Week 9

Book of the Week: Dora's Eggs       Rhyme of the Week: Mary Had a Little Lamb

Dora's Eggs has quickly turned into a class favourite book! The children really enjoyed this fun story all about farm animals and their young and could read it word for word themselves by the end of the week. In the story, Dora the hen lays her first eggs and she loves them but thinks they are a bit boring - they don't do anything! The puppies can run and calf sleeps and ducklings swim but the eggs just stay still. Little does she know what will happen to them next. This book allowed us to revisit our learning about life cycles from last half term in a new way and the children enjoyed learning about the life cycle of mammals this time. Across the week, they have built nests, explored eggs, made chicken lifecycles from dough, measured farm-themed animals and plants and so much more! In Communication and Language we have focused on the sound 'a.' We have found items that start with 'a,' explored where the 'a' sound comes in different words and listened for rhyming words with the sound 'a' in them. We don't focus on the written letter yet as that comes in Reception but developing our phonological awareness around sounds really gets us ready for September. In Maths, we have thought about 'one less' and what comes before numbers as well as a focus on measuring. We measured farm animals, each other and even measured the size of the biggest Eagle's Nest found in America (after reading about it in a book). It was 2.5m wide and 4m tall. Even on her tiptoes, Miss Bagnall couldn't reach 4m high we measured out the space on the playground of 2.5m and got to 3m high in the end! All of the Caterpillar children in that session were able to fit inside, with lots of space left! Bald Eagles return to the same nest each year and just add to the top and sides, which is why they get so big... who knew?!

        

      

Week 8 

Book of the Week: Tractor Saves the Day       Rhyme of the Week: Baa Baa Black Sheep

What a busy week exploring our theme of tractors, vehicles and jobs on the farm. Our focus book had lots of really impressive vocabulary in it which we explored together e.g. furrow, plough, blustery, harrow. We have also been exploring tractor tyres and learning why they have such deep tread. We enjoyed testing out our tractors on different surfaces indoors and outdoors, as well as rolling different tractors across the dough to see the tracks, and getting very messy by rolling our tractors through muddy paint! Across the week we also enjoyed creating lots of disaster scenarios on our Small World Farm and seeing how Tractor might save the day, listening to farm stories and working together as a class to create our own huge shared artwork piece of... you guessed it... a tractor! We were a great team and the children really looked at each part of the tractor and decided how they could make it. They used sellotape to make the windows shiny like glass, tree stamps to show the reflection of the farm in the windows and string to make the ladder feel 3D as if you could really climb it! In Communication and Language, we focussed on retelling narratives in detail and recalling facts from a story and on listening for the sound 's' in words and objects. In Maths, we focused on 'one more' and knowing what comes next automatically with the numbers 0-5. This has involved lots of playing with number lines, spotting mistakes in number lines, creating games and singing Maths songs. 

         

 

Week 7

Book of the Week: Farmyard Hullabaloo      Rhyme of the Week: Old MacDonald

Welcome back Caterpillars! We started off our Farm learning in style this week! Our focus book was a poetry book and the children remembered that we didn't have to start at the start of the book like we do with a story. They really enjoyed jumping around from page to page, picking which animals to read about. During the week, we enjoyed learning and performing whole poems which we were really proud of. We even got to put on animal masks to help us perform our poems and shows. During the week we learnt what a farm actually is, what animals might live there, what animals give us and how some farms don't have any animals at all, only things that grow in the ground! We enjoyed some farm art, music and small world play and created our own questions and ideas to explore across this half term. In Communication and Language we focused on storytelling and including the features of 'who, what, where, when, what happened and the end.' In Maths, we focussed on the composition of 5 and the ways in which we can make five using different amounts e.g. 3+2, 4+1, 1+1+1+2. 

       

 

On The Farm - WELCOME BACK!

