22 Street Lane Nursery - February 2021 Newsletter

Newsletter February

Play • Discovery • Growth

February Newsletter

Dear Parents and Carers, Welcome to our February newsletter, and as always, greetings to our new families who have recently joined us. We have a very busy month ahead of us for the children, kicking off with Mindfulness Week and Chinese New Year celebrations, followed by Valentine’s Day and Pancake Day. Thank you too for getting involved in all the wonderful home learning challenges there has been this month. From creating homes for the Arctic animals, baking Beetroot Chocolate Whoopie Pies to freezing natural resources in ice for ice play. It has been lovely to see the activities the children have taken part in at home and their beautiful creations. We will be celebrating China this month to tie in with Chinese New Year which is the Year of the Ox. The children will be exploring different parts of China, Chinese cuisine and of course the New Year celebrations with the exciting lion dance and dragon dance. Chris can’t wait to share his Chinese meals with the children too. To find out more, please read on!

Children’s Mental Health Awareness Week: 1st - 7th February The focus of this week is ‘Express Yourself’. We all know how important it is for children to be able to express themselves and more than ever, in these difficult times, we need to find tools and resources to enable children to do this more easily. Puppets and stories about feelings is a good place to start. At 22SLN, we will be looking at ‘in the moment’ breathing, doing mindfulness eating and simple yoga exercises to help focus in the moment. The following website offers resources for you to do with your children at home too, as well as more information if you wish to donate to this charity: https://www.childrensmentalhealthweek.org.uk/about- the-week/ February Newsletter NEWS Deborah, from Yoga with Debs, who has previous lead yoga exercises with the children at 22SLN, has offered some online classes for you to access from home during Children’s Mental Health Awareness Week. Deborah is going to do a 30 minute class from 11:30am to 12pm on Monday through Friday. Here are the details if you wish to join in: https://www.facebook.com/events/406537430797331 As well as here website for more information: http://www.yogawithdebs.org.uk/

February Newsletter NEWS Parent Feedback Your feedback is vital, and we would like to hear your thoughts on areas that you feel the nursery could improve, so that we can continue to deliver outstanding care and education. If you haven’t already done so, please could you take a few minutes to fill out our Parent Feedback form. All forms will be evaluated by the Management Team and acted upon where possible to improve our practice and service. https://www.22streetlanenursery.co.uk/parent-feedback-form/

Team Training Days 2021: Dates for your Diary The nursery will be closed on the following dates in 2021 for staff training days: Thursday 24th June & Tuesday 26th October Thank you for your continued support.

Employee Recognition Awards We are extremely grateful to have an incredible team that strive to deliver outstanding care for the children at the nursery. For this reason, we are looking to honour one of our employees who deserves recognition for delivering outstanding care and education every day through their work. This will be a ‘monthly’ award and the winner for February will be announced in our March newsletter. Please could we ask you to take time to vote as your opinions and feedback are very important to us. https://www.22streetlanenursery.co.uk/employee-recognition- award-vote/

February Newsletter NEWS

Martin House Children’s Hospice Fundraiser Thank you to everyone for your very generous donations for our charity uniform sale in December. We have been able to raise a total of £293.50 for Martin House Children’s Hospice, who were very grateful for the donation.

Redecorating The Cygnets Room We are happy to say that the Cygnets Room has received a makeover. The room has been repainted and deep cleaned; maintaining our neutral, calming environment and colour scheme in line with our ethos based on the Reggio Emilia approach to learning. We understand how difficult it must be for our parents not being able to come into the rooms, so we hope these photos will give you a better idea of where your children spend their day.

February Newsletter NEWS

Country of the Month - China This month the children will be learning about the primary colours of the Chinese flag and stars. This will support learning around counting, shapes and colours. It is always fun for children to learn about different clothes, homes and food specific to other countries! And who doesn’t enjoy Chinese food! The children will also get the chance to practice some Chinese writing too. Did you know? China has the largest population of any country on earth, with 1.43 billion citizens. It is also the fourth largest country in the world in terms of landmass, after Russia, Canada and the USA.

