April 2024
Here comes the sun! (We Hope!)
As I am sure you have noticed, we are flitting between lovely sunshine and cold hail storms! Please keep this in mind when packing for nursery as some days we are in sun hats popping on suncream and others we have even gone out in woolly hats, waterproofs and snoods!
Note to parents:
Please, if your child is taking any medication, even if it doesn’t need to be administered at nursery, can you inform the office. It is vitally important that we are aware of this information.
If you know of any planned absences, we would really appreciate if you could inform the office as soon as you can. This helps us to plan the weeks food orders and various other bits and bobs and really helps us to reduce waste and better plan activities/staffing etc. Thank you.
Also we wanted to extend a big thank you to all of those who have ever used our clothing bin outside reception. We hope that you all find it useful to get rid of any unwanted clothes clutter. 100% of the money we receive for our donations is then in turn given to Save The Children charity for the Yemen & Gaza funds. So your clutter is absolutely helping a good cause. <3
Lets take a look at what we have been up to!
We may have had to wait a little longer than expected to celebrate Holi the Hindu festival of Spring and colour but what a worth while wait! Take a look at the madness and fun below!
Click the link below to find even more photos of our Holi Fesitval!
Snapdragons Media - Holi fun 2024 - All Documents (sharepoint.com)
A huge thank you for all of your support, dressing your little Snappies up and buying one of our lovely treats from the bake sale! We raised a fantastic £211 for the Wiltshire Wildlife Trust, our chosen charity. What a super fun week we had learing all about the wildlife surrounding us! We are hoping to hold more fundraising events in the future so watch this space!
We have had our wonderful Forest School Leader Nat with us throughtout April to help the children plant the herb and vegetable gardens ready for the summer. She has also had the children out hunting for wild garlic, cooking snacks out in the forest school area, making their own flower holders, flower beds, bug hotels and much much more!
Staff News:
It is with a heavy heart that we are saying goodbye to Lauren our Primrose Head of Room at the end of May; Lauren travels all the way from Frome each day for work and has therefore found work at a nursery closer to home. I am sure you will join me in wishing her the best of luck there.
We are so pleased and excited to be welcoming back both Samii (left) and Beckie (right) from maternity leave. Both ladies will be working a couple of KIT days over the next month or so before their official back to work date so you are likely to see them about. Both are returing part time and will be working in our Primrose room as a job share, which gives them the opportunity to catch up with children they had as their own key children before leaving! For any Primrose parents who are yet to meet these wonderful ladies, once they are back and into a normal routine of working, they will of course be introducing themselves to you.
Welcome Lyndsey! Lyndsey has been volenteering with us for 3 months now. She was supporting at her last nursery for a number of years before it unfortunately closed. The children all get on with her very well and we are very pleased to be welcoming her into our Snappies family!
We have chicks!
The eggs are just beginning to hatch now and we know how much the children (and you guys!) adored them last time, so we feel super lucky to have the opportunity to have more. This time around we thought we would offer them out to a family for a weekend. They will be with us until the end of the month and we will obviously provide you with everything you would need to care for them. So if you’re feeling like becoming a chick parent for the weekend please just let us know.
Dates for your Diary:
May is going to be Art month with lots of different activities going on around the nursery. This will get messy at times! So please make sure you are sending your Snappy to nursery in clothes you don’t mind getting a little ‘arty’!
Monday 17th June 3pm-6pm - Fathers day forest school fun! More information to follow.
Saturday 13th July 11am-12pm - School leavers graduation
Thursday 7th November - Spooky Smores - More information to follow but I thought I would get this date in your diary’s now as it’s one of our favourites!
Do you know a Superstar staff member who is always making your little Snappy smile?!
(We hope so!)
If you think that any of our staff deserve an extra special well done or thank you, please nominate them as a Snappie’s Superstar using the below link so that we can give them a little treat <3 This is avaliable all year round and you can make as many nominations as you wish as frequently as you like!
We absolutely love hearing about how wonderful our staff are and management get to see all the nominations!
Medication and Illness policies:
If your child has been prescribed medication then they will need to have had it for 24hrs before returning to nursery.
When Calpol or any temperature reducing medicine is given to your child, they are then unfortunately not able to attend nursery until they have had 4hours clear.
And a little reminder about some of the more common illnesses and the exclusion periods:
Conjunctivitis - They have to have been treated for 24hours and the child has to be comfortable.
D&V - 48hours clear of the last incident.
Chicken Pox - Children can’t return to nursery until the spots have all scabbed over and are completely dry.
Thank you for your help and understanding. If you have any questions or are unsure of anything, please do get in touch with the office.
March 2024
We’ve had an eggcellent month!
This month seems to have flown past and although we unfortunately had to postpone our Holi celebrations (because powder paint and rain certainly don’t mix) we still had lots of fun with our other March events.
Snappies Egg Hunt
Our team venture out into the elements wherever possible and, although it was raining, we went ahead with our easter egg hunt and still had a fantastic time.
A massive well done to all the Snappies who braved the rain (and hail)!
The Shrew With the Flu
A big thank you to Will Hamilton-Davies who popped in to visit our preschoolers. The children were so engaged with his themed activities and listened beautifully to the story, we hope that Will’s visit inspired some little authors and illustrators.
World Book Day
Another fabulous World Book Day filled with lots of storytime, book themed activities, trips out, and fantastic costumes!
A big thank you to Corsham Bookshop who played host to lots of our Snappies when they took a trip to town to redeem their World Book Day tokens.
A visit from Mr Tort!
Our Primrose Head of Room, Lauren, bought Mr Tort in to visit each of our age groups. The children were fascinated learning all about how to care for him, and loved admiring his beautiful shell.
Easter chicks are here
After three weeks of incubation the chicks finally hatched and they’re a big hit. Our children (and staff) have loved coming to visit the chicks, learning all about how to handle them gently and how they change as they grow up.
St Patrick’s and St David’s Day
Lots to celebrate in March, including St Patrick’s and St David’s Day. We think it’s so important to celebrate our children’s heritage and backgrounds, as well as teaching children about different celebrations and traditions.
On St Patrick’s Day we explored the legend of the leprechaun through stories, and created our own traditional shamrock paintings.
For St David’s Day we dressed in red and celebrated by baking traditional Welsh cakes and learning all about daffodils.
If you or your family celebrate any special days at home, please let us know so that we can incorporate these into your child’s nursery experience.
Staff News
We would love you to join us in wishing Kait congratulations, she will be stepping into the role of Head of Preschool when Kirsty goes on maternity leave in summer. Kait has been part of our team since 2020 and, as a qualified Primary School teacher, has a huge amount of knowledge, experience and enthusiasm that she brings to her practice.
Dates for your Dairy
Monday 15th April 2.30-3.30 - Holi Festival: Please send your child with a change of white or light coloured clothes to wear, old pillow cases with holes cut in have been used in the past! Parents are more than welcome to join this for this fantastically fun event!
Tuesday 16th April - Wiltshire Wildlife Trust Animal Fancy Dress Day: In support of our chosen charity, we would love anyone who would like to, to dress up as an animal native to Wiltshire. If you choose to dress up we would appreciate a £1 donation that will go towards Wiltshire Wildlife Trust’s mission to protect our local wildlife. We’ll also be hosting a staff bakeoff and running a few other fundraising games throughout the day.
Wednesday 24th April - Parents Evening: If you haven’t yet done so, please arrange a time with your childs key worker, sign up sheets are in the rooms.
February 2024
What an absolutely fun packed month we’ve had!
We have so much more to come in March so make sure you take a look at our ‘Dates for your Diary’ section
Children’s mental health is at the heart of everything we do here. Each year we show our support for Children’s Mental Health Week by doing lots of activities throughout the nursery, really focusing on how to communicate our feelings… here is a snapshot of just a few from this year.
Our Primroses have been practicing their yoga while listening to some lovely relaxing music.
Sweetpeas and Sunflowers took a walk to the park as many of the children told us the park is something that makes them happy!
Our superstar cook Jayne sent children home with a ready measured biscuit baking bags, just look at those cheesy creations!
Keep an eye on the shelf opposite the kitchen for our March baking bag.
Are we running a Nursery or a Spa I hear you say?! Our Buttercups and Sweetpeas visited our Snappies Spa for an afternoon of ultimate relaxation…
Yellow playdough makes our Sunflower room happy as it makes them think of sunshine and flowers!
Sweetpeas also felt inspired by the sunshine and flowers they could see coming through outisde, they decided to paint pictures to hang up in the room.
Keeping our Snappies happy and healthy is very important, we are always teaching the importance of eating fresh and healthy foods.
Our Daisies and Buttercups took a trip to May’s Greengrocer and got involed in snack prep!
Our Sweetpeas love the story of the Gruffalo so Kirsty and Kait decided to take them on a Gruffalo hunt at Westonbirt. It was a little wet but splashing in the muddles made the day all the more fun!
So, what else has been going on this month?
Primroses have been using our new texture stamps and rollers to create tracks and trails for the animals to follow through the jungle!
