Trip, Trap, Trip, Trap...

We have been reading the topic story, The Three Billy Goats Gruff. The children have had great fun reading and joining in with the repeated refrains of the story. After reading the text, the children worked collaboratively to build bridges both inside and outside the classroom using a variety of resources. After they enjoyed re-enacting the story with their friends.

“Who’s that trip trapping over my bridge?” Kenzie.

“Trip, trap, trip, trap...who’s that walking over my bridge?” Max.

“The troll is under the bridge!” Domenique.

Reception Awards!

The children in Reception have been working really hard, both at school and at home. We are very proud of all their achievements and below are the children who received certificates last week.

Apple
Star writer - Chisom
Resilience - Louise-Maria

Reading Awards
Bronze - Eden
Bookmark - Chisom, Raffy

Alder

Star Writer- Louisa

Resourcefulness- Lucas

Resilience- Larissa

Reciprocity- Areya

Reading Awards

Bookmarks- Irfan, Ruby, Rosie, Peter, Regan, Faramade, Domenique, Thea-Rose

Bronze- Khalifa

Silver- Louisa, William

Keep up the good work! 

Charlie the storyteller visits Reception!

The Reception children started their week off with a visit from Charlie the Storyteller. The children handled the change in their daily routine well and were able to adapt their behaviour to a new situation. They listened well, participated with enthusiasm and there was a lot of laughter. 

The session was based around the story of the Honeymouse who wanted to collect something to make him happy. He met an array of birds who all 'collected' different bugs, that made them sing. The children joined in with an array of actions, sounds and songs as they joined in with the storytelling. 

This storytelling workshop links in with our topic of the term, traditional tales. The children have been retelling familiar stories, creating alternative endings as well as making up their own stories. 

"I loved Charlie's instruments." Karimah 

"Charlie was funny." Louise-Maria 

"I'm going to tell the story to my family." Charleigh 

Exploring Watercolour in Nursery

Last week we introduced watercolor paints to the children. The children spent a long time creating their own masterpieces and exploring the new paints.Through experimenting they began to discover that too much water would make the paper rip and too little would mean their paintbrush would be dry and the beautiful colors wouldn't transfer onto their page.

Through trial and error they learnt lots about watercolor painting and were very keen to continue with their efforts and perfect their new skill.

"Look at my pink colors... it mixed to purple here!" Hope

" It was too wet here, this is working now " Teo 

Nursery Newsletter 28.1.2019

Dear Parents,

We have an exciting week ahead with Stay and Play sessions this Thursday and Number Day on Friday. The Stay and Play session will start at 10pm for morning children and 1pm for afternoon children. 
 Cate Douglas the author of the story 'Poppy's Tails' will be sharing her story with the children at the end of sessions. This session is completely free of cost to the school and yourselves. Cate will be available with signed copies of her book after the session for any parent's/carers who would like to purchase her story. We look forward to seeing lots of parents, remember if working parents are unable to attend we are happy to welcome other family members.

Our Nursery Rhymes to focus on this week is:  Hickory Dickory Dock and Jack and Jill. 

Maths

Our number of the week is 0. We will be learning the Ten Town song for the number and the children will have lots of opportunities to develop number recognition and counting skills in all areas of our learning environment. Don't forget Friday is Number Day! We look forward to seeing all of your costumes and having a fun mathematical day. 

Communication and Language  

In language groups the children are focus on the question stem 'Who' this week. We are supporting them to answer 'Who' questions. The context for developing this skill will be family members and rooms/furniture in houses. You can support your child by ensuring they can name different rooms of the house and furniture and if you haven't already sending in your family photo. This can be emailed to eyfs@broadford.havering.sch.uk or given to any member of staff.

The children are also developing their listening skills by listening to environmental noises, we are listening to sounds and using our memory to recall sequences.

Malleable

The children have glass pebbles, buttons and rolling pins available for them to create their own gingerbread men.

Creative
We are continuing to develop our painting skills this week and have added more colours to the area. The children have enjoyed experimenting with watercolor and are learning how much water they need to create a successful picture!

Snack
Our Story this week is 'The Magic Porridge Pot'. Later on in the week the children will make their own porridge and add various fruits for toppings.

