22 Street Lane Nursery - March 2023 Newsletter

Newsletter March

Play • Discovery • Growth

March Newsletter

Dear Parents and Carers, Welcome to our March newsletter, and as always, a very big welcome to the new families who have joined us recently. The children have had a very busy month with a lot to celebrate and many fun-filled days themed around National Storytelling Week, Valentine's Day and Pancake Day! We will be kicking off March by celebrating St/ David’s Day and World Book Day! Later on in March, we will be celebrating Comic Relief, Mother’s Day, the festival of colour ‘Holi’ and St. Patrick's Day! With spring fast approaching, we look forward to the warmer months and lighter nights, as well as enjoying more outdoor activities. The children have already started to plant various flowers and vegetables, and are excited to watch them grow! To find out more, please read on...

March Newsletter NEWS

Upcoming Car Park Closure The nursery car park will be closed for five days during March, as we are refreshing the resin entrance and entire car park, as well as carrying out some essential maintenance work. We will confirm the exact dates closer to the time via Tapestry. Parents will need to find nearby street parking and enter the nursery through the pedestrian gate to drop off and collect their child during this period.

Country of the Month: March 2023 - Ireland Throughout March we will be celebrating Ireland as our Country of the Month.

Ireland is known as the Emerald Isle because it is so green and rains for a good chunk of the year. The children will be learning about the Harp, which is the national symbol of Ireland and traditional Celtic music which features fiddles, tin whistles and harps, and who can resist giving Irish Dancing a go!

March Newsletter NEWS

National Storytelling Week Activities The children celebrated National Storytelling Week with a visit from the Library Bus. The librarian read some of the children's favourite stories and nursery rhymes!

Celebrating Family and Friends on Valentine’s Day The children had lots of fun celebrating Valentine's Day! They made special pictures for people that they love, as well as sharing pictures of their loved ones at circle time. The younger children enjoyed a ‘Love Potion’ themed water tray and petal play! Other activities included decorating love hearts by sticking together different materials using glue sticks and painting them with cotton, and a variety of messy play activities involving pasta, water, playdough and rose petals!

March Newsletter NEWS

Shrove Tuesday Festivities To celebrate Pancake Day, Chris cooked up some yummy pancakes, which the children then added their favourite toppings to and enjoyed as their pudding! The children also read through the book 'The Run Away Pancake' and took part in lots of different themed activities, such as pancake races in the garden and making pancakes out of playdough The older children even put their culinary skills to good use by chopping up different fruits, like strawberries and bananas, to add to their pancakes as a topping! We hope that all you all enjoyed our taster pancakes too.

St. David's Day Celebrations To celebrate St David’s Day, we will be exploring the country of Wales and different Welsh customs, such as daffodils and castles! The children will have the opportunity to get crafty by using a variety of different resources such as egg cartons, leaves from the baby garden and yellow paint mixed with glue to make daffodils. Chris will delicious leek and potato meal for high tea and a Welsh rarebit for snack.

March Newsletter World Book Day: Thursday 2nd March

We will be celebrating World Book Day and the magic of lots of different stories on Thursday 3rd March. The children are invited to dress as their favourite book characters and bring their favourite book along with them to the nursery. Each room will also be arranging their own fun activities to celebrate the day!

March Newsletter Holi Colour Festival: Tuesday 7th March

What is Holi? - Holi is a Hindu festival that celebrates spring, love, and new life. Some families hold religious ceremonies, but for many Holi is more a time for fun. It's a colourful festival, with dancing, singing and throwing of powder paint and coloured water. Holi is also known as the 'Festival of Colours'. To mark this occasion, the children are invited to wear bright coloured clothes, the brighter the better!

March Newsletter Mother’s Day Tea Party: Monday 13 th - Friday 24 th March

We would like to invite all of our special people to our Mother's Day Tea Party which will be held over two sessions for each room at 3-4pm. Due to space in theroom, we can only accommodate a limited number of people depending on the session, details of this and the dates foreach room can be found to the right. Spaces will be offered on a first come, first served basis. If you’d like to attend, please speak to Alex or Shosh at the Reception Desk who will book your slot in for you and advise which spaces are remaining

Tuesday 14th March Thursday 23rd March Friday 17th March Monday 20th March

10 Spaces 10 Spaces 11 Spaces 11 Spaces

Chicklets

Ducklings

Wednesday 15th March 11 Spaces Tuesday 21st March 10 Spaces

Goslings

Monday 13th March Friday 24th March Thursday 16th March

21 Spaces 21 Spaces

Cygnets

20 Spaces Wednesday 22nd March 19 Spaces

Swans

March Newsletter St. Patrick's Day: Friday 17th March

The children are invited to wear green to celebrate St Patrick’s Day. We will be exploring all things green, shamrocks and leprechauns! The children will be learning about Irish customs and traditions. They’ll also get to enjoy a traditional St Patrick’s Day lunch of Irish stew, which we’re sure will be super yummy!

March Newsletter

Dish of the Month

Leek and Potato Soup

While the days are starting to get a little longer, the colder months can still creep into Spring. With this in mind, we wanted to share a warm and hearty soup recipe that is quick and simple to make, while also being filled with lots of vegetables! The children really enjoyed the taste and texture of it when they tried it at the nursery this month.

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

• 1 tbsp vegetable oil • 1 onion, sliced • 225g potatoes, cubed • 2 medium leeks, sliced • 2 pints vegetable stock

• 150ml double cream or crème fraiche • Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Method

1. Heat the oil in a large pan and add the chopped onions, potatoes and leeks. Cook for 3-4 minutes, or until the vegetables start to soften. 2. Add the vegetable stock and bring to the boil. Season with salt and pepper and simmer for 10 minutes, or until the vegetables are tender. 3. Blend until smooth, then reheat in a clean pan and stir in the cream or crème fraiche. Heat through and serve.

March Newsletter Chicklets Room News February has been full of love here in the Chicklets Room!

Of course, we celebrated Valentine's Day with lots of themed messy play activities. We even painted our loved ones on a Valentine's Day card to tell them how much we care about them. The Chicklets were also spreading the love with their friends - practicing gentle hands and giving our friends cuddles. A big interest in the Chicklets Room has been babies. The children have been super helpful in caring for our dollies; washing them, dressing them, and feeding them too! We also had a very special visit from Shamyla and baby Zaki, and the Chicklets were extra gentle with the tiny baby. Well done everybody! As a lot of the Chicklets are beginning to start taking independent steps now, we are all going to be working hard on our physical development. The children love song time, so this will help us to practice big movements like stomps and marches up on our feet. We are also going to be spending lots of time challenging ourselves on the climbing frame inside and on the steps outside to build our confidence in manoeuvring across different surfaces. We can’t wait to see what March brings!

CHICKLETS ROOM

March Newsletter

Ducklings Room News

The Ducklings have enjoyed getting involved with our weekly baking activities where they have enjoyed making their own mixed berry loaf! They used their fine motor skills to mix the ingredients with the big spoon in the mixing bowl. We have also baked yummy flapjack and banana bread this month, all with the help from the Ducklings. We introduced ‘Ducklings Diverse Dishes’ afterthe children showed interest in our roleplay area, which features a scrapbook of pictures of our families and all the food the children have tried. We have created this scrapbook and placed it outside the Ducklings Room for all parents to have a look at. The Ducklings enjoyed listening to Millie and Colin read us a story in the big Story Bus and we sang some of our favourite nursery rhymes. The Ducklings then confidently chose a book in the Story Bus and began reading in the story den, or with a member of staff. The Ducklings explored all the different books the Story Bus had and really enjoyed this visit. We had a special visitor, Noodle, a therapy dog who came to say "Hello!". The Ducklings were very gentle and kind to the dog. We sang some of our favourite nursery rhymes and did all the signs to go along with them.. After we had finished singing, the Ducklings loved giving Noodle lots of cuddles and we even gave him some treats. The Ducklings enjoyed exploring the pancake tough tray, we spoke about all the ingredients we put into pancakes and explored the textures of the ingredients on our hands and mouths. The Ducklings then explored the different ingredients, such as lemons, which they enjoyed tasting and pulling very funny faces!