We love to learn about different celebrations and cultures on special days of the year
During this month we celebrated Chinese New Year, Valentines Day and Shrove Tuesday!
Storytelling week:
We love a themed week here as you may have gathered! During storytelling week our team of storytellers loved switching their enviroments to match the theme of the book!
Police Visit:
Thank you PC Kevin and PCSO Shaun!
Why children love emergency vehicles so much we don’t know, but they were so excited to have the opportunity to learn all about the Police and what they do for our community. Of course no visit would be complete without taking a seat in the police car with the sirens and blue lights on!
Trips Out:
We are so lucky to be within a safe and short walking distance to so many lovely local places and we really enjoy taking the children out as much as we can.
Watch this space though, we now have more access to the Snappies school bus and Rebecca is hoping to do a few more trips a little further a field soon!
Staff News:
For those of you who don’t already know, our lovely Kirsty is expecting her first baby in August! We are so happy and excited for her; yet are super sad that we’ll have to say goodbye for a while.
Kirsty has been rather thoughtful in timing this very well and has lined up her mat leave just as her Preschoolers go off to school meaning that she’ll get to see them all graduate before she leaves! <3
I am sure when the time comes, you will all join us in wishing her and her husband the best of luck on this new chapter of their life. We can’t wait to hear if it’s a boy or a girl!
Dates for your Diary:
Monday 4th March - Aurthor Visit - Our Sweetpeas, Sunflowers and Afterschool club will be getting a visit from Will Hamilton-Davies, author of The Shrew with the Flu. You can purchase the book prior to the visit if you like via the below link:
The Shrew With The Flu | Childrens Book — WILL HD (willhdofficial.co.uk)
Thursday 7th March - World book day! This is one of my (Gina) absolute favourite days of the year! We encourage all of our Sanppies to dress up as their favourite book characters and the staff love to get involved too! Last year we had the cutest little group of hungry caterpillars lead by a bigger Shannon caterpillar!
We would love to invite any Grandparents with a free afternoon to pop in to read to their grandchild’s class! If any Grandparents have some spare time, let us know in the office.
Friday 8th March 2pm-3pm - Mother’s Afternoon Tea - To celebrate Mother’s Day and all that Mums do, we would love to invite you in for a little stay and play. If your chidoesn'tsnt attend on this day and you would like to join us, please let the office know.
(Gosh, what a busy week!!)
Monday 25th 2pm-3pm - Holi Festival - This is one of Rebecca’s favourite days of the year and we really go all out! We invite our parents to join us out on the field and encourage everyone to be sent in with a white t-shirt or pillow case they can wear for the festivities, and a spare change of clothes to wear afterwards. I wouldn’t be able to describe this amazingly fun event well enough to do it justice, you’ve got to see it for yourselves! Our children and staff have the absolute best time celebrating the Hindu Festival of Spring; have a look at some of the pictures from last year on the link below.
Thursday 28th March - Easter Egg Hunt - We will take all of the children out in small groups to complete the annual Snappies Egg Hunt in our forest school and field area. Imagine eye spy mixed with a little bit (or a lot) of running around, perhaps with a couple of obstacles to get over too! There may even be a little treat at the end for each Snappie who spots all of our hidden eggs. If you have any time free in the afternoon, please feel free to join us to complete the hunt with your little one.
If your child doesn’t normally attend on a Monday or Thursday and you would like to join us for Holi Festival or the Easter Egg Hunt, please do! We would love for you all to get involved and get messy, Please note however that you will need to stay with your child if they are not normally booked in for the day. If your child is booked in and you decide to leave with them after the event, please make sure you let a member of staff know. Hope to see you there!
Note to Parents: Please do not leave any medicine, creams etc in your child's bag - anything your child needs that day should be handed to a member of staff.
Practice mindfulness and remember to give youselves a well deserved 10mins when you can! <3
Local News:
January 2024
Happy New Year!
We hope that you have all been having as much fun as we have through this long wintery month!
I know we re-post monthly, but please give our reminder posts a read at the bottom of the page. It really saves us having to have any horrible conversations with you at the door re our illness policies in particular - thank you.
We certainly started as we mean to go on! Our Daisies and Buttercups have been wrapping up warm to explore locally.
Our Primroses have enjoyed an invitation to play based on stripy animals, we love the observational paintings the children have created, using sticks that had been collected from outside helped to make wonderful stripes.
Our Sweetpea’s have been getting exploring different reactions, testing and trying different ingredients to make a volcano.
Our Sunflowers have been learning about textures and have been using our new texture stamps for their painting. They chatted lots about how the colours changed when mixed together and what we thought the different textures looked liked.
Our pre-school children had a wonderful week celebrating national bird watching week. It of course had to include a visit to Corsham Court for a spot of bird watching, we are so lucky to have this on our doorstep. The children also had a great time getting super messy making plenty of bird feeders to pop out the front of the nursery and the Sweetpeas window. The children have found it very funny that the squirels have been helping themselves to the birds food!
We had another very successful year wassailing!
‘What is that??’ I hear you ask. Wassailing is the ancient tradition of visiting apple orchards in the South West of England to sign to the trees and feed them in order to promote a good harvest for the year ahead.
Nat our forest scool leader, made a lovely warming fire for the children to gather around. She toasted home made flatbreads and apples with the children for them to enjoy as their afternoon snack. Once their tummies were full, the children helped to squeeze out some apple juice which they took up to feed to the trees with the left over bread.
It was then time for the children to break out the tambourines and jungle bells to sing as loud as they could to wake up the trees!
Dates for your Diary:
This week is story telling week! Thank you to all of those parents, grandparent etc who have agreed to pop in to read a story, if you have the time and you haven't yet put your name down, we would love to have you! Just pop into the office or drop us an email.
5th-9th of February - Childrens mental health week. All week we would encorage children to come dressed in anything that makes them happy. Pj’s, fancy dress, favourite christmas jumpers etc! Keep an eye out on social media for everything we will be doing to support.
Monday 12th February - We will be celebrating Chinese new year thoughout the nursery with themed activities, we would also encorage all of our Snappies to wear a bit of red for Chinese Luck!
Tuesday 13th February - Pancake day! We will be celebrating by hosting lots of silly pancake inspired races on the field and would encorage parents to join us from 10am-11am.
Need a little extra child care? We have Friday sessions avaliable across most of our rooms. If this might help you and your family, have a chat to the office!
Reminder posts:
Please remember to name everything that is sent into nursery. As you can imagine it is very tricky to keep track of all the children’s items so if things are named it is easier to keep track of them and ensure we are popping things on pegs to avoid things getting lost.
Warm clothing:
Hats, gloves, scarfs, coats, jumpers - it is now VERY cold outside and we of course are still venturing out so please make sure you send in everything your child needs to stay warm out there.
Waiting at the front door in the morning:
Politely we would ask that you wait at the door or just inside reception in the mornings or when you are dropping off. We hope you can understand, many of our younger children can get themselves a bit upset when they see other mummy’s and daddy’s who aren’t their own about in the morning while they are just settling in. Furthermore our cleaners don’t arrive until the evenings so we would like to keep the nursery lovely and clean throughout the day and prevent as much mud, leaves etc being walked into the building throughout the day as possible.
Medication and Illness policies:
If your child has been prescribed medication then they will need to have had it for 24hrs before returning to nursery.
When Calpol or any temperature reducing medicine is given to your child, they are then unfortunately not able to attend nursery until they have had 4hours clear.
And a little reminder about some of the more common illnesses and the exclusion periods:
Conjunctivitis - They have to have been treated for 24hours and the child has to be comfortable.
D&V - 48hours clear of the last incident.
Chicken Pox - Children can’t return to nursery until the spots have all scabbed over and are completely dry.
Thank you for your help and understanding. If you have any questions or are unsure of anything, please do get in touch with the office.
Christmas Edition
We’re simply having a wonderful Christmas time!
We would just like to take this oppertunity to say, we wish you a Merrry Christmams and a Happy New Year!
Here’s a little look at just a couple of the fun festive things we got up to this month..
Our Buttercup and Bluebell rooms have been busy making decorations and reefs.
I think it may have even been snowing in their room at one point…!
Our little Daisies have been getting messy too trying out our new texture stamps to decorate Christmas cards.
Our Primroses and Buttercups have been busy baking delicious Christmas cookies to leave out for Santa and his reindeer. (Although I’m not sure many ever made it to Santa before being eaten!)
The whole nursery sat down for a lovely Christmas Lunch complete with home made paper crowns.
All of our rooms had a wonderful Christmas Party with an unlikely visitor…
It’s still not too late to get a coply video of this years wonderful nativity! We are so proud of them all, it was certainly one of our best show yet and is a fantastic Christmas watch!
Bring £5 into reception and we can send you it right away!
Dates for your Diary:
24th January 5pm-6pm - Bedtime Stories. This is a really snuggly evening where we like to invite our parents in to read bedtime stories to the children. We all get changed into PJs and cosy up with a glass of milk and a cookie.
Do you know a Snappies Superstar?