Here are the words to this weeks Nursery Rhymes so you can practice at home:

Hickory, dickory, dock,

The mouse ran up the clock.

The clock struck one,

The mouse ran down,

Hickory, dickory, dock

Jack and Jill went up the hill

To fetch a pail of water.

Jack fell down and broke his crown,

And Jill came tumbling after.

Up Jack got, and home did trot,

As fast as he could caper,

He went to bed to mend his head,

With vinegar and brown paper

 If you would like to contact a member of the EYFS team via email the address is  eyfs@broadford.havering.sch.uk.     

 Kind Regards,

The Nursery Team

Number Day is coming!

Reception Newsletter 28.01.19

Term: Spring 1                 Date: 28.01.19

Dear Parents and Carers,


Thank you to all of the parents and carers who came to the Maths Stay and Learn on Tuesday, the children enjoyed inviting you into their classroom. We hope you enjoyed it and found it useful.

Last week the children loved reading the story of The Three Billy Goats Gruff. They enjoyed retelling the story with masks, puppets and acting it out themselves. The children also made some fantastic wanted posters to help catch the troll.

This week we will be reading another traditional tale, The Three Little Pigs. We also have a visit from Charlie the storyteller, where the children will become storytellers. Do not forget that it is NUMBER DAY on Friday - we cannot wait to see all of your costumes and for a day of Maths fun!


Communication & Language
The children will be retelling the story of the Three Little Pigs as well as joining in with a storytelling workshop.

Maths
This weeks number is 13. Perhaps you can spot the number at home or outside. We will be looking at measure for the next two weeks, introducing and using key language as well as ordering objects by length, height, weight and capacity.

Literacy
We will be making wanted posters to help catch the big bad wolf. The children will build on the simple sentences they wrote last week, this time describing the wolf.

Expressive Arts and Design
We will be building houses from a variety of materials in the art, construction and loose parts areas.


Dates for your diary:
Number Day: Friday 1st February
A day full of fun Maths activities. Please come dressed as something related to Maths. We will be collecting £1 per family to go towards the NSPCC.

Literacy Stay & Learn Session: Tuesday 12th March

Messages:
Ethan is missing a jumper, please could you check the labels in your child’s jumpers to ensure they have the correct one. Thanks in advance.

Can we please ask that your child has their reading folder in school on their reading day so that their reading books can be changed. If you are unsure of what day this is, please ask. A staff member will read with your child on this day also writing in their record. Remember to write in your child’s reading record each time you read together at home, as these will be counted towards reading awards as well as letting staff know how your child is getting on at home. You should be aiming to read together for around ten minutes on most days.

If you would like to contact a member of the EYFS team via email the address it is: eyfs@broadford.havering.sch.uk.


Kind Regards,
The Reception Team

Banana Bread Muffins

Banana bread is a fun and simple recipe but it involves lots of important skills like mixing, cutting, stirring, counting and baking!
The children had a picture recipe to follow and were encourage to talk about what they would need to do to complete each step successfully. We learnt that mashing bananas was a little tricky with our knives but that forks did a great job!  The recipe allowed the children to work very independently, they were able to crack eggs, mix and pour all by themselves and were very proud of their efforts. We counted, weighed and measured the ingredients and to make sure everyone had a chance to mix counting to 10 before passing the bowl to the next person.

"I mushed it with my fork.. then put it in the bowl."Teo
"Mine is going to be yummy!" Hope

Reception Awards!

The children in Reception have been working really hard, both at school and at home. We are very proud of all their achievements and below are the children who received certificates last week.

Apple
Oliver and Megan for showing resilience.
Karimah for reciprocity.
Niamh for fantastic writing.

Reading Awards:
Bookmarks- George
Bronze- Max and Hashir
Silver- Harvey
Gold- Lily

 Aspen
Jake for reciprocity.
Charleigh for being resourceful.
Manuella for being a reflective learner and Miraz for her resilience.

Reading Awards
Bookmarks- Poppy
Bronze- Eleni and Jimmy

Keep up the good work!

Kitchen Counting

The home corner is a fantastic place for the children to use appropriate real-life resources to play out their own experiences and to explore and use mathematical ideas.

We are all familiar with activities such as weighing ingredients for cooking, estimating how much water we need to fill pots, pans and kettles, cutting pizza into halves and quarters and counting our coins when shopping.

This term we will be hanging up our washing (ordering number), using timers when cooking, reading and making our own recipes cards and books, filling and emptying tea pots, cups and jugs (capacity), ensuring the table is always set and many more real-life experiences related to mathematical learning.

We welcome any donations of china cups and saucers; egg or sand timers; old telephones or mobile phones; measuring tapes and jugs  and weighing scales.

Stuck in the Muck

Reception children have been enjoying the big, bad return to the mud kitchen! Mud Kitchen 2019 is more popular than ever before, with a rapidly growing menu. Please note, cash only! 

Manuella: I am making soup!

Macie: I am making mud cookies!

Rosie: I am making cupcakes! 

Dominic: I am mixing my pancakes!

We are now able to self-select our appropriate attire for the mud kitchen, choosing our wellies and aprons to cover us up. And most of the time we are able to dress ourselves independently! We enjoy the responsibility of preparing ourselves for the mud kitchen.

We have had to be resourceful AND reflective, considering how to soften up the frozen mud.

Alex: We need to get the hose to make it wet!

Jake: And then we can dig it all up.

However, the frozen mud is quite hard and it is a real whole body workout to try and churn up the mud! This is great for our gross motor development, and it is really satisfying when we succeed! In Reception we know that if we try, try try, we can, can, can! 

Reception Stay and Learn

Today Reception enjoyed sharing their maths learning with their parents in our 'Stay and Learn' session.

We were proud to show off our counting abilities and teaching our parents how we use our skills in different games and activities.

We love being able to show our parents around our classrooms, and demonstrating our learning. We really appreciate all of our grown-ups being able to take the time to come in and see our school with us.

We look forward to showing how much more we learn about how to apply our maths skills to real-life situations.

Woodwork Wonders!

Last term the children learnt to use both a hammer and a screwdriver, as well as the safety rules of our woodwork area. This term the children have been beginning to apply their woodwork skills as they created their first models. 

After a recap of the safety rules, the children first sanded down any rough edges on their piece of Balsa wood. The children were then provided with a range of resources including buttons, bottle tops, corks and hammer beads along with screws and nails. Some children chose to explore the different materials and enjoyed fixing them to their piece of wood. Others had an idea in mind and used the resources to create their idea. 

Woodwork provides children with the opportunity to develop a range of skills across the curriculum. It is great for improving fine motor skills, which are crucial in becoming a writer. It also allows children to use their creative skills along with their imagination. 

As they worked the children came across many problems they needed to solve, including which tools they needed to use (there was quite a lot of trying to hammer in screws). Holding pieces in place also proved tricky and sometimes they needed a friend or adult to lend a hand. The children demonstrated high levels of concentration and engagement. As their confidence grew, the nails went in straighter, the smiles got bigger and their plans became more elaborate. We cannot wait to see how the children's woodwork skills develop over the rest of the year! 

Oliver "I'm making a flying car!"

Sahir "That's the fan that can make the aeroplane fly." 

Amber "It's tricky making the nails go in straight." 

Nursery Stay and Play

We look forward to welcoming Parents and Carers to our next Stay and Play session on Thursday 31st of January. The focus is on Sharing Stories. The session will start at 10am for parents of morning children and 1pm for parents of afternoon children.

 We are very lucky to have a story session from the author Cate Douglas that the children can enjoy on the day. You will also be able to join in with activities in different areas of the provision which will be linked to the fairy tales we have been sharing this half term.

Nursery Newsletter 21.01.19

Dear Parents,

This week our focus story is 'Once upon a Time'. The story introduces us to many of the characters we will meet on our fairy tale journey this half term. The children will have lots of opportunities to read tales with giants, brave princesses, big bad wolves and many exciting plots.

Our Nursery Rhyme to focus on this week is:  Humpty Dumpty and Hey Diddle Diddle 

Maths

We are focusing on counting accurately and in order. The children have wooden logs and people to place on the logs. They will be encouraged to recognise the numbers and make sure they count each person once. 

