Hedgehogs
Welcome to Wellington Nursery
Welcome to Wellington Nursery. We provide a caring, exciting and happy atmosphere for children from the age of 2 and ½ years old to attend and take their first steps into education.
I thought I would introduce myself and talk about our wonderful nursery. My name is Emily Sevenoaks and I am the nursery manager. I work very closely with my nursery assistant, Clare Bowcott who has been a well-loved member of the Wellington School community for quite some time. We also work very closely with our Head of EYFS, Miss Evans to help strengthen our links with Reception and help develop our understanding and planning of the early year’s environment.
In the Nursery, we take pride in carefully planning stimulating and structured activities built around the children’s interests however allowing for free flow and child-initiated play. With our experienced staff, all children are encouraged to explore, learn and discover. We implement a topic-based approach to learning but are flexible to changes where we support the development of the whole child.
Our Nursery setting offers one large classroom with an adjoining wet area for all our messy fun. We also have an adjoining sheltered outdoor area with access to a large playground, fields and a wooded forest school area. We make use of this amazing outdoor space most days, but particularly go to the forest school area during our ‘Welly Wednesdays’.
Our staff support positive relationships with both children and parents. We are open from 9:00 – 3:00pm each day and you can choose which days and sessions best suit you and your child, with the option of half day, full day and breakfast and after-school provision. Breakfast club is open 7:45-8:30 and afterschool club runs from 3:00-5:30, 4:15 on Fridays.
Through careful observation and assessment, we can establish each child’s next steps. We use tapestry as a communicational guide to help support positive relationships with parents and support strong connections between each child’s home and school life.
At Wellington Nursery, every child’s happiness is of paramount importance. We want all the children in our care to feel happy, safe and for their experiences to guide and support them for their next adventures in education. Please feel free to contact the school reception or email myself or Miss Evans directly for any more information.
Contact details: kevans@wellington.hereford.sch.uk : esevenoaks@wellington.hereford.sch.uk or phone our school office on 01432 830264.
Autumn Term Newsletter
hedgehogs autumn term newsletter 24.pdf
Queenswood
To link with our topic of ‘Woodland Wonders’ we enjoyed a very autumnal trip to Queenswood. The week leading up to our trip, we explored the story ‘The Gruffalo’. The children made some wonderful Gruffalo masks, enjoyed making Gruffalo crumble and built some robust log pile houses for the snake.
The day of our trip arrived and we enjoyed a quick bus ride up to the woods. The children had their masks at the ready, looking forward to hunting down the Gruffalo. We went in search for all the characters from the story, jumping in muddy puddles on our way around the woods. We enjoyed a quick snack and drink, before playing in the playground. The children loved watching all the autumnal leaves fall off the trees in the wind, talking about the different colours and shapes. What a fantastic trip to end the first half of Autumn term.
Autumn Term Learning
The children have settled in beautifully after the summer holidays and have been exploring and playing with all our new toys, especially our new role play kitchen! A big warm welcome to our new starters, who have got stuck in and have become members of our nursery family.
We have explored different areas within the first few weeks, finding out about the children’s interest and what they enjoy playing with. We have particularly made the most out of the lovely sunshine by going on welly walks around our beautiful surroundings. The children have made some nature bracelets, been on an autumnal scavenger hunt and created natural pictures using the items they found outside. We will continue with our ‘Welly Wednesdays’, linking to Autumn and the changes we will begin to see outside and all around us.
The children have also explored the lovely story ‘Elmer’ which helps explore our differences. The children have made their own patchwork elephants, whilst also exploring multi-coloured rice in our investigation station. Elmer the Elephant teaches us that everyone is unique and each of us has something that sets us apart from everyone else. We should embrace our differences and always be true to who we are. In our circle time activities, the children talked about what makes them special...
‘I am different because I have blonde hair’.
‘I am different because we are different people. I wear different t-shirts to my friends’.
‘I am different because I wear different clothes to my friends. I am special because my face is different and I have blonde curly hair’.
The Everywhere Bear
In Hedgehogs we have a nursery bear which each child gets to take home. A take home teddy bear is an activity which helps connect what the children are learning in nursery and extending that into their home. It is a chance for the children to share their own experiences with the bear and then talk about those experiences in nursery. We use the wonderful story written by Julian Donaldson to help support this activity. Our class bear has already enjoyed such wonderful outings including a trip to a football stadium, park and building dens in the woods.
Please Don’t Forget…
- Healthy/appropriate snacks and lunchboxes to be provided please
- A labelled bottle of water
If you would like your child to have hot dinners, please speak to Mrs Pennington in the office.
If you have any questions regarding nursery please speak to Miss Sevenoaks (Nursery Manager) or Clare (Nursery assistant).
