Our Nursery 2024 - 2025

Welcome to Tanworth-in-Arden Nursery

For information, bookings and viewings, please call:

Tel School Office: 01564 742284

E-mail: tanworthnursery@welearn365.com

We are Ofsted rated to provide care for 38 children within our dedicated nursery facilities.

We'd be delighted to show you around our facilities and introduce you to a fantastic environment for your child's early years.

If you are interested in a place at our nursery please contact the nursery office on 01564 742284 to make an appointment.

Our Nursery Staff

EYFS Lead

Amy Blatchly

Nursery Managers

Jade Wheildon 

Deputy Manager

Louise Stephens

Nursery Assistants

Gayle Paterson

Abigail Ashmore

Dawn Eade

For 'Nursery News' please visit our new class page. Select the tab 'Children' at the top of the home page, select 'Class pages' and then select 'Nursery'. You will now find all our recent updates, exciting news and photographs uploaded regularly on there. 

Nursery News (Week beginning 10th July)

This week following on from thinking about the sea and sea creatures the children took us in the direction of thinking about mermaids and mermen. Our story of the week was 'There's no such thing as mermaids' by Lucy Rowland, it told a tale of a little sister proving to her big sister that there are such things as mermaids. The children thoroughly enjoyed joining in with the story and spotting the mermaid hiding on each page (they were quicker than me to find her each time!). Throughout the week the children have enjoyed creating their own mer people using small world characters, play dough and the all important gems, they have made sea foam using whisks, they have made clam shell biscuits including rolling their own pearl and they have created egg box treasure chests. Also using the kind donations of recycling the children created loo roll mer people. On Tuesday the 'Little Dots' van could be seen very early outside the church setting up for our special end of year treat. The children arrived so excited, going over to the church allowed them to feel like we were on a real school trip. They played and explored beautifully at the session showing exemplary behaviour which wowed the Little Dots staff. Back at Nursery we had a wonderful discussion about each of the children's favourite parts of the morning.   

Nursery life (Week beginning 3rd July) 

This week as we have discovered all about the ocean the children enjoyed our story of the week ‘Dolphinella’ this lead them to taking all about their own dreams that they have at night time. We enjoyed spending time watch sea creatures using our big screen, seeing them move through the sea. Our particular favourites were the giant sea turtle, the giant octopus and the jelly fish. Thought the week the children enjoyed partaking in a range of ocean activities, including creating their own octopus, seaweed painting and painting their favourite sea creatures. During PE we went on an under water adventure as the children moved around the apparatus. 

Nursery life (Week beginning 26th June) 

This week we have enjoyed thinking about holidays supported by our hilarious story of the week ‘You can’t take an elephant on holiday’ by Patricia Cleveland-Peck. We have enjoyed lots of exciting activities including making our own edible beaches, crushing chosen cereal to make sand and dying yoghurt to make the sea. The children also enjoyed a very special treat when they made their own real ice cream cones adding toppings of their choice. Over at Forest School the children made Forest School wands, adding special treasures found around the site. The children then used them as magic wands, one even turned me into a frog! This week the pre school children have continued with their play sessions in Reception class, the teachers commented on how well the sessions had gone and how impressed they were with the behaviour of our children. 

Nursery life (Week beginning 19th June) 

This week we focused on summer! Talking about the season and all the things we enjoy during the summer. The children enjoyed making ice creams from shaving foam in the tough tray. Going on adventures as we talked about the different ways in which we can travel when we go on holiday. However most importantly this week we loved preparing for sports day, it gave us lots of opportunity to spend time down on the field. On Friday we were thrilled to see so many Nursery children join us for sports day. The children were all absolute superstars in their races making us all very proud. 

Nursery life (Week beginning 12th June)

This week we have been celebrating Father's Day, making cards, painting portraits and generally talking about our Daddy's. Our story of the week is 'My Dad' by Susan Quinn this discusses all the reasons why the main characters Dad is really great. This has prompted lots of lovely discussions in group about why our own Daddy's are so special to us. Alongside our Father's Day focus we also thought about healthy eating this week. Fruit and vegetable printing, making our own healthy ice lollies and fruit kebabs and painting some beautiful fruit portraits. 

Nursery life (Week beginning 5th June) 

It was wonderful to welcome back the children from half term this week. We loved to hear of all the adventures they had over the previous week. The conversations about trips to the park and beach lead us beautifully into talking about the summer. We have talked about how the weather is changing becoming hotter and the sun is shining more. The weather was on our side as we had these discussions, we talked a lot about wearing our hats and putting sun cream on to protect our skin. We enjoyed taking part in lots of sunny craft activities. 

Nursery life (Week beginning 22nd May) 

This week our week has been a combination of fun with fire engines and maps! On Monday we were so excited to welcome a visit from some fire fighters who arrived in their fire engine. The Nursery children had the opportunity to look around the engine, ask questions, spray the hose, feel the fan, try on a real helmet and sit in the engine. Later in the week we used the book ‘What the ladybird heard’ by Julia Donaldson to support our learning. The children loved the map in the story and we used this as an opportunity to go on an adventure around the school following a map to find the ladybird from the story. The children have also loved creating their own spontaneous maps and creating their own maps of forest school.  