 

Week 6 

Book of the Week: Owl Babies    Rhyme of the Week: Twinkle Twinkle Little Star

What a super end to this half term! We have focussed on the story of Owl Babies and learnt all about what happens in our gardens at night when we are asleep. We learnt the words 'nocturnal' and 'diurnal' to describe whether animals sleep in the day or the night and found out all about how animals might be adapted to being awake at night such as bats echolocation skills. We loved drawing and painting on black paper which proved to be a very different experience to the day time. On Friday, we ended our 'In The Garden' topic with a special Minibeast Ball celebration day with Reception Class. We enjoyed lots of games, activities and even some dancing, using our knowledge from the topic to guide our play. We really enjoyed spending the day with Reception as well. For those of us joining Butterflies in September this was a lovely chance to spend more time in Blue Room and with Mr Pinnock. In Maths we continued our learning about 3D shapes and in Communication and Language we spent the week practising our key skills from this term: rhyme, alliteration and blending! We also had the chance to release our class butterflies this week which was so exciting! We have loved watching them go from tiny caterpillars to beautiful butterflies.

Wishing you all a very happy and sunny half term break. We look forward to welcoming you back after half term for our final half term of this academic year and our new topic: On the Farm. 

   

   

 

Week 5

Book of the Week: Bird Builds a Nest    Rhyme of the Week: 5 Little Ducks

This week we have thought about some bigger animals that we see in the garden... birds. Our Book of the Week was really interesting as it was a mix of fiction and non-fiction. Across the week we did lots of bird-themed activities and learnt all about some common British birds. Our favourites included blue tits and goldfinches as we liked their beautiful colours. In our learning, we found out how birds made nests, did observational drawings of birds and even made some bird biscuits to take home to put in our gardens or on our windowsills for birds to enjoy. We also enjoyed lots of bird-themed stories and making our own binoculars to take outside bird-watching. Across the week we spotted lots of blackbirds, pigeons and crows.

Baby Eva is now 9 weeks old and it was time for her vaccinations. We learnt that some babies have injections in their arms or legs and we set up a baby clinic to weigh Eva and give her her medicine. She was very brave! In RE, we learnt about May being the Month of Mary and had our own May procession with flower garlands. 

In Maths, we explored 3D shapes (cubes, spheres, cylinders and cuboids) and in Communication and Language, we continued our work on sound-talk as this is a tricky skill!

         

 

Week 4 

Book of the Week: The Crunching Munching Caterpillar    Rhyme of the Week: 5 Little Speckled Frogs

This week's Book of the Week was all about a caterpillar who was desperate to learn to fly! The book contained lots of examples of ellipsis (...) which was a great opportunity to practise the skill of predicting. Every time we saw ... we knew something was about to happen and we used clues from the story and from what we know about nature to predict what would happen next. This story allowed us to think more broadly about life cycles too, and particularly those that might happen in our gardens. We learnt that life cycles go around and around and around and we found out about the life cycles of butterflies, sunflowers, bees, and frogs! One of the children also knew about the life cycles of turtles too and told us all about it. Within our learning we made frog life cycles in the dough, completed life-cycle jigsaws and made beautiful butterfly art. Baby Eva is now 8 weeks old and responds to us when we coo and smile at her. She is beginning to make noises in response to us as well! 

In Maths, we have been exploring 2D shapes and using lots of maths words such as sides, corners, straight and curved. In Communication and Language, we continued our focus on the first sounds in words. Playing 'I Spy' at home can really support this if you use the letter sound not the name e.g. something beginning with 'f' not EFF. 

Next week we will be thinking about a different type of animal that we see in our gardens... birds! 

        

 

Week 3 

Book of the Week: Mad About Minibeasts     Rhyme of the Week: There's a Worm at the Bottom of the Garden

It's been another busy week in Caterpillars and we had another new child join our class this week. Welcome to St Peter's! We had a minibeast focus as part of our 'In the Garden' learning. The children loved our book of the week, which is a poetry book - they couldn't believe that you don't have to start at the beginning like you do with a story book. We jumped around everywhere, exploring different poems! Across our learning we have been on a minibeast hunt, built a giant spider web minibeast tray, printed footprints with minibeast toys, read lots of minibeast stories, made and measured playdough worms, built an outdoor minibeast hotel and even pretended to be birds, using different 'beaks' (pegs and tweezers) to pick up worms. We have also been watching both our cress and the caterpillars growing very quickly. Baby Eva turned 7 weeks old this week and she is beginning to smile when she is happy. We have been finding lots of different ways to make her laugh and smile.

