Nessie

Today the children were ready to get to work at the Tinker Table . We read our new safety rule book which we all helped to create last week. This is to ensure we are keeping ourselves and others safe.

“ I can get the goggles on myself”

”Safety First”

” I helped make this book”

The children took turns and selected different types of wood in all shapes and sizes. They discussed what they were going to do  and as we had been reading No Such Things as Nessie for Scotland book week all the children were excited to create their own Loch Ness Monster . We then  looked out the nails and hammer. They held the hammer firmly and using their hand and eye co-ordination to gentle hit the nail several times.

“I am making Nessie”

”It’s a nice monster”

When the wood was nailed together the children then chose a variety of materials e.g.   buttons, corks, ribbon and sequence they could add to their creations.

“ the buttons are  it’s eyes”

”This its tail”

”I am going to make a funny one”

The children followed the safety rules well and had great concentration skills.

They then proudly sat them on the display table

Scotland Stories – Book week Scotland 2022

Today is the start of Book Week Scotland 2022. This year the theme is Scotland Stories – traditional Scottish tales and legends.
We introduced Book week Scotland in our Noisy/Quiet room by sharing traditional and Scottish books with our children.

We picked which story we liked best and settled down, nice and comfy, to read them together.

One of the Scottish stories the children picked to read was about bagpipes. Some of the children were keen to find out more about Bagpipes. Luckily Gail was on hand to show us videos of her family members who had visited Cart Mill previously to play the bagpipes for us.

It was a fantastic learning experience for the children to relate the story book to a real life event.
After we brushed our teeth, we read another story. This one was about the Lock Ness monster. Some of our children had the opportunity to paint their very own Loch Ness monster after reading the story in the Studio Room.

Book Bug came to visit the Noisy/Quiet room and shared a Scottish story about a girl named Katie Morag. Emma told the children that she used to read this story when she was at school a very long time ago.


We even had a wee cuddle of Bookbug as we shared the story.

We have enjoyed listening to the Scottish stories both as part of a group and on our own.

Reading stories are so much fun and are a fantastic way to promote the early literacy skills our our children. Books hold vast learning opportunities. Reading books promotes vocabulary expansion, introducing new words. Books also helps to increase imagination and creativity. Reading stories together also helps to Improve concentration and memory skills. And many more skills all from reading stories.
I wonder what other learning opportunities we will have through the week as we celebrate Book Week Scotland across each of our playrooms/gardens within Cart Mill.

Remembrance day

This week some of the children have noticed Angela’s poppy badge and have been asking why she is wearing it. In honour of Remembrance Day we decided to make our own poppies and discuss the importance of Remembrance Day. This can be a difficult subject for children to understand, so we talk about remembering the soldiers who help to keep us safe and focus on the importance of kindness and celebrating each other’s differences.

The making of the poppies has been a two part process. We started yesterday by looking at pictures of poppies and discussing the different parts of the flower. We dyed pasta red for the petals, rice black for the seeds and coloured lollipop sticks green for the stems. We then left that to dry to use the next day and made red playdough to make poppies with that day.

Today we observed a two minute silence while watching a CBeebies video about Remembrance Day. The children sat beautifully and we reminded them about the importance of being kind to each other after the video.


“We need to remember the soldiers that fought in the fight.”

The video shows the poppies growing in the fields after the war has ended so we then went to make our own poppies.

“I’m making a poppy field. These are the seeds so more can grow.”

“Look at my poppy man.”

Just look at our beautiful designs…

Today at Cart Mill family centre we are feeling happy😁


Today the children were feeling happy and wanted to bake smilie scones made with yummy strawberry dairy free yogurt.

”We need flour first” “I remember it’s four scoops”

“Three tablespoons of yogurt need to go in to make it extra strawberryish” “ I love strawberry yogurt””It smells so good”

We added some coconut milk “ we need to measure it in the jug”vanilla essence and baking powder. The children used their fine motor skills to measure and stir.

.“ I think we should make the face with cherries and raisins “ “We need to make the cherries smaller, we could cut them in half” “I need 8 cherries for the smile” “I only need one cherry for the nose” “I’m making a big nose out of 4 cherries, some people have a big nose” “They go into the oven for 12 minutes “The children used lots of mathematical language during their baking.