If any of our wonderful Snappies staff members have gone above and beyond and you think deserve a little treat from us, please do nominate them as a Snappies superstar! You can as many nominations as you want as regularly as you want to!
You will see a flashing star in the left corner of this web page, do click on it to make a nomination! We absolutely love seeing these come in and can’t wait to hopefully see a couple more!
You can also click this link: Snappies Superstar — Snapdragons Nursery
Finally we would like to say a very big thank you to our wonderful Santa who joined us all the way from the North Pole, we wish him very safe travels back home after a busy season and a Happy New Year!
Reminder posts:
Please remember to name everything that is sent into nursery. As you can imagine it is very tricky to keep track of all the children’s items so if things are named it is easier to keep track of them and ensure we are popping things on pegs to avoid things getting lost.
Warm clothing:
Hats, gloves, scarfs, coats, jumpers - it is now VERY cold outside and we of course are still venturing out so please make sure you send in everything your child needs to stay warm out there.
Waiting at the front door in the morning:
Politely we would ask that you wait at the door or just inside reception in the mornings or when you are dropping off. We hope you can understand, many of our younger children can get themselves a bit upset when they see other mummy’s and daddy’s who aren’t their own about in the morning while they are just settling in. Furthermore our cleaners don’t arrive until the evenings so we would like to keep the nursery lovely and clean throughout the day and prevent as much mud, leaves etc being walked into the building throughout the day.
Medication and Illness policies:
If your child has been prescribed medication then they will need to have had it for 24hrs before returning to nursery.
When Calpol or any temperature reducing medicine is given to your child, they are then unfortunately not able to attend nursery until they have had 4hours clear.
And a little reminder about some of the more common illnesses and the exclusion periods:
Conjunctivitis - They have to have been treated for 24hours and the child has to be comfortable.
D&V - 48hours clear of the last incident.
Chicken Pox - Children can’t return to nursery until the spots have all scabbed over and are completely dry.
Thank you for your help and understanding. If you have any questions or are unsure of anything, please do get in touch with the office.
December 2023
Tis’ the season!
Hats, gloves, scalfs, coats, jumpers etc. - It is now super chilly outside and we of course are still venturing out, so please make sure you send in everything your child needs to stay warm out there!
Do you know a Santa?
We are looking for an expertly qualified Santa to spread a little Christmas joy with a visit to the nursery on Thursday 14th of December. See job description below:
Full costume provided, dressing up to look the part is essential. We are looking for a very jolly man with a love of Christmas who would like to volunteer their time to come and visit all of our children and to hand each one a gift. If you know someone who might fit the bill then please do let us know. Rebecca-clause is our plan B so please help us out!
Of course we had our Spooky S’more’s event and despite the rain, we all had a lovely time and were so pleased and proud of all those who braved the elements to go out to the fire for a S’more!
(We’re not joking when we say we go out in all weathers!)
We also had lots and lots of fun getting ready for the night handmaking all of the decorations and getting in the mood with themed activities!
We try to make use of everything here and our Snappies LOVED the pumpkin soup for tea!
Swiftly moving on we also had lots of firework themed crafty activities popping up throughout the nursery.
We love to get out and about when we can!
Our Primroses have been out a Bear Hunt around Corsham Court which soon turned into a who can find the biggest leaf competition!
Our Sweetpeas and Sunflowers took a walk to the war memorial to learn about remembrance day.
Our Sunflower room went out hunting for woodland treasures to put onto their crowns recently.
Staying on the crown theme, our Daisies and Buttercups have been making wonderful crowns/ears to show their support for children in need.
Thank you so much for all the support for Unicefs world childrens day by wearing blue and your donations. We had fun at nursery with blue themed activities and talking about childrens rights.
If you would like to make a donation, you can do so by scanning our Snappies Unicef QR code here.
Staff News:
Welcome back to our lovely Amber. Amber has been back gradually getting back into the swing of nursery life having returned back from maternity leave in September. She started back in her old stomping ground in Buttercups and Bluebells but with the move of her little one in Janauary to this age group Amber will be moving into our Daisy room to become part of their team. We are so pleased to have welcomed her back.
Welcome Ellie to our Daisy room. Ellie is our new apprectice working in babies. She is getting on so well already and settled into the team wonderfully.
Reminder posts:
Please remember to name everything that is sent into nursery. As you can imagine it is very tricky to keep track of all the childrens items so if things are named it is easier to keep track of them and ensure we are popping things on pegs to avoid things getting lost.
Warm clothing:
Hats, gloves, scalfs, coats, jumpers - it is now BOLTIC outside and we of course are still venturing out so please make sure you send in everything your child needs to stay warm out there.
Waiting at the front door in the morning:
Politely we would ask that you wait at the door or just inside reception in the mornings or when you are dropping off. We hope you can understand, many of our younger children can get themselves a bit upset when they see other mummy’s and daddy’s who aren’t their own about in the morning while they are just settling in. Furthermore our cleaners don’t arrive until the evenings so we would like to keep the nursery lovely and clean throughout the day and prevent as much mud, leaves etc being walked into the building throughout the day.
Settling in forms:
Many of our little ones will be moving up into their next stage rooms from January. I hope that you have now been in to see their new room and meet the staff, if this has not happened please do let me know so that we can organise this for you. Could we also request for updated All about Me, Development Step forms to be completed. Please keep an eye out for an email from us. (These can sometimes go into the junk mail box!)
Medication and Illness policies:
If your child has been prescribed medication then they will need to have had it for 24hrs before returning to nursery.
When Calpol or any temperature reducing medicine is given to your child, they are then unfortunately not able to attend nursery until they have had 4hours clear.
And a little reminder about some of the more common illnesses and the exclusion periods:
Conjunctivitis - They have to have been treated for 24hours and the child has to be comfortable.
D&V - 48hours clear of the last incident.
Chicken Pox - Children can’t return to nursery until the spots have all scabbed over and are completely dry.
Thank you for your help and understanding. If you have any questions or are unsure of anything, please do get in touch with the office.
Dates for your diary:
6th December - PreSchool Nativity at the Pound Arts Centre 9.30am. If your child usually doesn’t attend nursery that day and are participating, please drop them in at 9am so that the children can all walk over together. We will then meet you at The Pound!
12th December - Christmas Lunch, if your child attends on this day, we would love them to wear Christmas jumpers or anything festive!
14th December 2-4pm - Christmas Party! This is open to all of our children and parents, we would love to see you all there… we may even have a surprise guest! Ho ho ho…
25th December - 1st Janurary - The nursery will remain closed for the festive period. We will be back on the 2nd of Jan. These days are not charged.
November 2023
Remember remember the 9th of November!
A BIG BIG BIG reminder of our spooky smores (previously spooks and sparkles) night on the 9th of November! We have a whole host of little activities going on and would love for you all to join us. Dressing up is encouraged and we have lots of nibbles for little and big people!
See you there!
While our gardens have been having their make overs, we have had our Forest School Leader Nat in making wonderful conker creations and keeping our Snappies very busy in our Forest School area and front field.
The school have been really great in letting us use their grounds more; we have also been out lots to local parks and into town!
The gardens are finished and they look fab!
You may have heard that we now have our lovely new gardens for every room and our Snappies have already been enjoying playing in them! We are just waiting for all of our new equipment to be delivered, once it has please do come and have a look if you would like, we are very proud and pleased with them!
We had lots of fun during Space Week with all sorts of Space related activities happening throughout all of our rooms!
Our Snappies have been helping staff get the nursery ready for Spooky S’mores with lots of pumpkin play and decoration making!
Our lovely lending library..
You would have walked past our little library lots and lots by now and we would love to see more of you taking advantage of it! We have a whole host of books for the little ones to choose from. So please do have a look through and sign them in and out using the sing out sheet on the wall.
Do you know a Snappies Superstar?
If any of our wonderful Snappies staff members have gone above and beyond and you think deserve a little treat from us, please do nominate them as a Snappies superstar! You can as many nominations as you want as regularly as you want to!
You will see a flashing star in the left corner of this web page, do click on it to make a nomination! We absolutely love seeing these come in and can’t wait to hopefully see a couple more!
You can also click this link: Snappies Superstar — Snapdragons Nursery
Reminder posts:
Waiting at the front door in the morning:
Politely we would ask that you wait at the door or just inside reception in the mornings or when you are dropping off. We hope you can understand, many of our younger children can get themselves a bit upset when they see other mummy’s and daddy’s who aren’t their own about in the morning while they are just settling in. Furthermore our cleaners don’t arrive until the evenings so we would like to keep the nursery lovely and clean throughout the day and prevent as much mud, leaves etc being walked into the building throughout the day.
Settling in forms:
Many of our little ones will be moving up into their next stage rooms from January. Those who are will be hearing from us soon if they haven’t already about settling in dates and requests for updated All about Me, Development Step forms etc. Please keep an eye out for an email from us. (These can sometimes go into the junk mail box!)
Medication and Illness policies:
If your child has been prescribed medication then they will need to have had it for 24hrs before returning to nursery.
