The 12 Days of Christmas

12 Days of Christmas

Ark Start John Archer Nursery

Ark Start John Archer is a new nursery 6 minutes walk from Clapham Junction train station. It was set up by a group of qualified teachers who are committed to making sure that every child has a joyful, engaging and secure nursery experience.

Our nursery is about much more than childcare. Our expert staff have created a nursery where children can play, learn and have fun together. Ark Start John Archer is also a place where families can come together, share their experiences and build support networks. This week the children have been making their very own salt dough winter decorations and ornaments to take home. Children demonstrated a range of skills across the EYFS areas of learning as they mixed, kneaded and rolled out the dough, all the time having lovely conversations about all things winter. Just one of the many activities planned to celebrate the winter season!

www.arkstart.org.uk

Bridge Lane Nursery

This December, the children at Bridge Lane Nursery have been super busy getting all excited and prepared for Christmas. As well as the young ones’ yoga and Stretch and Grow exercise classes, the children have been impressing everyone in their music sessions with their singing and dancing along to their favourite Christmas songs. Every child has been taking part in showing off their unique creative skills as they have been sticking and gluing to produce a wonderful array of decorations to hang on the tree. But ssshhhh! … There has also been a surprise visit from Father Christmas! What a treat! But of course, this is because all the children at Bridge Lane Nursery are on the good list this year.

www.bridgelanenursery.com

Bright Horizons Northcote Road Day Nursery and Preschool

These are some of the learning experiences that the children have been doing throughout the month of December. The babies have been using both gross and fine motor skills to create this wonderful artwork. Lots of critical thinking has been involved and problem solving. The Children have had a wonderful time creating these. Have a wonderful bubbly Christmas and Happy New Year. Preschool have been exploring arctic animals and making their own Christmas trees using different materials and tools. They are very excited about Christmas!

www.brighthorizons.co.uk

Churcher’s College Junior School and Nursery

It was with great excitement that the Nursery and Reception children retold the story of ‘The First Christmas’ in their nativity production this week. The children delighted their parents and grandparents with their beautiful singing and storytelling. They looked wonderful in their costumes on a stage bedecked with little, sparkling stars. The event was just magical and we are all so proud of the children. What a fabulous way to start the school Christmas celebrations! We have a very special Christmas gingerbread house set up in the Nursery, complete with a fireplace and sofa, where the children can explore lots of Christmassy books and activities. They can also design and make their own Christmas cards and post them in the ‘post office’ with its little post box. The children are looking forward to a Christmas party to round off a fabulous fun-filled term!

www.churcherscollege.com/nursery-3-4-/about-the-nursery

Eaton House the Manor Nursery

Christmas is absolutely my favourite time of year! The children have been creating Christmas cookies and baking biscuit baubles! There is glitter galore, from wrapping and writing to sticking and stamping the letters and parcels! Father Christmas has got lots of letters with many requests,

I know that all our children are on the nice list! Everyone has a part in A Bundle of Joy, they have been singing, acting and dancing to the brilliant Out of the Ark soundtrack, and having a week on Zoom didn’t stop the excitement and energy of our staff and children. There has been Christmas jumper day in aid of Save the Children, along with numerous creative crafts and incredible imaginative igloos!!!!

Everyone deserves a delightful Christmas and a wonderful New Year!

www.eatonhouseschools.com/ the-manor/nursery

Little Forest Folk Nursery

Little Forest Folk in Putney Heath is a fully outdoor nursery and the children there have been busy in the forest getting into the swing of the festive season. The children have been creating their very own special Christmas spiral calendars so they can count down the days to Christmas, taking great care to paint them in beautiful colours. There have also been plenty of other creative festive crafts happening including collages and even making sensory tree cookies which were exquisitely decorated. The children have also enjoyed reading festive books together with their friends in the forest which has led to lots of lovely imaginary play. Little Forest Folk Putney Heath are all keeping their fingers and toes crossed for some snow before the end of the year, so they can get the sleds out and go sledging in the forest!

www.littleforestfolk.com/putneyheath

Little Lancing Day Nursery & Forest School

Little Lancing Day Nursery & Forest School is now in its third year and offers year-round childcare from two months to 5 years. Wellestablished, it now has over 120 children on roll. The children get out and about, with walks in the College woodland and alongside the neighbouring river Adur.