World Kite Flying Day: 8th February 2021 To support of exploration of China, we will also be celebrating ‘World Kite Flying Day’, which encourages the exploration of flying and making different types of kites, which are a big part of Chinese culture. There are some wonderful kite designs that look like dragons, lions and butterflies too. The origins of kites even date back to China in 470 B.C.

February Newsletter NEWS

Country of the Month Celebrations: Iceland The children have had great fun this month learning about Iceland. We did start this a little early with our Christmas Eve celebration of Jolabokoflod, where the children got to share their favourite stories with the friends with some warm cocoa. The Swans have had an exciting home learning challenge to build homes for the Arctic animals and there have been some lovely creations from them. They have also learnt about puffins and narwhals too. There have been ice-making home learning challenges for the younger children who have enjoyed exploring the natural objects found in the ice when it melted. The children have explored the colours of the Iceland flag and also talked about the exciting blend of colours in the Northern Lights too. The children even got to create their own Northern Lights too by mixing together their favourite colours of paint. The younger children explored silver, white and blue through their sensory play and really enjoyed the shiny discs and foil. The Ducklings created their own ‘Blue Lagoon’ and had a lot of fun filling and pouring the blue water.

February Newsletter NEWS

Burns Night Celebration The children at 22 Street Lane all enjoyed this celebration in different ways. Chris made a lovely meal of a Scottish ‘neeps and tatties’ stew with a traditional Raspberry Cranachan for pudding. Some children also continued their Burns Night celebrations at home with a traditional meal of haggis, neeps and tatties. The children learned about kilts, using tartan fabric and different coloured paper to make their own. They concentrated really hard on their gluing and sticking, which promoted small muscle control, especially having to select the pieces of fabric and then use the glue spreader. There were a variety of painting activities going on throughout the day with children exploring blue and white paint in different ways. Some enjoyed the messy activity of mixing the colours whilst the older children had a go at creating their own Scottish flag. The Ducklings also enjoyed the opportunity to do potato printing.

February Newsletter

Dish of the Month

Tuna and Red Pepper Pasta Bake

We’ve had a lot of parents ask about this recipe after the rave reviews from the children, so we are happy to share it with you as our ‘Dish of the Month’!

See our past selections on: 22streetlanenursery.co.uk/dish-of-the-month/

Ingredients

• 2 tablespoons of dairy free butter • 2 cloves of garlic, chopped • 3 large red peppers, seeded and roughly chopped • 3 spring onions, chopped • 3 (160g) tins of tuna, drained • 2 tins of chopped tomatoes

• 50 grams of spinach • 300g of penne pasta

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 180 C / Gas 4. 2. Bake the peppers in the oven until soft 3. Bring a pan of water to the boil and then cook the pasta until soft 4. Melt the butter and add the garlic, pepper and spring onions. Cook and stir this mixture for 5 minutes until softened slightly. 5. Add the remainder of the ingredients, stir well and then transfer to a baking dish, seasoning lightly with a salt and pepper. (You can blend the sauce before adding the tuna if you wish) 6. Add the cooked pasta and gently stir 7. Bake in the preheated oven for 20 minutes until piping hot and golden brown. 8. Remove from the oven and serve.

February Newsletter Chinese New Year Week: 11th - 17th February

2021 is the ‘Year of the Ox’. The children at 22 Street Lane will get the opportunity to look at beautiful Chinese lanterns, learning about why ‘little red envelopes’ are given to children and getting to taste some sweet dumplings. Red is the main colour of the festival, so our rooms will feature plenty of red decorations.

February Newsletter Valentine’s Day Celebrations: Friday 12th February Valentine’s Day is celebrated on February 14th in honour of Saint Valentine of Rome. In England, it grew into an occasion in which people expressed their love for each other by presenting flowers, offering confectionery and sending Valentine’s cards. The children at 22SLN will be busy making their own Valentine cards to send to the people they love, looking at heart shapes, exploring the colours red and pink, as well as rose petals that will provide a wonderful sensory experience for them too.