Nursery life (Week beginning 15th May) 

This week we have been thinking about our emotions, how we feel at different times and enjoying lots of mindful activities to support our mental health. Our story of the week has been ‘My many coloured days’ by Dr Seuss. This story has helped the children to understand their emotions through colour and we have spent lots of group time discussing which colour we are feeling and why each day. Over at Forest School the children used their senses to really focus and explore the environment sense by sense. On Wednesday afternoon we had a lovely visit from Louise the Warwickshire road safety officer, she and Warwick the bear taught us how to safely cross the road by holding hands. They children were lucky enough to get to take home their own little Warwick Bear and copy of the accompanying story. 

Nursery life (Week beginning 9th May) 

This week we have been celebrating our families and the differences in different families. So support our understanding our story of the week has been ‘My friends and me’ by Stephanie Stansbie. We have loved looking through the family photographs everyone sent in, the children have thoroughly enjoyed using them to draw their own portraits of their families. Over at Forest School we managed to dodge the rain and had a wonderful morning mixing powder paints and experimenting with creating some large scale art. We will continue to have a fun week painting our houses, talking about our families and enjoying plenty of sensory activities in the tough tray. 

Nursery life (Week beginning 1st May) 

This week felt very strange coming back on a Tuesday. We hope everyone thoroughly enjoyed the first bank holiday Monday of the month. Our week is consumed by preparing for and celebrating the Kings coronation. Our story of the week had been ‘The Kings pants’, this is a hilarious story about all the different pants owned by the King. Due to this choice in story, that is why you received a very strange request for the children to bring an old pair of pants into Nursery. On Wednesday afternoon the children along with Mrs Gidley thoroughly enjoyed designing their own pants out in the sunshine, followed by posing for some photographs in their new designs. We are looking forward to joining the whole school celebrations on Friday over on the field. Please feel free to join everyone on the field from 12pm even if Friday is not your usual Nursery day.  

Nursery life (Week beginning 24th April)

This week we celebrated St George’s day, to support us with this our story of the week was ‘George and the dragon’ by Chris Wormell. This story taught us all about a mighty dragon who was scared of tiny mice, the children found this hilarious and loved to read the dragons facial expression on each page. 
Throughout the week we looked at our England flag, recreating this through collage, in biscuit form and over at Forest School we mixed our own paint so we could do some large scale painting of the red cross. We also created our own shields, completed knight training during our PE session and enjoyed building many castles throughout the week. 
Also this week we have some special visitors when two baby lambs came to visit. We joined Reception class in their classroom to enjoy watching the lambs and asking Mrs Dicken all about how she takes care of them back at her farm. 
 

Nursery life (Week beginning 17th April) 

This week It has been wonderful to welcome back the children from the Easter break. We have thoroughly enjoyed hearing all about their adventures while they were away from Nursery. The adventures have included beach trips, ice cream, caravan stays, park visits and lots and LOTS of chocolate eggs! 
This week we are thinking about the Muslim celebration of Eid. Our story of the week has been ‘The most exciting Eid’ by Zeba Talkhani. This story has taught us so much about the traditions, celebrations and values behind Eid. The Nursery children have enjoyed exploring activities within Nursery to support our learning of Eid. 

Science week (Week beginning 13th March)

This week in Nursery we joined whole school science week, jumping into the biscuit dunking investigation. We based our week around the story of ‘The Gingerbread man’, the children have loved joining in with telling the story adding “Run, run as fast as you can, you can’t catch me I’m a gingerbread man.” as a whole group. Throughout the week the children have enjoyed dunking biscuits, tasting biscuits, taking part in a happy smells investigation and making their own gingerbread men. They have thoroughly enjoyed using ginger incorporated throughout their play including ginger play dough and using ginger in the mud kitchen cooking over at Forest School. 

Nursery life (Week beginning 6th March) 

We began the week by celebrating colour and rainbows as our story of the week was ‘The rainbow fish’ by Markus Pfister. Children enjoyed making their own sparkly fish scales, making rainbows from play dough, experimenting with colour mixing and colour matching. Over at Forest School children enjoyed blowing bubbles, carefully looking at the coloured rainbows created inside the bubbles. However our colourful week was interrupted by a big flurry of snow making Nursery very difficult to get to. We hope you managed to enjoy some snow fun at home, we look forward to hearing all about it from the children next week. Fingers crossed this week for the return of the spring time weather. 

Nursery life (Week beginning 27th February) 

This week we welcomed back the children from half term and enjoyed hearing all about their adventures during their week at home. Our focus this week has been ‘Save our planet’ and our story of the week has been ‘Somebody swallowed Stanley’ by Sarah Roberts. This is a lovely story teaching us the importance of looking after our seas and therefore it’s creatures. It also touches on up cycling our rubbish to create something new. The children took to this idea with great enthusiasm, spending much of the week junk modelling and up cycling mountains of recycling. The children also showed us their brilliant understanding of recycling and how and why we do it during a sorting game. 
Forest School this week fell on St David’s day, we took some leeks over to the mud kitchen to use in creating some muddy kitchen leek soup. The children made many wonderful creations and included these in their play. We had an exciting surprise while over investigating Forest School, we discovered new frogs spawn in the ponds. Miss Ashmore kindly collected us a little into the fish tank for us to take back to Nursery to watch it change and develop. 

