The Scottish Book Trust have produced a resource for practitioners supporting the nursery to Primary 1 transition. This resource will provide ideas, activities and examples of projects that can be used to support transition during this challenging time. The resource is split into three areas:

• Activities to support transition – including sharing song and rhymes, creative writing and reading
• Books for transitions – recommendations and where to find books on and offline to share
• Transition projects – examples of projects from across local authorities and individual school projects

Bookbug Transition Session

A Bookbug session themed around the transition from nursery to Primary 1 has also been created along with a template to run this session.

Please find the above resources HERE.

Over the last couple of months staff at Newtonmore Nursery have been using Google Meet to connect children, families and staff to support play, learning and transition.  They host regular story meets with a book focus for the week.  Early Years Practitioners, Fiona Johnstone and Caroline MacDougall,  describe more about their latest book focus below.

As part of our last story meet we read Going on a Bear Hunt for a week. The children took part in experiences related to the story.  They made binoculars, bear caves and dens,  created their own stories and joined in with our “live” Going on a Bear Hunt video session.

There were many positive comments from children and parents which included:
• ‘She loved it thank you very much’
• ‘He was buzzing when he came off the meet’
• ‘She is now re-telling the story on her own’
• ‘He recreated the bear hunt in the chicken run’
• ‘I made my own Bear Hunt story now’
• ‘They loved to make up the story book’
• ‘He has been using them in the garden to look for bears’

Realising the Ambition highlights the importance for children to be in nature and use all of their senses to experience the world.  It also emphasises  the importance for children to access opportunities to develop their confidence, creativity and curiosity.  Through the book focus week the children were able to connect with nature through the virtual bear hunt outdoors as well as practice and develop new skills such as re-telling a favourite story, mark make, create texts and of course have lots of fun!

Little Bugs is a commissioned childminding service run by Becki and Ryan McKenzie in the village of Muir of Ord. They have a passion for outdoor play so the children are usually found enjoying rich learning opportunities in the garden or while exploring the local woods and lochan area.

As Little Bugs remained open for key worker families during lockdown, Becki and Ryan have kindly shared their experiences of providing a service during this challenging period. You can read their account here: Little Bugs – Childminding During Lockdown

You can follow Little Bugs on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

Please find below some opportunities to join in the discussion on developing outdoor learning in your settings.

Twitter – Final #BeingMeBlether of the term

Please join the #BeingMeBlether team for a cuppa and a blether about making the most of OUTDOOR OPPORTUNITIES.

WEDNESDAY 24th JUNE
From 10am via Twitter – ES Children&Families (@CaFTeam)

With special guests – YOU and the Minister for Children and Young People @MareeToddMSP 🤗☕️💬❤️🌈

Festival of Learning Spaces

The Festival of Learning Spaces runs from 1st of June until the 10th of July and offers a host of free to attend webinars, on demand content, workshops, classes and many more digital learning opportunities.  These opportunities include various sessions which focus on outdoor learning delivery.

Find out more about the Festival of Learning Spaces at the link below:

http://www.festivaloflearningspaces.com