Happy New Year
The children settled in so well after their Christmas break. They’ve been brilliant at getting back to their usual routines and we’ve been so impressed with their self-care skills. Lots of children can put their coats on themselves, get ready for snack time independently and get ready for home time too.
This week, we’re reading ‘The Gingerbread Man’ and children are already beginning to retell the story. This story will be our focus for two weeks. If you have a copy of the story at home, please enjoy reading it together. The children have loved to join in with the repeated refrain in the story. “Run, run, as fast as you can, you can’t catch me, I’m the Gingerbread Man.”
For Maths we’ve been building our mastery with number 1! We can represent one using our hands, with Numicon, by making marks and collecting one object.
In phonics our sound box had lots of ‘m’ objects including a marble, a mouse, a map and a mirror.
Help at home-What can you find around the house that begins with the ‘m’ sound? What other ‘m’ objects could we have put in our sound bag?
Sharp teeth and claws
A Cosy Afternoon
We have had a lovely Christmassy afternoon watching a virtual pantomime in our pajamas!
The children gave a big “Merry Christmas” as I took their photo! 
Feeling Festive
On Wednesday, the Nursery children enjoyed making their Christingles.
A Christingle is a symbolic orange decorated with raisins on sticks, a red ribbon and a candle. It is used in church services, around Christmas time, and represents Christ as the Light of the World. Each part of the Christingle holds specific Christian meanings.
Orange: Represents the world.
Red Ribbon: Symbolizes Jesus’s blood and love.
Four Cocktail Sticks: Represent the four seasons or directions (North, South, East, West).
Fruit: Symbolizes God’s creation and blessings.
Candle: The central symbol of Jesus as the Light of the World, bringing hope into darkness.
Whatever Next
This week, we listened to another of Jill Murphy’s stories titled ‘Whatever Next!’
It’s about a little bear who went on an adventure to the moon. This story led to lots of conversations about space and rockets. In the story baby bear makes his own space rocket from a cardboard box. We decided to make our own rockets in the creative area using different shaped boxes and bottles. It was quite tricky working out how to attach the different parts together. But we didn’t give up.
‘I need some more sticky tape for my rocket bottle blaster!’ Archie
‘My rocket has got a shiny thing on to make it go fast.’ Frankie
Next week’s learning:
We are looking forward to reading ‘Stickman’ by Julia Donaldson in our story times next week.
In maths, we’re learning about length so will be using the words long, short, longer and shorter to compare different objects.
Sound of the week
i for iguana
Pull your lips back and make the i sound at the back of your mouth.
Nursery rhyme of the week –
Twinkle, twinkle little star
World Nursery Rhyme Week
This week has been World Nursery Rhyme week. We have had a great week celebrating our favourite Nursery Rhymes and have focused on a range of different nursery rhymes and we have been singing them (even more!) at carpet times.
Help at home: Sing your favourite Nursery Rhyme and send a video of you singing it for us to share in class.
Odd Socks
On Monday, we wore odd socks to signify our differences and share the message that we are all different in some way. We discussed how important it is to celebrate our differences and respect everyone.
Phonics
As part of our phonics learning, we’ve introduced the letter ‘a’ this week. We took turns to pull some objects out of a bag that all started with the letter ‘a’ We talked about the ‘a’ sound that we could hear at the start of each word. In Nursery, we focus on our listening skills. We’re not learning about letter formation just yet.
We show the children this picture card and use this pronunciation phrase.
a for astronaut and apple
Open your mouth wide and make the a sound at the back of your mouth a a a
Help at home: What can you find at home that begins with the sound ‘a’? Go on a sound hunt together and look for some. Let us know what you find.
Mrs. Kendrew, Mrs. Rippon, Miss. Feldman, Mrs. Linton and Mrs. Cairnes
The children were very excited when they returned to school this week. They excitedly shared their stories about Halloween with their friends. There was a lot of talk about witches, bat costumes and skeletons.
As part of our phonics learning, we’ve introduced the letter ‘s’ this week. We took turns to pull some objects out of a bag that all started with the letter ‘s’ We talked about the ‘s’ sound that we could hear at the start of each word. In Nursery, we focus on our listening skills. We’re not learning about letter formation just yet.
We show the children this picture card and use this pronunciation phrase.
Show your teeth and let the s hiss out ssssss
You could try this at home.
Help at home: What can you find at home that begins with the sound ‘s’? Go on a sound hunt together and look for some. Let us know what you find.
Next week’s Learning
It’s World Nursery Rhyme Week so instead of our usual Nursery Rhyme of the week, our provision will be Nursery Rhyme themed. We’ll be singing lots of our favourite rhymes. If you’d like to send us an email with your child’s favourite rhyme and we’ll try to sing it at Nursery next week. stjameseyfs@spherefederation.org
Sound of the week – a for astronaut and apple
Open your mouth wide and make the a sound at the back of your mouth a a a
Story of the week – Peace at Last by Jill Murphy
In this story Mr Bear moves about the house to try to find somewhere that is quiet to sleep. We will find out how many different sounds he hears.
Reminders
- Odd Socks Day – Monday 10 November
Children are invited to wear odd socks to school today, marking the fact we’re all different in some way. - Children in Need: non-uniform day – Friday 14 November
Mrs. Kendrew, Mrs. Rippon, Miss. Feldman, Mrs. Linton and Mrs. Cairnes
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Colour and light
Autumn 2-Colour and Light
Welcome back! We hope you’ve had a lovely half term and are feeling well rested. This half term our overall theme is Colour and Light.
We’ll be using the following focus books to help us with our learning
See you all in the morning for some fun and some learning about St James.