Nursery news (Week beginning 13th February) 

After a lovely week last week talking out our feelings and engaging with ‘Children’s mental health week’, we developed this into thinking about love this week. Thinking about who we love in our lives, why these people are so important to us. The children have loved talking about their families, extended families, friends and even pets. We have enjoyed lots of lovely sensory play including making potions, moulding play dough and decorating biscuits. On Tuesday we also enjoy making our own biscuits to take home to our families, in addition to this at snack time we enjoyed a special heart shaped snack. 
Finally we would like to thank all of our families for their support over this last half term and wish you all a lovely restful week ahead. See everyone from the week beginning Monday 27th February. 

Nursery news (Week beginning 6th February) 

This week we have focused on ‘Children’s mental health week’, thinking about our feelings and doing mindful activities which make us feel calm and happy. Our story of the week has been ‘Ruby’s worry’ by Tom Percival, the children really engaged with this story and could see how Ruby was feeling throughout. They could quickly tell me that the best way to get a worry to go away is to talk about it. Throughout the week we enjoyed many mindful activities, water play, play dough squishing, yoga, baking and painting. Over at Forest School we enjoyed blowing bubbles and rolling down the sides of the dragon. Children also had the opportunity to paint a self portrait, expressing their feel into a mirror before painting. 

Nursery news (Week beginning 30th January)

This week has been ‘National story telling’ week, in Nursery we decided to focus on traditional tales. We find the children engage in traditional tales particularly well and can be seen retelling the story the story independently throughout the Nursery within their play. This week we took a snapshot look at a different story each day, giving the children the opportunity to be immersed into a whole new experience each day. We also took part in a wide range of activities throughout the week to support the different stories, painting, creating, building cutting and moulding. During our Forest School session children searched for natural items ordering them into small, medium and large to represent the three billy goats. On Thursday during the PE session children used the apparatus to navigate their way to Grandma’s house through the hall. 

Nursery life (Week beginning 23rd January)

This week we have had great fun celebrating Chinese New Year with the children. They have loved gaining an understanding of how the new year is celebrated in China. They remembered that the lucky colour was red and we found out that this year is the year of the rabbit. Throughout the week we shared some new experiences together including tasting some of the Chinese food and taking part in the dragon dance during our PE session in the hall. The children have also enjoyed sensory play in rice and noodles. Practiced doing some Chinese writing and made lots of decorations to decorate the Nursery for the celebration. 

Nursery life (Week beginning 16th January) 

This week we continued with our Winter theme and the weather was definitely on our side. After reading our story of the week ‘Jack Frost’ by Sharon Peters the children couldn’t wait to get their hats, coats and gloves on and get outside to see if Jack Frost himself had paid us a visit. They were thrilled to find frozen leaves, frosty ground and plenty of ice in the mud kitchen. In the story Jack Frost leaves frozen marks on the window of the little boys house, we used the easel and and some shaving foam to have a go at creating the same effect. The children were also thrilled to experience ice inside the tough tray as they tried to free some of the arctic animals. The icy fun continued all week, including a very frosty Forest School. 

Nursery life (Week beginning 9th December)

We have welcomed in the new year at Nursery, with the new year we have also welcomed 6 new Nursery children. These children have begun to settle in amazingly well and have been enjoying exploring the nursery environment. 
Our focus this week has been winter and our story of the week has been the much loved ‘Gruffalo’s child’. The children were delighted to see this book and enjoyed joining in as we read the story together throughout the week. The children have enjoyed painting characters from the story, exploring ice and how it melts, making paper snowflakes and snowflake biscuits. Thank you for all the kind donations of plastic bottles, the children have loved creating their own penguins with Miss Stephens. We will continue in our Winter theme next week. 

Nursery life (Week beginning 12th December) 

we had a wonderful final week of the Autumn term. We celebrated Christmas with a Christmas dinner, party and plenty of Christmas activities. We would like to wish all of our families a Merry Christmas and a very happy new year. All the Nursery staff would also like to take this opportunity to say a huge thank you for all the cards, gifts and kind messages that we received for Christmas. See you all in the new year ready to welcome some new little faces in Nursery. We will return to Nursery on Wednesday 4th January 2023. 

Nursery life (Week beginning 5th December) 

Such a fun packed Christmas week this week. It all began on Monday when Mrs Bamford called us to say a very special visitor would be popping into Nursery. It was magical to see the children’s faces when Father Christmas came through Nursery. Some of the Pre school children also had the opportunity to watch the Reception class nativity, Miss Stephens was so impressed with their behaviour in the hall when watching. Fun continued on Monday when we received our second visitor, Eleanor’s Mummy who came to teach us all about Christmas in Germany. The week continued in this way as we received our welly full of treats from St Nicholas, left at Eleanor’s house for us. On Wednesday we hosted festive Forest School. We were lucky enough for Mrs Ashmore to return for the session and set up a camp fire for us. We were overwhelmed by how many families came to support this session, it made it incredibly special for all the children. Further into the week ‘Little ones’ came to Nursery and hosted a Christmas session, it was wonderful to hear the children singing along with Mr Lindsey and Mary. Overall it has been an incredibly magical week at Nursery, the staff and children alike have loved every moment. 

