learning/play at nursery - 14months

[Disneybabe]

Hi new here - so not sure if I'm commenting in right section, but does anyone know what type of things 14 month toddler does at nursery - are they just left to play or do they get interaction learning from nursery nurses? like, do they paint handprints or teach them new things. - can't seem to find any information. Hope you can help xxx

[MrsBadger]

Go and visit one and see what they do!
Any nursery worth its salt welcomes prospective parents, esp if you ring in advance.

[gigglewitch]

hi db! mine go to a nursery where they follow the early learning goals (do they all do this?) they have lots of themed stuff, so that the children develop in the target areas of confidence, communication, strong child, sensory experiences and so on, and they do it through exploring winter for example by playing (relatively briefly) with a big bowl of ice, making snowflakes, dressing teddy-bears and stuff so that they wear "winter" clothes, oohh and this is only stuff that they have done in the last couple of weeks. Oh, and made bird-feeders, collected stuff like fir cones and put glitter (everywhere) on them to make them 'frosty'. They have listened to 'wintery' stories involving snow ice and stuff.
does that answer any of it for you?

[gigglewitch]

have had alcohol. thus overuse of the word stuff due to lack of vocabulary

[PortAndLemon]

Very like gigglewitch. There's a theme every month for the whole nursery things like "Transportation", "Autumn", "Opposites", "People Who Help Us" and so forth, and activities like those she describes that tie into the theme. Lots of messy play and painting, too handprints, footprints, body painting (strip them down to nappies and let them at it). Each room pitches the activities at the right level for the age group involved.

[gigglewitch]

P&L oh yes. painting.



remember to send them in their oldest clothes / hand-on's as they regularly come home green. or purple. DD came home with lovely yellow hair yesterday and one green foot. which we didn't discover until bathtime.

[TabithaTwitchett]

My DD (13 months) has a mixture of activites. She will play with the books and toys, work in the art room with painting/footprints/pasta etc, she also plays in the sandpit and things like crawling through tunnels. The nursery also take her out for play in the garden and have a lady in once a week to do singing.

The nurseries have national guidelines (I think) about the type of activites and learning suitable for each age group of children. They also record the development of each child and update parents with their progress.

DD was not sure at first but loves nursery now. I would also recommend visiting a few nurseries to see what they do and get a feel of the place for yourself. The Ofsted website also has reports of every registered nursery. Hope this helps

[TabithaTwitchett]

I second the comments about the mess - make sure you pack a couple of changes of clothes!

[gigglewitch]

Am seriously considering marketing toddler-sized workman overalls and wellies as standard nursery wear.

should we go into design and production???

[TabithaTwitchett]

That's a pretty good idea actually - some Kwik Fit Fitter type overalls would definitely be useful. I am sick of washing DDs entire wardrobe every week!

[gigglewitch]

[Disneybabe]

Thankyou so much - you have all answered my question, - glad i moved over from BOUNTY forums.
Will sort out visit days too at a few nurseries.

Thankyou