National Numeracy Day
We held a Stay and Play for National Numeracy Day. It was a day dedicated to promoting numeracy and raising awareness of it's importance in everyday life. We read number stories, played a number bubble game, measured ingredients for making a bread roll and enjoyed lots of outdoor number challenges. Thank you to everybody who was able to attend and join our session.
International Family Day
We had a fantastic Stay and Play for International Family Day. Some families even came wearing traditional dress and looked stunning. We had a lovely session with one parent leading a chapati making session, a family 'Kids Rock' session with Sue, a family forest school session, an outdoor picnic and some lovely family portraits.
It was great to see so many parents joining our session. Thank you to all who were able to stay.
VE Day Celebrations
This week at Hoyle, we celebrated the 80th anniversary of VE Day. This marked eight decades since the end of the Second World War in Europe. This year's commemorations provided a unique opportunity to connect our young children with a key moment in history. Our children came to Nursery wearing something red, white and blue. We iced biscuits in red, white and blue and did some dancing to 1940’s music.
Earth Day
Earth Day is an annual event to demonstrate support for environmental protection. Earth Day is a day that acknowledges our planet, which provides for us and ways we can protect and preserve its beauty. Nursery 3 planted some sunflower seeds on Earth Day which we will be caring for and will hopefully plant in our outdoor area once they are big enough.
Easter Activities
The children at Hoyle have enjoyed making Easter nests and taking part in an Easer egg hunt.
Eid al-Fitr
We had a very special Stay and Play to mark the occasion of Eid al-Fitr, which is celebrated by Muslims worldwide. It is a festival which happens at the end of the month long, dawn to dusk, fasting of Ramadan. We had Mehndi patterns, sampled Eid cuisine, listened to Eid related music and took part in Eid crafts. Thank you to everybody that was able to attend and to all the volunteers that offered their time to do our Mehndi.
Daffodil Deliveries for our local residents
The children have been visiting our Nursery neighbours to wish them a Happy Easter and to give them a gift of some beautiful Spring flowers. As you can see from our photographs this gesture brought great joy to both the neighbours and to our children.
World Autism Awareness Day
World Autism Awareness Day is an annual celebration, which aims to increase understanding and acceptance of people with autism and to foster worldwide support. On World Autism Awareness Day people are encouraged to wear blue as part of the 'Light it up blue' campaign and as a symbol of solidarity. The children and staff at Hoyle came to school in blue and took part in several blue themed activities. We also invited parents of our RP children to come and join us for our group time that day.
Brookdale Care Home
We went to visit Brookdale Care Home to sing a selection of Easter songs for the residents. We had a lovely time and could see that our children brought lots of happiness to the ladies and gentlemen that we met.
Great British Spring Clean
This week we have taken part in the Great British Spring Clean. The children have learnt that they have a role to play in taking care of their community and environment. We dusted off our litter pickers and had a lovely walk around our community and we are pleased to say that we filled two bin bags. The children were so pleased with themselves and said everywhere looked lovely.
Food Bank Delivery
For Red Nose Day, children were asked to bring donations of food to Nursery to donate to our local food bank. This week a group of children helped to deliver all of your fantastic contributions to Chesham Community Hub. All of our donations were very gratefully received. Thank you so much for your generosity. This will make such a difference to people in our local community.
Red Nose Day
This year for Red Nose Day we decorated cakes and biscuits for our cake sale, donated food for the local Food Bank, wore lots of crazy colours and painted our noses red!
It was a fun day for everybody and we raised lots of money for a worth while cause.
Thank you everybody for joining in and for your cake purchases and food bank donations.
World Book Day
World Book Day is an annual celebration of authors, illustrators, stories and the joy of reading. We invited all of our children (and staff) to wear Pyjamas to celebrate cosy bedtime stories. Members of staff acted out the story of 'Little Red Riding Hood' for the children, which they really enjoyed. Betty, our Nursery dog, came to watch too. One of our children took on the wood cutter role. We had a super World Book Day.