In Maths we have been exploring the concept of 'more' and 'fewer' and in Communication and Language we have focused on listening to and identifiying the first sound we can hear in words. 

It has been so lovely and sunny that we have been outside a lot, spotting lots of minibeasts! Please can children bring hats to school when the sun is due to shine so brightly. Thank you. 

    

    

 

Week 2

Book of the Week: Jasper's Beanstalk      Rhyme of the Week: 5 Little Peas

This week, we have enjoyed exploring the book Jasper's Beanstalk to continue our theme of 'In the Garden.' This book helped us practise the days of the week and sequencing events. Within our learning we have retold the story, planted cress, rolled beans in the dough, made a junk model giant to go at the top of beanstalk, had real-life caterpillars delivered to school and enjoyed a Forest School session with Mr Pinnock! We have been settling into the new routines well and have welcomed another new child to our class.

This week, Baby Eva has turned 6 weeks old and we have learnt about the importance of tummy time for babies as it helps them develop so many important skills and muscles. We found out that tummy time is important for us too as it helps develop our shoulders and core muscles which will help us sit on a chair and be able to write. We had some tummy time drawing on a big roll of paper on the floor together which was great fun and a great chance to talk with each other. In Communication and Language, we focussed on rhyming and in Maths we explored positional language such as 'in, on, under, next to, between, behind, in front and through.' A great week - well done Caterpillars!

 

   

   

 

 

Week 1

Book of the Week: The Tiny Seed         Rhyme of the Week: Incy Wincy Spider

 

Signs of Spring

In Caterpillars, some of the children thought it was snowing on Tuesday because the sky was full of white pieces floating and whirling around in the wind. We talked about how this was actually called 'blossom' and is a sign of Spring. Over the next few days, we explored blossom in lots of different ways - collecting blossom, looking at different coloured blossom around school, making blossom pictures, stirring up blossom potions and even using chalk to make our own tree drawings on the floor which we added real blossom to, before pretending to be the wind and blowing it away on the breeze! There really is so much learning to be done outside in Spring!

 

 

 

Baby Eva

There have been lots of new people in Caterpillars this week! As well as a new teacher and a new child, Caterpillar Class have also been joined by a new baby. The children chose to name her Eva and she is only five weeks old. Across the year, they will learn all about baby Eva and experience lots of milestones with her. This week, they learnt how to hold her (being very careful of her head as she cannot hold it up on her own yet!) and how to feed her - patting her back when she is finished. In their Maths learning all about sequencing, they also created a bedtime routine for baby Eva to help her sleep well, including bath, story and cuddles. Welcome to St. Peter's Baby Eva!

 

 

  

 

Welcome Back!

Welcome Back Caterpillars!

 

We hope you all had a wonderful Christmas holiday filled with fun, laughter and special moments with your family and friends. 

The New Year will bring fresh routines, new discoveries, and plenty of opportunities to learn, play, and grow together. Our days will once again be filled with stories, songs, creativity and lots of happy adventures as we settle back into classroom life.

Here’s to a wonderful year ahead, we can’t wait to make many more happy memories together! 

Christmas Party Day

Our Caterpillars enjoyed their very first Christmas party today and it was truly magical. They were all dressed in their festive outfits and had so much fun playing pass the parcel and musical statues. We sat down for a Christmassy lunch, beautifully decorated with tinsel, making it feel extra special. A huge thank you to our wonderful kitchen staff for making the most amazing chocolate cake shaped like Christmas trees – the children absolutely loved them! Finally we joined the whole school for a Christmas sing-a-long, where we were fantastic at our part of “3 French Hens” and showed off a super hen wiggle! So many smiles, laughter and festive cheer… what a perfect way to celebrate! 

