This half term has gone so quickly – only one week left before we close for a week. The children are so settled and learning so much at their group times. We have had a focus on being healthy this week which will continue into next week as well, leading up to our half term break. Halloween will creep into our play next week and we will have lots of craft going on which we will send home for you to use to decorate your home if you take part in Halloween! Lots of the children are talking about Halloween and Home Bargains is full of bits and pieces to buy!

Our circle times in Star have been focused on learning to be independent and recognising our bags and shoes and coats, practising taking shoes on and off and the stars are amazing! They chopped up their own snack and poured their own mil and water, talked about how to keep clean and washing hands, brushing teeth and hair and also enjoyed some wonderful Autumn craft as well.

The Sun and Moon groups have also been working on independence and self care skills and can all take their shoes off and put them back on independently which is brilliant – especially as we move towards wetted weather when the children need to be able to take off their shoes, put wellies on and be ready to go and play outside in the puddles! They have been learning about their bodies, bones and muscles, skin and our brain, feelings and exercise, self care and healthy foods.

Outside we have been working on our strength buy crawling and playing sports and playground games like What’s the time Mr Wolf! Our bike repair and wash shop has also been full of chatter and turn taking and hard work!

Our Forest School groups have made wands outside in the garden and explored the mud kitchen and lit fires and have their lovely hot chocolate and story time. We continue these sessions whatever the weather and the groups swap after half term – MOON on a THURSDAY and SUN on a FRIDAY.

We would like to invite Grandparents in for a coffee morning on Monday 30th October OR Wednesday 1st November – from  9.45-10.45 – we will have some Halloween and Bonfire Night craft available and a coffee or tea and a cake! The invitation will come out today and please RSVP by Wednesday 18 OCTOBER to admin@cullomptonpreschool.org

Next week we will be off to the Church with two groups – Moon on Thursday with Amelia and the Sun group on Friday with Louise W. We would love your help to walk there and stay with us for the hour – it is a lovely trip and we do need walkers to make it possible – please call into the office if you or a grandparent can help – 01884 35018

We hope you all have a lovely weekend, our newsletter was published yesterday and we will be handing out more key worker info next week for you and some photos from the first half of term!

All of the children are settling in so well, moving through the third week has been getting easier for those who feel a little upset at drop off as the routines are becoming families, names are being learnt and friendships made with peers and relationships growing with key ladies. We have a key person meeting on Monday to talk about how everyone has settled and to make a start on checking where children are developmentally and sharing that info with you. We are really good and supporting all children here to make fantastic progress whatever their starting point and we pride ourselves on working with each child as an individual and with their family. We will be sharing ideas for home learning in a couple of weeks and will share if we think your child will benefit from a little nurture time in their emotional development and feeling happy and safe here or in any of the areas of learning.

We follow the Early Years Framework and design our own planning and curriculum based on that and Birth 2 Five and Development Matters – all links are below.

A parents guide to the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) | Family Corner

Early years foundation stage (EYFS) statutory framework – GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

foundationyears.org.uk/files/2021/09/What-to-expect-in-the-EYFS-complete-FINAL-16.09-compressed.pdf

Birthto5Matters-download.pdf

Development Matters – GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

Please do not hesitate to ask any questions either by email or chatting to any of our team.

We plan activities to really grab the children’s interests and to teach them, we use fascinating ideas, awe inspiring activities and games, resources and adult led group times to ensure there is learning throughout the pre-school to stumble across and enjoy.

Our focus for the week has been reading, writing, exploring and listening to stories with a strong purpose to develop communication and language skills.

The circle times for Star group this week have included Going on a Bear Hunt, Talking about favourite stories and TV programmes and characters, listening games such as spotting different animal noises, different farm animal noises as what those animals eat, mixing colours, drawing to music, naming fruits and veg and listening to instructions and exploring textures, using new vocab to describe items in the treasure basket.

The Sun and Moon groups (children leaving in July 2023) have also been learning about stories and books and developing their language abilities too. We have laughed along with Goldilocks being cheeky in her story, made our own Bear Hunt trail on a huge piece of paper, written our own stories using our favourite animal, listened carefully to tricky animal sounds and identified them, Billy Goats Gruff story sack and a shopping game which supports our listening skills too.

Our activities in free flow have been really fun, so many children are loving the farm shop and the flowers that Aldi donated smell fantastic and have brought the shop to life for all our senses, some of the apples for sale have been eaten!

Life is never dull for a moment here – from milking a cow…to a hen laying eggs….to mixing paint into foam….lighting a fire at Forest School….making potions in giant bottles…..or enjoying a story and a cuddle – just a tiny snapshot of the week!

Next week our focus is Autumn and Sensory play and “Fascinations!” – the group leaders will be creating awe and wonder in their circle times with exciting objects and sensory trays and in our free flow our farm shop will still be open to customers and we will be having a food theme inside on the Sun table – we would love donations of the following items please:- recipe books, vegetables, herbs and spices, rice, flour tortilla, cheese, tomato puree, frozen veg – thank you!

This is our last full week at pre-school and it is so sad to say goodbye to all our friends that are moving on to primary school in September. We wish them all the best and look forward to seeing them when we visit the school for a trip in the Autumn with our new school starter group!

Our week has been a bit wet, we have made it outside as much as we could and managed the Thursday Forest School parents session which was lovely until the rain came but Friday’s session was a washout so we are so sorry to the parents that missed out on spending that time with their children in our garden – you were probably relieved a little when you saw the rain start on the dot at 9am!

We have enjoyed sensory play this week, with lots of the children feeling quite overwhelmed with school visits it has been a lovely activity for calming and settling. Circle time has been full of fun – lots of dancing and singing and games and competitions and letting the children choose what they would like to do.

Our stars know whether they will be a sun or moon in the Autumn and have had a little mini progress update which we hope you have enjoyed reading with some ideas for learning at home over the holidays.

Our graduation celebrations took place on Thursday outside and inside on Friday – a really lovely time to reflect on a great year here at pre-school and wish our friends good luck with a song and a gift from us. We hope you have all enjoyed your time with us and we look forward to welcoming new friends next year and welcoming back our Stars. Happy holidays to you all – if you need any support over the holidays at all please email amelia@cullomptonpreschool.org and I will check emails weekly and please have a look at the link below if you have school aged children that may benefit from some time at a free club in the holidays – there are clubs running at the leisure centre which are free so have a look and check if you are eligible.

Information for parents and carers – Education and Families (devon.gov.uk)