Storytellers have been learning about Diwali, also known as the festival of lights, and many rituals and traditions in the event include light. Diya lamps are lit around the doorways and windows of people's homes. This symbolises the triumph of light over dark and welcomes Lord Rama home from the story of Rama and Sita. The children enjoyed creating their Diya lamps and decorating our entrance with Rangoli, a popular Diwali tradition –beautiful patterns made using colourful powders and flowers. People draw rangoli on the floor by the entrance of their homes to welcome the gods and bring good luck!

We should certainly have lots of luck as the children made sure they covered everywhere with colourful patterns 

This month, we continue our season's theme by investigating a festival that signifies the move from autumn to winter, Halloween, which is always a great favourite of our young children.

We have enjoyed reading a classic this week, "Room on a Broom” by Julia Donaldson. The story of a witch, a group of animals who help her, good manners, friendship, and cooperation was fun to read aloud because of its rhythm and rhyme and opportunities for the children to join in.

The children thoroughly enjoyed the potion Station, where they measured out bicarbonate and various coloured vinegars along with a variety of Halloween-inspired pasta shapes; they then watched the results. They were immersed in the process; this created some excellent learning opportunities as we talked about the reactions and the words we could use to describe them.

 The children carried this passion for potions within their role-play area, currently themed as ‘Meg and Mogs’ house. There have been lots of magic spells and rhymes as the children have explored roles together.

 Having a selection of pumpkins around the room has offered an abundance of learning opportunities, from size ordering and counting to mark-making in a variety of exciting ways. We are excited to see what next week’s learning adventures bring …

As part of the celebration of Harvest time, the children visited Strawberry Fields at Lifton to explore the pumpkin patch. It's the biggest pumpkin patch we've ever seen! We were greeted by a fantastic variety of pumpkins of all colours and sizes stacked outside the farm shop in a beautiful display. There was also a giant pumpkin display made from bales. The children loved having their photos taken with the various props! 

We are continuing our topic: Can One Idea Change the World? For the next two weeks our focus in on D.T. We are creating wind turbines which will power LEDs. This unit will see pupils creating strong tower structures which will house a motor. We will run the motor backwards to create electricity from wind. Pupils will need to think about the shape, size and orientation of the blades in order to turn the motor as quickly as possible.  This unit also requires pupils to use their knowledge of circuits. 

As always pupils have attacked the brief in their own unique ways. At the end of the unit we will evaluate each others turbines to see which are the most effective and why.

In English we have started a new writing unit. We are looking at instruction writing. Our example text is How to make the World's Healthiest Smoothie. Pupils will pull apart the features of this text before creating their own instruction texts. 

We have started the second Autumn term with a a highly dramatic event. The school was blasted by storm Ciaran with a tree taken down. Within a day the tree had been removed and we were back open for business.

Kensa class have been busy learning about the Great Fire of London. In art they have been creating Tudor houses and discussing the causes of the fire.

Nessa have been building their way into the term with a D.T focus. Pupils have been creating wind turbines. They have been designing strong towers out of wooden dowel and will be using their circuit knowledge to run a motor from wind power which will light an LED.

Cross-country has been a run away success! On the first week we had 14 pupils attending. The mud was no match for our runners and Mr Jones coached the pupils around a two mile course.

We have parents evenings this week so make sure you have contacted Kelly in the office to book your slot.

Pro20 is continuing this term so make sure you sign up for more coaching excellence.

Lastly, we are beginning to prepare for our Christmas play. Parents have been emailed costume requests. 

Thank you for your continued support,

Mr Smith

Healthy Teeth  

This week at Storytellers, we have been learning how to look after our teeth. The children have been learning this in a variety of ways.  

• Encouraging the children to brush the teeth of dolls or soft toys. 
• We have large teeth models and brushes for children to practice on. 
• Read stories about keeping teeth happy and healthy. 
• Talked about tooth-friendly food and drinks that help to grow strong teeth and those that we should limit as they’re not so tooth-friendly.  
• The dentist role-play area has been popular in class; children and teddies have been booked for checkups! This familiarises the children with the dentist's environment, equipment, and processes. 
• We brought in our toothbrushes and used special discolouration tablets to highlight areas we might have missed when brushing our teeth; this proved very exciting when we discovered we had purple tongues! We learnt that we only needed a small amount of toothpaste and didn't need to rinse afterwards as the toothpaste continues to protect our teeth after brushing.