February Newsletter Shrove Tuesday (Pancake Day!): Tuesday 16th February This is always a very popular celebration at 22SLN/ In other countries it is referred to as ‘Mardi Gras’ which translates as ‘Fat Tuesday’. This is the time that people traditionally use up their leftover sugary foods before starting their fast for Lent. Chris will be onboard for this celebration too, providing a lovely spread of healthy pancakes for the children to enjoy.

February Newsletter Chicklets Room News

This month in the Chicklets we welcome the New Year with new friends and new interests. We would like to say a big welcome to our new Chicklets who have joined us this month. They have settled into the room really well and we can’t wait to see how they develop further. Throughout January we have celebrated Iceland as our ‘Country of the Month’. We explored various types of messy play, such as shaving foam snow. Icelandic setups included reflective materials, foils, and ice blocks. We also recreated mini-Northern Light canvases and recreated a very messy version of the Iceland flag. The children have shown an interest in the sensory materials this month too. These have been used during singing sessions to make it more interactive. The children also enjoyed using these scarves to hide their face and play peek-a-boo. The Chicklets have also shown an interest in animals and have enjoyed picking out books and looking at the different animals pictures in them. We have been practicing the different animal noises for farm and jungle animals.

CHICKLETS ROOM

February Newsletter

Ducklings Room News

The Ducklings have celebrated Iceland for our ‘Country of the Month’, which involved in lots of messy play activities involving ice play and shaving foam. They used their fine motor skills to pick out and explore different objects, and painting a representation of the Northern Lights. The children used their senses to explore the texture of the paint and created marks with the paintbrush on the paper. They used their motor skills to move the paintbrush backwards and forwards to create shapes and designs. The Ducklings have also enjoyed baking this month. The children loved making their own mixed berry cake and they took turns to mix the ingredients together with the big spoon in the mixing bowl. The Ducklings enjoyed cracking the eggs, mixing the sugar and butter, as well as sprinkling the flour and adding yummy berries. As the Ducklings interests lately has been spotting different birds in our garden and in the sky, we decided to make our own bird feeders for the birds to enjoy using pinecones and recycled toilet paper holders. The Ducklings used their hands and fingers to scoop the bird seed and stick it to the pinecones using honey. We can’t wait to see if the birds come and enjoy our bird seed holders. The Duckling’s favourite book to read this month has been ‘Peace at Last’. We followed their interest and extended the learning by creating their own ‘Peace at Last’ cosy corner. The Ducklings enjoyed roleplaying and getting into bed like Mr. Bear and reading the story together.

DUCKLINGS ROOM

February Newsletter Goslings Room News

January has been the perfect month to explore winter and our ‘County of the Month’, Iceland, especially with all the snow we have had! We have incorporated these themes into our daily activities and the Goslings have really enjoyed being curious and investigating the snow further. Not only did we get the chance to play in the snow outside, but we also transferred the snow into our indoor play. The snow was added to the tuff tray along with powdered paint where we were able to use sticks to create marks and mix the colours together. We discussed the colours that had been added and then identified the new ones as they changed when we mixed them. We were also able to talk about whether the snow was warm or cold and what it felt like when we touched it. The Goslings have been exploring our interpretation of the Blue Lagoon, which is located in Iceland, and we found the children were very engaged in this activity due to their interest in water play. We showed the children real life pictures of the Blue Lagoon and we were able to implement this by creating blue water and using shaving foam for the snowy mountains. This month we have been focusing on promoting kindness and sharing with one another by using a lot of positive reinforcement, along with visual picture cards, hand gestures and actions. We have noticed that in OUR activities, the Goslings have been doing a lovely job in sharing and taking turn

GOSLINGS ROOM

February Newsletter Cygnets Room News

The Cygnets have had a fun-filled month exploring the world. We have spoken about what we can do to make the world cleaner, such as recycling and making sure we put our rubbish in the bin, rather than on the floor. The children have really enjoyed exploring animals from around the world and finding out what countries they live in. The ‘Country of the Month’ has been Iceland. The Cygnets Room has started ‘Curious Cygnets’ and the children have really enjoyed exploring their outdoor surroundings and collecting natural materials to create some amazing artwork. The children are very excited to continue this throughout the year and are looking forward to venturing out to the park to find lots of natural and wonderful treasures. The Cygnets have also been excited to explore our new area in the room ‘The Baking Station’ The area is available for the children to bake independently, explore ingredients and to work together as a team to create things together. The children have really enjoyed exploring this area and have made some wonderful, healthy cakes and treats. We have had so much fun in the snow over the past couple of weeks and have been making lots of fantastic snowmen, snow angels and having snowball games. We can’t wait to plan many more activities for next month.