DUCKLINGS ROOM

March Newsletter Goslings Room News

The Goslings have been very busy over the past few weeks, we kicked off February by celebrating Valentine's Day. In order to celebrate the day of love, the Goslings have been enjoying decorating heart shapes using all things red and pink! This includes making cards for the ones we love the most. The Goslings have been enjoying action-based nursery rhymes recently, before lunch or teatime we often give the children an opportunity to choose whether they would like to read a story or do some singing! They enjoy movement when singing along to songs such as ‘Miss Polly had a Dolly’ and ‘Head, shoulders, knees and toes’. With the weather becoming milder, we have been busy taking trips to our local charity shops on Street Lane. The Goslings were very excited to walk to the shops and explore what things they could find for the nursery! We bought a new drum, alongside jigsaw puzzles, which was a great find. We also have been taking trips to Roundhay Park to feed the swans and ducks, we find it is important to provide as many new experiences as possible to spark the children’s curiosity. Moving on, Shrove Tuesday was a very busy day. The Goslings enjoyed yummy pancakes with delicious fruit with their lunch. We also made out very own pancakes inspired by nature, using leaves from the baby garden and purple-coloured rice to use as sprinkles on our playdough pancakes. Lastly, The Goslings have been enjoying their new curiosity surrounding mini-beasts as of late. We have been enjoying lots of mini-beast themed activities in our tuff trays filled with different materials which have been great fun.

GOSLINGS ROOM

March Newsletter Cygnets Room News

Throughout February, the Cygnets children have had so much fun and enjoyed lots of lovely activities. We loved celebrating Valentine's Day, where all of the children made cards and a little decoration to take home to their loved ones. At group time, the children also shared who they love and why. We then had a special visit from Noodle the Therapy Dog. He came to teach the Cygnets some sign language. We sang some of our favourite nursery rhymes and learnt the signs to go along with them. The children then took turns giving Noodle a big cuddle and some yummy treats. A big interest in the room recently has been exploring shapes, so we have been setting out lots of activities for the children to take part in. A favourite was making shapes in the creative area out of different materials, such as making a triangle out of lollypop sticks. Towards the end of February, we also celebrated Pancake Day! The children did a great job at helping to make some delicious pancakes and cutting up some fruit for our toppings. We had so much fun designing our own pancakes using playdough. The children used natural materials and their imagination to create their favourite pancakes. In March we are looking forward to celebrating World Book Day. There will be lots of lovely activities revolving around the children’s favourite books for them to explore, as well as dressing up as our favourite character. We are also going to start some planting in the big garden as we move into Spring! We can’t wait to begin planting and watch our flowers and vegetables start to grow.

CYGNETS ROOM

Swans Room News March Newsletter

In February we had a lot of fun activities and experiences. At the start of the month, we celebrated National Storytelling Week and got to see everyone's love of books and characters. The children shared their favourite books and enjoyed spending more time in our reading area together. We also had a visit from the Story Bus, which provided a lovely experience for the children. This has made us very excited for World Book Day in March. We also celebrated Valentine's Day and felt the love in Swans Room. The children shared lots of special people in their lives and added their names to 'The Love Box' that the children had made. We also made Valentine's frozen bark. The children chopped up their own fruit and mixed them into natural yogurt and honey which we froze. We then got to smash the bark and take them home. We also delivered some to other rooms as an act of kindness to others. Lots of the children have recently shown an interest in balance and challenging themselves to make obstacle courses and bridges out of wooden planks. These have become very popular as a lot of the children now enjoy playing 'The floor is lava' and jumping between planks. We were also lucky enough to have another visitor to our room to help us learn about people who help us, a vet and her helper 'Chester the Dog'. The children listened well and were able to take part in lots of little activities including using a stethoscope, using bandages, meeting Chester and trying on vet's scrubs. It was a super visit!

SWANS ROOM

March Newsletter

Upcoming Events

Wednesday 1 st March St. David’s Day Thursday 2 nd March World Book Day Tuesday 7 th March Holi Colour Festival Monday 13 th - Friday 24 th March Mothering Sunday Tea Party Friday 17 th March St. Patrick’s Day Friday 17 th March Comic Relief

March Newsletter

*ATTENTION* Important Information - Please Read

Car Park Please can we kindly ask that parents ensure they are only parking in a single car parking bay. As you are aware, we have very limited space, and it is very busy a peak times. Thank you for your support. 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. 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.

CONTACT US 0333 043 22 22

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