Talking Tables Training

In September, the nursery Pactitioners went on Speech and Language training. This was to seek further advice on speech and language activities that can be used in nursery to support children's language development.
Speech and Language is a crucial part of children's learning and it builds solid foundations for children to then learn in all other areas. It is the most important part of your child's learning development. There are many ways that you can support your child in being a good communicator. Playing with your child is a great way to model language for them. It doesn't matter what the game is. It can be playing with a ball, a board game, animals etc etc. Parents should talk about what they are doing and provide a running commentary for children, "my horse is thirsty, he needs a drink, I wonder what he would like?" This can be carried out with all general routine actvities, giving children a bath, cleaning their teeth, making their food, travelling to nursery. These are perfect times to talk to children about what the weather is like, what letters and numbers you can see in the environment, talk about crossing OVER the road, walking NEXT TO Mummy/Daddy, talk about exercise and how walking is good for them, the traffic lights, cars, people on bikes, the list of possible communication interests goes on and on. This is especially important if your child is not a confident talker or does not talk in clear, full sentences.
When children are not talking appropriately for their age group it has an inpact on all areas of their learning development.

Here is an example of speaking goals in the seven areas of learning:

30-50 months, approx age 3-4 years 

Personal, Social and Emotional Development

Children should be aiming to keep their play with friends going, responding to what children are saying to them and offering other ideas and suggesstions. They should be able to inititate conversations with their friends and adults.
Children are aiming to talk confidently about their family and community and be able to ask for help.

Communication and Language Development

Children should be aiming to join in with songs and stories they are familiar with and follow directions.
Begin to understand and respond to 'why' and 'how' questions. Understand prepositions such as 'on top' 'behind' 'under'
Begining to use more complex sentences, questions why things happen and gives explanations.
Uses a range of tenses eg, play, playing, played

Physical Development

Children should be aiming to tell adults when they are hungry or tired and clearly communicte a need for the toilet.

Literacy Development

Children should be aiming to be aware of the way stories are structured, suggest how a story might end. Describe main story settings, events and principle characters.
Talk about marks they see in the environment, asking what symbols, signs, notices etc might mean or say.

Mathematics

Children should be aiming at reciting numbers in order to 10. Using positional language. Talks about the similarities of shapes in the environment eg "that wheel is a circle"
Begining to talk about the shape of every day objects 'round' 'tall' etc

Understanding the World

Children should be aiming to talk about significant events and describe special tims or eents for family or friends.
Comment and ask questions about aspects of the place they live or the natural world. Talk about the things they have observed such as plants, animals etc.

Expressive Arts and Design

Children should be aiming to describe the texture of things. Sing a few familiar songs.
Build stories around toys. Sings to self and makes up simple songs. Engage in imaginative role play based on first hand experiences.

A messge from the Queen

When the Queen celebrated her 90th Birthday, St Marys @ The Park celebrated too. We dressed as Prince and Princesses and had a tea party and party games. The pre-school children also made the Queen a card and we posted it off to the Palace. This week we received a letter of thanks.

You said, we did ..........................................................

Riley said he really enjoys and is showing great interest in Crown Green Bowling.

We werent allowed to use the bowling green in the Park but we improvised and took the children out to play Crown Green Bowling, St Marys @ The Park style

If your child has a strong interest in anything in particular, please share this with your childs key worker and we will try our best to explore it with them at nursery too.

Dough Disco

Believe it or not, teaching your child to write letters and follow dotted lines is not the way to make them successful writers. Before children aquire these skills they must first ensure that their bodies are strong enough to hold their pencil and begin to control it. To prepare young children for writing it is important to strengthen the muscles in their hands and fingers. Children always learn better through fun and interesting activities. St Marys @ The Park has launched Dough Disco. This is carried out a couple of times through the week as just one of the ways we can strengthen and develop children's muscles ready for them to begin their journey into writing. Dough Disco involves, encouraging children to manipulate dough while listening to upbeat songs. Children are encouraged, while practitioners model, rolling the dough, squeezing it, poking it, flattening it etc. manipulating the dough and giving the muscles a good work out. Playdough is a wonderful resource and can be used in a variety of ways to teach children many educaional benefits. It is not just something to be feared as it sticks to the carpet. Here are some of the children getting involved in Dough Disco at nursery. We carried out our first Dough Disco to Pharrell Williams - Happy.

Making Playdough

Today some of the children have made their own playdough. Allowing children to carry out activities such as this allows them to build their confidence, problem solve and explore using their different senses. These children used the ingrediants on the table, they made predicitions of what the ingrediants might be. They used their hands and their noses to explore the different scents and textures. They used tools to help them achieve their personal goals. They supported one another and worked as a team. They sometimes followed direction if required and they built up their hand and finger muscles, squeezing and manipulating the mixture to make it into dough. The children talked about, the look of it, the smell of it, how it felt on their hands and used descriptive language.

Family Photos

Don't forget to bring in your family photo for our display on families as we continue with our all about me topic. If it is easier, photos can be emailed to Amanda
a.halstead@stmarysblackburn.ac.uk and she will print them out for display, thank you.

MacMillan 'Come and Eat Cake' Session

We would like to say a huge thank you to all our parents who supported our fundraising for MacMillan Cancer Support. We have a lot of wonderful donations of cake given including some extra tasty homemade cakes. We hope you all enjoyed your tasty treats and shared them with your families at home. The money raised will be counted this week and we will inform you of our total. Thank you again so much for your support.