Little Lancing

It’s been a busy time at nursery with numbers on roll continuing to climb steadily. We now have some 120 children on roll with more preparing to join us in 2022.

The new school year began with transitions; Pre-School welcomed children moving up from Investigators for their final year at Little Lancing and some of our older Explorers children moved up to Investigators. The Explorers Room Nest is now firmly embedded into nursery life and there were lots of new babies joining us too.

The nursery has been buzzing with autumnal activities. Our youngest children in Explorers made marks in scented playdough with fresh fruit slices and developed their fine motor skills as they played with their ‘pumpkin tray’ with added dry spaghetti! The Investigators children decorated pumpkins and brought in natural objects collected whilst at home for everyone to share and explore together. The Pre-School children were excited to collect apples from our very own trees in the nursery garden and then tried out apple bobbing. In the art corner, they created their own abstract representations of pumpkins with watercolour paint.

Children across the nursery made the most of the mild Autumn sunshine to undertake some seasonal jobs in our garden, clearing up leaves and collecting our pumpkins and fruit and vegetable peelings for composting, as part of our Eco School initiative. They also quietly searched our fairy garden and pond to see if there were any new little visitors!

Indoors, it’s been lovely to see many of our younger children live up to their Explorers name by trying out new things and the Investigators begin to engage in role play with their peers, reflecting real life experiences. The PreSchool children started their ‘school readiness’ programme, working together in small groups. They learnt about Road Safety, creating

their own traffic lights and talking about looking out for the ‘green man’ and crossing roads safely, both out on walks and back at nursery.

As the longer autumn nights drew in, the children learnt about Diwali, the Hindu Festival of Light. They decorated diva lamps and made Rangoli patterns from our collection of loose parts. It’s amazing how fascinated they are by the collection of nuts, bolts and washers! We were of course also thinking about fireworks and Bonfire Night. The children explored colour and light using mixtures of powder paint and created firework paintings.

Poppies are the iconic emblem of Remembrance and across the rooms, the children talked about why remembering is important. From playdough and sensory play to painting and creative art, the children made their own poppies in nursery. They also went ‘poppy-spotting’ in the fields on their walks in our local area.

Looking outwards and thinking of others are further important themes at Little Lancing and everyone had great fun dressing up for Children in Need. There were lots of fantastic spotty outfits and Pudsey-themed sensory and creative activities, with yellow playdough, making Pudsey headbands, creating teddy bear tea parties and playing with exciting water trays. It was a great way of contributing to a worthy cause.

The nursery Christmas tree looked fabulous and set the scene for our Christmas activities, with Christmas Jumper Day, the staff dressing up as elves and Christmas tea parties. The children were eager to collect their present from under the tree to take home for the big day.

COVID-19 has of course never been far away in this area and the nursery staff have worked long and tirelessly to keep the nursery family, children, parents and staff, as safe as possible. As 2021 draws to a close, we are all hopeful for a brighter 2022.