysalis! We then transferred them into a butterfly habitat and awaited for them to emerge as beautiful butterflies! Children were so excited as the butterflies began to emerge from the cocoon! We fed our butterflies slices of apple and ripe banana. Today, we waved the butterflies goodbye and watched them fly around for a little while until they all disappeared to find their new homes! 🐛🦋

14/04/21 Fruit Smoothies 

Children had a lovely morning learning about healthy eating. They talked about a variety of fruit and vegetables and the importance of eating ‘5 a day’ which contribute to a healthy mind and body. Children really enjoyed learning how to make a fruit smoothie and got to sample some! Delicious! 🍓🍎🫐

12/04/21 National Pet Day

Children enjoyed sharing photographs of their pets with their friends. It was a great activity to develop speaking and listening skills and children asked lots of questions! 

All About Bears

Over the last few weeks, children have enjoyed learning about different bears- Polar bears, Brown bears and Panda bears. They have explored and compared where they live and the conditions they live in. They have talked about their physical adaptations and how this enables them to survive in their environment. Children have enjoyed creating paintings and models of bears, listening to factual clips on the internet and reading stories to gain knowledge.  We all had fun using the app ‘Chatterpix’, to record a fact about our favourite bear. 

15/03/21 Making Porridge - Home Challenge 

We have been exploring the text ‘Goldilocks and the Three Bears’. Children have been using porridge oats during role-play activities to retell the story whilst using vocabulary of size- large, medium and small. Children were set a home challenge to use their senses to make their own bowl of porridge that was ‘just right’. They had to talk about how the dry oats felt then compare to how they changed once liquid was added and the oats were cooked. They thought of some fantastic adjectives whilst also making a healthy breakfast with some healthy toppings too! 

12/03/21 Science Week

Nursery and Reception have had lots of fun this week taking part in experiments for Science week.  First we explored ‘dissolving’ and created a ‘Rainbow’ using skittle sweets. Next, we took part in a colour changing flower experiment. We asked the question ‘Does water travel up the stem?’ If this was true then we could change the colour of the petals! Children placed food colouring into cups of water followed by a single flower. As we observed, we noticed that the petals started to change colour.
Our third lesson explored materials to make a comfortable bed for the ‘Three Bears’. Children had to feel each material and sort them into hard and soft. Our third experiment was to explore how Polar bears keep warm in the Arctic. Polar bears have a thick layer of fat which helps to keep them warm so we wanted to put this to the test! We placed both hands into icy water but one was covered in thick lard. The lard helped to keep our hand warm just like it helps polar bears in those cold Arctic winds! Our final experiment was creating an exploding volcano! What a fantastic week we’ve had.

8/03/21

We have had a lovely day and enjoyed catching up with all their friends. It was so lovely to see their happy faces as they lined up this morning! We had lots of fun exploring our ‘Bear’ topic. Children also enjoyed taking part in a ‘Rainbow’ experiment for Science week. They worked in teams to create a circle of skittles and then poured water onto the plate and watched as the colouring from the sweets dissolved and created colourful rainbow swirls and shapes! This afternoon we embraced Mindful Monday by connecting with nature and looking for things to make our own ‘nature’ paint brushes! We then used these to paint and mark-make back in class! What a wonderful day. 🌈❤️

🎄Merry Christmas🎄
It has been a pleasure to work with each and every child in Nursery and Reception this term. We are excited for the next chapter in our journey after the holidays. Have a fabulous rest with your amazing children and we will see you in the New Year. As always, many thanks for your continued support.

Welcome to Foundation Stage!

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Christmas Songs

The best way to spread Christmas cheer is singing loud for all to hear! 

30/11/20 Mindful Monday
Today we talked about times when our minds are too busy and we need to release the tension! Children talked about times when they feel angry or annoyed:

• When they are asked to do too many things. 
• When a friend upsets them. 
• When something goes wrong or when a toy breaks. 
• When they want something they can’t have. 
• When they are told off at home or a sibling annoys them.

Children made stress balls by filling balloons with water beads. They all enjoyed squeezing the balloons! We talked about using these to ‘squeeze out’ their anger or when they are annoyed.

12/11/20 Diwali
Children enjoyed learning about the Festival of Lights called Diwali. We learnt about the story of Rama and Sita. We talked about how people prepare for Diwali by decorating their houses and making bright Rangoli patterns on the front door step to bring good luck. 

Mehndi is also known as henna - it’s a body art tradition where intricate patterns are drawn onto the hands and arms. Mehndi is part of the celebration of Diwali, but it’s also said to be a general good luck charm.

Children enjoyed following instructions to make Coconut Barfi sweets. Once all the ingredients has been mixed together, children rolled the mixture into a ball and left it in the fridge to set.

Whole School Harvest Collection

Sefton Community Pantry has asked me to pass on their thanks for the food donations that you sent in. They talked about the work they do in the local community and how they support families all over Sefton. THANK YOU ♥️

18/10/20 Repeat Patterns 

This week children have enjoyed creating autumnal repeat patterns using natural objects. 🍁🍂🪵

25/09/20 Science Experiment- Dissolving 

Following on from children talking beautiful ‘rainbows’, we decided to create a rainbow experiment using skittle sweets. We talked about whether the water would dissolve the sweets. Children asked, “What does dissolve mean?” We used coffee granules to demonstrate this. The water broke up the coffee granules - they dissolved into the water and turned it brown! The lumps of coffee had gone! We placed skittles around the edge of a plate. We made predictions, talking about what we thought would happen if water was poured over the skittles. Children loved seeing the colouring from the skittle dissolve into the water to create a beautiful rainbow! Following on from this experiment, we decided to find out what other substances dissolve in water. Children used their senses to describe the following substances and predict whether or not they thought each would dissolve:

rice, sugar, coffee, cake sprinkles.

We found that sugar and coffee dissolved while the rice  grains didn’t. The cake sprinkles were similar to the skittles- the colouring dissolved  and turned the water purple but the hard white balls remained! Check out your child’s Tapestry account to see their comments! 

This week Nursery and Reception have been learning about what it means to ‘recycle’. We looked at recycling symbols on packaging and learnt about the different materials that can be recycled - glass, cardboard, plastic,paper, metal. We read lots of stories about the effect of plastic pollution on God’s Creatures and environment. Children made a handprint on a world template to represent how they can leave a positive mark to help combat pollution. We watched ‘A Whale’s Tale’ on YouTube- Under the sea a whale tries to help the smaller creatures who are struggling with plastic waste. On land a young boy seeks help to clear the sea in his area. But neither the boy nor the whale can succeed on their own. This reinforced the need to work together. Happy Recycling everyone. 🌎  

https://youtu.be/xFPoIU5iiYQ

11/09/20 Roald Dahl Day 
Today children enjoyed dressing up in character to help raise money for Roald Dahl’s Marvellous Children’s Charity.  They all looked wonderful and we had fun using the Green Screen app to superimpose our pictures onto a chosen background! We also enjoyed reading ‘The Enormous Crocodile’ 🐊
Thank you all for your kind donations.

01/03/20 St David’s Day
On Friday, we enjoyed learning all about St. David's Day. We located Wales on a map and looked at a Welsh flag, talking about how the red dragon is a symbol of Wales. Children also used their senses to explore and paint daffodils and we talked about how they are a popular emblem of a Wales, especially on St David's Day.  We are all looking forward to baking welsh cakes for our snack tomorrow!