Creativity and imagination are important attributes that we aspire to for our children and these children certainly impressed us with their efforts in the craft area. Having decided that they wanted to play with guitars, they simply investigated the materials available in the craft area and created their own super guitars which provided endless play opportunities.
It seems that the children in the Rainbow Room think fairies may have been visiting our garden so they decided to make homes for them. As you can see, the art area and outdoors were very busy as the children discussed their designs and created some wonderful fairy houses, using paint and glitter.
Fences and stepping stones required some careful work but they showed good fine motor control to create these little additions to the scene. Once the children had set out all their work, including the shells that had been painted recently, it looked like a very welcoming place for local fairies to live. We hope that they are impressed with their new homes.
Just like the Raindrop Room, a group of children in the Rainbow Room recently developed their skills by making a Swiss roll. They showed great listening, concentration and fine motor skills, as well as developing their learning in Sciences and Technologies, producing a super cake for their efforts.
This group in the Raindrop Room recently developed their baking skills by making a Swiss roll. As you can see, a lot of care was required, for example when cracking eggs, weighing ingredients and using the food mixer, but they proved themselves to be ready for the challenge and produced a wonderful, tasty end product.
Confidence in the kitchen is growing in our children as they increasingly prepare foods and enjoy baking which provides great opportunities to develop their skills in Numeracy and Mathematics as well as Sciences and Technologies. This little group recently made chocolate cornflake cakes, showing great independence and responsibility.
Our Burns celebrations last week were a great success and this little group did a super job of helping with the preparations as they made shortbread for our Scottish snack. The children showed good counting and measuring skills as they prepared the ingredients and were involved in lots of discussion about what was happening as they were mixed and then put in the oven. Super work from these independent little learners!
The Rainbow Room children having been looking at tartan and creating their own in the art area and on the Promethean board, just like those in the Raindrop Room.
What great imagination and creativity this little group showed outdoors when they worked together to make a bus. Good use was made of the resources they could find and they shared their ideas to produce a super bus which was then part of their imaginative play. As you can see, they had some great adventures in their bus including a poor pedestrian being knocked over and the police having to come along to investigate the accident. Great work from these little engineers of the future!
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Here are more of our bakers busy making gingerbread just before Christmas. The children are becoming increasingly confident to be involved in food technology as their knowledge and understanding of the processes and health and hygiene rules develop.
Having visited the Music Department at Annan Academy several times and had exciting visits in Nursery from a Science teacher and STEM Ambassadors, we were delighted to be able to arrange a visit by some of the Raindrop Room to the Technical Department at Annan Academy towards the end of last term. This was a fantastic opportunity for our children to experience model making at a whole new level and to learn how to safely use tools that we do not normally provide in Nursery.
Mr. Paul Johnston, Principal Teacher of Technical Education, and several of his senior pupils modelled how to use a range of tools then showed great patience to help our children make spinning tops. Each child used a ruler to mark the centre of their wood and donned safety goggles as the senior pupils made a hole in it for them. Mr. Johnston and his pupils showed great patience to teach our children how to hold the wood safely and supported them to use the electric sander. We were so proud of our children who showed super listening skills and concentration to be able to use the sander safely.
Once the spinning tops were complete, the children enjoyed using the coloured pencils to decorate their tops and some were even supported to sharpen the pencils with Mr. Johnston’s tools.
This was a fantastic opportunity for our children, experiencing learning in Numeracy and Mathematics, Technologies and Health and Wellbeing and we greatly appreciate the kindness and patience of Mr. Johnston and his pupils on this visit. Thank you also for the off cuts of wood which are being put to good use in Nursery. We have loved our visits to Annan Academy and hope that we can continue to learn from you in the future.
