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Nursery - St Andrew

Welcome to Nursery

We are really pleased to welcome you and your children to St. Mary's. This page gives you lots of information about us and about what we do in the Nursery, here, at St Mary's. It also lets you know what we will be doing this term so that you can support your child's learning. If you have any questions please feel free to telephone school and leave us a message or email the office: admin@stmaryslevenshulme.org.uk. We will phone you back as soon as we can (usually when the school day is over) or we will make an appointment to see you. It can be tricky to answer queries when the children are being dropped off or collected as the priority at that time is the safety of the children. We can sometimes answer short queries at the end of the day if you can wait behind until all the children have been dismissed safely.

The Nursery team

The staff in Nursery are as follows:

Miss Knowles - Class teacher

Miss Bowen - Key worker and learning support assistant

Mrs Mulhern - Key worker and learning support assistant

Miss Doherty - Key worker and learning support assistant

Dropping Off And Collecting Your Child

The Early Years gate opens at 8.30am and closes at 8.40am. Please bring your child up the ramp to the early years gate where you will be met by one of the Nursery team. You will say goodbye here at the gate and your child will walk into Nursery on their own. If your child has a full-time place you can collect him/her at the Early Years gate at 3.10pm each day. If your child has a morning place then you should collect him/her outside the main school door at 11.30am. Please arrive promptly to drop off and collect your child. The school gates will open 5 minutes before the start and end of the day.

What Your Child Needs In School

Your child should have in school the following:

A waterproof coat which can be brought in each day
A pair of wellies which should stay in school
A drawstring bag containing a few changes of clothes which will be sent home when your child has been changed during the day

What a typical day looks like

8:30-8:40am - Arrive at Nursery

8:45am Register & prayers

8:50 - 9:00 - Story/songs/phase 1 phonics

Continuous provision inside/outside

10am - snack time

Continuous provision inside/outside

10:40 - tidy up time

10:50 -11am - Numbers/shapes/counting

11:05am Lunch in the hall

11:30am - Lunchtime (outside)

12:30pm - Register & prayers

12:35-12:45 - story/songs

Continuous provision inside/outside

14:30 tidy up time

14:40 snack/story time/brush teeth

15:05 - Home time

Monday - R.E.

Tuesday - Dance in the hall (From November)

Wednesday is our welly walk day.

Thursday & Fridays are our baking days

Outdoor Learning

Learning outdoors is a very important part of the curriculum here at St Mary's, offering the children so many valuable opportunities to explore, talk, create. develop their physical skills and build their confidence. The Nursery children have access to the outdoors all day, every day and so it is important that your child brings a waterproof coat into school. It is also vital that they have a pair of wellies in school to use when accessing our Let's Explore area which can become very wet and muddy. We will also be having welly Wednesdays where we will be going out walking in our wellies around the school grounds and local community.

Reading books and Home learning

Book bags will be sent home every Friday and should be returned to Nursery on a Wednesday. Please note these will be sent home at the start of October once the children have settled into Nursery.

Please enjoy reading these books together and note in your child's reading record how s/he responded to the books. We want all our children to develop a life long love of reading and this begins with sharing and discussing books with adults.

Our online learning platform Seesaw is where we will share the learning we do each week in Nursery. We will also document some key moments in your child's learning here in Nursery. You will receive a login code for your child. It is also an opportunity for you to share special events and occasions at home where you can upload photographs and videos. We will share these together on a Friday morning during our celebration assembly. This is a lovely opportunity for the children to talk about and share their learning.

Autumn term

This Term's Topic

This term's topic is All about me. We will be reading lots of stories about starting school and about families. We will be learning about ourselves, our names and those around in Nursery - our key worker and the friends in our key group and whoe class. We will be sharing familiar stories such as 'We're going on a bear hunt' and encouraging the children to join in with the words and actions. We will be learning about the days of the week by singing the song and by exploring the colour boxes. Each day references a colour:

Monday - Red, Tuesday - orange, Wednesday - Yellow, Thursday - Green, Friday - Blue. We will be looking at using our senses to explore the different objects - how they feel, describing the textures, smells, and tastes.