    

 

Christmas Sing-a-long

A huge well done to our wonderful Caterpillar Choir for performing at their Christmas sing-a-long for parents.

They performed “Father Christmas Had a Tree”, using musical instruments and sang favourites such as “Five Mince Pies in a Baker’s Shop”. The children sang beautifully, had a great boogie and performed with big smiles from start to finish – well done, we were so proud of you all!

   

 

Christmas Workshop 

A huge THANK YOU to all our amazing grown-ups who joined us for our magical Christmas workshop! We had so much fun together crafting cheeky little elves, decorating melting snowman biscuits, making Christmas scented playdough and much more! Your support and seeing their faces made our morning truly special. We hope it got everyone into the festive spirit ready to celebrate. 

   

 

Oh Christmas Tree, Oh Christmas Tree

Our Caterpillars have had a magical time decorating our Christmas tree! Everyone worked together to help put the twinkly lights on, then we added tinsel and baubles to make it sparkle. The best part? We did it all while singing (and dancing!) along to 'Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree' and we absolutely love how the tree is decorated perfectly to how far they could reach! 

The classroom is now full of festive cheer and excited little faces!

 

    

 

Numbers 1 and 2

This week in Maths we have been exploring the numbers 1 and 2 and having a blast while learning through play. One of the highlights was a fun game of Hook-a-Duck — a playful way to practise recognising numbers and counting. The children cheered each other on as they picked ducks and counted aloud together.

 

     

 

Frosty Morning!

We were full of wonder this morning as we explored the very first frost of the season! We discovered sparkling spiderwebs, touched frosty leaves, crunched across the frozen grass and even watched our breath dance in the cold air. We loved making marks in the frost and noticing how the ice melted in our hands. It was a magical morning of curiosity, sensory play and seasonal discovery!

 

      

Stickman

We had a wonderful afternoon in the Autumn sunshine exploring the world of Stickman! We gathered together to read the story, then used our imaginations to think about all the different things a stick could become. We thought of a hammer, a fishing rod, drumsticks, a magic wand and even a car! We even had time to explore the woodland to find our very own stickman to take home!

 

   

        

 

Stickman - Exploring Clay 

We have been getting wonderfully creative this week by exploring clay for the first time. We practised rolling, shaping and pressing the clay to make our very own ‘Stickman’.  This was a great activity for building the muscles in our hands and getting them strong. We are so proud of our fantastic creations and look how each one unique and full of character!

 

    

 

Maths - Size

We have been learning all about size and we used the story of ‘Goldilocks and the Three Bears’ to help bring the concept to life! We had great fun sorting bowls, plates, spoons, and even sieves into the correct sorting hoops. Outside, we continued our learning by hunting for leaves and sorting them into big, medium and small. A wonderful week of hands-on learning, storytelling and exploring the world around us!

 

  

Remembrance

Today we explored the meaning of Remembrance. We talked about the red poppies and what they stand for and the children were fascinated to learn that purple poppies remember the brave animals who helped in the war so of course, we had to paint those as well! Together we made big, beautiful art using rollers in green paint for the grass and using apples to print our poppies!  We finished the day with a happy game of football, just like the truce that brought peace at the end of the war. A meaningful day of learning, creativity, and teamwork!

 

   

 

 

Garden Fun!

Our Caterpillars always have an amazing time outdoors, making the most of every corner of the garden! Our builders have been hard at work using the diggers, our mechanics have been busy fixing the bikes, the musicians fill the air with joyful sounds as they explore our musical instruments. In the outdoor kitchen, the children make amazing hot chocolate and vegetable soup and of course we play plenty of football and teamwork games. But the best part of all? Just being together, playing, laughing and enjoying the outdoors.

 

          

 

Fireworks!

This week we have been talking all about our own Bonfire Night experiences. We loved sharing what we saw and heard, taking turns to speak as we passed around our special pretend “sparkler”. We also played a fun listening game, guessing different bonfire and firework sounds. We made stunning firework pictures using salt and watercolours, then added loose parts to decorate our very own night skies.