Welcome back…

Everyone has settled back into the routine well, and we have had a great week kicking off our new topic, ‘All about me’

One of the most important aspects of early years education is the development of a child's sense of self. This involves not only understanding who they are as individuals but also recognising and respecting the differences between themselves and others. Celebrating differences with activities is a great way to introduce young children to this concept in a fun and engaging way. These activities range from simple discussions about skin colour and hair texture to more complex lessons about cultural traditions and beliefs. This week, we created an "All About Me" painting using mirrors; the children painted a visual representation of themselves. This not only helps them express their identity but also encourages them to learn about and appreciate the unique qualities of their classmates. Over the coming weeks, other activities will include reading books about different cultures and traditions and engaging in role-playing games to encourage empathy and understanding. By incorporating these celebrating differences activities into our early years curriculum, we can help children develop a strong sense of self, while also promoting respect and tolerance for others. This is an essential foundation for building a more inclusive and diverse society in the future.

Welcome to our Nursery blog ...

In our spacious inviting nursery we work hard to offer a nurturing and supportive learning environment for the children to thrive and grow. We follow the Early Years Foundation Stage Curriculum with an emphasis on promoting the characteristics of effective learning. 

This approach fosters a love of learning and provides challenge linked closely to developmentally age appropriate experience. We strive to create an environment where the children feel confident to explore and discover new things. We have weekly forest school activities and have constant access to a large safe outdoors space and all-weather area. All meals are cooked daily on site by our wonderful cook. 

As a Nursery, we understand that all children are unique and understand the importance of following their individual interests.

We are set just outside the beautiful village of Blisland which is 10 mins from Bodmin town centre.

As we are a smaller setting we can only offer 10 places per year group but this therefore ensures a very high level of interaction with adults and quality impute for your child while they are with us. We are very family orientated and have strong community connections. 

We can offer places to children from the age  2yrs and offer 15 and 30 hour funding, more information can be found here: www.gov.uk/30-hours-free-childcare

Morning sessions are from 9am - 12  cost £16.80

Lunch available from 12-1pm at £5.60 plus meal cost or home packed lunch.

Afternoon session would be from 12-3pm at £16.80 plus meal cost or home packed lunch. 

All day session 9am - 3pm £33.60 plus the meal or home packed lunch.

We are offering a fourth session free if you pay for 3. It can be just mornings or a full day.  Your equivalent 4th session would be free, saving a max of £28.80

We are very flexible with hours and days so please feel free to ring for more information.

We also run a parent and toddler group, ' Twiglets', on a Wednesday morning 9am -11am, where you can come along to stay and play and meet new people, have a coffee and get a feel for what we are all about; this runs weekly in term time and its free. Bump to 4yrs.    

Weekly information also available on our 'Twiglets' Facebook page. 

By following our nursery blog which we hope to publish on a weekly basis this will allow us to inform you through words and pictures how we promote your child’s learning in the nursery, it is also a great way for you to discuss with your child at home what they have been doing each week. 

Mrs Pearce.

Welcome Back!

We are very excited to welcome the children back to Kensa Class this term! Here is a sneak peak of some of the exciting new areas we have for them to enjoy! 

Please find below some updates and reminders for the new term:

Seesaw
This year you will be able to follow your child's learning journey using Seesaw. Please let me know if you have any problems accessing your account.

Reading
Reading is one of the most important things we do in Kensa Class and we continue to encourage all children to read aloud to an adult at least 4 x per week. Please remember to record any reading in your child’s reading record – they love to share this with us!

Inside your child’s reading pack you will find:

• Your child’s reading record (please record in this each time you hear your child read aloud at home).

• 2 Read Write Inc books (your child should be reading these regularly throughout the week in order to develop their fluency and comprehension. If they finish them, please read them again and again and again)!

• A reading for pleasure book (these are books chosen by your child, for you to read to them at home. We will change these over every Monday but you are very welcome to swap them yourself at any time during the week. The books can be found in the reading for pleasure box in the children’s cloakroom).

Books will be changed every Monday. We really want children to enjoy the time they spend reading with you. Little and often is much better than sitting them down to read the whole book (2/3 pages a day is fine) and as they progress they may wish to start exploring other texts of their choice such as magazines, websites, recipes etc.

PE/Outdoor Learning
We love to go outdoors at Blisland but the weather is not always kind! To help us embrace the rain it is important that we can get the children warm and dry again. For this reason, we would like children to have their PE kit, a change of clothes and a coat in school at all times.

If there is anything you wish to discuss, please always feel free to pop in!

Best wishes,
Sally Elliott
(Class Teacher, EYFS, English, Science and Mental Health and Wellbeing Lead)