Our day at The Croft begins at 7.30am when we welcome the children who join us for breakfast. By 8.30am all of our little Crofters will have arrived and we spend the first part of the morning finding our special friends, playing with a favoured toy or sharing a catch up with a special grown up.
At 9.00am we come together for our group activities, and we start with a session of dough disco. In this session the children manipulate playdough to their favourite music building the muscles in their hands, arms and shoulders and using cross body movements. Crossing the midline is vital to development especially in the skills that require using both sides of the body together, such as putting on shoes and socks, writing and cutting.
We follow this with our daily maths activities where we focus on all facets of number in a fun and playful way. Using our friendly aliens and numicon to help us the children gain deep understanding of numbers to 10.
We follow this with a large uninterrupted period of child led play which includes continuous access to our outdoor learning area. We are outside in all weathers so children are asked to leave full waterproofs, including wellington boots in the nursery each day.
Mid-morning we open our self-service snack area. The children are provided with choice of two healthy fruit or vegetable options and are encouraged to serve themselves independently. Not only do they learn the important skills of pouring drinks, they also learn about the importance of hygiene and gain responsibility for clearing up and recycling.
As the morning comes to an end we come together again for our daily dose of phonics. We start our phonics journey with lots of rhyming and alliteration games as well practicing to discriminate different environmental sounds. Once the children are ready we will introduce our Phase 2 letter sounds.
At lunchtime, the children take the walk through the school to The Refectory where they are served with a hot and nutritious meal.
During our afternoons we not only revisit the work done in our morning sessions we make the most of our time playing and exploring the nursery together or we may also make the most of the school grounds by taking the children out for a welly walk and exploring the changing seasons.
By the end of the day it is time for a quiet story or music session and we can relax and reflect upon our day before some of our children are collected at 3.30 p.m.
Our tea-time club starts at 3.30pm where each day the children are treated to a different daily focus before sitting down with their friends for tea.