Nursery life (Week beginning 28th November) 

This week we have thinking all about the ‘World cup’ which is being played at the moment. We have enjoyed plenty of time outside, using our large gross motor skills when practicing kicking the footballs. We enjoyed taking the footballs over to Forest School, but what really sparked the children’s interest was was practicing scoring goals in the football nets down on the field just like the big children do. We also enjoyed some small world football in the tough tray, it was lovely to see children working together as little teams. Our story of the week was ‘Spinderella’ by Julia Donaldson. Not only did this introduce us to the idea of playing football, but encourages lots of counting throughout the story. Just like the children in the story, we practiced counting to 20 as a group. 

Nursery life (Week beginning 21st November) 

This week we have had a lovely mixed week. We spent the beginning of the week focusing on our last couple of Nursery rhymes after our enjoyment of ‘World Nursery Rhyme week’, followed by the end of the week thinking about the important topic of road safety following the whole school focus. Our Nursery rhymes at the beginning of the week were ‘We went to the animal fair’ and ‘Miss Polly had a dolly’, these are two of the children’s all time favourites rhymes. They enjoyed making animal masks, caring for the dollies and becoming doctors and nurses. We didn’t go to Forest School on Wednesday due to the heavy rain, but this didn’t stop us jumping straight into our road safety topic. We set up roads with traffic lights, created a zebra crossing for children to practice crossing the road and even made our own set of traffic lights. There were so many lovely conversations about how to safely cross the road, and how children cross the road safely out and about with their families. 

Nursery Life (Week beginning 14th November) 

This week Nursery has been celebrating 'World Nursery Rhyme Week', each day we focused on a different Nursery Rhyme. Our adult led activities related to the daily rhyme as did the sensory play and child initiated tasks. On Monday we sand '1,2,3,4,5 once I caught a fish alive', they children had the opportunity to make fish shaped biscuits. On Tuesday we sang 'Twinkle twinkle', the children had the chance to make a star prop to use during our singing. On Wednesday we sang '5 Little speckled frog' and we went over to Forest School to look for frogs. On Thursday we sang 'The big ship sails' and the children enjoyed engaging in some water play with the boats. Finally on Friday we enjoyed wearing our own clothes, supporting 'Children in need' and singing 'B I N G O', enjoying modelling dogs from play dough. We have had so much fun with Nursery Rhymes this week we have decided to continue it into part of next week, allowing us to explore even more rhymes.  

Nursery life (Week beginning 7th January)

This week in Nursery we joined the school in a focus on remembrance before our traditional remembrance service on the green on Friday. Our story of the week was ‘Detective Dog’ by Julia Donaldson, this allowed us to think about caring for people and animals and also showing compassion for someone when they really need it. 
During the week we discussed the poppy and the significance of it as it helps us to remember people who have helped us. Some children brought money in over the past two weeks and enjoyed a trip into school to select and purchase their own poppy. Within nursery we used the poppy as inspiration to inspire lots of our activities, painting, crafting, collaging, water play, shape and number work, the list goes on. It was lovely to see some of our Nursery children over on the green for the service on Friday, we couldn’t be more proud of them as they stood sensibly and paid their respects with the rest of the school. 

Nursery life (Week beginning 31.10.22)

It has been wonderful to welcome back the children this week after half term. As always it has been lovely to hear all about what they have been up to, the adventures this time ranged from visiting princesses to going to the chocolate factory, hosting dressing up parties and everything else in between. As bonfire night approaches us at the weekend our focus this week has been fireworks and rockets. Our story of the week was 'Poppy cat's sparkly night' by Lara Jones. The children have loved creating firework art, building 2D and 3D shape rockets and mark making in the glitter. Our week has been particularly glitter filled this week, we took glitter over to Forest School on Wednesday to introduce into the mud kitchen. The children enjoyed creating a range or sparkly recipes. 

Nursery Life (Week beginning 17th October)

This week we explored a very well loved story 'The smartest giant in town' by Julia Donaldson. It was wonderful to see the children's face light up as many of them recognised this book from their collection at home, they eagerly told me about their copies at home and who read this story with them. Throughout the week the children became more and more confident with the text, eventually joining in with the repeated phrases. We used this story as an opportunity to investigate and talk about size, measuring things against each other and using some wonderful early mathematical language. The children also designed a tie for the giant and some children even took the opportunity to paint their own version of the giant onto giant paper. A very special shout out to Eleanor this week who painted the most wonderful 'scruffy giant'.