NSPCC Number Day
Number Day is an annual campaign organised by the charity NSPCC. It encourages children to get involved in number based activities.
N2 and N3 invited our parents to come and join us for our Stay and Play event and join in with our number games. We had a very active dice game, a speckled frogs pond and a little duck pond.
Thank you to all the parents that were able to attend and for joining in with the activities so enthusiastically!
National Storytelling Week
National Storytelling Week is taking place from February 1-9. National Storytelling Week is a celebration of storytelling and is a time for people to share stories in many forms, including reading from a book or creating their own.
We invited our parents to come and share stories with us in N2 and N3 in our special Stay and Plays.
In N2, the children shared the story they have been focusing on over the last half term 'Goldilocks and the Three Bears'. They even had porridge to sample with lots of toppings.
In N3, each group shared a different story, full of interactive elements and lots of actions to join in with. We shared Dear Zoo, Peace at last and We're going on a bear hunt.
Thank you to all the parents that were able to join us in National Storytelling Week.
Chinese New Year
At Hoyle Nursery, we marked the start of the Chinese New Year with a special red day and lots of exciting activities. The Chinese festival lasts between 3 and 15 days. 2025 is the year of the snake. People born during the year of the snake are thought to be wise and enthusiastic. As part of our celebrations at school we tasted lots of delicious Chinese food, made playdough snakes and a huge dragons head, use chopsticks for eating and also for drumming and we tried to do some Chinese writing.
Gong Xi Fa Cai! (Happy New Year!)
RSPB Bird Watch Week - Walk to the Woods
We had our first Stay and Play of 2025 - a fantastic wintery walk to the woods. We wrapped up warm in our snow suits and wellies and headed off in search of birds. We were very lucky on our walk to spot pigeons, magpies, crows, a blackbird and a robin. We placed lots of seed in the woods to feed the birds. The ground is frozen hard under the ice and snow at the moment, so I am sure the birds will be very happy that we have left them some seed.
A very big thank you to the parents who attended our Stay and Play and braved the sub zero temperature!
Christmas Party
We finished our Autumn Term with an amazing Christmas party. There were lots of exciting things to do and lots of surprises. We had a visit from Santa, party games, glitter faces, a lovely party lunch and then a visit from Olaf and .....SNOW!!!!
It was a great way to finish, before sending our children off to enjoy their break with their families.
The staff at Hoyle would like to thank you all for your continued support and wish everybody celebrating, a very Happy Christmas.
We will see you all again on January 6th 2025!
Christmas Dinner
We had a delicious Christmas Dinner made by Jackie, our wonderful cook. N2 and N3 ate together for this lovely event.
Christmas Treats for our neighbours
Some of N2 and N3 children went out to visit the homes of people living close to our Nursery. We took Christmas cards and chocolate treats to give them as we wished them a 'Happy Christmas'. It was so lovely to meet our neighbours and to spread some festive cheer.
Our Christmas Singing for Parents
We invited all of our parents to come and join us for a festive sing-a-long and campfire. Everybody was able to toast a marshmallow, to make a smore and to drink some hot chocolate whilst enjoying the songs. The children were absolutely brilliant and made both their parents and the staff very proud. A huge well done to all and a big thank you to our parents for coming along and supporting us.
Our Visit to Brookdale Care Home
The children really enjoyed visiting the residents at Brookdale in both the morning and the afternoon, to perform our Christmas Songs. The residents joined in with all of our songs and did a great job of ringing our Christmas Bells. Brookdale presented the children with some lovely Christmas chocolate to say thank you. We loved our visit and hope to be back for some Easter singing.
Meeting SANTA!
Whilst some children were busy singing at the Care Home, our other children went to meet Santa at Millers. As you can see from our beautiful photographs, the children were in awe. The children had a dance to Santa's music, saw his reindeer and his sleigh and then Santa gave every child at Hoyle Nursery a selection box.