CYGNETS ROOM

February Newsletter

The Swans have been very busy throughout January and have enjoyed learning about lots of exciting things. Our ‘Country of the Month’ was Iceland, and the children have really enjoyed exploring where Iceland is located on the world map, foods traditionally eaten in Iceland, animals that can be found in Iceland and their habitats and lots more exciting facts about the country! The Swans started by exploring animals that live in Iceland. Some firm favourites were definitely the narwhal, puffin, arctic fox, and Icelandic sheep. The children were also set an exciting home learning challenge to create a home for an animal of their choice. It has been so lovely to see all the various habitats that have been created using a large range of natural resources! Linked to Iceland, the Swans have also been focusing on our current season ‘Winter’, especially as we have recently had lots of snow! The Swans were all so excited to explore the snow in the Big Garden, building a snowman and even sledging down the hill on Paul’s sledge. The children also really enjoyed sharing their photos on Tapestry of what they had been up to, and it was really great to see what you had been up to at home! We have also been creating our own winter collages using cotton wool, paint, and tissue paper. The Swans have also been learning about the importance of being kind to one another, looking at some of our new stories ‘The Squirrels who Squabbled’ and ‘The Colour Monster’ and discussing why we need to be kind to each other and what we can do if we are feeling angry or sad. The children also thought of a time when they were kind to someone and had a go at drawing it and putting it onto our new ‘Kindness Tree’. Swans Room News

SWANS ROOM

February Newsletter

*ATTENTION* Important Information - Please Read

Car Park As you are aware, there are double yellow lines outside the nursery which have been put there for the safety of the children. Please can we ask that parents do not park on them, and also be mindful when parking on Park Lane that you do not park over the driveways of the residents there. Many of them are Key Workers who need immediate access from their homes when called out. There have been a few vehicles obstructing their driveways recently. Drop Off and Collection Can we kindly remind you that we open at 7.30 am and close at 6.00 pm and any parents who pick up after this time will be charged. We would just like to also remind you that the side gate to the Goslings, Cygnets and Swans areas will be locked between 9.00 am and 4.00 pm and should you drop off or collect outside of these times, it will be necessary to contact reception to arrange for someone to unlock the gate. High Temperatures and Fevers Please can we kindly remind parents that children cannot attend nursery if they have a high temperature (37.6 ° C). If a child develops a temperature whilst at nursery, parents will be called to collect them, as supported by our policies and procedures. Due to the guidance from National Health England, children who have a high temperature and a cough will be asked to have a Covid-19 test with a negative result required before returning to the setting. HMRC Additional Funding Code (3- & 4-year-olds - 30 hours) If you are eligible and in receipt of additional 3- & 4-year-old funding, look out for a prompt every three months from HMRC to reconfirm your details so that your eligibility can be re- assessed. If you do not do this, please note that we are unable to claim the funding on your behalf. Absence Please note that we are unable to swap days or offer an alternative day if your child is absent from nursery. We are now extremely busy, and it is impossible for us to do this for all children. This is stated in our terms and conditions. Thank you for your co-operation. Labels in Clothing To avoid items being lost, please can you ensure that your child’s uniform is clearly labelled including their coats, hats, scarves and wellies. If your child brings gloves to nursery, we strongly advise for these to be attached and threaded through their coat to avoid any gloves going missing.

February Newsletter Upcoming Events

W/C Monday 1 st February Children’s Mental Health Awareness Week

W/C Monday 8 th February Chinese New Year Celebrations

Friday 12 th February Valentine’s Day Celebrations

Tuesday 16 th February Pancake Day!

Monday 1 st March St. David’s Day

Thursday 4 th March World Book Day

CONTACT US 0333 043 22 22

www.22streetlanenursery.co.uk info@22streetlanenursery.co.uk