Nursery life (Week beginning 10th October) 

This week as we continued in the theme of Autumn, our story of the week was ‘The leaf thief’ by Alice Hemming. This story taught us what happens to the leaves in autumn and why, the children loved to hear how the squirrel was tricked by the weather into thinking there was a leaf thief. This week we went on colour hunts for the autumn colours in our beautiful school grounds. We built ramps and tunnels to roll conkers. Thank you to all those families who donated us some autumn treasure from their weekend walks. We used these in many ways, including creating abstract pictures using the loose parts and printing the different shapes and textures into the play dough.  

Nursery life (Week beginning 3rd October) 

This week we embraced the new season of Autumn, this lead our learning to exploring conkers, acorns, leaves and everything else that autumn brings. We also had the school photographer in this week, taking individual and sibling photos. Considering we are only a few weeks into the new year I was so impressed with how patient the children were as they waited for their turn in front of the photographer. Our story of the week was ‘Don’t wake the bear’ by Jill Newton, here the children learned why it is so important that we have Autumn and the animals prepare to sleep. Without this quiet time in nature nothing would have time to regrow and regenerate ready for the spring. We used some of our autumn treasure in our play, particularly in the mud kitchen and using some of the construction equipment to create a rolling activity. We also used the leaves we had collected on our welly walk to print beautiful leaf prints onto our windows. Next week we look forward to another week of autumn fun! 

Nursery life (week beginning 26th September) 

This week we have continued to discover all about ourselves, this includes us, our families and our homes. They children have enjoyed a wide range of activities including drawing ourselves and our families, taking part in a pen disco and building our homes in the construction area. We have also enjoyed plenty of sensory play involving conkers, cereal and even cutting some spaghetti hair. On Wednesday we went for our welly walk, we were amazed to see how many conkers had dropped from the tree since last week. The children excitedly collected them up, managing to fill the bottom of our large Forest School trolley. It has been wonderful this week to hear the children talking about their homes and their families. Thank you to those of you who have sent in pictures of your child with their home, these have ignited lots of conversation and contributed towards a lovely display in out curiosity home corner. 

Welcome back to Nursery. 
 

Over the last two weeks we have enjoyed welcoming back our existing children and also welcoming some of our new members for the first time. It was wonderful to reconnect with our existing children in the first week, discussing their holidays, adventures and how much each of them had grown while they had been away from Nursery. They enjoyed coming in and exploring the environment and getting themselves settled back in. Last we we then began to welcome our newest Tanworth-In-Arden Nursery members, it was lovely to see some new faces and get to know some new little personalities. Parents got the opportunity to pop in and see the setting during the settling in period and it was very reassuring to get some lovely feedback from them. Our new children had fun exploring, making connections and even trying out the lunch hall for some lunch. Myself and the staff look forward to a wonderful year ahead as we see all of the children form new friendships, grow and develop. Next week we will be focusing on ‘All about me’ this will give children a further opportunity to teach us about themselves. 

Nursery news (Week beginning 11th July) 

Little Dots Play village came to visit...
 

On Tuesday Nursery had the pleasure of 'Little Dots play village' coming to visit and set up in the school hall. It was wonderful to see the surprise and joy on the children's faces as we entered the hall to see if transformed into a play village. The staff and children thoroughly enjoyed the morning emersed in role play, dressing up and going on imaginative adventures. Aime the play leader commented multiple times on how impressed she was with our children's behaviour, manners and how grown up they were. Well done children, a very well deserved end of year treat.  

Nursery life (Week beginning 27th June) 

This week has been another wonderful week in Nursery. As the summer holidays approach we have begun talking about holidays, the beach and ways of travelling. Children have loved telling us all about their holiday experiences with family and friends. It was amazing to see some of the detailed drawings done by our preschool children and the in depth discussions which had taken place during these drawings recorded by staff. Painting a beach scene with sand was a big hit and the children loved to investigate the sandy paint.
On Tuesday we embarked upon our sponsored ‘Big fancy dress walk’, the children were amazing and all completed the challenge with huge smiles on their faces. We walked the whole of the school grounds including both fields, playgrounds and a walk through the length of school. The children looked amazing in their outfits, as did the adults. We can’t thank family and friends who sponsored the children enough, we look forward to letting you know what we purchase for the Nursery with the money. 
Finally a big well done to the pre school children who have completed their final play and stay sessions in Reception class this week, they have all loved their time in there and have come back full of excitement. They are now throughly looking forward to moving up in September. 

Nursery life (Week beginning 20th June) 

This week has been a fun packed sporty week. We have spent lots of time down on the field getting to know our three races, learning to cheer out friends and most importantly trying to stay in our lanes! The children have loved being on the field enjoying a running race, obstacle course and most importantly the teddy bear race. It was wonderful to see all the children cheering on their friends and clapping for each other’s successes. Inside Nursery children have been making medals, having their own small world races and engaging in lots of water play due to the hot weather. 

This week the pre school children began their play and stay session in Reception class, Mrs Blatchley was so impressed by how happy and confident the children were to be in Reception class. They came backs even happier with their all important ‘smelly stickers’!

Finally on Friday our school sports day took place, we were so proud of the Nursery children who did an amazing job of taking part in the races. It was lovely to see so many non Friday children join Us for the races too. Also a big thank you to those who came to support us on our ‘hook a duck’ stall. 

