Hello everyone, we will now be uploading our learning blog monthly as opposed to fortnightly. Here is a little snippet of everything we have been getting up to during the month of February!
Outdoors: Out in the garden, we have been continuing to explore the ‘Stanley’s Stick’ story as we have been creating a variety of things with sticks. This month we made tepee’s using sticks, ribbon, tape and string and we also went into the Glen and built a den using large sticks and foliage.
We have also been exploring minibeasts and going on regular bug hunts whilst out in the garden. We have been collecting the data from these bug hunts to work out which minibeasts we have the most and least of in our nursery garden.
We have explored the weather during the month of February, in particular the rain. We have observed the rain and discussed where the rain comes from, linking this to the seasons of Winter and Spring. We have also recorded which areas of the garden are the rainiest using homemade rain catchers. We measured how much rain each of the rain catchers collected to find out which area was the rainiest.
We have continued to explore shapes outdoors, going on shape hunts in our local community to see if we can find shapes in our environment. We collected the data from our shape hunt using tally marks to record how many of each shape we found. We then used natural resources to create our own 2D shapes.
We have been developing our early numeracy skills whilst outdoors through a variety of experiences. We have been exploring subitising, estimation, measuring, patterns and identifying/sorting numerals.
STEM: In the stem area, we have been exploring magnets and learning about how magnets work. We have discussed forces of magnets using concepts such as attracting and repelling different objects. We have also been learning which objects are magnetic and which objects are not magnetic and recording our data.
We have also been exploring things that fly and how these things work, this has included things like hot air balloons, aeroplanes and kites. We also made our own flying objects and took these to the gym hall to test them out.
Story Corner: In the Story Corner, we have been exploring our emotions, particularly love as there have been lots of discussions about Valentines Day and people who we love. We have been reading books surrounding feelings and thinking about what makes us feel loved. We drew some of the things that made us feel loved which included things like football and our families.
We have continued to explore the ‘Snail and the Whale’ story by Julia Donaldson. We have been exploring all of the different animals within the story and sorting these into groups based on their habitat.
We have shown a really keen interest in story telling this month and so have been creating our own story books through mark making and re-telling stories.
Creative: In the creative area, we have been exploring shapes through art and the work of different artists. We have explored some famous artists who specialise in abstract art working with shape. We have also been exploring the weather and creating different art work to represent the weather such as making clouds and rainbows using a variety of materials.
Snack and Baking: In the Snack and Baking area, we have been developing our self help skills by using a variety of different utensils to prepare and eat snack including eating our snack using chopsticks. We have been making some exciting new things for snack such as frozen jelly and yoghurts which were a suggestion from one of the children.
Literacy: In the Literacy area, we have been developing our fine motor skills and scissor skills by participating in some scissor challenges such as cutting certain shapes and patterns using scissors.
Numeracy: In the Numeracy area, we have been exploring quantities and the value of numbers as we have been counting out a variety of objects to correspond with a specific number. We have also been exploring problem solving and matching as we used the numicon to create ‘Numicon City’ by using the correct amount and sizes of numicon to fill the space.
Outdoor Learning Group: We have been exploring forces using our new water rockets. We filled the rockets with water before using the pump to pump air into the rockets, creating bubbles and pressure inside. Once the rockets were full of air and the pressure was high, we observed the rockets blast SO high into the air.
We explored sinking and floating as we made rafts using lollipop sticks and sticks. We added different natural materials to the rafts including sticks, stones and leaves to see if this would impact the rafts ability to stay afloat.
Community: We have been involved with our local community as we have been attending ‘The fun zone’ at Twechar Healthy Living and Enterprise Centre. We have been developing our gross motor skills, balance and coordination as we have explored the equipment here as well as building positive relationships whilst playing with our peers and working as a team during play.
Teaching time with Mrs Smith:
Talk4Writing- The children voted for the new talk4writing story and the winner was… Jack & the Beanstalk. We have been busy learning the actions to the story and the children have been using the Group Story Map to help them remember the sequence of the story. Over the next couple of weeks the children will get the opportunity to become authors and create their own story maps based on Jack & the Beanstalk.