The Little Lancing children have been busy in December and enjoyed helping to dress each Christmas tree and make their own Christmas decorations. There have been a multitude of festive activities including making playdough snowmen and gingerbread, Christmas wreaths and treasure baskets. There’s even a Christmas elf making mischief in the Preschool room! With Christmas Jumper Day, parties and Christmas Lunch to come, everyone is getting excited for the Christmas holiday.

www.lancingcollege.co.uk/littlelancing

Marmalade Caterpillar Nursery

At the Marmalade Caterpillar we have been exploring special days of our families and the local community, such as Thanksgiving, Diwali, Eid, Hanukkah, and Christmas. This year for the Christmas project the children have enjoyed creating their own reindeers, Christmas trees, angels and letters for Santa. We have investigated some of the different names for Father Christmas from around the world, revisiting the importance of being a little bit the same and a little bit different. The children’s enthusiasm for the Nativity Play, their songs, costumes and all the little moments that happened on the day, made this a truly magical event. We were exceptionally pleased to be able to welcome parents back into the nursery to join us for the start of their Christmas celebrations.

www.marmaladeschools.co.uk

Park Lane Nursery

We are big fans of advent at Park Lane Primary School and Nursery, as it’s all about the run up to Christmas – which can be just as exciting as Christmas Day itself!

Our nursery children have been getting involved in our virtual advent calendar, as a creative addition to the usual Christmas performances. They sang a beautiful rendition of ‘We Wish You a Merry Christmas’, which can be viewed here.

But Christmas isn’t Christmas without seeing the big man himself, and it turns out he has freed up some time from the workshop to make a visit to the children next Monday – we can’t wait! In addition, our local vicar will be visiting soon after to tell the Christmas Story and help everyone to understand the true meaning of Christmas.

Most importantly, the children have already been treated to a Christmas Dinner, complete with party hats and crackers!

www.parklane.brent.sch.uk

Sparkies Nursery School

At Sparkies we have been very busy making an array of treasures to take home and celebrate with family! We take each festival adding our Sparkies magic! This year we made our wellbeing wreath exploring the sensory aspect, making chatter as our feature. Each hand represents a feeling (happy, sad), and each finger represents what our family and friends mean to us…

“I like my family, friends because…” - we had some beautiful comments, here are a few:

“My mummy is my best friend.”; “My daddy reads stories not from a book.”; “My friend is my friend.”; “I like using kind hands.”; and finally “Sharing is caring.” Christmas is not about making, sticking and doing, BUT it’s the why, what, how, when and who… If we stop and listen we understand their feelings and support their needs.

www.sparkiesnurseryschool.com

Tadpoles Nursery

Tadpoles Nursery have been getting excited for Christmas with a range of activities: making gingerbread men and fake snow, singing songs and learning about the Winter seasons and celebrations. With our fantastic garden we have been able to watch hibernation with our tortoises, Trouble and Strife, and our pond life. We got to meet a real-life reindeer and sung our hearts out to our parents in our annual Christmas Concert.

www.tadpolesnursery.com

The Kindergartens Nursery

The run up to Christmas lends itself naturally to our topic of Let’s Celebrate! As the final festive event in the year, it’s a tremendously exciting and busy time.

We do as much outside play and learning as possible, wrapped up warm and drinking hot chocolate. From half-term we learn the story of Mary and Joseph, and letter hunt in the snow (Dad’s shaving foam - very giggly) and make Christmas cards to sell for our chosen charity. Our Christmas trees arrive on 1st December when we are well into nativity rehearsals, so it’s time to start making Christmas gifts. There’s also lots of baking to be done, the smells of Christmas are so good! Orange, gingerbread, pine, chocolate, slowly-warming dough.

During this week’s Forest School, we had a scavenger hunt on the theme of The Twelve Days of Christmas – one group located Twelve Swans-a-Swimming on a local pond!

www.thekindergartens.com

TURN TO P14 to read about Christmas miracles at Park Lane Preparatory