Our Visit to Bridge House Care Home
We had two fabulous visits to Bridge House Care Home to perform our Christmas Songs to the residents. Thank you so much to Bridge House for your warm welcome, your enthusiastic joining in and the little goody bags that you gave us as a thank you gift. We wish you all a very Happy Christmas. On the way back to Nursery, we spotted Santa at Millers. We took the opportunity to pop over and meet him.
Our Christmas Fair and Winter Wonderland
Thank you to everybody that attended this years Christmas Fair. We hope you all had a great time visiting all of our stalls and going over to our very magical grotto in Forest School to see Santa. All funds raised go back to supporting our children in school. Thank you for your continued support with all of your donations.
Coffee, Toast and Catch up - Play Dough Session
This week our coffee and catch up looked a little bit different. Firstly we introduced toast, rather than cake, which was definitely well received and something we will continue with over the colder months. Then we had some of our lovely children joining the session with their grown ups. Kelly and Joanne delivered 2 fantastic sessions throughout the day, where parents were shown how to make a basic play dough with their children and then how to develop the dough further by adding glitter, food colouring and spices.
Thank you so much for attending our session. We hope you enjoyed it and will continue to do at home with your children. We would love to see photographs of you making and using dough at home with your children.
Hoyle Christmas Tree
The children were very excited about the delivery of our Hoyle Christmas Tree..... especially when they saw it was being delivered by SANTA!
Road Safety Week (November 18 - November 24)
Road Safety Week is an annual event which aims to reduce road accidents and save lives. At Hoyle, we were joined by Stan and his puppet Tommy, who came to promote pedestrian safety. We learnt lots of rhymes and catchphrases to help us stay safe. All of our Nursery children now know how important it is to hold an adults hand when near a road or crossing a road. Stan showed us how to wait until the lollipop man/lady tells us to cross or the green light is flashing 'go'. Stan also told us how important it is when travelling in a car to wear a seat belt (adults) and be fastened into our car seats (children).
Thank you Stan and Tommy for helping to keep us all safe.
Children in Need
The children and families of Hoyle Nursery have been working hard this week to raise lots of money for Children in Need, a charity that helps improve the lives of disadvantaged children and young people around the UK. We iced buns and biscuits for our cake sale, we dressed in pink, yellow or blue, we had a sponsored walk around Hoyles park, we played some games featuring Pudsey Bear, Peppa Pig and George Pig and we had a donations pot. A big thank you to everybody that supported us with their extremely generous donations and to all that joined our walk. You have all helped to make a difference.
World Nursery Rhyme Week
Nursery 2 and Nursery 3 have taken part in World Nursery Rhyme Week. This was an event launched in 2013 to promote the importance of nursery rhymes in early childhood development and education.
We have completed the 'Rhyme a Day Challenge'. This year the official rhymes were Twinkle Twinkle, Old Macdonald, The Big Ship Sails, Incy Wincy Spider and 5 Currant Buns. The children have completed lots of exciting activities linked to our rhymes to support their language and literacy skills, numeracy skills and social, physical and emotional skills - plus we had SO MUCH FUN!
All the children were awarded with a certificate for taking part.
Remembrance Day
The children in school took part in some special activities to help them begin to understand Remembrance day and the significance of wearing a Poppy. We told them the poppy symbolises hope for a peaceful future and commemorates brave soldiers who fought in the war. The children were able to buy a Poppy, take part in some Poppy crafts and watch a short age appropriate clip showing poppies starting to grow in a battlefield after the war had finished.
World Science Day
To coincide with World Science Day, Hoyle Nursery had a full week of fabulous scientific investigations. Nursery 2 had lots of fun adding different colours of paint to water and observing the changes. They also mixed milk, hand sanitizer and food colouring to see what happened. They then watched what happened when feathers were dropped onto a fan. N3 did lots of observing of shadows and lights, they mixed bicarbonate of soda with vinegar to create a volcano and they put 'magic powder' onto the camp fire at forest school to change the colour of the flames! What an exciting week we had!
