I wonder if the children use terms of measure at home? These children have been talking about ‘full’ and ’empty’ as they experimented in the water area. Some were able to pour water to make cups ‘full’ or ‘half-full’ and most understood the term ’empty’. They certainly looking like they are concentrating well in these photos.
There is so much learning happens in the snack area and recently the Rainbow Room used this area to focus on tasting different foods and recording their likes and dislikes on a graph, developing the children’s skills in Numeracy and Mathematics as well as Health and Wellbeing. The children tasted a range of fruit and then vegetables to find out the most popular as they recorded their preferred choices then learned how to understand their recordings.
Measuring and counting are a big part of making playdough and some of the children are becoming very adept at following instructions to make their own dough. It’s much more fun to play with dough that you have made yourself and the children are very keen to follow the recipe and choose their own colours. Good listening and counting skills are developing with each batch that they make. Here is a little group of chefs busy at their work.
With a recent focus on shape in the Rainbow Room, some of the children took a walk round part of the school to see if they could find any shapes in their environment. It was amazing how many shapes this little group found and they even took most of the shape photos themselves. Great work!
“Graph” will be “Word of the Week” for the Rainbow Room this week as they develop their skills at recording data. The children have begun to record the weather recently on a chart and will now be looking at making graphs linked to snack choices. The Raindrop Room will be learning to use the word “lantern” as they continue to talk about Chinese New Year. I wonder if anyone will be able to make a lantern in the Raindrop Room?
It wouldn’t be Hallowe’en without investigating a pumpkin and some of the children had a busy time last week emptying the flesh and seeds from their pumpkin. Both morning and afternoon children had a great experience investigating what they found inside their pumpkin, discussing safety around sharp knives, counting seeds and talking about how to describe what they could see and feel. Great fun was then had decorating their empty lanterns. It’s amazing the learning you can have from one simple pumpkin.
I wonder how many of you have tried out those little tester pots of paint at home and spent ages comparing different shades? These children had great fun recently, mixing paint and experimenting with colours to paint outdoors. As with most art at this stage, it was the process of experimentation, rather than the end result of lots of wood painted in various colours, that was the most creative and exciting part of the activity. They mixed, measured, poured and did lots of talking about their findings as part of the process. Great teamwork boys and girls!
Learning about Autumn this term has been helped greatly by the children’s super contributions to our display. Chestnuts, acorns and leaves of so many colours have been collected by the children and their families. Good talking skills have been evident as the children shared their finds with others and talked about where they had found them. Thank you so much to all those families who have taken the time to talk to their children about the signs of Autumn and have helped them find examples. Here is a selection of the things the children have brought in.
As the season changes and we begin to learn about Autumn, our “Word of the Week” this week is indeed Autumn. This may be a new word to the children so we will be using it a lot in Nursery and explaining what it means. Hopefully the conversations you have with your child will help to reinforce this learning in Nursery.
National Maths Week Scotland brought a range of activities in Nursery to focus on learning in this area of the curriculum. We were delighted that some children brought in examples of numbers and shapes that they had found with their families. The children also talked about shapes as they printed in the art area and produced a great effort when faced with the challenge of making the biggest tower they could in the construction area. Counting the number of bricks in their towers was tricky but the children pointed carefully to help them count and were able to use the language of measure to talk about their construction, for example, using words like ‘bigger’, smaller’, ‘taller’ etc.