Communication and Language  

In language groups the children are focus on the question stem 'Who' this week. We are supporting them to answer 'Who' questions using stories and props.

The children are also developing their listening skills by listening to environmental noises - they will take part in sound walks in different areas.

Malleable

This week we are using our senses and have added lavender to our playdough. The children have pine cones, dried oranges, and conkers available to create their own designs.

Creative
Daffodils, Lemon and limes have been added to the table this week alongside lots of different shades of yellow and green.

Dates
Our next Stay and Play is on the 31st January and will focus on Sharing Stories. The morning children will have a session with an author at 10am and the afternoon children at 1.00 pm. We would love to see lots of parents and carers at this event. The children will be able to take home and keep a free storybook from Booktrust.

Here are the words to this weeks Nursery Rhymes so you can practice at home:

Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall,

Humpty Dumpty had a great fall;

All the king's horses and all the king's men

Couldn't put Humpty together again.

Hey, diddle, diddle,

The cat and the fiddle,

The cow jumped over the moon;

The little dog laughed

To see such sport,

And the dish ran away with the spoon.

 If you would like to contact a member of the EYFS team via email the address is  eyfs@broadford.havering.sch.uk.     

 Kind Regards,

The Nursery Team

Mirror, Mirror on the Wall

We have been using mirrors to explore our reflections in Nursery. Mirrors are a great way for the children to discover more about themselves and how they look. The children have been encouraged to look carefully in the mirror and see what they notice before completing their own self portraits. They have learnt to think carefully about drawings and make sure important things like eyes and noses are added!

"My eyes are blue"Jack
"I have curly bits there, on my hair look!" Hope

Rainbows in Reception

On Friday, Reception children were excited to see a 'smiley face rainbow' in the sky smiling down over our playground.

The children were excited to discuss what they could see and to learn about how rainbows are formed. For many of our children it was been an exciting week with showers of snow, rainbows hanging in the sky and some frosty morning dew!

Abdulkarim: "It's just floating."

Callum: "It's like in a photo."

Miraz: "It's like a smiley face!"

We love observing what is going on around us as it gives us a great opportunity to talk about our ideas and our understanding of the world! 

Reception Newsletter 21.01.19

Term: Spring 1             Date: 21.01.19

Dear Parents and Carers,

The children loved building bridges for the Gingerbread Man to escape the sneaky fox. They worked in pairs to build them from cocktail sticks and foam pieces before testing how well their design worked. Some children also chose to build bridges from the construction resources. Our Maths Stay and Learn is on Tuesday afternoon at 2pm, we look forward to welcoming as many parents and carers as possible into our classroom.

This week we will be reading another traditional tale involving a bridge, The Three Billy Goats Gruff. The children will be building more bridges, retelling and acting out the story in their own words.

Thank you for all the Parent Share feedback forms we have received. If you still have one at home, we would love your feedback or if you would like another form please let your class teacher know.


Communication & Language & Personal, Social and Emotional DevelopmentThe children will be building bridges in the loose parts and construction areas. Here they will be able to retell and act out the story with friends.

Physical Development
The children are beginning to make their first Balsa wood models using a range of resources, including screws and nails. Woodwork provides a fantastic opportunity to develop fine motor skills for writing, the children often demonstrate high levels of engagement and concentration. 

Maths
We are going to be focussing on a teen number each week this term. Many children already know their teen number but we will be looking at them in greater depth, including the different representations of the number (tally marks, ten-frames, Numicon, dots) as well as different ways we could make the number (addition and subtractions, use of coins and Numicon). This weeks number is 12. Perhaps you can spot the number at home or outside. We will be looking at counting objects beyond 10 as well as counting fixed and irregualr arrangements.

Literacy
We will be making wanted posters to help catch the troll. The children will apply their phonics knowledge as well as begin to write simple repetitive sentences.

Expressive Arts and Design
We will continue to model the new resources in our home corner and bakery. Encouraging children to add narratives to their play.


Dates for your diary:
Maths Stay & Learn Session: Tuesday 22nd January at 2pm

Number Day: Friday 1st February
A day full of fun Maths activities. Please come dressed as something related to Maths. We will be collecting £1 per family to go towards the NSPCC.