Nursery life (Week beginning 13th June)

This week we have begun preparing for Father's Day. The children have been busy creating their cards and telling us all about why their Daddy is special to them. Our story of the week was 'Don't wake Dad' by Eden Wells, the bear cubs threw a party for their dad to show him how much he meant to them. The children enjoyed comparing their own Daddy to the Daddy bear in the story. Our wonderful artists also created some wonderful portraits for their Dads using both the paints and the colouring pencils. Towards the end of the week the children came to school in their pyjamas, we would like to say a huge thank you for all the tombola and hamper donations. Wishing you all a wonderful weekend celebrating Father's Day. 

Nursery life (Week beginning 6th June) 

It was great to welcome back the children back from half term on Tuesday. Lovely hearing all about what they got up to last week and the the Jubilee celebrations that they enjoyed. This week we have been thinking all about the season on summer. Our story of the week was ‘Sam grows a sunflower’ by Kate Petty. The children engaged so well with this book, quickly being able to tell me how to grow a sunflower. They were also able to tell me what happens to the sunflower when it dies, beginning to understand the life cycle of the sunflower. Naturally the children were excited to plant their own sunflower seeds this week and we eagerly anticipate seeing some growth happening in our pots. Once we have seen some growth happening, the children will bring home their sunflower to continue to grow at home. This week we also enjoyed using compost in the tough tray to engage in imaginative planting. We have painted sunflowers and made them from play dough, plus much more free imaginative and investigative play. 

Nursery life (Week beginning 23rd May) 

This week was all about celebrating the Queen and the forthcoming diamond jubilee. Our story of the week was ‘The Queen’s knickers’ by Nicholas Allan. The children had a wonderful time designing their own knickers, painting portraits of the Queen and engaging in lots of red, white and blue sensory play. We even had some knickers in the role play area which the children enjoyed trying on over their clothes, we even had some knickers big enough for the grown ups to try on over their clothes. We changed our interest table this week in keeping with our jubilee celebrations, this meant finally saying goodbye to our tadpoles as they returned to Forest School before half term. Finally on Friday we joined the school to celebrate in style with our Jubilee picnic. It was wonderful to see so many families joining us on the field. The Nursery children and staff looked fabulous dressed as royalty for the occasion. Wishing everyone a brilliant half term break, including some further wonderful Jubilee celebrations. 

Nursery life (Week beginning 16th May) 

This week as we continued on our under the sea journey, our story of the week was ‘Commotion in the ocean’ by Giles Andreae. We used this story to help us to discover a wide variety of sea creatures. Thinking about what they look like and what they do when they are under the sea. The story also aided us in thinking about rhyme, words which rhyme with each other and playing a rhyming game. On Tuesday it was class photo day, the children stood/sat so smartly and sensibly when it was our turn. Luckily we had ours taken first before all the messy play began. During the week the children also took party in some under the sea yoga, made jelly fish and discovered what happened after water was accidentally added to their playground chalk pictures. Wednesday night we were delighted to finally invite parents inside the Nursery to host our face to face parents meetings, it was a hive of activity around the nursery and a wonderful atmosphere as parents and key workers happily chatted together. Thank you to all those parents who could make it to the session. 

Nursery life (Week beginning 9th May) 

This week our sea theme lead us into the world of sharks. Our story of the week was the fabulous ‘Shark in the park’ by Nick Sharratt. The children engaged with this story so well, including actions and reading along with the adult. They also loved having the chance to research different species of shark, finding out how they look different to each other. The hammerhead was a particular favourite and this inspired lots of lovely paintings. Our busy week also involved a visit from Warwick the bear to talk to us about road safety. Louise who accompanied Warwick was so impressed with our children’s behaviour, manners and enthusiasm to be involved in the activities. The children even got to bring home their very own baby Warwick and mini story to teach their families at home the rules of crossing the road. We also had an extra special birthday in Nursery this week as Mrs Gidley turned 40. The children loved singing to her, making a fuss of her and presenting her with cards, presents and flowers. 

Nursery life (Week beginning 2nd May)

This week in Nursery we have continued on our pirate adventure. Our story of the week was ‘Pirates in the supermarket’ by Tim Kapman. Naturally we had to open our own pirate supermarket, the children loved to take turns serving and purchasing food in the supermarket. We also made shopping lists, pirate parrots, did pirate yoga and enjoyed lots of pirate sensory play. Forest school started as a rainy one this week, but this didn’t deter us. We went over and enjoyed exploring and discovering where all the rain had been captured to incorporate into our muddy cooking. Later in the week we put our cooking skills to use and made fruit pirate ships, it was

lovely to see some of the more unsure children taking the plunge and tasting the fruit. 

Nursery news (Week beginning 25th April) 

It was lovely to welcome everyone back from the Easter break, great to hear all about holidays, Easter egg hunts and all the other adventures that the children had been on. We have also welcomed some new children into Nursery this week, it was lovely to see our existing children taking them under their wing and showing them the nursery ropes. We have launched ourselves into a pirate theme this week, which was prompted by the children’s interests in maps and treasure last half term. Therefore this week we have been making pirates hats, walking the plank and digging for treasure. We even made pirate party sandwiches for ourselves to celebrate our story of the week ‘Captain Beastlie’s Pirate Party’, we were lucky enough to enjoy these outside picnic style in the sunshine. 

