Great involvement and problem solving

 It’s been lovely to see smiley faces at Broadway Playschool (2-3yrs) and we have seen the children show some good painting skills, sand digging and balancing on planks.

It’s been really encouraging to watch the children get to know each other through role play and building constructions together. A super team effort!

The children are demonstrating good looking, listening and sitting skills at circle time recognising the symbols of the routine they put on the visual timetable.  The children are also recognising their name label to put on the tower.

There has been some great problem solving on how to collect up leaves from the ground and what to use to scoop them up.

The children seemed very excited when they spotted an aeroplane fly over Playschool. Following a suggestion from an adult a large group became involved in large outdoor construction building their own aeroplane.  Lots of problem solving working together to think about what they needed ie. wings , cockpit for the pilot bringing opportunity for vocabulary and language development. 

At Forest school we observed lots of activity in the digging area, one child discovered a dinosaur bone!  A small group were involved in fossil hunting too.

Welcome back!

 We have enjoyed welcoming the children back to Playschool after such a long absence for many and children new to Playschool who have settled incredibly well and picking up the routine quickly. The 3-4yrs haven’t taken very long at all in becoming very involved and engrossed in play.

In the first couple of weeks we have witnessed some wonderful imaginative play with small world and animal play where one child made up some inventive names for them.

Children attending Tuesdays and Fridays have been re introduced to Forest school and have remembered the rules brilliantly.  It’s been great to watch them exploring and running around freely.  They are picking up the “123 Where are you?” game brilliantly.

We are all getting used to our new Broadway setting, the older 2yr children have adapted brilliantly following the routine and children new to the group are picking up cues and coping very well.  They have instigated the story ‘We’re going on a Bear Hunt’ and are seating and listening to the story beautifully.

Re opening Towerview- Happy outdoors 😄 🌦

Towerview Playschool has reopened to key worker and vulnerable children, also those who are transitioning to school in September and Autumn born 3yr olds.  We have had to put a cap on spaces due to some staff members self isolating with vulnerable family members.
We are trying to do our best to keep in touch with all families, we can be contacted by phone and email. We have a Facebook page where we have uploaded ideas for activities to do at home along including speech and language posts shared from Worcestershire Speech and Language.

The children who have returned to Playschool have settled very well and seem to be coping with the routine and rules very well and are delighting us with their new skills they have learnt during lockdown.  We have seen some very impressive mark making and writing skills, new songs and rhymes and have heard how one child can now “crack eggs without getting the shell in the mixture”.
This week the children have enjoyed being together, we have seen some lovely building role play where the whole group - all eight of them - have worked to together to ‘fix the playhouse’ and with all the wet weather they are keen to be outside.  Together they have discovered that the rain has collected on the sail they we have put up and have taken turns to manipulate it to create a waterfall over them, brilliant thinking!! With coats on of course. They’ve also made great use of the Playschool spare wellies for puddle splashing in the outside area and at Forest school.  Children new to Forest school seem to enjoy it immensely! It was a great opportunity for all the children to run around freely and just enjoy the space. Relaxing for the adults too, especially to see how happy the children are.

Hope everyone is keeping safe in these uncertain times.  We would suggest where you are able to encourage the children to be outside, water painting, den building, gardening, treasure hunting and other physical activities when possible to support their well being and keep stress levels to a minimum.
If parents have some ideas they would like to share please feel free to contribute by commenting on the Playschool blog.

                             Stay safe

Update on Keyworker

COVID-19

Dear parents and carers,

The Department for Education has issued guidance today for schools and colleges on maintaining educational provision during the current COVID-19 pandemic.

Schools and educational settings have a key role to play, alongside other partners, in meeting our priority to preserve life, prevent spread of infection and keep critical services going. We are working together with key partners, including the Local Authority, to coordinate our response to the pandemic.

The guidance makes it clear that where children can safely stay at home they should, to limit the chance of the virus spreading.

We are being asked by Government to continue to provide care for a limited number of children including children who are vulnerable and children whose parents are critical to the COVID-19 response and cannot be safely cared for at home.
We are working with the local authority to identify all children defined as vulnerable.

The guidance published includes children who are supported by social care, those with safeguarding and welfare needs, including child in need plans, on child protection plans, ‘looked after’ children, young carers, disabled children and those with education, health and care (EHC) plans.

We will talk to these parents directly about how care will be provided.

Please note, as a school, we need to ensure we can prioritise those most in need so that our provision is sustainable and supports the Government’s number one key principle from their latest guidance that maintains social distancing:

If it is at all possible for children to be at home, then they should be.

