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    Healthy Living

    Home -> About Us -> Healthy Living


    Healthy Living

    At Goodway Nursery School we want children to give children the best possible start in life and support children and families to make healthy choices.

    HEALTHY MIND

    Our focus upon children’s personal, social and emotional development is built around our Key Person system where children are in a key group of 13 and develop close relationships with their key person. This starts with a home visit which enables the Key person to start to develop a relationship with the child and family before they start at nursery.

    We are a Rights Respecting School and teach children about their rights under the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, and the rights of others. We listen to children, taking them seriously and valuing their thoughts and opinions.

    We teach children vocabulary to describe how they are feeling and a weekly Nurture Group supports children at risk of lower emotional well being.

    Relaxing classical music at the start of the day and yoga in the afternoon help develop self regulation. Children have access to the outdoor environment throughout the day, which is a calming antidote to city life.

    We teach children conflict resolution techniques so that they learn to manage and resolve conflicts amongst themselves.

    We give children leadership roles and encourage them to be proud of what their efforts and achievements to boost their self esteem. We provide managed risks and encourage persistence and a growth mindset which helps build children’s emotional resilience.

    HEALTHY BODY

    We encourage children to be physically active and to eat healthily eating using Start Well and Health for Life initiatives.

    Physical activity

    Children have access to the outdoor environment for most of the day, where they have the space to move freely, run and climb.

    We understand the importance of physical development for young children. We have carefully designed and developed our garden area by creating undulations in the landscape to run up and down, a hill for climbing and rolling as well as a log tangle climbing frame, a tyre swing, steps up to our field area and outdoor block play.

    Children take part in action rhymes during daily group times and staff play ring games with children at lunchtime.

    We encourage families to take part in Walk to School week and provide bike racks for children who cycle to school.

    Healthy Eating

    We encourage parents to provide water in their child’s drinks bottle and ask them to provide healthy food for their child’s lunch. Sweets are not allowed at nursery and we ask parents to buy a book for the school rather than providing sweets to celebrate their child’s birthday.

    We offer children fruit for their daily snack and milk or water to drink. Staff model healthy choices, drinking water and sharing fruit.

    Children learn about the properties of food by exploring it and take part in cooking activities.

    Self care

    Children are encouraged to manage their own self care and we expect all of our 3 year olds to attend nursery wearing pants unless there is a medical need to wear a nappy.

    HEALTHY ENVIRONMENT

    We teach children about the importance of a healthy environment and are working towards our Eco School Award.

    Our new building is designed with sensor taps and lights, to minimise energy usage, and hand dryers to minimise paper waste.

    One of our leadership roles for children is the role of Eco Warrior, and children are responsible for turning off lights, ensuring that waste is recycled, collecting litter and composting the food waste.

    Staff support children to compost their food waste after snack time and lunch. We have a wormery, turning our food waste into compost that we use for our vegetable plot, and a water butt to collect rainwater which children can access independently for watering the plants.

    Groups of children take part in Forest School every afternoon with our trained Forest School leader, learning about the natural world.

    We encourage parents to recycle materials and loose parts for construction, modelling and collage.

     

    Change4Life

    The NHS website Change4Life has lots of ideas for healthy lifestyle choices:

    https://www.nhs.uk/change4life/

     

    There are lots of ideas for healthy cooking at home from the UK Association of Dieticians on the Let's Get Cooking at Home website 

    https://letsgetcooking.org.uk/lets-get-cooking-at-home/

     

    Startwell

    Helping children to eat healthily and move more in the very early years of life is very important for their health as they grow up and as an adult. Early life experiences of a healthy lifestyle can make a big difference to the types of activity they do throughout life.

    There is lots of information available on the Healthy Start website

    There are lots of ideas for keeping your child healthy on the Start Well website:

    http://startwellbirmingham.co.uk/

     

    You may be eligible for vouchers for free milk, fruit and vegetables  and vitamins.

    Click on the link below to check if you are eligible:

    www.healthystart.nhs.uk

     

    Click on the link below to find out about keeping your child's teeth and gums healthy:

    Simple Rules for Healthy Teeth & Gums