All posts by Miss Mitchell

Outdoor Learning, Trips and Outings

Wednesdays are for Wild Raspberry picking 😃

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Today at Cart Mill family centre the children discovered wild raspberries on their nature walk. They talked about what other fruits grow wild in Scotland” I found strawberries when I was on holiday , they were really sweet” “ I like finding brambles on a walk they are big  purple and juicy ”  They collected the raspberries  and decided  to make them into yummy muffins.

The children looked up a muffin recipe in a baking book and decided what ingredients they would need. “We need flour sugar milk and baking powder to make them rise” “let’s wash our raspberries so they are clean ““We will need scales to weigh out our ingredients “ “ The children were able to name and weigh out their ingredients waiting patiently on their turn.

“ I need 150 grams of flour” It’s not sticky enough you need more milk” “ I need to put in two tablespoons of sugar “


The children used lots of descriptive language whilst making their muffins.  They are looking forward to tasting them at home , well done everyone.

 

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No Monday blues for us, We made fantastic fairy cakes🧁

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Today in Cart Mill we decided we would like to make fairy cakes. We looked on the internet for a recipe and decided on vegan fairy cakes. Then, we collected all of our ingredients.

“We definitely need flour, oat milk and sugar”.

We were able to use the scales to weigh out all the ingredients.

“ I need 200ml of milk” “It’s only at 150ml, I need some more”.

“ I think it needs more flour it’s to sticky”.

We used our fabulous fine motor skills to stir and then transfer the cake mixture into paper cases.

“It’s very messy and slimy”.

We put our cakes in the oven for 10 minutes.

“I can do the timer for ten minutes”.

We were delighted when we took the cakes out of the oven and they were golden brown. Next, it was time to make the icing!  We discussed what colours we would like to use.

“ I want mine red because that’s my favourite colour “.

“ I want mine blue, like the sky”.

We finished off with some  lovely rainbow sprinkles . We are looking forward to tasting our cakes at home. Yummy 😋

Special Event

Today at Cart Mill family centre we celebrated the queen’s platinum jubilee

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Today was a day for celebration in Cart Mill as we had a ‘street party’ to mark the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee. The children and staff all made such an effort to dress up for the occasion. Thankfully the weather was kind and we were able to decorate the garden with red, white and blue flags and bunting. It looked fit for a queen!
The best bit is, we got to do it all again in the afternoon – a double party!

The children enjoyed Victoria Sponge Cake, scones with jam and cream – we had jam first, how do you have yours? We also had fresh fruit and a glass of chilled water to wash it all down. It was a fantastic party which was followed up with a Royal banquet at lunch.
We were very proud of the children – who, along with Iona made all the party food. Here are some pictures of them hard at word making their Victoria sponge cakes and their fruit scones. Maybe you could ask your star bakers to show you their skills at home because we can tell you, their baking is delicious!

Snack

Fruity fun in the baking area 🍓

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Everyday the children enjoy helping to make their own snack.  Which usually consists of seasonal fruits and vegetables. Preparing snack offers children the chance to develop their fine motor skills through chopping and slicing, make choices, gain an awareness of healthy eating and be able to express their likes and dislikes.
Today some of the children found some blueberries in the fridge and asked if they could make something else with them? We looked at different recipes and found one for blueberry muffins! We decided that this would be fun to try.


First we talked about what ingredients we would need.

Then we got to work making our yummy muffins. We followed the recipe, adding flour. One child commented “ I bake lots with granny, I know that is flour” Next thing to do was mix the oil into the mixture, followed by some soya milk and of course we had to add the most important ingredient, some blueberries. The mixture needed a lot of mixing and our arms got quite tired but we took it in turns so everyone could get a rest!
Next we used our mathematical skills to divide the mixture up between our paper cake cases before taking them to the oven. The hardest part was waiting until they came out because we could smell the delicious baking scent. Finally, they were ready and they looked amazing!

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Crunchy Fruit Cups!

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Today the children decided they would make something new and a little different. They looked through our ingredients and chose what they wanted to use.

“I think we could use Cornflakes I know they taste good, I have them for my breakfast”.

“What about some cherries, they are my favourite fruit and my favourite colour , red”.

“Yogurt is nice I have that for my lunch.”

“Raisins are my favourite, I want to use them.”

“ I like syrup it is sweet I want to. Put that into my cake.”

Everyone got to work crunching up the corn flakes using rolling pins. Then it was time to put our cornflakes into a bowl and add 1 teaspoon of syrup. “Only a little it’s not good for your teeth.”

“mix, mix mix”

The children carefully cut up their cherries using their fantastic fine motor skills.  “1,2,3,4,5 I have 5 cherries”

Next it was time to add two tablespoons of raisins and mix it all together.  “It’s a bit sticky” I will need to wash my hands after this.”

Finally, they then transferred the mixture to paper cases and added a tablespoon of dairy free yogurt.

“ I need more yogurt .” “ I think the cakes will taste yummy!”

It was time to put them  into the freezer to set . The children worked well together and demonstrated good use of mathematical language, for example more and less.  They also used lots descriptive language such as bumpy, crunchy, sticky. The children noticed that the texture of the yogurt  changed after it came out of the freezer.

“It’s cold and hard now”

The children are so excited to finally taste their Crunchy Fruit Cups! Fabulous work everyone, well done!

Expressive Arts

Fun time, Junk time 😊

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Today in the Studio the children were inspired to be creative by some giant boxes kindly donated by one of our parents.

They decided to build a house complete with a back and front garden and even a chimney. The children worked well together planning how their house should look.


There was a lot of chat about what everyone had in their house and what they could use in the centre to replicate the items. Some of their ideas included;
“ look I have made the key to get into the house, I used a cotton bud and tissue paper” “I think I will make a table to have my dinner at” “ I think there should be two doors at the front “ “ The garden should have rainbow grass” “I’m going to make the grass with different colours of tissue paper” “ I want to make  a dinosaur room for my stegosaurus”  I think it’s snowing at our house” I have made a barricade to keep everyone in the back garden”
What wonderful, imaginative suggestions!

The children used team work and exercised their gross motor skills to move the big boxes to where they wanted them and working together, they were able to use their problem solving skills to keep the roof up.” Let’s put these supports into stop it falling down”  

The children loved using their imagination to make their house and spent many hours playing in it.  Great team work everybody, well done!

Expressive Arts, Outdoor Learning

Spring has Sprung at Cart MillđŸ„

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Today we have been discussing Spring.  Some of the children were able to identify things we may see during Springtime.

“birds making nests”

“flowers on trees”

“Baby animals being born, Lambs”

“spring flowers in gardens and parks”

We have some lovely spring flowers in our playroom, the children decided they would like to paint them. We talked about the different types of spring flowers for example Crocus, Hyacinth and Bluebell.

” I seen bluebells in the woods”

“daffodils are my favourites because they are yellow and in my front garden ”

“I like tulips the best because my Mum has them at home”

We pegged our daffodils and tulips to a line and put mirrors underneath them. We noticed that we could see the spring flowers reflection in the mirror.

“I can see the purple tulip, I want to paint it on the mirror”

“I’m painting the yellow daffodils in the mirror”

The children enjoyed mixing different tones and shades for their spring flowers. They noticed the differences between the petals on the flowers.

“The shapes are different”

We discussed the different parts of the flower.

“that tulip has the longest stem”

At the end of the day the children didn’t want to throw away their creative work, so decided to print their mirror painting onto a big sheet of paper to make a spring freeze next week.

Well done, great team work everyone.

Expressive Arts

Colour mixing creativity in the studio😊

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Today some of the children chose to do some colour mixing learning experiences. They decided to use shaving foam and food colouring and see what happened when the colours mixed the children thought they would mix the colours using marbles.

First they found some big trays added some foam and then used the pipettes to add different colours of food colouring. “ Its turning brown” “ Its hard to mix the colours with all of the shaving foam” “ I need more red” “ We need to add lots of different colours for a rainbow effect“

The children then got some paper and pressed it down on the foam. “ It looks lovely like a butterfly “ The younger children particularly enjoyed the sensory aspect of the experience.

Next the children decided to mix some different shades of green, orange and purple using paint. They used problem solving to decide what to do if the colour they mixed didn’t turn out how they expected, they also took turns guessing about what colour they were going to make. There was lots of opportunities to use mathematical language, such as more and less.
This activity allowed the children to have great fun experimenting with cause and effect.  What a fabulous, busy day in the studio.

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Creative pendulum painting đŸ–Œ

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Today some of the boys and girls decided they would like to try out a different way of painting. They decided that pendulum painting  might be fun.


“I want to make pink paint to swirl” “ I need lots of white and a little red to make pink”


Learning about gravity and the forces of motion and also developing our gross motor skills. We chose some suitable containers that had holes in the bottom to let the paint through. The boys and girls then self selected their own paint.

The children knew quite a lot about colour theory and understood that mixing colours would make different colours.
“I’m making orange paint it’s my favourite colour “ I know that red and yellow makes orange”

The children wanted two different surfaces to paint on a shiny one , We chose tinfoil and paper called news print. Then the fun began,  they poured the paint into the pendulum  and swung it backwards and forwards up and down fast and slow. “ It sounds like rain when it goes onto the tinfoil “ “look the colours are mixing the red and blue are changing green” “I’m making circles “

The children took turns swinging their paints and got very messy but they really enjoyed their learning experience. I think you will agree that their art work looks amazing. The boys and girls thought  that we could make our own pendulums next time using our studio room junk .  Well done everybody!!

Expressive Arts

Today in the studio we were Marble painting.

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Today some of the children wanted to try out marble painting. This activity allowed the children to express their creativity whilst strengthening fine motor skills and developing their hand eye coordination.

”First we need water”

We used special paint called marbling paint which contained oil. We learnt that oil and water don’t mix and because the paint has oil in it, it sits on the surface of the water.

“I want the red paint”

“when you mix the yellow and the red it makes orange ”


”Let me add the black to see what happens, Oh it’s turned brown”

The children soon realised if we stirred the colours together too much they would all mix together to make one colour so they were very careful just to swirl the paint in the water. The children noticed that the paint was lying on top of the water and that it looked shiny. They took a piece of paper and laid it gently on top of the paint to make prints of the patterns they had made. Everybody commented on how smelly the paint was but that it did make pretty pictures. The children demonstrated some excellent turn taking skills and were able to show off their knowledge of colour theory.