Parents whose work is critical to the COVID-19 response may need support from schools and educational settings and we are working hard to provide that support wherever possible.

Many parents in this category will be able to keep their children at home and where children can be safely cared for at home they should be.

For those who cannot keep children safely at home and who work in one of the critical sectors listed below, your children will be priorities for education provision when you are at work.

However, it may not be possible to provide this in your child’s usual school, as inevitably school staff will also be impacted by the virus and our shared priority is to keep children safe and prevent the spread of the virus.

If your work is critical to the COVID-19 response, or you work in one of the critical sectors listed below, and you cannot keep your child safe at home then your children will be prioritised for education provision:

• Health and social care
• Education and childcare
• Key public services
o This includes those essential to the running of the justice system, religious staff, charities and workers delivering key frontline services, those responsible for the management of the deceased, and journalists and broadcasters who are providing public service broadcasting.
• Local and national government
• Food and other necessary goods
• Public safety and national security
• Transport
• Utilities, communication and financial services

Provision is only available when you are required to work. It is not available at other times.

Where only one parent/carer is a ‘critical worker’ there is an expectation that the child stays at home with the other parent to ensure the principal and impact of social distancing is maximised.

Further guidance on key workers can be found in the following link:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/coronavirus-covid-19-maintaining-educational-provision/guidance-for-schools-colleges-and-local-authorities-on-maintaining-educational-provision

If you are a key worker and your child needs educational provision, please send us the following information to broadwaytowerview@gmail.com by Sunday 22nd March.

• Your name:
• Your most up to date contact details:
• Evidence of each parent’s / carer’s job role:
• Name of employer and contact details (for verification):
• Student’s name and year group:

More information on the closure of educational settings for parents and children can be found in the following link:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/closure-of-educational-settings-information-for-parents-and-carers

Many thanks for your assistance through this challenging situation.

Building fine and gross motor skills through imaginative play.

This week up at Broadway Playschool some of the younger children enjoyed
being outside in the sunshine and enjoyed doing some building & fixing in
the wendy house.  
We encouraged them to really explore and access resources from the outside store which got them to engage in building, shape matching and chalking.

Towerview older children also enjoyed time outside in the sunshine and wind,
the children worked out throwing up a piece of paper and then watching it
floating in the wind!!  It created a lot of laughter.

Great being ‘waited’ on by some of the children, coffee, tea, cakes and donuts in the home corner, nice chats and great little chefs!!! 

Being led by the children’s interest, main interest this week has been dinosaurs, on Tuesday a dinosaur had been and laid eggs in the outside area ( musical instruments that looks like eggs). In forest school today (Friday) the children found frozen dinosaur eggs they could see the dinosaurs inside the eggs, some children managed to get the dinosaurs to hatch by putting the eggs in water. 

With drier weather outside has been used more. The children are playing in larger groups where tag, hide and seek, running and ball play are involved.  They negotiate the games between themselves and taking turns.

The children have enjoyed exploring media and materials in 2 and 3 dimensions. Collectively the children decided that the grandfather clock for their hickory dickory dock activity would be 'rainbow colours' and what a multi-coloured clock it is! It was lovely to observe the children working creatively together on their project with a purpose in mind and how thrilled they were at the end result. Working individually and on a small scale the children created their mice by looking at the example template then choosing the shapes and materials they wanted to use. The end result were a collection of very colourful characterful mice ready to run up and down the grandfather clock! 
We printed an image of a Grandfather clock for the children to work from, many hadn’t seen one before, they did a brilliant job. Take a look in the home corner!

Letter to parents

BROADWAY & TOWERVIEWPLAYSCHOOL

Within AppleVale Children’s Centre, 

Broadway, Worcs, WR127BD

Jo Bason  Leader.  Becky Davis Manager

                                www.btvplayschool.co.uk 

Towerview PS – Tel 07922025902 

  Email: broadwaytowerview@gmail.com

 

Children and those with family members living together who have a high temperature or continuous cough should not attend Playschooland self isolate for a minimum of seven days.

Washing hands frequently for at least 20 seconds.

At Playschool the children are washing hands before and after snack and lunch, and are singing the rhyme;

Wash your dirty hands, 

Wash your dirty hands, 

Rub and scrub and rub and scrub, 

And wash your dirty hands

Repeat 

Do not touch your face.

Parents need to keep updated by visiting www.gov.uk/coronavirus

Playschool closures will be on the Playschool website ‘blog’