Nursery

The Foundation Stage Curriculum

Spring Term Curriculum Overview

Nursery Spring Curriculum Overview 2020

Welcome back to all our parents and children after the Christmas break. We trust you are well rested and ready for an exciting term ahead.  Our Topic this term is ‘Traditional Tales’, beginning with ‘The Gingerbread Man,’ and we will be following the children’s interests within this topic.

As part of Communication & Language and Literacy, we will be beginning our Show and Tell programme. This involves the children bringing in a photo/object when they get their special bag. At the end of the day they will talk about their photo/object in front of the class and children will be invited to ask questions.

We will be continuing with phase 1 phonics, focusing on hearing sounds in the environment and rhyming words. Each week the children will learn a new nursery rhyme of the week. We will be encouraging mark marking and supporting children to ascribe meaning to their marks.

In Maths, we will be working in practical ways with numbers from 0 – 10.  We will learn about the four main shapes – circle, square, rectangle and triangle. Through practical activities the children will have experience of size – big/small, measurement – long/short and ordering – small, medium, large.

In Understanding the World, we will be exploring materials and deciding which materials are strong to build a bridge for the Gingerbread Man and a house for the Three Little Pigs. Through our topic work, the children will experience the other areas of the Foundation Stage curriculum, including Art, Language and Literacy and Technology.

We would be grateful if you could ensure a spare set of clothes is in your child’s locker; it is especially important this term as children can get muddy in our mud kitchen and sand and water area. Please ensure all items of your child’s school uniform including, hats and gloves have your child’s name clearly marked. Also, it is still important that your child has Wellington boots in school alongside their indoor shoes (plimsoles) so that we can all go outside and build on our Physical Development and make use of all of our beautiful grounds.

As our Nursery children are getting more experienced and confident with books now, we ask that you share as many stories as possible at home and encourage the children to become involved with reading in the environment, ie. signs, labels etc.

If you have any concerns or worries please do not hesitate to contact us.

Thank You

Miss Gorman Kiely and Mr Jeans

 

Ways to help at home

Routine

Try to establish a routine for school days;

• Wake your child in good time to have breakfast and wash and dress in peace.
• Make time after school to listen to them telling you about what they have been doing.
• Your child will be tired when he/she comes home from school. Please ensure that he/she goes to bed early. If he/she does not get enough sleep he/she will not learn efficiently.
• Speaking and Listening: always use speech as a model for your child’s language skills.

Reading

When parents share books with their children regularly reading becomes a more enjoyable experience and progress in learning to read is enhanced

• Share books as often as possible
• Talk about print you see at home or when you are out
• Let them see you enjoying reading
• Discuss stories, predicting what might happen next
• Share poems and rhymes with your child
• Talk about the cover and pictures in stories. Ask your child to tell their own story using the pictures
• Encourage your child to finish a sentence by pausing at a suitable place, e.g. Humpty Dumpty sat on a …….
• Playing I-spy, – use letter sounds rather than names

Writing/Mark making

Have fun with making marks and discussion about marks

• Chunky pencils/chalk etc. helps to develop motor control.
• Make play dough – develop arm strength
• Use chalk on pavements, outside walls, chalk can be removed by putting water over it.
• If your child is ready to write you could begin by helping them to trace shapes or letters to develop their pencil control. Try writing with a highlighter pen for your child to copy over.
• Encourage your child to hold their pencil correctly – it is better to learn slowly, using the correct technique. If your child alternates the pencil between hands don’t worry as dominance takes time to develop.
• Have lots of paper and writing implements readily available so that they can practise drawing and writing whenever they want to.
• If you choose to teach your child to write his/her name please use a capital for the first letter and lower case thereafter. Once children have formed the habit of writing in capital letters it is very hard to break.

Mathematics

Encourage your child to:

• Learn counting rhymes
• Weigh and mix ingredients for cooking
• Count in different situation e.g. stairs, buttons on coats, people at dinner table etc
• Identify shapes and colours inside and outside your home
• Describe and sort things into sets e.g. big/small, heavy/light, rough/smooth
• Recognise numbers up to 10, then 20
• Gardening (let them help you care for a small section of plants)