Spooky Walk Stay and Play
We had a Spooktacular walk up to the woods this week whilst wearing our very spooky outfits. We spotted lots of spooky eyes and spooky cats hiding in the trees, we did a pumpkin hunt and played catch the ghost. Thank you to all the parents that stayed to join our walk and making it a big success.
Pumpkin Stay and Play
Lots of parents came to join our lovely Forest School Stay and Play. We all gathered to sing our '5 Little Pumpkins' song, before choosing a pumpkin from our pumpkin patch. Then everybody carved their own unique pumpkin designs. The finished pumpkins look absolutely fabulous. We think they will look even better lit up with a little light inside. Well Done to all that took part.
Our walks to the woods for World Mental Health Awareness
Throughout the week, small groups of Nursery 3 children had a turn to walk up the woods for some fresh air, exercise and time to enjoy our great outdoors. We also sat together in the log circle for some mindfulness activities, deep breathing and yoga. On one of the walks, Betty our dog mentor, joined the walk. The children did a fabulous job of holding Betty's lead alongside Rachel.
Thank you to Suzanne, our Forest School Leader, for arranging our lovely walks. We all returned to Nursery feeling positive, happy and calm.
Our Nursery Fish Friends
We have got three new fish friends at Nursery. We used your super ideas to name our fish - Calypso (black fish), Finn (gold fish) and Pearl (white fish). The children have been taking turns to visit the tank and meet our new pets. We have had some lovely language from the children as they have been sharing their thoughts, opinions and questions about our fish with the adults.
Hello Yellow!
To show our support for World Mental Health Day, we decorated our reception area and came to Nursery wearing yellow. Seeing our children dressed in such a happy colour, put a smile on our faces and brightened our day. Thank you for taking part.
Betty completes The Dog Mentor training
Lesley and Katy successfully completed their Dog Mentor training programme and our lovely school dog, Betty, has now been assessed as suitable to work with the children at Hoyle Nursery.
We are very excited about Betty now being able to work more closely with our children, as many studies have shown that providing children positive experiences with dogs can help them educationally, developmentally, emotionally and socially.
Donating to Chesham Food Bank
A big Thank you to everybody who donated food during our Harvest collection week. The children took all of the donations up to Chesham Food Bank this week and the staff there were overwhelmed by your generosity.
Harvest Stay and Play
We had our first stay and play of the school year today and it was fantastic! We had such a great turn out, with so many parents staying to join in with our scarecrow themed session. First we sang our 'Dingle Dangle Scarecrow Song' , which our wonderful Sue from Kidsrock played along to with her guitar. Then we said a scarecrow rhyme before building our amazing scarecrows. We were so impressed with all of the unique creations.
A big thank you for all of the food donations which we will be delivering to our local food bank next week.
End of Year Party
The children and staff from N2 and N3 celebrated a fabulous year at Hoyle with a special party day. We had lots of dancing, balloons, glitter tattoos, a Kids Rock session, a yummy outdoor dinner and even an ice cream van!
Then it was time to say our goodbye's to some of our children and families as they leave us to move onto big school and to say goodbye to others until September.
Have a fabulous Summer everybody!
Class of 2024 - Our Leavers Celebration
This year for Graduation, we planned a wonderful informal celebration over in our Forest School. Parents and other family members joined us to celebrate the children's time at Hoyle, before they leave us to begin their new journeys at 'big school'. The children had learnt a lovely song, which was introduced to us by Kids Rock Sue, called 'We are Family'. We all sang along and signed some of the words. Then the children did a traditional folk dance with lots of audience participation. There was an opportunity for crown making using our beautiful wild flowers. We had strawberry scones and Victoria sponge cakes. Finally the children took turns in sitting under our beautifully decorated arch to be awarded with their learning journey from Rachel.
We would like to wish all of our leavers good luck for the future. We have loved being part of your early education and watching you all grow. We are so very proud of all that you have achieved. Do come back and see us and let us know how you are getting on.