The children were very excited to see how well their scones turned out hopefully they are as tasty as they look. Well done everyone 🤩

 

 

 

Let’s get busy

Today in the home corner the children were able to work on lots of different skills, practicing helping, sharing, nurturing and caring skills.

The babies are well looked after here atCart Mill Family Centre, getting washed, dressed and fed, developing a sense of nurturing and hygiene.

“ the babies need to eat breakfast “

”I’ve made pasta”

“Great washing up boys and girls”

Then it was time to put on the washing, developing fine manipulative skills by pinching the pegs to hang up the “wet” washing.

It was soon time for a nap and working from home.

This type of role play gives children the opportunity to apply their learning in real life situations mimicking what is observed in their home life and in the world around them.

Tea party in our den!

Today in the home room the children wanted to make the cosy corner into a den using blankets. They picked some blankets and used the large pegs to secure them.

This created a great comfy space for reading books and it was lovely to watch the older children reading books to our younger children. They all joined in singing Hickory Dickory Dock whilst looking at the book.

Some of the children decided to bring the babies to their den and have a tea party. They brought the cups and plates over and set up a lovely party. They invited other children to come for some tea and cake too!

“I’m having chocolate cake and my baby wants her milk!”

”I don’t like chocolate cake, I want strawberry cake!”

Some of the children then decided to dress up “fancy” for their party.

“I’ve got a big hat and a special bag!”

”I want all the pretty jewellery on me!”

What great fun we all had using our den for lots of different fun things!

 

 

What can you create?

Today in the discovery room the children have shown an interest in our loose parts area. Some of the children were talking about the fireworks they seen at the weekend with their family for guy fawks night, so they created their own fireworks.


“It goes poooooof”

”So noisy I had to cover my ears”

“So high in the sky”

”Lots of colours”

“I’ve made a rainbow with lots of colours and fireworks under it”

Some of the other children made funny faces and little houses.

“My face is funny”

”My face is excited”

“I’ve made lots of houses, they are all different colours”

 

 

This week in the noisy/quiet room

Following on from recent interests, this week in the noisy quiet room the children have enjoyed exploring the farm animals in the small world area.

The children have been using their imagination and role play skills to create their own stories and play using the small world equipment.

”its Old MacDonald’s farm, there is sheep and pigs and cows”

”There is little cows and big cows, small goats too”

”My favourite animal is the pig”

The children have also recently enjoyed building with our wooden train track and talking about all the different places you could go on a train…

   

”You could go to the shops or to a restaurant”

”I go on holidays”

”Trains go so fast”

Small world play is a great way for children to explore their imagination and develop their role play skills. It could represent a real life place like a farm or it could be a completely imaginary world.

 

Why don’t you try some small world play at home?

Firework Splat Painting!

Today In the garden we created some firework pictures in preparation for bonfire night this weekend.

The children selected some paint and resources that they could spray and splat. We picked a selection of different spray bottles and pipettes to spray at the large plastic sheet and create our firework picture.

The spray bottles and pipettes helped us to develop our fine motor skills. We demonstrated good skill when filling them up and spaying them.

We then used the paint and sponges to throw the paint at the ground to make splats that resembled fireworks. This was a good way to get our bodies moving and develop our gross motor skills while being creative.


While we were painting we talking about fireworks and how we can stay safe.  These are some of the children’s comments.
😊

“You don’t touch the fire”

“Fireworks and very hot so you need to stay away”

“They go in the sky”

“Only adults do the fireworks”

Building fun 👷🏻‍♂️

Today the children loved engaging their imaginations in the construction area. We had a variety of building materials for the children to use, and they enjoyed creating different types of role playing scenarios.

“I want to make a hotel for spider man”

“We’re making a tunnel for the train”

”eyes!”

The children worked great as part of a team, helping each other and using their problem solving skills to build their creations. Some children loved making rocket ships…

Other children enjoyed making busses and dens…

”beep beep!”

And we even had a Spider Man fire engine!

The children really loved showing off their creativity through role playing with the blocks, and sharing the fun with all their friends. Great work everybody 👍🤩