We just can’t believe that this is our last full week! We have one more day on Monday when we are open as usual and then our annual sort out and clean up day! Then Holiday Club will open on Tuesday 5th August and will run every Tuesday and Wednesday through August from 8am – 4.30pm – the club is pretty full but do enquire if you would like to book in as there are a couple of spaces towards the end of August at the moment.

We have had a lovely week, it is very sad to say goodbye to our school starters – they have been a brilliant cohort and we have thoroughly enjoyed teaching them all. Lots of amazing memories from circle times to role play, making friends, forest school and trips out and about in our community. We have welcomed grandparents in for afternoon tea and morning coffee – celebrating the role they play in the children’s lives too.

Add in an Outstanding Ofsted report and we really have had a brilliant year – the graduation is a lovely way to say goodbye and also to say thank you to the whole team here, everyone works hard and everyone has such a commitment to the children.

We wish all our school starters the very best of luck for their journey into primary school and we look forward to welcoming back our current families in the Autumn and to seeing the new children settle in and start their journey with us! Amelia

One of our favourite weeks of the year – our butterflies appeared over the weekend with the warm weather and we released them into the Forest School garden on Tuesday afternoon, with a lovely party and picnic and story and face paint! The children absolutely loved watching the butterflies fly away and there are extra videos and photos on Tapestry for you to have a look at with the children too, so sorry to anyone who missed out on that afternoon but once they emerge the butterflies have to be released in a couple of days.

Our circle focus has been numbers this week, and we have created lots of different games and activities to support learning and we have lots of brilliant observations to share with the key workers as they start to complete the special book ready for giving to families at the graduation celebration at the end of the term.

The Sun and Moon groups have been representing numbers, counting and subitising, linking numerals to amounts, tricky bingo, shape and number cutting games, making and adding big numbers using numicon, knocking down a tower and counting how many bricks fell and adding two totals together and also looking at how clocks use numbers too.

The Star children have also been working on their number skills too, they have had a number hunt, shape and number sorting tray in foam, counting wooden blocks, and number songs! The Stars have had Forest School sessions on Thurs and Fri am and the photos are so wonderful!

We have visited St Andrew’s School this week for a lovely trip which the children enjoyed and two teachers from Willowbank have also visited us too so the feeling of a transition ahead is real!

We have been building rivers with planks and gutters and tubes all week which has been great for imaginative play and solving problems and for getting very wet!

Inside we have been exploring colour and making rainbows all week, ready to use in our display for the fete on Saturday! Come along and support us – 11.30am – 2pm – so much to do and eat and drink and enjoy and we hear the weather will be great too!

Welcome back to the second half of the summer term! We are in Week 6 and looking forward to a wonderful half term ahead, ending with our graduation celebration for children that are leaving us to go onto school and to meeting new families and siblings of current and past children back to pre-school. Please let friends and family know that we are currently taking registrations for the Autumn Term!

We have had a great start and have spent our week exploring mini beasts in circle times ahead of our caterpillars arriving!

Star – played a minibeast info game, drawn spiders, made butterflies, enjoyed the hungry caterpillar story sack, explored a minibeast tray, made mini beasts out of playdoh, played bug bingo and counted legs and spotted wings!

Sun and Moon – played bug bingo, played a big drawing games, explored the sensory garden and growing garden, learning about the new plants and looking for bugs, counted bugs and enjoyed a mini beast clue game, drawing and colouring in the mini beasts and bugs and made bug hotels for the sensory garden!

Forest School has re started and the Moons attend on a Thursday am and Suns on a Friday am for the next two weeks – then we welcome the Star group out to Forest School to familiarise them with the rules ahead of them turning into Sun and Moon children in September! Then a final session each for Moons and Suns in Week 5 and 6.

We have also spent time this week looking at lots of photos – of the children and their families, looking at the special books and circle time photos and the photos that you have shared with us too.

Outside we have used the wonderful petals you have collected to make perfume and sun catchers, we have planted some seeds and used our physical skills to conquer the different obstacle courses and challenges in the garden.

Next week we will be enjoying musical play outside and our costa coffee role play. Our summer fete is coming up so we will be practising performing so that the children are confident for our singing at the fete so we will have a stage inside with lots of dressing up and will be developing independence too – dress ourselves, put clothes back on the hangers, find our own shoes etc!

We would love donations for theatre role play – any wigs or funny sunglasses and hats!