We will be learning aboutthe different parts of our bodies by naming them and what they do. We'll discuss how to keep our bodies healthy by what foods we should eat. We will also tak about the importance of exercise and brushing our teeth.

Phonics

We will be starting phase 1 phonics by focusing on our listening skills. We will be singing lots of nursery rhymes and going on sound walks. We will learn about environmental and body percussion sounds.

Maths

This term we will be singing lots of counting songs such as: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, one two buckle my shoe, 5 little ducks, 5 cheeky monkeys, 5 little speckled frogs. We will be looking at the environment around us and describing what we notice - the patterns, shapes, colours etc. We will start to subitise - look at groups of objects and recognise there at 1, 2, or 3 objects there without having to count them.

Religious Education

This term in our Come and See programme the themes are:

1. Domestic church and family

2. Baptism and belonging

3. Advent/Christmas

We will have Religion every Monday which involves one lesson - come and see & Caritas and a collective worship.

Each day, we will say daily prayers and we will sing hymns during our Celebration assembly every Friday.

The Early Years Framework

As you may already be aware, the DFE (Department for Education) have introduced a new EYFS (Early Years Foundation Stage) framework, commencing September 2021. Your child will follow the updated EYFS framework and will work towards the final assessment at the end of the Reception year, using the new ELGs (Early Learning Goals). These goals are short statements that teachers assess your child against at the end of the year. During the nursery year your child will be learning within the '3 to 4 year old' stage. The 7 main areas of learning remain the same. These are;

Communication and Language
Physical Development
Personal, Social and Emotional Development
Literacy
Mathematics
Expressive Arts and Design
Understanding the World

As part of the changes to the new framework, it also means that there is less emphasis on recording paperwork, meaning we, as adults, can spend more time with your child getting to know them and having those quality interactions. The new framework is also more aligned with the KS1 curriculum, further ensuring your child’s educational journey from Nursery, then Reception and into KS1 is building upon previous knowledge. See the attached link below for the statements that your child will be assessed against at the end of the early years. We have also provide a link below to the Development Matters 2021 document, which outlines the principles behind the new framework.

Early Learning Goals

eyfs-elg-one-page-document.pdf

Development Matters 2021 New EYFS Framework

What to expect in the Early Years A guide for parents/carers

Partnership with Parents

Here at St. Mary's, we are reknown for our strong relationships with our families and the communications we have with them. For our children to thrive in their learning and in our school, it is imperative that they feel safe, secure and listened to. The interactions the children have at school and at home are all parts of the jigsaw and learning journey for each and every child. We want to give the children the very best start to their education.

It is important for parents and early years settings to have a strong and respectful partnership. This sets the scene for children to thrive in the early years.
This includes listening regularly to parents and giving parents clear information about their child's progress.
The help that parents give their children at home has a very significant impact on their learning.
Some children get less support for their learning at home than others. By knowing and understanding all children and their families, we will offer extra help to those who need it most.
It is important to encourage all parents to chat, play and read with their children.

Useful Information for parents from the NSPCC

Positive parenting (nspcc.org.uk)

Look Say Sing Play: to build your baby’s brain every day (nspcc.org.uk)

Handle with care: How to keep your baby safe (nspcc.org.uk)

Talking about difficult topics | NSPCC

Helping Your Child Cope with Your Divorce or Separation | NSPCC

Online Safety for Children - Tips & Guides | NSPCC

Useful Information for parents from Early Education

Babies - learning starts from the first day.pdf (early-education.org.uk)

Children as artists.pdf (early-education.org.uk)

Going out to play and learn (3).pdf (early-education.org.uk)

Helping children cope with change.pdf (early-education.org.uk)