Literacy Stay & Learn Session: Tuesday 12th March


Messages:
Ethan is missing a jumper, please could you check the labels in your child’s jumpers to ensure they have the correct one. Thanks in advance.


Can we please ask that your child has their reading folder in school on their reading day so that their reading books can be changed. If you are unsure of what day this is, please ask. A staff member will read with your child on this day also writing in their record. Remember to write in your child’s reading record each time you read together at home, as these will be counted towards reading awards as well as letting staff know how your child is getting on at home. You should be aiming to read together for around ten minutes on most days.

Learning Challenge:
Each half term we will be setting our pupils a challenge related to their learning. We believe that it is important for us to provide guidance for parents on how their children's learning can be extended at home. The learning challenge is optional and will include either a nursery rhyme, famous person, illustration or a piece of music. Please talk to your child about the challenge and help them to engage in their learning. The children can choose how they present their learning challenge outcomes to their teacher or class.

This is an optional ongoing activity that should take place over a number of weeks, it should be the children’s own work (supported by the parents).

Person: Choose a Traditional Tale Character
Artist/Illustrator: Axel Scheffler
Poem/Song to learn: Teddy Bear, Teddy Bear

If you would like to contact a member of the EYFS team via email the address it is: eyfs@broadford.havering.sch.uk.

Kind Regards, 

The Reception Team

Save the Gingerbread Man!

The children have loved reading The Gingerbread Man and it always gets a gasp when the Gingerbread Man is eaten by the sneaky fox at the end of the story.

The Gingerbread Man needs to cross the river as there is a range of people chasing him. How else could he cross the river without falling for the Fox's cunning plan? The children thought about and discussed alternative endings and ways for the Gingerbread Man to cross the river. There was a wide range of ideas including helicopters, bridges, boats, slides and swimming. We discounted the last as we remembered the Gingerbread Man would get soggy! 

Deciding that a bridge was a good idea, the children looked at a range of bridges for inspiration. The children planned and built their own bridges using cocktail sticks and foam pieces, before testing them out over a tray of water. Initially the children struggled with the concept of making one bridge between them, and often needed prompts to talk to each other. But once we got going the children demonstrated great reciprocity, it was essential to work as a team. Resilience, it was quite a tricky task. And reflectiveness as they adapted and changed their ideas as they worked. 

Chisom "It needs to be longer." 

Niamh "Harvey, we need another one." 

Mahdi "Carefully he might get soggy!" 

Megan "Come on Bernardo, we can do this!"

Whilst some children were building their cocktail stick bridges, others chose to build bridges from the construction materials. There was a variety of different designs and methods used to cross the material river that was laid out on the carpet. What a busy afternoon of building! 

Maxi "We've built a different bridge here."

Darci "This ones a tall bridge."

Tea, anyone..?

The Nursery children were delighted to use our brand new tea set this week. This was a little different to our usual set as it wasn't made from plastic, instead the children had the chance to use a beautiful china tea set. First we spoke about the differences between the plastic items and the real ones, then we spoke about what we would do if something got broken. The children understood that the items were very special and needed to be handled carefully.

After this we had tea parties in small groups and learnt how to carefully pour into the cups and hold the tea pot at the right angle. It proved to be a great way of teaching children to respect property and to ensure they used equipment carefully, they were able to understand the consequence if these items ended up on the home corner floor. The children spent long periods of time creating different flavoured teas and thoroughly enjoyed the new addition. 

"It's china... be careful!" Mason

"I'll just put this in, it's lemon tea.. Mrs Ngenge has lemon!" Fariah

Reception Certificates!

Congratulations to all of our certificate winners in Reception last week! 

4R certificates were awarded to these children children for demonstrating one of the 4R's.

Resilience: Harvey, Ruta

Reflectiveness: Max, Dominik, 

Resourcefulness: Liam

Reciprocity: Vanessa

Star Reader awards were awarded to these children for reading at home. 

Bookmark: Megan

Bronze: Niamh, Emma, Ryan, Macie 

Silver: Emily, Ryan, Larissa, Flynn

Olivia was awarded a Star Writer award for using her phonics knowledge within her play.