Festive fun during December at LSH

Firstly, congratulations to Loretta who was our December Employee of the Month. Loretta won the award for making sure that she checked in on her colleagues, cheered them up if they were feeling a little low and supported her team when the Rom Co-ordinator was off on holiday. Thank you, and well done!

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Olivia gained her Level 3 Qualification in style passing her End Point Assessment with a distinction grade. Olivia worked hard to achieve this and we’re all very proud of her. Well done Liv!

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On Friday 15th December, we held our Pre-School Christmas Concert at St. Chad’s Church. The children did a fantastic job singing Christmas Carols, using props that they had made, and Makaton that they had spent time learning. Afterwards, they were rewarded with a lovely treat hot chocolate station – yum!

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Toddlers held a Christmas workshop in December that parents, children, and staff all thoroughly enjoyed. We had a range of different activities; children enjoyed creating their own baubles for their Christmas trees at home, decorating their own biscuits (which most of them ate before the icing had set!), making some reindeer food to sprinkle outside on Christmas Eve, and even making reindeer hats and paper plate wreaths to take home.

It was Christmas Party Day in December too, and we had lots of fun playing Pass the Parcel with our friends. We did some dancing and played musical chairs. We didn’t have a ‘normal’ nursery lunch on this day, instead we enjoyed lots of yummy party food! Once we were ready to go home, we got a special present to take home and put under our tree.

 

On Monday 18th December, our Baby Room enjoyed having their very own Elf Day where the staff and babies all dressed up in their elf clothing and had lots of fun taking part in different elf activities.

 

All the children enjoyed a Christmas lunch cooked by the lovely Abi in the kitchen. The children enjoyed eating their lunch while listening to Christmas songs, and having different conversations about what we would like Santa to bring us for Christmas.

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We also held our termly staff training sessions. We spent time refreshing our knowledge on the Characteristics of Effective Teaching and Learning, before spending time on Loose Parts. As always, a great opportunity for quality practice sharing and bonding across the branches.

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We loved wearing our Christmas jumpers for Christmas Jumper Day, supporting the charity Save the Children. We designed our own Christmas jumpers on paper and decorated them with different creative resources.

We enjoyed our session of Superstar Sports, where we played different games with the balls. One of these games was rugby, where we balanced the rugby ball and kicked the ball so we could see if it was different from kicking a football. We then played a game of What Time Is It Mr Wolf? to end the session.

That’s the end of our December, and the end of 2023! We can’t wait to see what 2024 brings for us!

December at Oak Valley!

We started off December cheering on England in the World Cup! We used the children’s interest in this to learn about the countries taking part in the tournament & the different cultures. The children enjoyed designing their own football shirts, making flags & even made their own role play football pitch where they predicted the score!

The Baby & Toddler rooms have been particularly exploring the sensory trays this month. They have enjoyed using shaving foam, cereals, flour & ice to investigate.

We then began our festive activities, stating with our Christmas Jumper Day! We enjoyed wearing our favourite Christmas outfits & taking part of lots of themed activities! We also had a yummy Christmas dinner & pulled crackers with our friends!

Every year, Hallam FM run the ‘Mission: Christmas’ campaign as part of their Cash for Kids charity. Mission: Christmas accepts donations of cash & toys from members of the public so that they can support hundreds of organisations & the children they help. This year we decided to get involved. Instead of doing ‘secret Santa’, the staff decided to buy gifts for the cause instead. With parent donations & bake sales, we really managed to make a difference this Christmas! Well done & thank you to all involved!

Sparkles the Elf returned to Oak Valley this year to see the children! He got into quite a bit of mischief & the children had to remind him of our golden rules! Sparkles then copied the children’s good behaviour & earnt himself lots of stickers. Well done for learning Sparkles!!

Pre-School enjoyed inviting their parents & grandparents into nursery to watch them in their Christmas concert! After enjoying mince pies & the children’s singing, we then took part in a Christmas-themed workshop! We made melted snowman biscuits, wrote letters to Father Christmas & made snowflake decorations. Thank you to everyone who came to support us!

We finished off our Christmas celebrations with our annual party! We danced, played games & had a party lunch with our friends! We enjoyed lots of craft activities & even recieved a special present from Father Christmas! What a fun year we have had. We can’t wait to see what 2023 brings!

November at Oak Valley

We started a busy month off at Oak Valley celebrating Bonfire night. The children were excited to make firework pictures, explore different colours and design their own rockets! The children then made their rockets using junk modelling equipment and flew them outside. Using the children’s interests Pre-school investigated colour further by enjoying lots of messy play in the cornflour and chalk while Baby room made hand and footprint pictures in the paint.

Messy play
Messy play
Poppy pictures

We raised a fantastic £90 for Children in Need by coming into nursery in fancy dress/pjs! The children took part in lots of fun activities such as making Pudsey bear hats and baking buns. We also had a bear hunt in the garden where we managed to find 10 different bears that were hiding from us! We also paid our respects on Remembrance day by making poppy pictures and having a 2 minutes silence.

Bear hunt

Road safety awareness week also took place this month. We made road signs and practiced how to cross the roads safely. Pre-school & Rising 3’s particularly enjoyed role playing scenarios with the cars and bikes outside taking it in turns to drive the cars and hold the signs. Toddler room read road safety stories and were excited to explore the ‘Ready, Steady, go’ tray while Baby unit got messy painting in traffic light colours.

Road safety Awareness week
Road Safety

As November drew to a close, the children wrote their letters to Father Christmas and made him lots of lovely pictures. We went on a walk to post the letters and make sure they safely arrive at the North pole.We are looking forward to lots of Christmas themed activities such as craft workshops, party days & festive baking. We also welcomed a little visitor to nursery,.I wonder what mischief he will cause in December…………………?

Buddy the Elf
Posting letters to the North Pole
Excited about bubble time!

September at The Little School House

It has been an exciting start to Autumn. September at The Little School House started with a visit from the ever popular Mini Movez; they come into the setting to engage our Toddler and Pre-School children in fun physical activities. These sessions consist of some themed activities; this time it was ‘Safari’ which saw the children involved in creating their own unique variations of different animal sounds and movements, followed by some excellent cheer-leading involving pom poms and lots of energy and enthusiasm!

 

Our loose theme of ‘Space’ has seen all our age groups participating in numerous activities surrounding the planets; Pre-School learned about the different names and their climates, as well as learning about different methods of space travel and constructing the planets for a display. The children thought it was out of this world!! While our budding astronauts were busy upstairs, the Babies and Toddlers also had fun creating their own unique space designs such as stars, galaxies and their own interpretation of the planets. These messy activities were another great way for our early learners to explore different sensory experiences and learn through play.

 

We also took the time to host a Princess and Pirates day charity event in aid of  Cracker Jack Children’s trust which was a great success. The children came in their fancy dress and really got into their characters. They enjoyed making props for their costumes and demonstrated some fantastic role play.

 

So what’s next for The Little School House? The children and staff are all looking forward to our Pre-School Autumn workshop & activities for Road Safety Week, as well as lots of upcoming festive activities including our Christmas Concert, Christmas Party, Christmas Jumper Day for Save the Children, and Baby Room Christmas workshop.