Nursery News 11th May 2026

NURSERY NEWS

 Monday 11^th May 2026 – Edition 409

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A. Please park your cars with consideration.

B. What are the children learning about this week?

A. Please park your cars with consideration.

One of the schools’ neighbours, a resident in Goldstone Crescent, telephoned us last week expressing her frustration that at dropping off and collection times cars are parking across the entrance to her driveway. She said this has been becoming a more frequent occurrence recently. We have explained that we have no control where parents choose to park, but we have pointed out that we raise the issue of considerate parking with all our new parents through our ‘New Parent Pack’.

This little corner of Dunstable sees a lot of school pupils and their families arriving and departing during school drop-off and collection. There must be around 1,000 pupils arriving each day to attend Willow Nursery School, Hadrian Academy and The Vale Academy.

More parents than ever are now working parents, so many parents have to do a quick child drop off by car, then depart for work.

It also seems that recently some parents are beginning to choose to park in the turning into our Car park, blocking the school gates, and the staff’s ability to move in and out of the car park. The majority of the staff have school age children, and some staff need to leave at collection time in the afternoon in order to get across town in time to collect their own children.

We also have refuse trucks that arrive near to 9am every week. I have seen the refuse truck unable to access our car park to empty wheelie bins as there is a car parked blocking our gates. In this circumstance the truck remains sitting in the busy junction, just outside the school, blocking the entire road for everyone. I have seen a parent arrive back to their car after dropping their child into Hadrian Academy. We then all wait for them to leave, so that the refuse truck can have access to our car park, and the road can become useable again.

We should always have unobstructed access to our car park in case of emergencies.

We frequently witness cars being parked right across residents’ driveways.

So, I must ask parents to be considerate, and think of the needs of others.

 B. What are the children learning about this week?

This week the theme is chicks.

We are very lucky to be able to help look after some chicks this week. We will have some eggs arrive in an incubator, which will be placed in Room 1. The children will learn about the life cycle of a chick and that they begin their life inside eggs. They will be able to observe the eggs inside the incubator and keep a watchful eye on them, in case they begin to hatch. Staff will explain to the children that it is important for our eggs and chicks to stay inside their incubator because it helps them to keep warm until they have hatched and are a little bigger.

Ten eggs have been delivered to the school. We are told they should hatch on Wednesday.

Our learning intention this week is to recall a sequence of events in everyday life and stories. The children will be learning about the life cycle of our chicks and staff will support them with sequencing the different stages of a chick’s life. This will be done by discussing the changes form egg to chicks that the children notice through the week and also through reading and completing puzzles.

The discussions staff will have with children will help to support our 7C’s learning intention to confidently use a developing vocabulary appropriate to the individual child’s capabilities.