Category: 3 – 5 Curriculum

At Orchard Brae Nurseries we work in conjunction with the school using the Pre birth to 3 years old and the Pre-Early Curriculum for Excellence benchmarks to support our targets setting and tracking. Planning and development is supported by the Building the Ambition Document and by HIGOELC.

Exploring ‘Things That Go’ In Nursery

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The children in Howes Road nursery class have been exploring lots of ‘Things That Go’ in their play and have been engaged in a series of art opportunities. 

We have explored painting with balls of different sizes and textures on a big and small scale – a big group session where there was lots of fun throwing, dropping and rolling and as individuals where we used trays – some children chose to move the balls in the paint independently and others had lots of fun tipping the trays to make them roll. 

Driving toy cars through paint and using rollers of different sizes had us working hard on controlling our hands as well as watching and tracking the movement.  Toy cars on the ramps outside combined with paint was a great experiment too… ‘ready steady go’ and lots of laughter could be heard from afar! 

There has been so much creativity and a lot of very active participation in these sessions as you can see from the photographs. 

National Numeracy Day: 19th May 2021

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19th May is National Numeracy Day. There are events throughout the day on the National Numeracy website:

https://www.nationalnumeracy.org.uk/numeracyday

Numeracy is all around us. It helps us to understand the world and process our environment. Colours, patterns, shape, size and texture are all related to numeracy and play can support our early understanding of these concepts. As our pupils develop, we focus on functional numeracy, learning about time through our daily routine, money in practical situations such as knowing we have to pay in the shop, measurement in HE and outdoor learning. Numeracy skills are developed across the curriculum.

There are lots of things you can do at home to support your child’s numeracy development. Why not some of these activities? For Primary / early Secondary learner here are some ideas. Follow the link below for more:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1EIwt0gKHQ-0tJ7N1p1J9XeYrV3OBIUOx0KXplmkf5zQ/edit?usp=sharing

For our Senior Phase learners:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/e/2PACX-1vSl3vrEw2_6rLo8diWVck-jzCk2OMK5RZ81ZAe6isXMGMf1dWo2qD-xW6I0En-8f9Tq6ReYeie3tIdI/pub

We’d love to see how you use numeracy at home. Please share any photographs or comments by e-mail to: gw19russellclare@ab-ed.org

Christmas Fun at Howes Road Nursery

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It’s been a busy and fun time over the last few weeks. The children had all practised so hard for the nativity and each and every one of them did a fantastic job of dressing up and shaking their bells and beating their drums to the music. I’m sure you will enjoy seeing the video when it comes onto the website and Facebook. 

Lots of art and craft,messy play and sensory activities have been happening in Nursery. We have been foot painting reindeers,hand and finger painting big and little Christmas trees, playing with red slimy jelly, making sparkly reindeer food with oats and glitter and not to mention making a big snowman for our wall. It’s been great fun.

To finish off this term we had a fun party day on Thursday. We had dancing, music, disco lights and a very special visit from Santa. 

All the staff at Howes Road Orchard Brae Nursery wish you and your families a safe and Merry Christmas and we look forward to seeing you all in 2021. 

Autumn Activities in Nursery at Howes Road

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November has been a busy month in Howes Road Nursery. We have enjoyed lots of Autumn activities in nursery. On crisp Autumn walks around our local area we collected leaves and twigs to explore the different textures and colours. We  used these to make lovely artwork and had fun putting them on the parachute and watching them being thrown up into the air.  

We made yummy vegetable soup for snack with Autumn vegetables. We liked chopping up the vegetables best.

For Bonfire Night we made lovely artwork with bright coloured paint and dishwashing sponges and brushes. It was messy and good fun.  

We celebrated St Andrew’s day by making beautiful tartan paintings, with a taste of Haggis, Neeps and Tatties for snack and finished off the day with Ceilidh Dancing which everyone joined in with.

Back to Nursery

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Our morning and afternoon nursery children at Howes Road have been very busy since starting Nursery this term. Many have been showing an interest in vehicles and we have been listening to stories and songs about cars, buses and other things that help us to move around. A favourite song is ‘The Wheels on the Bus’ and great fun has been had playing the desk bells which sound like the bell on the bus. Some children have been using vehicles in the paint and looking at their tyre tracks. Others have been exploring the paint with their fingers. The garage and toy cars have proven very popular as the cars go up and down ramps whilst some children have been exploring cause and effect steering wheel toys or completing puzzles.

We also made lots of playdough as part of a group and have been using transport cutters to make shapes of planes, cars, trains and motorbikes. Some have been rolling the playdough in their hands and squeezing it as it is lovely and soft. 

We have had fun in the nursery garden, watering the flowers when it has been sunny and jumping in the puddles when it has been raining. 

Return to nursery

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All the returning children from Orchard Brae at Ashgrove have settled well since starting back in August. We have been able to welcome new children to our Nursery and it has been great to see how quickly they have adapted to their new setting. They all appear to be enjoying and becoming familiar within the Nursery environment.

We have been doing lots of sensory activities with painting, gloop and shaving foam. We have also been making vegetable and fruit printing pictures. We have been planting our spring bulbs and enjoying what remains of the “summer weather.”

As the trees are now beginning to change colour we have been exploring this concept as we go for walks in the local community. Some of the children have shown great interest in our apple and plum trees which grow in our outdoor play area and have been collecting them. We have used some of the plums for our snack. Next week we are planning to use the apples to make apple pie.

The staff team at Ashgrove are all looking forward to working with the children and supporting them throughout their time with us. 

    Howes Hoose and Howes Road P.M. Nursery try the Fruit/Vegetable of the Fortnight

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    Our fruit/vegetable of the  past fortnight was apple and for the next two weeks is CARROT. All our classes are encouraged to serve this vegetable at least five times during snack to expose our children to fruit/vegetables and encourage them to have a taste. Our Howes Hoose group certainly enjoyed their apple and carrot and at the other end of the school our little ones in nursery are being exposed to and encouraged to taste the fruits/vegetables.

    News from Ashgrove Nursery’s Morning Group

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    The morning children at Ashgrove Nursery participated in several Christmas activities over the festive period. Such as a trip to BA stores where they got to meet Santa and have a ride on the Christmas train. Some of the children particularly showed interest in decorating the tree within the play room.

    All have returned after the break and have settled well. They have been making Ashgrove tartan in preparation for the Scottish celebrations next week.

     

    Fruit/Vegetable of the Fortnight

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    One of our new initiatives for Healthy Eating in 2020 is ‘Fruit/Vegetable of the Fortnight’. A fruit or vegetable will be introduced at snack time and served regularly over a two week period. In this way we aim to expose the children to fresh fruit and vegetables and encourage them to try new fruit and vegetables, develop a taste for healthy foods as well as  offering children the experience of preparing and tasting a selection of fresh fruit and vegetables. We will also be sharing our Healthy Eating successes … WATCH THIS SPACE!!

    Our ‘Fruit of the Fortnight’ is APPLE.