Nursery news (Week beginning 4th April) 

This week has been none stop Easter fun. We began the week with the story ‘We’re going on an egg hunt’ by Laura Hughes, the children loved joining in counting the eggs and discovering the naughty wolf. As the week went on we have embraced Easter crafts, cooking, sensory play and even some egg and spoon races during our weekly PE session. Over at Forest School we had a jam packed time with not only an Easter hunt, but hot cross buns for toasting on the camp fire. Thank you so much to Mrs Ashmore for making this possible. Finally we rounded up the week with the annual Tanworth-in-Arden Easter bonnet parade around the village, it was so nice to be back embracing this tradition with the full school and Nursery out in their Easter bonnets. I cannot tell you how proud I was of the Nursery children, they walked proudly round the village wearing their bonnets (little legs trying to keep up with the year 6’s) and they were not a bit phased by the supporters and family members. Well done what a brilliant way to end a fabulous term. Wishing everyone a wonderful Easter and we will see you on the week beginning Monday 24th. 

Nursery news (Week beginning 28th March) 

This week out focus has been the life cycle of a frog as we eagerly watch out little tadpoles grow and develop. Our supporting story was ‘Growing Frogs’ by Vivian French, this story really shows the children the journey that the frogs go on throughout their cycle of change. All told by a little girl just like them. They really engaged with this story, helping to tell it throughout the week, remembering what comes next in the life cycle of the frog. We have also enjoyed lots of sensory play this week, including exploring frozen peas, jelly and bubble painting.  Outside the children have been keen to spend time in the construction area, creating cars, beds and other large items to involve in their role play games. It is wonderful to see the, working together and sharing their imagination to create their desired effect. 

Nursery life (Week beginning 21st March) 

This week has been all about celebrating our wonderful Mummy’s. We have been busy using our creative skills to prepare some lovely surprises to take home ready for Mothering Sunday. On Tuesday we also made some ‘Mummy and me’ biscuits to take home to share with Mummy. I chuckled to see who would be getting the bigger ‘Mummy’ biscuits, it seemed the children were in favour of keeping those ones for themselves. Our story of the week showed us how busy our Mummy’s are being real superhero’s. ‘Superhero Mum’ by Timothy Knapman. The children loved to share at group time why their Mummy is a superhero. We have also throughly enjoyed the wonderful weather this week and the children have chosen to spend nearly all of their time outside. At times even insisting that we take register and eat our snack outside on the grass. Long may the beautiful weather continue. 

Nursery life (Week beginning 14th March)

This week we have been lead by the beautiful weather and all the natural changes happening outside, we have been celebrating spring. We began by reading the beautiful story ‘Spring’ by Jo Lindley. This taught us about how Winter passes the weather crown to Spring, and the friends work together to make the changes for the new season happen. We have made our own weather crowns and the children wore them to have an adventure out of the field where they had the opportunity to run in the breeze, roll down the hill and look for signs of spring. The children have also enjoyed exploring daffodils this week, taking the time to draw and paint them. The daffodils have been out on the tables all week in water for the children to access and it had been wonderful to see how the children have treated the, with so much care and respect. Also this week our frogspawn has hatched and we now have some lovely little tadpoles on our interest table, it is wonderful to see the children come in each day and check on how they are and their progress. Finally this week we have had ‘Crazy hair day’ it was brilliant to see the effort made, the children and staff looked great! 

Nursery news (Week beginning 7th March)

This week in Nursery we have had a brilliant science week. We began the week by introducing the children to our story of the week ‘Ada Twist scientist’ by Andrea Beaty. The children loved the idea of Ada becoming a scientist when she was three, just like them. They were excited to become scientists themselves as we completed our experiments each day. Throughout the week we experimented with melting, making ice gardens, magnets, filter jars, colour mixing and more. It has been lovely to see the children so engaged and excited about what they are doing. Asking lots of important questions, giving us the opportunity to find out the answers together.
Over at Forest School Mrs Ashmore gave us the opportunity to have a camp fire, the children made us proud with their sensible behaviour around the fire. We loved toasting and eating our marshmallows. We also loved watching the fire and seeing the flames move in the wind. 
Before we left Forest School we collected some frogspawn for our fish tank in the Nursery, we look forward to seeing it develop and following the life cycle of a frog. 

Nursery life (Week beginning 28th February)

This week we welcomed back our lovely Nursery children and enjoyed hearing all about their half term adventures. We also welcomed two new children and it was wonderful to see how our children took them under their wing and showed them the nursery ropes in such a kind and caring way. We had a very busy week, beginning with celebrating pancake day! This was supported by the fabulous story ‘Mr wolfs pancakes’ by Jan Fearnley. This story taught us so many skills from, list writing, recipe reading to kindness and independence. We were invited by reception class to take part in some playground pancake races. This as so much fun and the children enjoyed taking part and also watching reception class take part. The fun this week continued as we celebrated ‘World book day’ on Thursday, it was wonderful to see all the children (and staff) dressed up as their favourite characters. We had so much fun with lots of activities inspired by the fairy tale characters included in our story of the week. 

