Christmas is coming! Have you kicked into full festive mode and rolled out the tinsel? Or taken the time to reflect on how the children in your care will benefit from your celebrations?
It can feel like there is a lot of pressure on making it a December to remember, but many early years practitioners are scaling back their festivities in response to having greater numbers of children with additional needs and a cohort of children born during the pandemic who are not used to big social occasions. Rather than being ‘bah humbug’, practitioners are realising that the fun and magic of Christmas can be shared without all the elaborate wrappings.
‘We used to have a nativity, the children would get dressed up and some would act and sing solos, but we’ve stopped doing that,’ says Katherine Hardman, nursery manager at Sunshine Day Nursery in Peterlee, County Durham. ‘We have so many children with additional needs now that we don’t want to put the extra stress and pressure on them. Instead, we are inviting the parents along to rock around the Christmas tree at our local church. We’ll be singing Christmas songs that the children can easily learn and have fun with.’
While more informal, parents will still have the joy of seeing their children perform and get to join in. Children will also be helping to decorate the Christmas tree at the church and are visiting the residents at a local nursing home to make Christmas crafts with them.
‘I just thought, what are we doing this for?’ says Steph Bull, pre-school co-ordinator at The Cottage Day Nursery in Derby. ‘We were doing it for the parents, but the children were not actually gaining anything from it, so I decided to do something different that is based more around children’s needs and can also include parents.’
She considered the highlights of the year and recalled a visit from a couple of ‘Positive Ponies’ which had a big impact on all the children, particularly those with SEND (see Further information). The ponies will be making a return for an interactive nativity session where children and families will sing songs and celebrate together.
Parents are also being asked what Christmas looks like in their households so that children can share their traditions and explore those from other cultures, such as a Japanese family who celebrate by eating Kentucky Fried Chicken, and a French family who celebrate St Nicholas’ Day on 6 December as well as Christmas Day.
APPROPRIATE FOR ALL
Jessica Angell, nursery manager at Kindred Odstock Day Nursery in Wiltshire, has come to the same conclusion as Katherine and Steph. ‘We look at the cohort of children that we’ve got and consider what works for them, and we’ve got a very young pre-school group at the moment, so we’re not doing anything extravagant for Christmas this year,’ she says. ‘We’re going to come together with families and sing different Christmas and nursery songs in a “winter wonderland” atmosphere.’
Children who want to – and there are often those who revel in having an audience – will stand in front of the parents, but Jessica will make it clear that it is perfectly acceptable for children to sing from their parents’ laps. ‘Some children are very excited, while others are nervous, and we don’t want to scare them by making them perform,’ she says.
To take the expense of sourcing costumes away from parents, the nursery provides tabards for the children to decorate however they choose. Sometimes they have multiple Mary and Josephs; one year they even had a carrot! ‘His dad was bemused but we explained to him that he’d chosen his role and that he’d been working on his costume really hard,’ recalls Jessica. ‘When the dad watched the performance he saw how proud his son was on stage and that he took pride in his outfit because he’d made it himself.’
A festive collaboration with the Sing and Sign baby signing programme is being planned at Shenfield Day Nursery in Essex. ‘The children absolutely love their Sing and Sign sessions, and they are so beneficial for the youngest children to help them communicate their needs,’ explains deputy manager Sarah Allison. ‘The tools they learn through Sing and Sign are also useful for children who are delayed with speech or for whom English is an additional language. So we feel that this will be an inclusive event for all children and families.’
Along with a traditional dinner and tea party, staff will also be reading the nativity to the children and talking about the meaning of Christmas. Sarah adds that many religious celebrations are shared at the nursery to encourage a respect and tolerance of different faiths and beliefs as part of British Values.
COMMUNITY SPIRIT
‘For Little Forest Folk, our three main considerations are inclusivity, celebrating individuality and making memories in the great outdoors,’ says operations director Jeni Dunning. ‘During the Covid years we held individual celebrations at each nursery. However, this Christmas we are planning a huge event that all our families can attend.’ She hopes that it will be a great opportunity for parents to meet other families from the group’s seven London nurseries.
Gathering together is also important at Osmotherley Pre-school in North Yorkshire.
‘The pre-school is integral to village life and it’s the wonderful community spirit that keeps us going. We are situated oppositethe church, which is a community hub and where we’ll be holding our fun Christmas celebration,’ says manager Gill Hunton.
Families and people from the village are gathering for a coffee morning where the children will sing. Speech and language is a focus at the pre-school, with Makaton used as a communication tool, so it is hoped that the children will sing ‘We Wish You a Merry Christmas’ accompanied by the simple signs. But, although staff plan songs – often popular action ones that the children can use props with– Gill says there is always ‘a lot of spontaneity’. Last year, for example, her grandson joined in with an impromptu bell solo.
It will be a particularly poignant celebration because Gill is retiring at the end of term after working at the pre-school for more than 30 years. ‘I’ve spent half my life working here and am getting such nice messages from members of the village,’ she says. ‘I always get emotional at Christmas so it’s going to be a struggle. I just hope I don’t cry too much.’
Celebrating at school
In the month leading up to Christmas, Reception children at Holbeach Primary School in Catford, south east London, are compiling a small book about the nativity before putting on a simple performance for parents.
‘We found that there were a lot of assumptions around what children knew, but many of our children are from different faiths or have no faith,’ explains teacher Sophie Bell. ‘Children didn’t know the Christmas story, so we make a simple five-page book with them. They do drawings and by Christmas have enough phonic sounds to write out a few words. The process is full of rich discussions because there is a lot of language that the children don’t know, such as what is frankincense and myrrh? Also, conversations around why they ride on donkeys and camels rather than getting the bus to Bethlehem.’
Decorating the class Christmas tree and putting it in the home corner is always a highlight. ‘It is a lovely communal act, especially as not all the children have a Christmas tree at home,’ says Sophie. ‘It is an artificial tree so there is a lot of problem solving as we locate and fix together the correct parts and unravel the lights. We then unleash a big box of baubles and the children hang them on the branches, often all on one side, but I resist moving them! We have a Black fairy, which I feel is important because we have a culturally diverse class.
‘The children are very proud of their tree when it is finished and invite people in to see.’
At Ormiston Herman Academy in Gorleston, Norfolk, the nursery children get dressed up and sing one simple song with actions during the Reception nativity. The school has a stock of costumes so parents do not have the worry of buying or making them. ‘We also have a Christmas dinner and the children are invited to wear Christmas jumpers,’ says EYFS specialist leader of education and teacher Amy Jackson. ‘We have a local lady who knits them for us so we can make sure that no child is left out and that we are not putting families under financial pressure.’
Parents are also invited to a ‘Christmas Story Cafe’ where they join their children to listen to a story and make decorations. There is also great excitement when Father Christmas makes his annual visit.
FURTHER INFORMATION
- ‘We’ve explored… ponies’ by Annette Rawstrone, Nursery World (September 2023)