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Nursery - St Mary

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. 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 and key worker

Miss Bowen - Key worker and learning support assistant

Miss Casey - learning support assistant

Mrs Mulhern - learning support assistant

Miss McColgan - learning support assistant (mornings only)

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 - Outdoor P.E./games on the astro turf

Tuesday - Dance in the hall

Wednesday is our welly 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 for most of the day, every day and so it is important that your child brings a waterproof coat into school each day. 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 Learning Logs

Book bags will be sent home every Friday and should be returned to Nursery on a Wednesday.

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.

You will also find your child's Learning Log in their book bag. The Learning Log will contain a short fun task for you and your child to work on together at home. Your child can document their learning by drawing or sticking objects in. Alternatively, you can stick in photographs too. The task will be designed to support your child's learning. Please return your child's Learning Log with their bookbags on Wednesdays. We will share learning logs together in Nursery every Thursday afternoon.

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 Thursday afternoon together with their learning logs. This is a lovely opportunity for the children to talk about and share their learning.

Summer term

This Term's Topic

This term's topic is Growing. We will be planting our own seeds and beans and learning about what they need to grow. We will have our own class caterpillars and look at how they change by learning about the lifecycle of a butterfly. We will also be learning about animals and identifying their babies.

Phonics

Phonics helps children to develop their awareness of sounds in words. You can support your child's developing phonological awareness by spotting rhymes in books and nursery rhymes, by clapping syllables in words and by talking about the first sound in words eg. playing I Spy or just noting when words begin with the same sound. You might relate this to their name e.g. oh look, c-a-t starts with a c just like the c at the start of your name. In school this term, we will continue to look at the initial sounds in words and playing lots of games to orally segment and blend the sounds in words.

Maths

This term we will continue to sing number songs, stories and rhymes. We will be learning about sequencing - day of the week We will look at the 2d shapes linked to these numbers e.g. triangles when learning about number 3. We will also be learning about length, height, mass and capacity.

Religious Education

This term in our Come and See and Caritas curriculum, we will be looking at Good news, Pentecost, Reconciliation and Our World.

In our Ten Ten SRE programme we will be looking at the module 'Creation/You are created by God out of love and for love. This module explores the individual, that we are created by God out of love and for love, it helps children to develop an understanding of the importance of valuing themselves as the basis for personal relationships.

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 re known 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)