This week, we have been enjoying another week of lovely weather and this has presented us with some opportunities for extended outdoor play, whilst discussing how to keep safe in the sun.  We try to include water play and more focused experiences that limit the physical exertion normally used during this time. The children have continued access to water throughout the day, both inside and out and this is encouraged by staff.
We have mainly worked in small groups this week, working together to build creations, explore the water run with pots and pans and participating in some sensory experiences with shaving foam, play dough and paints.

It was really lovely to see so many of our parents/carers joining us for our Summer stay and play. This was a great opportunity for both children and their families to enjoy some time together and from the feedback, we are confident that this was a positive experience for all. Below are just a few of the photographs capturing some lovely interactions.

The children have had a busy week learning all about how we change from being a baby, to how we look just now. Some have brought in their photographs and these have been displayed on our window alongside staff when they were younger. That has elicited a lot of conversation! And guessing games 😂

Some of the children have had their second visit to the woods and this has been successful for developing skills in climbing and balancing, risk assessments and developing an understanding of dangers and keeping ourselves safe.

Finally for this week it has been a pleasure to see the children participate in some fun party experiences to honour the coronation of King Charles III. This focus has been tailored to the children’s stage of development and understanding and has involved, discussions about the King being crowned on Saturday, making some special biscuits to have for our party snack and some storytelling and dancing. A few of the children have also decorated some plates and these have been displayed in our playroom. Well done everyone. We hope you all have a lovely long weekend whether celebrating the coronation or simply enjoying an extra day with your family.👑👑 🇬🇧🇬🇧

This week has seen the children participate in some Easter experiences, through crafts and songs. Singing develops great communication and language in the children and they respond well to the repetition and consistency of the songs. We had a great response to our Easter bonnets and they were all very creative, well done to all who participated. Your Easter bonnet photograph should now be on your learning journal. Easter creations were made using a variety of collage materials.

The children visited the Residents at Princess Court on Thursday to deliver the cards they had made and a small Easter egg donated by the staff of the ECC. All of the residents enjoy these visits and chatting to the children, it encourages the children to develop an understanding of different generations and shows a caring attitude towards others.

The children have also been experiencing gradients and size with the balls and ramps and pipes, working out which balls will roll or go faster. There have been experiences around size and volume with scoops and materials to estimate how many?

The children have had an extremely busy week. We wish everyone who is off a lovely Easter break, and look forward to spending time with those who will be in over the next 2 weeks. 🐣🐣🐣

The week began with our children making the most of our construction materials that are out in the room. They got very creative making all kinds of structures, working together and independently.

With school transitions approaching we went to the school grounds to explore the playground and the different environment. When we were here we played some attention and listening games as this is a skill that the room can find challenging, is remembering our “listening ears”.

Floating and sinking💧

This activity was interesting as the children mentioned that the larger items were floating because they were bigger and the smaller ones sunk because they were small. This encouraged conversations with the children about weights and why things that are bigger don’t always mean they are heavier etc and the same with smaller items. This allowed us to then introduce scales where we can further the learning of this into next month👍🏽

On Friday some of our PM children were doing an activity to see what ball will roll and what kinds of balls won’t. They created a ramp from our construction materials to use. They had a discussion about what the ball looked like and had a guess as to what one would get to the bottom first and go ‘faster’.

This week has been a very busy one, our new pm children are settling in and finding their comfortable place within the setting. This may take longer for some than others and we will support them all individually.
We have been finishing off our literacy focus with some drama. This was mainly focused around “Goldilocks and the 3 bears”and “We are going on a bear hunt” Some of the children participated really well in these experiences, some preferred to watch and play rather than speak the parts. Staff were really pleased with the contribution that all children made. We have a fair few drama students in the making!

The children have also participated in some Mark Making and early writing experiences through powder paint mixing and mark making on the wallpaper. This was very popular with the children who enjoyed the science of mixing up the powder into paint and then exploring this with their hands and fingers. Some were writing letters and names in this.

Making our own book of Goldilocks was fun. We each did a page and then put the book together and read it to our friends. We talked about the Author, Illustrator and story.

Some of the Oak children have been participating in a variety of activities such as; Making a wall display of the bear hunt, going on a bear hunt adventure, they were also introduced to a variety of  describing words: Swishy squashy, thick oozy mud, long wavy grass. The children were role playing the characters from the story. They also drew and painted their favourite scene of the book.

As part of our planning this week, one of the things we have been working on is shape recognition. To observe this, we went outside for a shape hunt to see what shapes we could find in the garden. many of the children participated in this, pointing out all the tyres as circles and locating squares, triangles and rectangles that they could see.

During the week we participated in some art activities using different shapes. The children showed enthusiasm with this, adding in different objects to paint with, telling us what shapes they had and showing creativity in them.

Another of our learning targets, is to identify the different parts of our bodies. So far we have done this through games such as Head Shoulders Knees and Toes, Simon Says and through drawing around one of the children. We then discussed all the different parts of our body, from our head to our toes and talked about what each part does and how they help Us.

Welcome back to all children who have returned after the Christmas break and welcome to our new starts. The children have settled back very well, and have been eager to explore the playroom alongside their new and existing friends.
We have observed lots of different experiences this week, from painting and craft to den building which was the idea of several PM children, although the morning group enjoyed this as well.

The children have been working well together and getting to know each other, helping and assisting where required. We have been cooking in the kitchen, washing and transferring the potatoes and learning about pattern on the board.

Moving forward we will have a planning focus on keeping ourselves safe, discussing shapes around us and understanding when to talk and when to listen, ensuring we wait our turn when another child or adult is telling us something.

As this is our last week in the ECC we have been very engaged in Christmas experiences and had our Christmas parties with a visit from Santa and The Grinch! Not everyone was a fan of the grinch.

We have had fun climbing and balancing in the gym hall, exploring various materials for Christmas crafts and sensory trays and generally having lots of Christmas fun.
The children are now all ready for their well deserved holiday break and the staff wish you all a very Merry Christmas and hope you have lots of fun memories to share when we return in January. 🎅🏻😊👍🏽

This week has been a very full week. We have participated in lots of Christmas experiences: letter writing to Santa, painting snowmen stones and lots of craft experiences.

During our mince pie and mingle event we sang songs with our families. Today we used the cutout for some photo opportunities.

We also chose to make different kinds of Christmas trees with materials. The photos of these can then be printed for display.
1 more busy week to go!

This week in the Oak room we celebrated St Andrews Day by making our own tartan pictures, using different materials. We sat together for a special snack of shortbread and then took part in some Scottish dancing and singing. 👯‍♂️💃🕺🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

The children then helped to put up our Christmas tree and decorate the windows. It was very exciting. We have talked about the Christmas story, practiced our songs and begun the countdown to Christmas with our advent Calendar. There will be lots of exciting experiences throughout the month to participate in and we look forward to posting some fun pictures.🎄🎄