Nursery news (Week beginning 14th February)

This week we continued with our theme of love, this time focusing on friendship and how we can we a good friend. We had a great example of how to be a good friend when Leo the lion showed us how to be strong and kind in our story of the week 'The lion who wanted to love' by Giles Andreae. To celebrate friendship we made friendship flowers and bracelets this week. Over at Forest School the children very much enjoyed the mud which had been left behind by the wet weather. We had some wonderful mud bathing going on, it was brilliant to see the children fully immersed in their natural environment. As the week continued we painted, engaged in sensory activities and built bridges in the tough tray. On Friday we said a very fond goodbye to Mrs Pullen who the children are very used to seeing in the lunch hall every day. This gave some of the pre school children their first opportunity to attend an assembly in the hall. 

Finally we would like to wish you all a wonderful half term break, see you all on the week beginning Monday 28th February. 

Nursery Life (Week beginning 7th February) 

This week love has been in the air. Our story has been ‘I’ll always love you’ by Paeony Lewis. This taught us that the little bear would always be loved even if he made a little mistake. It was a great opener into us discussing our own feelings, talking about what love is, how it makes us feel and who is special to us in our lives. The children thought so carefully about their answers to these questions and it was wonderful to see them carefully tapping into their feelings. We also talked a lot about the heart shape and enjoyed using this lots in our craft activities. At Forest School the children even showed their loved to the birds as they made and hung some heart themed bird feeders. In the tough tray we had sensory play and potion making, which was very popular with everyone. 

 Nursery life (Week beginning 31st January)

It was absolutely wonderful to all be back together this week in Nursery. Thank you again for being so understanding during our very difficult previous week. This week we were celebrating Chinese New Year, our supporting book was ‘Peppa’s Chinese new year’. We have celebrated with food, decorations and dancing. The children have loved exploring different elements in the tough tray, particularly getting to grips with the chop sticks. They have also taken a keen interest in the Chinese symbols, having a go at writing some of them for themselves. You can see some of these proudly displayed on our Nursery door. 

Nursery life (Week beginning 17th January)

As we continue to think about Winter this week we moved on to focusing on animals who live in cold places. The story ‘Lost and found’ by Oliver Jeffers led us into the world of penguins and thinking about where they live and what it might be like there. The children were thrilled to do some research on penguins using the interactive white board in nursery, watching how the penguins move, how they hatch from eggs and learning all about what they eat. We were most impressed with their fast swimming and watching them zoom through the water. Throughout the week we embraced lots of small world penguin play, the children enjoyed junk modelling their own boats like the one from our story for a penguin and boy to travel in. The children also collaged some umbrellas, just like the one that the penguin uses to sail in. You might see some of these in the Nursery porch. 

Nursery life (Week beginning 10th January)

This week our story of the week was a much loved favourite 'The Gruffalo's Child' by Julia Donaldson. The children engaged with this story so well at group times, joining in with the repeated phrases and guessing the which animal the Gruffalo's child might have found next by using the clues given in the story. We talked about the different trails made within the story and the children were keen to make their own trails when playing in the tough tray. Following this during Forest School on Wednesday the children looked for real trails left by creatures and people. One of our adult led activities this week was to create a hot drink mug in the creative area, this led to lots of talk about hot chocolate. We had to take this opportunity to have a lovely warm hot chocolate at snack time with the all important marshmallow on the side! 

Nursery life (Week beginning 3rd January)

We were so pleased to welcome back the children and hear all about their wonderful Christmas times this week. Although the week may have been short, we definitely squeezed in lots of fun. We kicked off our winter topic with a fabulous story of the week ‘Stickman’ by Julia Donaldson. The weather was on our side for our topic as we headed over to Forest School in the ice. The children loved exploring the ice in all areas of Forest School and finding sticks to create lots of mark making. They went on a stick hunt to find stick man, later using their sticks to bring their stick men to life in the creative area. It has been wonderful to hear the children retelling the story and using it their play across the Nursery environment. 

A sneak peek for everyone of our beautiful Nursery environment...

Nursery life (Week beginning 13th December)

This week has been all about having none stop Christmas fun. It has been so wonderful to see the children getting excited for the big day as we count down the days on our Nursery advent calendar. We began the week by reading an impromptu Christmas themed story called 'The Stinky Sprouts' by Rosie Greening, the children thought this book was hilarious and really connected to it. This therefore prompted a little change to our planned activities as we took the children's lead and introduced sprouts in to our environment. Children enjoyed rolling them, taking them on adventures and giving them names and characters just like they have in the story. Our busy week continued on Wednesday with a Christmas hunt at Forest School, followed by Christmas dinner in the lunch hall, finally followed by some dancing and party games back home in the Nursery. Also this week we were very privileged to receive a very special visitor, he popped in to say hello and drop off some gifts before he had to head back to the North Pole. I can safely say staff and children alike have had a fun packed and Christmas filled week. 

Finally from everyone at Nursery we would like to wish you a very happy and healthy Christmas and we will see you in the new year.