 

    

 

Autumn Leaves

We have fully embraced the magic of the season of Autumn! We headed out on a colourful autumn walk, collecting fallen leaves and sorting them by colour and size. We explored a weird and wonderful range of pumpkins, discovering all the different shapes, textures and patterns they come in. We had great fun at forest school hammering golf tees into the pumpkins and even experimented with watercolours as we painted them. We have also been learning about hibernation and made our very own playdough hedgehogs.

          

 

We're going on a pumpkin hunt

We had a rather wet and soggy adventure to Forest School! Thankfully, our waterproofs and wellies kept us warm and dry as we explored. We discovered some pumpkins hiding in the forest and had a fantastic time carving one open to see what was inside. The smell wasn’t everyone’s favourite but scooping out the seeds was lots of fun! We got very creative using watercolours to paint the white pumpkins and we loved hammering golf tees into the orange ones. A fantastic afternoon for those little hands and we had lots of muddy smiles all round!

 

  

Diwali

Wow, what a wonderful week we have had celebrating Diwali - the Festival of Lights!

We started off with a Diwali Celebration Day, where we came to school dressed in bright and traditional clothing. We learnt a special dance moving beautifully to the music and enjoyed a delicious curry together. Throughout the rest of the week, the celebrations continued with lots of creative learning. We made diva lamps, built temples with foam blocks and created colourful rangoli patterns with chalk in the garden. Happy Diwali!

          

 

Colours Everywhere!

We have been exploring colours by playing a variety of colour games. We played hide and seek and had to find our colour partner. We sorted objects into red, yellow and blue. We went on an exciting colour treasure hunt, searching high and low to find objects that matched our chosen colours. We practised colour sorting using bright, fluffy pom poms, developing our early maths and fine motor skills. A great week with lots of teamwork and big smiles along the way!

 

      

Friendship Week

This week we have been celebrating 'Friendship Week'. We have all made magical tissue paper caterpillars that grow when you add water. We have been practising turn taking, sharing, helping others and listening to lovely stories all about friendship. To strengthen our fine motor skills, we traced around heart stencils and peeled off colourful stickers to decorate them. We had lots of fun sorting and counting Love Hearts, which was a sweet way to practise our early maths skills! We all then took home our very own wax heart - a special reminder to share love and kindness with our families. What a wonderful week full of friendship, creativity and caring hearts!

 

     

 

 

 

Odd Sock Day!

Our Caterpillars had a wonderful time celebrating Odd Sock Day! With bright colours and fun patterns we used the day to learn an important message that everyone is unique and to be kind to all.Through stories, games and circle-time chats, we explored how small acts of kindness can make others feel happy. We talked about being good friends, helping each other and showing care in our classroom.

Odd socks, big smiles and kind hearts - what a perfect way to learn together!

 

                                                                            

 

Creation Walk

We have been on a wonderful walk to look for all the amazing things God has created! Using our special binoculars, we did some super spotting and then used amazing words to describe the treasures - we found raining leaves, spikey ends, squishy apples and even clouds that looked just like pillows!  What a beautiful world God has made for us to enjoy!

 

                             

 

Our First Week 

What a wonderful first week it has been in the Caterpillar class! Our little learners have been busy exploring their new classroom, making friends and settling into daily routines. We have enjoyed story time, sang songs and spent lots of time building, painting and playing games. The children are already showing curiosity and kindness as they discover all the fun that pre-school has to offer. We can’t wait to see how our Caterpillars continue to grow and thrive in the weeks ahead!

 

     

 

Welcome to the Caterpillars!

We are thrilled to introduce our brand-new Caterpillars Class in pre-school. As we begin this exciting adventure, our new Caterpillars are ready to explore, play and discover the wonderful world around them. From messy art, outdoor learning to stories, songs and friendships blooming, our classroom will be bursting with awe, wonder and plenty of fun.

We can’t wait to watch our Caterpillars grow and transform as they begin their journey with us.

Here’s to a fantastic start full of smiles, surprises and happy learning!