Tiny Treasures at Green Lane work hard with their parents to ensure that the packed lunches that are provided are healthy. They back these up with the characters to re-enforce healthy habits and options.

180 Katie is supporting the children to take part in a play dough station, making their own play dough step by step. Making play dough will also build fine motor strength, coordination, and independence, as well as a sense of accomplishment.

Most pushchairs do not come with an age limit, but we should be encouraging children to be walking when and where possible. Take a look at our Park the Pushchair blog post for more info!

Priory Poppets have been exploring Micky Me size and portion control. They use the characters with the children using small A frames to aid mobility between activities. They were drawing round their hands on plates to look at portion sizes.

Wednesday 6th August is National Play Day. It seeks to celebrate the importance of play in children's lives. Join community events, enjoy outdoor games, and engage in creative activities!

This is the third week of our 6 week Startwell summer holiday challenge. Have fun practicing throwing and catching with Sammy Skills and try food planting with Fay 5 a day:

Our new “Putting the Department of Education Nutrition Guidance into Practice” workshop is free and available for early years practitioners within the Birmingham area. Book your place now:.

Looking for ideas of activites you can do in your setting in August? Take a look at our August Events blog post where we link national events to Startwell activities!

1st to 7th August is World Breastfeeding Week. The Unicef Baby Friendly Initiative has a range of guidance resources to support parents with breastfeeding,bottle feeding and weaning.

From food growing to star gazing, enjoying a picnic to posting a letter the 50 Things programme is a fun way to build children's skills, awareness, knowledge and confidence! You can share the link with parents.

Signpost new and existing parents to the Healthy Start website for details about how they can access free vitamins and get money off fruit, veg, milk and formula milk.

This is the second week of our 6 week Startwell summer holiday challenge. This week includes walking with Active Azra and role play games with Micky Me Size.

Transition time is upon us and it is our role to support children to be school ready. Children will be going from 2 snacks during their nursery day down to 1 snack at school. Start talking with children and parents about having a healthy snack after school and making good choices

Love Park week runs from 25th July until 3rd August. It's a fantastic time to explore local green spaces. Why not do a walk with the children or send out an information sheet to families letting them know where their local green spaces are? Remember to link in Active Azra!

Are you picnic ready? Golden Stars nursery have been enjoying snacks and exploration outdoors. They have linked in the characters and added outside stories as well.

This is the launch of our 6 week Startwell summer holiday challenge. Please share the summer challenge with your families or complete together as a setting. The first week includes obstacle courses and eating a rainbow of fruit.

Keeping hydrated is important for mental and physical health and to prevent constipation. Encourage children to drink by adding chunks of colourful fruit/veg like pineapple, lemon, orange, strawberries, or cucumber to jugs of water that the children can pour themselves at snack.

Children may have watched Wimbledon or the England Women's Euros at home; tap into this by getting out the tennis balls, bats and footballs during outdoor play. Seeing staff playing with the bats and balls will encourage the children too!

Congratulations to Osborne Nursery School who have recently renewed their Startwell award!.

The UK Outdoors Championship arrives in Birmingham from 2-3 August at Alexander Stadium. Athletes will be competing for selection as part of the GB and NI team at the World Athletics Championship in Japan later this year. Tickets are available: