All posts by Miss Campbell

Snack, Social Studies

Scrumptious Snack

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Here at Cart Mill Family Centre our children are very independent when having their snacks. Our children are encouraged to show their independence skills from start to finish during the duration of the snack experience.

First the children choose what they would like to have for snack. Today we chose apples, bananas and cucumbers.
Our children are very clever and they help to prepare the snack for everyone by cutting it up.

We are very careful of our fingers when using the knife to cut the fruit.

Our children from 2-5 all have the opportunity to help prepare snack. By encouraging independence and using our fine manipulative skills to cut the snack is a great learning opportunity for our children to gain confidence from a young age.

We used different tools to help us prepare snack such as the apple corer. We had to push down hard. It was quite tricky at first.


We filled up the water and milk jugs and set up our table ready to invite our friends to join us for snack. We know the importance of washing our hands before we eat.

We collect our own cups and plates from the trolley before choosing our seat.

Our snack table is all self service and is a free flow snack which allows children to come as they please and have a leisurely snack experience which develops our social skills as we sit together having conversations with our peers.

Using the tongs helps our fine manipulative skills while saving on the germs.


We pour our own drinks and choose what we want. If some our younger children need help our older ones are always on hand to help. Once we finish our snack we take our plate and cup over to the skink to rinse it and pop it in the dish rack for the staff to help with the washing dishes.


We are very clever here at Cart Mill. The children have picked this routine up very quickly with our younger children now showing these skills and are enjoying the chance to become independent.

Expressive Arts, Literacy

Let me tell you a story…….

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In our story area this month our children have been having fun using the puppets to tell stories.
We went to the Studio room to get a box to repurpose and turn it into a puppet theatre. We picked the perfect box and got to work designing in.

We have used our imagination to create stories using the puppets and put on a show for our audience.

The children have had so much fun putting on these puppet shows and have made up some wonderful stories using their imaginative story telling skills.
We even added in some teddies who wanted to be one of the characters of our show.

We used finger puppets, teddies and hand puppets as part of our show.

Puppets are a great way to bring our stories to life. Our younger children also have great enjoyment using the puppets while In the story area.

We can use the puppets to help us re tell the story and help us with our literacy adding new words to our vocabulary.

Using puppets is a great way for our youngest children to get the most of of the story and help them build on their concentration skills.

Using the puppet story sacks is great way to help our children of all ages become familiar with the story and help them develop an awareness of characters and build on their recall and retell skills. One of our favourite story sacks is currently “Dear Zoo”. We enjoy matching which animal the zoo sent us.

Our story area is a fantastic place for our children to develop their literacy skills and go on a story adventure. We can  choose our own books…..

We can choose fiction books…..

or factual  books

We can read and listen to stories with the adults…..

or read them alongside our friends.

Next time you are here for stay and play why don’t you come and visit our lovely literacy story area.

Baking, Block building, Creativity, Expressive Arts, Snack, Special Event

Happy Halloween 🎃

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It’s a Hallowe’en fangtastic day here at Cart Mill. We have taken part in a variety of autumn learning experiences across each of our play rooms and garden.

We made spooky mud pie potions in our mud kitchen.

We also turned our water tray into a witches and wizards’ caldron using food colouring, shaving foam and different sized containers to create more potions.

We had opportunities to create Hallowe’en coloured crafts in our gross motor art area

In our Home Room we sang Hallowe’en songs and made Frankenstein’s green and purple sparkle playdough. We used our fine motor skills and imagination to mould our playdough into different shapes.

In the baking area we made witches fingers for snack (breadsticks with pumpkin seeds) it sounds like a yummy spooky snack.

In our Discovery Room we made a spooky block castle, using our creative and problem solving skills.

We also had our pumpkin potion experiment in our science area using our investigation and discovery skills.

And finally, in our Studio Room we were making Halloween houses, painting with our hands and creating wonderful pictures.

Some of our children came to nursery dressed up, here is a showcase of some of our many spooktacular costumes…..

Happy Halloween to all our families. 👻🎃👻🎃

Expressive Arts, Literacy, Outdoor Learning

Muddy Masterpiece

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Today in our mud kitchen we were busy using some new tools to aid us with our muddy masterpiece.
But first before we start, we used our independence skills to locate our welly boots from the shed and our puddle suit from the trolly. We put them on ourselves but Emma was on hand to help us if it got a bit tricky.

Now that we are suited and booted it was time for messy fun. We collected our mud and used some of our new tools. We used the rolling pin to roll out the mud to make mud pancakes.

We used the wooden masher, to mash up our mud and make it like mud pies.

We found a little worm who had sneaked into  in our mud, but we put him back home again. We didn’t think he would want to be in our mud pie.

We mixed it up and added in some leaves, water and grass and finally it was ready to be served.

We had such fun in the mud kitchen today, exploring our creative thinking, drama skills, and gross and fine motor skills.
After such a wet weekend it left lots of muddy puddles we couldn’t  pass by the opportunity to jump in them.

I wonder what we will create in our mud kitchen tomorrow?

Expressive Arts, Literacy, Outdoor Learning

Marvellous Mud

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The mud kitchen in our Cart Mill garden has recently been reinvented. We have added in a new work top to make all our delicious mud recipes on.  We have also introduced a seperate mud digging area. This provides a fantastic opportunity for our children to practice their digging skills and also somewhere for them to collect all the mud they need as part of their mud kitchen experience.

A huge thank you to everyone who helped change our area. The children have loved having more space to play and dig. I wonder what muddy creations will be made in our new mud kitchen?
During stay and play why not come and join us in our mud kitchen but don’t forget your welly boots it can get a little messy. Mud has so many benefits including building strong connections with nature. It also holds microscopic bacteria which scientific studies have shown make you happier. It helps develop a strong immune system and encourages a highly stimulated and active brain function but most of all mud is FUN!

In our new mud kitchen this week we have been exploring puddles.  The rain came and made quite a few large puddles in our garden. We got on our puddle suits and wellies and went to play.

We have been jumping and splashing in the puddles. We have been using new language such “squelchy” “sticky” “splash” “jump” and “mucky” to describe the muddy puddles.

We enjoyed the sounds the splashing made as we jumped into the puddles.

Some of the children were inspired by the puddles to work together to make scrumptious “chocolate mud soup”

It was hard work collecting all the ingredients to make the soup and stir it all together. Let’s hope it tastes as good as it looks…..

We were also using the mud kitchen to make and investigate more objects. Such as pouring and filling from the tea pots.

We also used the kitchen to cook our creations in the microwave or in the pots and pans….

Can I also ask as a polite reminder if you haven’t brought in a puddle suit or welly boots please do so with your child’s name clearly labelled on them. We have storage for both welly boots and puddle suits if you wish to leave them here. This just ensures your child is always ready and appropriately dressed for our muddy play.
Thank you.
Please  feel free to  check out our mud kitchen floor book for more messy fun experiences. It’s been so much fun in our muddy mud kitchen so far this week. We even have a chance to find a stick to go fishing in the puddle. I wonder what adventurers we will have in our mud kitchen next….

Expressive Arts, Literacy

More than just a box………

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What is a box? Is it just something to keep things in? Not according to our very clever creative children in the junk modelling area.


We have been so pleased with all your donations for our junk modelling area. We love turning an ordinary box into something completely different, creative and unique.

Today our children picked a box and I asked “what would you like to make?

We worked as a team to cut the box in half so we could share with our friend.

We discussed with our friends what we were designing.

One of our children was using his writing skills to paint their name on their box.

Another child was practicing his speed painting wondering how quickly he could paint the box.

One of our children seen a familiar face on one of the boxes. “Look it’s Bookbug can I paint it?”

Some of our children wanted to add things to their box. Using different boxes to create more detailed models.

Some children used the boxes to cut up and use parts of them to add to their masterpieces.

And of course we had to have a high speed chase in the police cars we made. It was the most fun in our studio room.

So as you can see, a box is not just a box.

Expressive Arts, Special Event

Music with Michelle

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What a week it’s been in our Noisy/Quiet room this week. First we had the wonderful dancing talents of Peters mum who put on a dance class for our children. We learned so many new dance moves. It was so much fun.

And today we had the wonderful musical talents of another one of our mums. Her name was Michelle and she told us how she was a opera singer. She also told us how she teaches people how to play the piano.

Michelle had a beautiful voice and it was so lovely to see her sing and play the piano.
My personal favourite was when she sang “tale as old as time” from the Beauty and the Beast movie.
She played some classical musical on the piano and it was so lovely to hear it played so well.
We also joined in with some dancing, showing off our moves we learned  on Tuesday.

We would like to extend our thanks to Michelle for getting our piano tuned for us, it definitely sounds 100% better.

I would like to also send my personal thanks for all the volunteers that came into nursery to join in with my intergenerational project. It’s been great having so many visitors in our centre, teaching our children new things.  Children learn best when having fun and this summer it has definitely been fun.

Expressive Arts

Creative Crafting

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We have been very busy in our Studio Room this week. We have been extending our crafting skills in the Junk Modelling area.
Our children have been keen to add different materials to their models. We introduced paper craft straws, pipe cleaners, feathers, shredded paper, and paper shapes and more thought provoking materials.

As well as extending our creative crafting skills we have  been practicing our scissor skills.

 

Our children have been so creative making lots of wonderful models.

We concentrate on getting all the bits to stick together. We can choose from sticky tape or glue. We are very independent in our junk modelling area.

We have been learning lots of new skills such as twisting, problem solving and helping each other our during our time in this area.

    

As well as making models in this area some of our children designed a game using the loose parts we have for crafting. They used the cups and the lids to make a “knock them down” game.

As we have been so busy making things all week our junk modelling area is running a bit low, we would welcome any donations.
here is some of the things we made that we are so proud of…..

Expressive Arts, Literacy, music, Special Event

Singing along with Grandpa.

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Today at Cart Mill we had a very special visitor. We had Grandpa Tommy who came along with his guitar to sing songs with our children.

We sang lots of songs such as Twinkle, twinkle, 5 little ducks, 1,2,3,4,5, Baby shark and lots more. He even took requests we had Yellow submarine and How much is that doggy in the window.

We all joined in and sang along. We even remembered all the actions to our songs.
At the end of our singing session we each choose and instrument to play and chose twinkle twinkle again as our last song.

Singing is a great way for our children to engage with music and learn lots new skills and vocabulary.
A huge thank you to Grandpa Tommy for coming in as part of our intergenerational project.
We have another mummy who is coming in to play piano and sing with us. We are very excited about this.

My name is Emma and as part of my Froebel in Childhood Practice course I’ve been set a challenge to promote a Froebelian approach within Cart Mill.
My project is “a Froebel Approach to intergenerational links within the community.”  As part of my project we will be reconnecting the link with Bonnyton house in the next few weeks to share stories etc with the older generation and continue our links with Williamwood High School after the summer.

We would love to invite any parents/carers/grandparents to come in to take part in any sessions or show case any talents within our nursery children. Are you good at baking? gardening? arts? Or can you spare half an hour to read a story with us? Thank you in advance and look forward to welcoming you in.

 

Makaton, Special Event

Cart Mill Celebrations – Class of 2023

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It was a very exciting day at Cart Mill today as we celebrated our pre-school tie ceremony.
We have been working hard to learn all our songs. We sang “hello everyone” to welcome everyone who came to watch.
We then sang “ if you are happy and you know it” we gave it a little twist and changed the lyrics to add in a little dance and blow a kiss.

Next we sang two songs using Makaton sign language that we had learned. “I can sing a rainbow” and “here comes the sun”

Next  was our show stopper song that all the children love to sing loud and proud “ we are going to a new school” and we finished off with a firm nursery classic “twinkle twinkle”.
Then we were individually presented with our new school tie. As our name was called, we read out what we wanted to be when we were older. We had a few budding scientists and police in our group.
Once the tie ceremony presentation was over we made our way through to the noisy quiet room for treats and juice.
There was pictures of us on the wall from when we started until now to see how we had grown. We had also each drew a self portrait.
It was a lovely day and I for one was very proud of each and every one of our pre-school children.
Here is a small selection of pictures of our day.  A huge thank you to every who attended.

We hope school is ready for you all. Well done everyone.

Article 28-  You have the right to education.