When Calpol or any temperature reducing medicine is given to your child, they are then unfortunately not able to attend nursery until they have had 4hours clear.
And a little reminder about some of the more common illnesses and the exclusion periods:
Conjunctivitis - They have to have been treated for 24hours and the child has to be comfortable.
D&V - 48hours clear of the last incident.
Chicken Pox - Children can’t return to nursery until the spots have all scabbed over and are completely dry.
Thank you for your help and understanding. If you have any questions or are unsure of anything, please do get in touch with the office.
Teacher training at big school:
These do not affect us here at the setting, so if your childs is TTO they will still be booked in for these sessions.
Please if you haven’t yet done so, return your photo proofs back to the office so we can get them all sent off!
PreSchool Sunflowers and Sweetpea parents, please could you return your Nativity ticket requests, we will soon be swapping them for keep sake tickets to this very special event!
Staff News:
A warm Snappies welcome to Grace who has started with us as an apprentice popping about various rooms but will be mostly based in Primroses working with our head of room Lauren. Grace has had a wonderful start and has settled in quickly.
Dates for your Diary:
9th November 5.30-7pm - Spooky S’mores
Change of date! 6th December 9.30am at the Pound Pill arts centre - Our PreSchool Nativity
14th December 4pm-6pm - Please come and join us for a little Christmas Party Play!
Note to parents: The Primary school fayre will be taking place on the evening of the 17th of Nov, this will cause a lot of traffic in the car park. If you are struggling to find a space, for a short time you can park in front of the row of nursery staff cars, this is the row on the furthest side away from the school by the exit.
October 2023
It’s raining, it’s pouring, our Snappies are still exploring!
Please remember to send in Wellies and Waterproof’s named and put on pegs please. It would be fab if you could also send them in with a pair of indoor shoes too! Thank you.
Soaking up those last days of summer sun, we were really lucky to be able to have our Teddy Bear Day and have a teddy bear picnics outside!
We have fun with bubbles in all age groups!
We loved getting all snuggled up with milk and cookies ready for bed time stories! Thank you so much to those of you who joined us.
Our very first ‘Snappies Mummy Coffee Mornings’:
Each Friday through September we have been having a lovely little catch up with all our mums who have recently had a baby; they all wonderfully had a baby at about the same time and these little future Snappies all had a lovely opportunity to meet their future best friends!
We were able to invite in a number of guest speakers in to to go over all sorts with them from postnatal exercising to getting babies prepared and ready for those first splashes in the swimming pool! We were so pleased with how positively everyone spoke of our Mummy Meet Up and it is something we would love to share with you in the hopes of doing it again soon!
Notes to Parents:
Our new gardens are finally on the way!!
We have been working with the design team for ages to ensure they all drain correctly and are laid out just perfectly. They are absolutely going to look amazing and are going to be the best ever, but please bare with us as the car park is going to be horrible for 2 weeks while this is being completed. Works have started a little earlier than planned (when does that ever happen!) and the team arrived on Thursday. Just a little heads up that the works do cross over with our concept photography days (See info below) So please take this into consideration when travelling in, especially if you are booking a photo slot.
…can you tell that we are excited?! We can’t wait for you to see the finished results and will most definitely pop photos onto our next blog entry.
Encouraging independence and reducing the spread of germs through the nursery during the coming autumn months:
We would like to gently start encouraging parents to say goodbye in the mornings at the front door leaving your child to walk or be carried down by their key worker or someone from their room. As well as stopping the spread of leaves, mud and outside germs throughout the nursery, it also helps your little ones to be independent in walking to their room and often helps with that initial separation giving them a nice amount of one on one time with their key worker before going into the room to meet with their friends.
Please please remember:
We can not have a child at nursery who has had Calpol in the last 4 hours as it hides their true symptoms that we need to be aware of to provide them with the best possible care. We absolutely hate having to turn you away at the door so please do keep this in mind.
Lost property box:
A polite reminder to be naming everything that is bought into nursery. It is very hard for us to find missing items of clothing if they are not named. Eloise has put a lost property box outside the office, items popped in here will remain in there until the end of the month when they will then join our ‘spares’ cupboard.
Changes to breakfast time:
We will now be offering children breakfast from 8.30am-9.30am.
Dates for your diary:
2nd October - Space Week! This week will be about all things Space related and we would encourage our little ones to come dressed in anything space themed they wanted to or to bring anything along with them like a story, a teddy or a toy they would like to share on Tuesday 3rd October.
10th & 12th of October - Concept Photography are coming in for photo day! If your child doesn’t attend nursery on one of these dates then please do get in touch with the office if you would like to book a slot to come in. Also if you would like to book a slot to bring in siblings for a family shot then please do let us know. Please note that you will have to stay with your child/children if this is not their booked day or if you are bringing in siblings and can not just drop off. Each ‘shoot’ only takes a couple of minutes.
If you would like to send in a spare change of clothes for your child to wear specifically for the photo then please put them in a named bag and let their key worker or head of room know. They will ensure they are changed into them and then changed back again so that they don’t get ruined!
19th October - Parents Evening. Closer to the date, we will put up slot specific sign up sheets on the door of each room for you to book an appointment with your child’s key worker. You will have 10 minutes with your keyworker to chat to them about everything related to your little one, we love to have this opportunity so please do sign up.
9th November 6pm-7pm - Spooks and Sparkles! Come rain or a spooky clear night, we will absolutely be going ahead with this event. For those who haven’t joined us before, many of our Snappies love to dress up and come in for lots of Spooky related activities, Smores & Sparklers round the campfire & nibbles. We would love to see you there!
Local Primary school open evening dates:
Scarily, for our Snappies turning 4 during this academic year, it’s already time to start thinking about those next steps and looking at big schools…
Corsham Primary Pound Pill & Broadwood: 24th November 3.10pm - 7pm
Haywood Prep: Friday 29th September 9.30am - 11.30am, Friday 8th March 2024 & 3rd - 7th June 2024 is open week.
St Patrick’s: Wednesday 4th October & Wednesday 15th November at 9.30am
Corsham Regis Primary Academy: Please get in touch with them to arrange a show round, a virtual show round video has also been put up on their website - Welcome – Corsham Regis Primary Academy
Neston Primary: Show around by appointment. 01225 810478
Box Primary: Show around by appointment. 01225 742663
Lots more information can be found on the government website:
Choosing a school - Wiltshire Council
Applying for a school place - Wiltshire Council
You can then begin to make your application through the council parent portal:
Portal Home (wiltshire.gov.uk)
Staff News:
Jessica has joined our lovely Primrose team, not to be confused with Jess also in the Primrose room, Jessica will be with us on a Thursday and Friday. You may have already met her but please do say hello! She has been working in younger childcare for a number of years and we are very excited to have her start with us.
Our buttercup and bluebell rooms have welcomed Veena to the team. She will be working under Sue as an apprentice and will be with us every day of the week, so all our Buttercup parents will surely get a chance to meet her, she is getting to know our toddlers so well already.
We are very excited to announce that we have permanently stolen Saba from our Broadwood site to join our under 2’s team working with Sue and Nicole across our Daisy, Buttercup and Bluebell rooms. Saba is already very well settled into our Snappies family and we can’t wait for you all to get to know her.
Just look at that smile!! Beckie from our Daisy room has welcomed her second handsome little man, Miles. A huge congratulations to her and her family.
And finally, another very big congratulations to our lovely Charly and her family, who welcomed baby Edie! Bonnie is already being the best big sister!
September 2023
Hello sunny September! (But remember to bring in wellies & raincoats!)
We hope you all had a wonderful summer!
“We’ve missed you!”
Lets take a little look at what we have been up to this month: Our Buttercups and Bluebells have been out hunting bugs and learning all about the tiny world hidden under the grass!
Our Sunflowers have been out picking fresh fruit and vegetables from the garden to use for snack time!
The pigs and chickens have certainly been missing the school children so our Primroses & Sweetpea’s were sure to visit to keep them company!
A polite reminder of our medication and illness policies:
If your child has been prescribed medication then they will need to have had it for 24hrs before returning to nursery.
When Calpol or any temperature reducing medicine is given to your child, they are then unfortunately not able to attend nursery until they have had 4hours clear.
And a little reminder about some of the more common illnesses and the exclusion periods:
Conjunctivitis - They have to have been treated for 24hours and the child has to be comfortable.
D&V - 48hours clear of the last incident.
Chicken Pox - Children can’t return to nursery until the spots have all scabbed over and are completely dry.
Thank you for your help and understanding. If you have any questions or are unsure of anything, please do get in touch with the office.
How we can help you in all sorts of ways..
Did you know there are a variety of ways we can help support your child and your family. We feel we know your child well but you of course know them best, so if you have any concerns over your child’s development then please speak to Eloise our SENDCO, your child’s key person or myself (Rebecca) as our nursery manager; we will do everything we can to support you.
Hearing - Glue ear and hearing difficulties are very common in children. Have you noticed your child sometimes struggles in larger groups or can seem away with the fairies? Do they seem off balance? Are you concerned about their speech? All of these things could potentially be down to hearing. It is really easy for us to put a referral into audiology and you would hopefully get an appointment within a few weeks for a hearing test.
Speech - If you have concerns around how many words your child has or how they are forming sounds, then this is the best time for us to step in for support! We can help make the world of difference for a child at this stage of their development which will help when they make the transition to school. We have staff who would be able to offer more one to one support alongside putting a referral through to the speech and language team who can help set targets for the child.
Lisa Angel - Her role within the council is as an inclusion officer and she is a wonderful support to us. She is able to help with any struggles around toilet training, sleep, struggles with behaviour, break-ups in relationships or a family loss and can support your child through this. Any child who has additional needs, she is able to work with us to ensure we have everything we need in place to best support that family. We would of course speak with you initially and would need you would sign a consent form. From there she is able then to come into the nursery to observe your child. We would then look to hold a meeting to see what support and help we can offer together as a one big team.
Our door is always open and we are here to listen to any concerns or struggles that you having. Bringing up children is the most rewarding thing we have the privilege to do but with that comes great responsibility, stress and sleepless nights. We get it.
Rebecca x
Movin’ on up!
As of next week all of our children due to move up into their next rooms will have all ‘officially’ moved. We know that this can sometimes be an unsettling process for both parents and children so please know that we are here if you would like to talk to us about any concerns. Most of our children are very excited for the next step of their journey and have already been having lots of fun playing with new toys and familiar faces during their settling in days. Keep an eye on Parent Zone as of course we will be positing updates of how they are all getting on.
We are still and always looking for donations!
If anyone is having a bit of a clear out please think of us before throwing anything away!
We are trying to find more pots, pans, photo frames, pots with lids, jugs, tea pots, kitchen utensils, pine cones, wicker baskets, place mats, garden tools and basically anything for our curiosity approach and home corners!
Books are always greatly appreciated too for all age groups! <3
Staff News:
Congratulations to our lovely Nicole who we have stolen out of our older toddler room (Primroses) to be our new Deputy Head of Room for our Daisy, Buttercup and Bluebell rooms working under Sue as Head of Room.
Nicole has been with us for a number of years and we are so excited for her to flourish in this new rather large role!
A big welcome to Sophia who will be joining our Primroses as an apprentice.
She has hit the ground running and is already getting to know our little Snappies well.
We have said a very sad goodbye to our lovely Poppy in our Primrose room who is off to study Child Psychology at Surrey university. We wish her the best of luck and very much hope to have her back for Christmas’ and summers!
Dates for your diary:
8th September- Is Teddy bear day! come in your pjs and enjoy a day full of teddy bear picnics, stories and other bear themed fun!
28th September - Bedtime Stories. Please join us from 4.30pm to share some bedtime stories, a cookie and hot chocolate with us! We would love it if you could send your child into nursery with a set of PJs to change into and their favourite teddy. We will spend the day having a focus on our favourite stories so please feel free to let your child bring theirs into nursery with them.
9th November 6pm-7pm - Spooks and Sparkles! We are asking that you put this date in your diary early as it is absolutely our favourite night of the year and we would love for you all to join us! More info to follow.
August 2023
You say goodbye, and I say Hello, Hello Hello!
We said a rather emotional goodbye and good luck to lots of our not so little Snappies and Parents this month. We truly wish you all the very best starting big school, don’t forget us! We would love for you to pop in every once in a while and let us know how you are getting on. <3
Graduation photos will be coming your way soon!
As not to leave a rather large empty space in our PreSchool room for long, many of our little ones will be moving up into their next stage rooms from September. Those who are will be hearing from us soon if they haven’t already about settling in dates. Please keep an eye out for an email asking you to update a couple of forms. (These can sometimes go into the junk mail box!)
We are looking for donations!
Our babies and younger toddler team specifically, but across the whole nursery we are asking if anyone is having a bit of a clear out to think of us before throwing anything away!
We are trying to find more pots, pans, photo frames, pots with lids, jugs, tea pots, books, kitchen utensils, pine cones, wicker baskets, place mats, and basically anything for our curiosity approach and home corners!
Staff News:
Congratulations to our lovely Sue who has taken on the role of Head of Room overseeing both our Babies and Younger Toddler rooms!
We are so happy she has taken the role, Sue is already part of the furniture in the Younger Toddler room and we are confident she will be a perfect fit for the role.
Sue will also be working alongside a deputy across the two rooms… check back in next months blog to hear the announcement!
To recap; Emillie will be moving into our Head of Room role in our PreSchool Sunflower room. Sadly Charly’s last day with us before she is off to have her baby is the 16th of August. Eloise will be starting her new role as Deputy Manager and SEND lead from August and will be working along side Charly during this transition period.
Get to know our new room names!
Ready for September we thought now would be a great time to introduce our new names for each of our rooms!
Babies will now be our little Daisies.
Younger Toddlers will be split across our two rooms as Buttercups and Bluebells. (Buttercups will be the usual drop off room)
Toddlers are becoming our Primroses
PreSchool All Year Round become our Sweetpeas
PreSchool Term Time Only becomes our Sunflower room.
There will be a lovely new sign on each door to help you remember!
Getting out and about:
This month we have had the opportunity to get the entire nursery out for little local walks and visits to the park. We even had one morning whereby every child was out together!
Thank you very very much to The Corsham Toy shop!! Our PreSchoolers popped in for a visit and were very lucky indeed to walk away with a special little present kindly given to us by the shopkeeper.
Have you heard about the Corsham town Pokemon hunt?! Fantastic fun for all ages, more info on how to play can be found at The Corsham Toy Shop!
Dates for your Diary:
8th September - Teddy Bear Day! We would love to invite all our little squishy friends to join us our Snappies for a fun day in PJ’s.
28th September - Bedtime Stories 5pm-6pm. We would love all of our parents to come and join us for hot milk, cookies and before bed story time. PJ’s are encouraged! (If your child doesn't attend on this day please do bring them along anyway!)
July 2023
We are loving this sunshine!
Our PreSchool Leavers trip to Warleigh Lodge:
We treat our very grown up leavers to a special and super fun day out each year; as you can see they had a wonderful time and we were so proud of all of them for being so amazingly behaved! We are going to miss each and every one of them lots and lots and we are all so grateful we got to share this lovely day with them before they graduate.
Staff News:
We are very excited to announce to you our new Head of Toddlers, Lauren!
Lauren has been working in early years for a number of years and comes to us with lots of experience and is already getting to know our toddlers well. I am sure you will all join me in wishing her a very warm Snappies welcome!
Sam has joined us as a Lunchtime Assistant now happily working alongside her sister-in-law Charlotte. Sam is working across all the rooms and already loves all of our little Snappies!
Dates for your Diary:
Saturday 15th - PreSchool Graduation Day! We would love for all of our PreSchool families to join us in celebrating with food and lawn games. Please if you have not done so already; do let the office know if you will be joining us. We’re not crying…
Finally, a shout out to Jayne one of our lovely cooks who has for the past couple of weeks been cooking double time while Kerry has been away! We are very happy to have welcomed back Kerry to the dream team this week!
June 2023
Sun, sun, sun, here we come!
We are big believers in leaning in the great outdoors and now the sun is out there is just no stopping us!
A little reminder: Please can children be bought to nursery with sun cream already applied. We will then re-apply later if we are going outside again after lunch.
We have been getting out and about, our Younger Toddlers recently took a local walk with a stop at the park behind the Springfield Community Campus and the library.
A big thank you to our grandparents who joined us for Grandparents Gardening Day
We would have loved for more of you to have been able to join us this year and we were wondering if there was anything we could do next year that would help? This year we held a gardening morning and last year an afternoon with a better attendance - is a PM better for everyone? Please do pop your head in the office or drop us an email because we do love Grandparents Gardening Day so much and we want to make sure we are making it as accessible as possible.
Baby news: (There’s a lot of it!)
Samii has welcomed her beautiful little girl, Millie. A huge congratulations and an even bigger well done to mum!
Beckie from our baby room is expecting another little boy in July! This will be Beckie’s second maternity leave with us; she will be greatly missed during this time. We are super excited to meet her little man and can’t wait for her to come back and for him to join our Snappies family soon!
As I am sure you all know by now, our lovely Charly, whom you would have seen in the office and also floating about all the rooms as our Deputy manager and SENDCO. Is expecting another little girl in September! We will be missing her loads and loads while she is on maternity leave but are also very excited and happy for her.
Snappies News:
Taking over from Charly in August as our new Deputy Manager and SENCO lead is Eloise from out PreSchool Term Time room. Eloise is currently the Head of Room and has been with us for a number of years. She knows all of our little Snappies very well and is excited to meet all of the parents she doesn’t already know! She will be saying hello to you all very soon and I am sure you will join us in wishing her the best in her new role.
As you may have seen in our recent email, sadly we have said goodbye to Brandon in our Toddler room but a very BIG and very exciting hello to Hannah! Lots of you will know Hannah from our Younger Toddler room and I am sure you will agree with us when we say that we couldn’t have hoped for a better fit for our Toddler 2 room as so many of the little ones know and love her lots already.
Meet our newest member to our Snappies team, Amanda!
Amanda has joined us from Jersey and has a number of years experience in child care. She is looking forward to getting to meet you all and I am sure you will all join us in wishing her a warm welcome to our Toddler 2 room.
Tiffinay and Amber are also joining us back after their own maternity leaves! We are so excited to welcome them back and we can’t wait for those of you who haven’t yet, to meet them! Tiffany works 7.30-1.30 in our pre-school rooms and Amber will be doing some KIT days over the next few months before officially starting back in September.
In other news, the work on our new air-con heating system has now finished. So no more workmen and all the children are back in their normal rooms.
Come and join our wonderful team..!
We are looking for a lovely house keeper to join our team as soon as possible! Hours from 6pm-8pm Monday-Friday; after working hours, the nursery will be empty and quiet! So perfect if you just want to stick the headphones in and get going with some cleaning therapy!! Please speak to the office for any further info.
Dates for your diary:
19th June - Father’s Day breakfast 8-9.30am - We would like to invite all of our lovely hard working dads in for a stay and play and a breakfast buttie, we hope to see you there!
21st June - Make music day 4.30-6pm - If you play an instrument or know a family member who does we would love for you to join us! (Please let the office know if you are able to pop along and don’t forget your music maker!). The children will be making instruments throughout the day and it will be great to have visitors come in and join in at the end of the day jam it out.
20th and 22nd will be our Warleigh Lodge farm trip dates for our pre-school school leavers. The staff will be letting you know next week which day your child will be attending (if your child attends both a Tuesday and Thursday). If your child is on the trip and normally finishes at 3pm we will need you to collect at 3.30 please. Your child will need their water bottle and welly boots for this great day out.
May 2023
We’ve had an EGGcellent April!
As well as lots of easter themed activities going on in the rooms, we had our big egg hunt on the front field too. We all had so much fun and there was a special treat at the end for all the groups who were able to find all 10 hidden eggs!
Our Preschool explorers have been back to Wesonbirt this month trying to track down the infamous Gruffalo and learning about the forest while they do so.
A visit from Kelly’s Donkey and Friends
Supporting our children's wellbeing, we had a lovely visit from Barney the Donkey, Flora the Pony, a mummy goat Betty and her little billy goats Pebbles & BamBam and two very fluffy bunnies. All our children were able to pop out for a visit to feed and groom the animals if they wanted to.
Snappies News: A Big Hello!
Svitlana has joined our Babies team. She was deputy manager of a nursery in Ukraine and has years of experience working in early years, so we feel very lucky to have her join our Snappies team. As she has come to our country as a refugee she did not know any English before arriving but is doing amazingly at picking it up. She is currently studying English at college to help support her with this. Her confidence is building daily and I am sure she will start handing over to you as parents soon.
Please do say hello and join us in wishing her a warm welcome.
Please join us in wishing Katie our Toddler Head of Room a sad goodbye but our very best wishes in her new role overseeing student practitioners on placements for Norland. Her last day with us will be Wednesday, we wish you the best of luck!
We certainly have some exciting plans with practitioners moving to the Toddler room permaenently soon - watch this space!
Dates for your diary:
Thank you to those of you who came along to our school leavers evening this week, it was lovely to see so many faces and I hope you found it useful. This is the first one that we have held so any feedback would be welcomed.
19th May - Grandparents gardening day 10am-12pm - This was such a success last year and we just loved it so much that we absolutely had to do it again! We are inviting all grandparents to join us for a lovely (hopefully sunny) day out in the garden. Here’s a little look at what we got up to last year.
A little reminder: please ensure your child is being sent to nursery with a named sun hat and named sun cream we can keep here. Bring on that sunshine!
April 2023
WOW what a busy month we’ve had!
Another year another fabulous book week!
Reading opens up a whole world of imagination to our little ones and we are very enthusiastic about encouraging a love of books.
During world book day our wonderful practitioners filled your little Snappies day with lots of activities; our younger toddlers absolutely loved creating books of their very own to take home with them…
We would love to say a MASSIVE thank you to all of our Snappie’s Grandparents who visited to share their favourite stories with the children.
5 Little ducks went swimming one day…
We welcomed and have now said goodbye to our 5 little Ducklings who very quickly became key members of our Snappies Family this month and who we will all miss dearly. All of our children got lots of opportunities to see and play with the them; it has been really special watching the children holding and stroking the ducks so carefully and watching them watch the ducks grow.
In the video above, our little duckies settled in their new home in Lacock where they will stay as egg laying ducks.
Seasons Change..
Despite the snow, we have been learning all about Spring and the changes it brings..
..and we certainly haven’t let the snow stop us from having lots of fun!
Thank you PCSO Redman!
Why children love emergency vehicle’s so much we don’t know, our PreSchoolers were so excited by our visit learning all about the Police and what they do for our community. Of course no visit would be complete without a sit in the police car with the siren and blue lights on!
Snapdragons Holi Festival 2023
My goodness….the pictures speak for themselves! There were so many great photos, please visit the link below for even more. https://snapdragonsnursery.sharepoint.com/:f:/s/MediaTeam/Eo_KzApMWVxDu-vuGdCuS94BkkpTLlSCTOFCemBmgN9hZw?e=jNpspU
Dates for your Dairy
6th April - The 2023 Snappies Easter Egg Hunt - Come and join us from 3-4pm
19th April - Parents Evening - Speak to your child’s key worker to book in a slot.
A Snappies News Announcement:
For those of you who haven’t spotted her yet, our lovely Samii will be welcoming a little girl in the Spring!
She will sadly be leaving us towards the beginning of May and although we are super sad to be loosing her for this time, we are all so happy for her and her partner and we can’t wait to meet their little lady.
Leading me on to wishing our new Head of Younger Toddlers Emillie the best of luck in her new role. She will be taking over when Samii leaves in the spring time.
Emillie is moving over from our PreSchool room so already knows so many of our toddlers well and is super excited to get to know all of our Younger Toddler parents too!
March 2023
Childs mental health week and more!
During February you may have seen our staff walking around in all kinds of outfits, pyjamas, comfy clothes and even Christmas jumpers! To show our support for child’s mental health week we have been wearing whatever makes us happy and encouraging our little Snappies to do the same.
Our Preschoolers are enjoying a story in their pajamas with their favourite teddy bears from home.
Our fantastic practitioners have also been shining the spotlight on some of the wellbeing activities they have been doing with the children, lets take a look…
Our younger toddlers have been making regular trips to ‘Sue’s Spa’ joining in with yoga sessions and getting a lovely little foot or hand massage to help them to relax!
Our Preschoolers have been getting experimental in creating home made calming lava lamps and sensory provoking play-doh in favourite colours!
We love our Snappies to be as involved as possible in what we do, learning to be as independent as they want to be!
We have been doing lots of baking throughout the rooms. Baking sweet treats for the whole nursery to enjoy with their tea and savory treats using natural resources found in our local forests and fields.
Getting Outside
As I am sure you all know by now, at the heart of our practices and beliefs is outside play and learning. Just look at how much fun our Snappies are having learning about the seasons and how to look after the creatures surrounding us. We also know what a positive impact being outside has on our mental health.
Our Toddlers and Preschoolers have made a couple of little trips out this month, playing i-spy at Whitehall, popping down to find a new favourite book at the Library, exploring Corsham Court and getting out and about exploring our town!
Dates for your diary
2nd March - World Book Day! We will be celebrating by dressing up as our favourite book characters! We will certainly be inviting all of you to dress up your little Snappie too!
15th March - Wild Club! - Our lovely Nat and Tim will be running wild club from our Forest school between 4.30-6pm. Learning about all things wild, we have a limited number of places for you and your child to join us!
17th March - Holi Festival of Colour and Spring - Everyone is invited to celebrating with us for this ulta messy stay and play 2-3pm. Have a look at what we got up to last time…
Corsham Toddlers & Preschool - Holi - Google Photos
20th March - Mothing Sunday but on a Monday! We are inviting all our lovely hard working mums in for coffee morning stay and play from 8.30-10am.
See you there!
February 2023
A new year means new things to explore, see what we have been up to!
Hello 2023!
Our little Snappies sure have been busy already, out in all weathers enjoying all the wonders of the natural world.
Our PreSchoolers took a class trip to Westonbirt to embark on a Gruffalo forest walk with Nat our Forest School Leader.
We have been lucky enough to have Nat with us all month in our forest school hosting a number of activities every day. She has been showing the children how to use an apple press, they have been cutting wood to start fires and making fresh fruit teas on them!
Say hello to Anywhere Bear
Our Younger Toddler room has a sign up sheet on the room door for anyone who wants to take anywhere bear on his next adventure! Where will he go next we wonder…
We can’t wait to welcome our ducklings!
Knowing how animals can play a big part in childrens mental health; we are super excited announce the arrival of 6 little duckling eggs to the nursery that will hopefully all be hatching in 28 days time.
Our Preschoolers are currently caring for the eggs and we are all very excited to meet them and introduce the ducklings to the rest of the children.
Dates for your diary..
21st Feb - Stay and Play
We would love to invite you all to our Shrove Tuesday celebrations and encourage you to enter our famous Snappies Pancake Race! Look out for an email with more details to come.
2nd March - World Book Day!
More information to follow.
February 2021
It’s a New Year and we have been very busy little Snappies
Hello Everyone,
We really have hit the ground running since returning from our Christmas break and I want to thank you for all your support with the different events we have been hosting. The outfits have just been amazing and we have loved all the posts you have shared on ParentZone with pictures and videos of the children sharing their favourite stories at home. If you would like any help with how to upload to your child’s learning journey please do ask. So let’s have a little look at what we have all been up to over the month or so.
Flour play in babies
There are so many things to learn when you're a baby exploring flour. There are all the different things you can put in the flour to make marks from sticks to make lines, to cars to make tracks. Discovering “mark making” is an early skill on the road to reading and writing! Then comes all the wonderful language that goes along with this play; is it soft? what colour is it? look what marks I can make, what can you do? It is also a great sensory experience; flour can turn from being light and fluffy to thick and gloopy when you add water to it, or mouldable if you turn it into playdough. Feathers are very exciting for little hands but when you tickle them in the flour and make it puff, it creates even more excitement. Sometimes it really is the small things that can create the most wonder.
Can you guess one of our books of the month?
Of course! It’s Goldilocks and the Three Bears, a firm favourite with children and adults. The children have had so much fun acting out the story. We have talked about different sizes and amounts: “How much porridge do we think Daddy bear likes to eat?”; routines and times of the day “When do we like to eat our breakfast?” and “When do we like to have a sleep”. The children used authentic objects for observational paintings, carefully recreating the props in front of them. The options are endless when it comes to using stories in our play and that is why we just loved our story telling week! The outfits we saw were amazing, thank you so much for all the effort that was made, the children really did have a blast (and the grown ups too) and it was great to have so many new stories to share.
Pre-school AYR have become avid bird watchers
Since the Autumn, pre-school have been putting out bird food by their window and have had so much fun spotting the different species of birds that come to visit us. They have had their binoculars at the ready with their tick charts to see if they can spot something new but the other week no binoculars were needed when Mr Squirrel popped by for some breakfast causing much excitement with the children. It has been so lovely to see their interest in the outside world grow and we are looking forward to extending this even more now that spring is on its way.
Wassailing
Well what on earth is Wassailing you my ask……. it is an Anglo-Saxon tradition to help with the apple harvest and ensure we have a plentiful crop in the summer. Our first job was to wake the trees up by banging our pots and pans and shouting very loudly “wake up trees!” As you can imagine the children very much enjoyed that job. The next job is to feed the trees, so the children baked soda bread and took out some apple juice (traditionally cider) and fed it to the trees, tipping the apple juice on the roots and pieces of bread on the branches; which was actually much harder than it looked! It took some patience to balance the bread and some thinking about how to press the bread onto the ends of the branches without them snapping. Plenty of problem solving and trial and error which is great for our pre-schoolers using all that brain power.
Burns night
For Burns night all children made their own oat cakes for snack, it is a lovely easy recipe to follow and the children were able to be involved in the whole process. Have a little look below at the link to our Nursery Kitchen where you can find lots of different recipes to try at home including these oat cakes!
We also listened to some Robert Burns (child appropriate ones only of course) and the children in pre-school created some pictures inspired by the Roses are Red poem. The children also created flags and had a traditional Scottish tea of cock-a-leekie soup and even a little bit of haggis on the side to try.
Coming up … it’s Carnival time
On Wednesday the 24th we are having a carnival themed day here at the nursery. If your child could come in some extra colourful/party clothes that would be amazing. This is for us celebrate the Italian and Spanish carnivals with some of our families. We will be having spaghetti bolognaise for lunch and then Spanish omelettes for tea. We also have some fun games, songs and activities for the children to join in with too!
Some new faces to welcome to the team
We have welcomed lots of new faces to the nursery over the last few weeks, Charly, Katie, Sue, Danielle, Megan and Chris will all be introducing themselves to you in due course over the next few weeks, we will just let them settle in a little before sending them out to do the hand overs.
Tim our Forest school leader is also basing himself here with us on a Wednesday and Thursday to work alongside Eloise who is completing her forest school training. He is working with all the age groups doing lots of what he does best, the great outdoors!
Sharing the love
During what a has been a bit of a tough time of it we thought we would share a little love. Thank you to those of you who have sent in photos to be included. We hope this video brings a smile to your face.
A few favours to ask
Feedback- We have just started a testimonial section on our website and we would love to share any lovely feedback you would like to give us. We would also love to hear from those of you who have started with us recently about how you have found the new settling in process so we can make any improvements where needed. We would also like to share with new parents who will be starting with us some positive comments on your experience. I am sure you will understand them feeling nervous, as you may have felt with your child starting during this time and I think this could prove to be incredibly supportive for them.
Spare clothes- firstly a big thank you to those of you who have dropped in clothes for our toddler and pre-school room, we are all stocked up now. Could we please now ask if you have any clothes aged 18-24 months, they would be very gratefully received.
Did you hear the news?
We’re delighted to announce that Snapdragons have won an award at the National Nursery World Awards! This was the Caring for Babies and Toddlers award which we won for the additional training and care we embed in our inductions, audits, environments and ongoing reflection in relation to our youngest children. Read all about by following the link below.
Sharing a little more love…… well it is February
Don’t forget you can nominate your very own Snappies super star, if there is a member of my team that you feel has been extra wonderful in any way, please do press that little flashing star in the bottom left corner of our website and tell them how much it has meant to you. As you can imagine it really does put the biggest smile on their faces when they receive one.
Well that’s it from me for now, keep safe everyone and a massive thank you for everything you are doing to ensure we can have a happy and safe environment for all of us here
Rebecca
December 2020
Celebrating the best time of the year
Christmas is nearly here as is the new year which I truly hope will bring some normality back to all our lives. We have had a lovely December here, celebrating all things Christmas. Kerry and Jayne did a wonderful job of creating the most sumptuous meal for us all and the children made their own party hats to wear too. They enjoyed listening to some Christmas tunes and chatting away about what they hoped might be under the tree on Christmas morning.
Christmas party day was so much fun, we had some adorable outfits and some groovy moves too! Father Christmas paid us a visit and read the children a story, also checking that the children knew what to leave out on Christmas eve, I particularly enjoyed hearing what drinks they felt he may like left out for him. Some of the children were concerned that they didn’t have a chimney but they were reassured by the man himself that he has a special key and that he would deliver their gifts no matter what!
The children in Pre-school have been busy creating wonderful decorations for the rooms and they look just amazing. They have also been making lovely things for you at home too which should be coming your way on their last day of the year.
Pre-school have been collecting twigs and branches to make the most beautiful wreaths that we have displayed around the nursery. This took lots of patience and some brilliant hand eye co-ordination, well done pre-school we love them!
They have been using so many different materials to create the all sorts of things, including clay reindeer which are just adorable.
Toddlers have been getting so excited for everything Christmas themed and dived into whatever the team has set out for them.
The Christmas tree brought plenty of laughter and mess. The cookies took a bit of thinking, all that measuring and mixing was hard work but it all paid off with yummy cookies to take home for all who helped to make them. Toddlers came in one morning to find snow had fallen over one of their favourite toys which lead to plenty of chatter about letters and parcels coming and going from the north pole!
Babies have been exploring all sorts of different media from ice to shaving foam and have enjoyed every moment of it, all Christmas themed of course
As you can see the poor elf got himself into mischief and got stuck in some ice, good job the babies were here to save the day! They also created the most wonderful Christmas tree by printing using the paint pots and the finished article was spectacular alongside being lots of fun and messy to make. You will notice that the babies are either stood at the table or the activity is on the floor, this is so they have the choice as to whether or not they want to join in.
Returning from our little break away
We return from our Christmas break on the 4th January and who knows what restrictions we will come back to but we really appreciate everything you are doing to help us stay as safe as possible. Just a few reminders for the new year, can your child please bring in a named water bottle and please can you ensure that it is only filled with water. Also please name items of clothing and welly boots to help us keep track of everyones things.
Wishing you all a very Merry Christmas
I always love this time of year in the nursery and we all feel very fortunate to share all the joys of this festive time with your children. I know it will be so different for so many of us this year at home but how ever you are celebrating I hope that the children bring all the magic of Christmas alive and you can enjoy time together as a family.
All the very best
Rebecca xx
November 2020
Back from Maternity leave and jumping into the hot seat
Hello Parents and Carers,
This is my first newsletter since returning from maternity leave and what a crazy old world I have returned to. COVID really has had an enormous impact on our normal day but it is so lovely to see all our families again and meet the children who have started while I have been off. I have just been blown away at how well the children are coping with our new way of life and the staff’s positive attitude to the ever-changing regulations we have put in place to keep us all safe. I must take a moment to thank Lyndsey who has been holding onto the reins for me while I have been off, it is truly clear she has done an amazing job and I am very thankful for all the support she has given you all.
Rebecca
Our safer operating procedures
Thank you so much for all your support with ensuring we are following all the procedures necessary to keep us safe. You can find our SOPS on our website www.snapdragonsnursery.com/covid-sop but the main points are
We are currently unable to have anyone on the premises who is not a member of staff. Any meetings will have to be held over a video call or if you wish to speak to me, then please feel free to give me a call at any time. During drop off and pick up please wait outside the building and we will bring your child to you as quickly as possible.
Please wear a mask at drop off and pick up
Please can you ensure that your child brings a labelled water bottle/cup to nursery with them
If your child presents with any of the symptoms they will need to be tested
If your child or anyone in your household has had to be tested could you email us a copy of the results once you receive them.
Be aware of the busier collection and pick-up times and if possible try to avoid them; this will hopefully help with keeping to social distancing as well as ensuring parents/carers do not have to wait in the cold and dark for too long.
Again, can I thank you for all your support regarding everything that we are having to put in place, I understand it is not an ideal situation.
Our mark of respect and appreciation
All the children have been very busy making different variations of poppies for Remembrance Day and I think you will share my adoration of what the children have created. In our pre-school rooms the children had a talk about why we were making the poppies and watched a brilliant video clip on why we remember. The children also took part in the two minutes’ silence for our lost soldiers.
Toddlers have been busy creating two beautiful wreaths for the war memorial; this included one for the soldiers and one for the animals too. The children then had a lovely walk to place their wreath with the others that had been placed at the weekend, what a lovely addition to a wonderful part of our community.
We feel that the children should be able to be creative as possible when making their poppies by showing them pictures and printing with them. Toddler 1’s interpretation is just lovely and they have covered one of their walls with these.
These are the lovely poppies that our babies have been creating
Nominating a Snappy Super Star
Did you know that if you feel a member of our team is a bit of a super star or you feel they have really gone out of their way to support you we have a staff nomination tab on our website. While the team already have the most rewarding job ever it is also lovely for them to get recognition from time to time so if someone springs to mind or if something comes up in the future please feel free to head over to our website and look for the star icon down the side or here is the link www.snapdragonsnursery.com/superstar
Pre-school Drop off
If you are arriving with a pre-school child for the AYR (8-6) room after 9 AM could you please bring them to the main entrance as the children and staff are sometimes getting ready for the day and are not hearing the bell or seeing you and we wouldn’t want you waiting out in the cold.
Busy babies
Here’s a little insight into what babies have been up to over the last month-
Pumpkins have provided so much fun for the babies, they have been very curious about all the different textures especially when one got filled with slime!
We loved seeing your children dressed up for Halloween and we had so much fun celebrating with them. Look at their wonderful fireworks picture that they created together.
No matter the weather we love to be out in the garden, babies enjoy exploring all the different things the staff provide while also just being out in the fresh air.
Messy play is one for nursery and babies loved to get well and truly stuck in
Terrific Toddlers
Lucy has been a wonderful new addition to our toddler team. She has come in with some wonderful ideas and is truly part of the team. Here is a little insight into what they have been up to this month-
Playdough as endless learning opportunities and these toddlers have created a space scene: to infinity and beyond!
They have been using objects that they have found out in the garden for sorting, size comparisons and counting
With fireworks night comes lots of conversations around colour and sounds, these children have taken inspiration from what they have seen and created some group and individual artwork.
Productive Pre-schoolers
Pre-school really have seemed to settle into nursery life without all the older children, who have left for school, quite quickly and we have seen plenty of new faces too.
The children have been very curious about the change in season and conkers have been a definite favourite all round. Fallen leaves from the trees and all the wonderful colours have been a big part of what the children have been up to. They have also been busy looking at animals and nature.
“Go find it cards” are always a favourite when out in the school grounds and the children found things of different shapes and sizes
These two boys are having a wonderful time acting out our book of the month ”Whatever Next?” - you can’t beat a cardboard box can you?
As I said conkers have just been the best thing to play with and the children got creative by building their own marble run for them. Isn’t it amazing!
Look at these wonderful pictures inspired by what they have seen or found outside.
Well that’s us for now, I hope you have enjoyed looking through what we have all been up to
August 2020
Update for September
What a year it has been so far and September is here already. I thought I would send you all an update to let you know the plan as we are entering the new academic year, there are not many changes to what we are currently doing but just to refresh for all the children returning / starting in September.
First off, I would like to thank you all for your cooperation and patience over the last couple of months while we have had to adjust to a ‘new normal’. It has been a really successful reopening, and we hope this will continue throughout the rest of 2020.
With this is mind there will not be any changes to how we are currently operating, and this will be the case until January 2021, unless there are any significant changes in the government guidelines.
The reason for this is that Snapdragons as a company feel that we have done incredibly well at making sure our families and staff are safe, and so we do not wish to change this now with the risk of a second wave and local lockdowns; it is better to remain as we are until we know the risk is sustainably minimised.
Key point to remember are as follows:
• Pre-school parents will drop off / collect through the side gate of our garden.
• Drop off and collections for Babies/Toddlers will still be at the main door. Remembering to follow social distancing while waiting.
• Make sure if it is a hot day that your child comes in wearing sun cream and brings some with them to be reapplied later in the day.
• Bring a labelled water bottle for your child – we have found this is working really well and the children are drinking much more which is great! Please make sure this is water only.
• If your child has had Calpol/fever relief medication then they will not be allowed to attend nursery. Also, if your child appears to be unwell then you should consider keeping them at home (especially moving into the autumn/winter months)
• If your child has a temperature and/or a new continuous cough, they will have to have a COVID-19 test before returning to nursery. Evidence of the negative test is required before they can attend.
• As we will be busier, bags may need to be taken home at the end of each day.
• Please avoid your child bringing toys into nursery and only bring with them a comforter if they require one.
I hope all of the above makes sense and once again thank you for your continued support with this. Together we will get through it and one day hopefully it will be a distant memory!
Our Safer Operating procedures are available on our website -
https://www.snapdragonsnursery.com/covid-sop
Goodbye and Good Luck
We want to say an extra special GOOD LUCK to all our lovely school leavers heading off onto their next adventure! It has been an absolute pleasure watching you grow into wonderful little people! We will miss you all so much but know you will have the best time at big school!!
Early Drop Offs
Pre-Booked Early Drop Off’s will commence from w/c 7th September (unless prearranged already). If you previously had these early drop offs booked pre lockdown you will need to rebook them with us as all the sessions were removed during lockdown. We have a limited space available for them due to our bubble system so they will be booked on a first come first served basis.
Return of the team
From September all of our staff will return from furlough leave so I’m sure you will be pleased to see some familiar faces. We have also had some lovely new staff start with us which I hope you have had the chance to meet - I am currently updating the website with their photos so you know who is who - but in the meantime just for your information so you can talk about names we have:
The Baby Team
Jess - Head of Room
Ellie - Deputy Head of Room
Elise
Charlee
Rosie
Tiffany (on a Thursday)
The Toddler Team
Lucy - Head of Room (due to start end of September)
Chloe
Nicole
Macy
Lorraine
Brandon
Gina (Monday,Tuesday&Thursday)
Gemma (Wednesday&Friday)
The Preschool Team
Eloise - Head of Preschool TTO/OOSC
Kirsty - Head of Preschool AYR
Michell
Tristan
Kaitlin
Jo
Tiffany (On a Monday)
What Babies have been up to…….
What Toddlers have been up to…..
What Preschool have been up to…..
Are we doing a good job?
We would really value your feedback about how you feel we have been doing lately - we know that the world is very different right now so it would be good to hear your feedback! If you have time please drop us a review at:
https://www.daynurseries.co.uk/daynursery.cfm/searchazref/50002035SNAC
Norland Nannies
In previous years we have hosted trainee Norland nannies on placements in some of our nurseries to help them gain the practical experience they need to enhance their academic study. This year, of course, things have been a little different, but we hope that we may be able to welcome back another cohort of future Norland nannies to work with us as soon as it is appropriate and within our Covid19 safe operating procedures.
Norland students are primarily training to become nannies within the home and the Placement Manager at Norland is looking for families who would be able to offer a four-week placement. This could be a great opportunity if you have recently had a baby (or two or three!) and would appreciate some help and support with your new arrival. You would need to be at home at all times to supervise, so if you are on maternity or paternity leave it could work well for you. If you are interested in finding out more, please contact placements@norland.ac.uk
Donations
We are introducing more of a natural feel across the nursery influenced by the Curiosity Approach. If you have any of the following unwanted items at home, we would love to take them off your hands!
Wall Clocks
Pots, pans and utensils (wooden or metal)
Photo frames
Artificial plants and flower pots
Small rugs and fabric
Old electrical items
Baskets
Figurines and trinkets
Old costume jewellery
Buttons, cotton reels, shells etc
It doesn’t have to be exactly what is listed but this is a general idea of what we are looking for!