Outdoor Learning

Icetastic time in the garden 🧊

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Happy New Year everyone😀

What a lovely icey cold morning for the children to get wrapped up and go out to explore the ice.

The children discovered large pieces of ice inside the tyres.

” Wow its so big”

“Its cold on my hands, its so heavy”

They collected all the big chunks of ice they could find and added it to our water tray. We discussed how water turns to ice and what conditions there has to be for this to happen.

 

“It needs to be so cold”

” But there is salt on the ground, that melts the ice”

We discussed why there was salt on the ground and what other ways the ice would melt .

” My mum said the  big gritter went by my house and put grit all over the place to melt the ice”

“The sun melts the ice and turns it into water, like a snowman when the snow goes away”

The children decided the wanted to fill some things up with water to see if they could make more ice.

They put some animals, pine cones, shells etc in the water trough and filled up some cupcake cases with water and blue food colouring.

We left it over night and came back to the garden in the morning to see what had happened.

“ITS FROZEN, YAY”

The children added some more water to the tray to see what would happen to the ice. “It melting a little bit but it’s still so cold”

They have had so much fun exploring, digging the ice to break the animals out and leaving more water in the garden to see if it freezes again tomorrow.

 

 

Block building, Creativity, Digital Technology, emotional literacy, Outdoor Learning

Welcome back everyone 🥰

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It’s lovely to see everyone and get settled well back into our nursery routine. Today we have enjoyed a variety of interesting learning experiences. We have made play dough, following an adult’s instructions to measure, mix, knead and roll. We then used it to make 3D shapes and discuss the properties of the different shapes. We got straight back to building wonderful creations including big towers so we could count how many bricks we had added. We investigated technologies and used our fine motor skills to make different drawings.

We also spent time problem solving to complete a pirate jigsaw and to build a new garage, which allowed us lots of imaginative play for our toy cars.

With everything being frozen, we decided it was a perfect time to role play with the artic animals.

And this is just the start of our first full week! Who knows what else we will do in Cart Mill this January?

Baking, Snack

December Round Up in the Baking Area

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Over the last few weeks in the baking  area the children have enjoyed lots of different experiences starting with making our own potato scones for St Andrews day, they worked so hard peeling, chopping, mashing and shaping before practicing their spreading skills buttering and of course enjoying the taste.

They have also been busy making a variety of different muffins for snack time, we’ve had blueberry, raisin and banana.

The children have been working on developing their fine motor skills at snack time having a go at spreading butter onto crackers, cheese onto bread and jam onto bread which has been voted the best.

We enjoyed the process of making fruit kebabs, peeling, chopping and carefully pushing them onto a skewer we introduced a wee bit of maths by recognising and following a simple pattern or making up their own.

We ended by making some delicious gingerbread cookies and decorating our “ home made” empire biscuits.

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Cart Mill Christmas Concert 🎶🎄

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Today is the day!! It’s Christmas concert time 🎅🎶


The children have been practicing super hard the past few weeks, learning new songs and actions, including a French song and Makaton signs.

All the hard work paid off today, the children had lots fun performing in front of all their family members! What a lovely day filled with Christmas spirit 🎄. Great job, you were all fabulous!

Special Event

Countdown to Christmas!

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It’s been another busy day as we continue our Cart Mill countdown to Christmas!

After a busy couple of weeks, it was lovely to relax in our cozy Christmas pyjamas and watch some of our favourite Christmas and winter cartoons with our friends.  And of course you can’t have a movie day without snacks!

We had so much energy left after our movie, what better way to burn it off than a few games of musical statues and musical bumps! Of course in true Cart Mill style we included a wee impromptu singalong to our favourite Frozen songs! (A good wee warm up before our Christmas Concert tomorrow!).

All of a sudden we heard a sound! We thought it sounded like bells! It was a surprise visit from Santa!!

It was very exciting to meet Santa who had a big sack full of gifts!  (Santa was very kind and left gifts for all our children not at nursery today).


What better way to round off our day than  with a fabulous dance session with our friend Colette from Blizzard Dancing.  We really are marvellous movers at Cart Mill.

Only 6 more sleeps to go!

 

Creative movement, Digital Technology, Expressive Arts, music, Special Event

Christmas Music and Dancing 💃

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As this is the last week before the Christmas holidays the children are full of excitement and energy. To help with the energy levels we decided to do some Christmas 🎄 dancing.

The children requested “Danny Go” as he has a lot of great Christmas moves

We enjoyed a dance with the Gingerbread man and the children were able to listen and follow the actions. This helps the children understand how their bodies can move and that  exercise is a good way to help keep their bodies healthy.

Our next dance was a penguin March we stood up tall and were able to waddle like penguins 🐧 making sure we could keep our balance when hopping on one leg.

After all the dancing it was time to help our bodies relax . We all enjoyed some rainbow relaxation.
The children followed the instructions to make a rainbow using their arms. Some of the children could name the colours and even knew that the rainbow 🌈 has indigo and violet .

We hope you all enjoy celebrating Christmas with us on Wednesday and you have happy and healthy holiday .

 

Article 29   You have the right to learn new things to the best of your abilities.

 

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Magnet ice play

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In our science area we have been exploring magnet ice play. The children started their exploration thought freezing different objects in the ice. First we used plastic, glass beads, magnet tiles and screws and used the magnet wands to see which one we were able to move or pick up. The ice melted very fast and we discussed why it was melting.

”it’s melting because of the sun”

We discussed how the sun melts ice and snow because it’s hot but it’s not the sun today. The nursery is warm and our hands are warm and that is what is melting the ice.

    

Yesterday some of the children helped to freeze some magnet balls in some ice cubes to explore today.

 

 

“It’s freezing on my hands”

”I’m watching it drip on my hands”

Magnet ice play is a very hands-on experience! There were lots of attempts to see how many ice cubes we could pick up at the one time.
The record was 7 ice cubes

“I got 7!”

We discovered we could make them spin around very fast by waving the wand in a circular motion above the ice cube.

Some children enjoyed trying to stack the cubes to build a tower. It was a bit tricky.

We lifted the tray up onto blocks and explored the ice cubes further by waving the wands under the tray and watching the ice cubes dance around.

It’s fair to say that the children had fun exploring the ice and it was just a shame it melted so fast.

Article 31  You have the right to play and rest

Literacy, Snack, Special Event

Christmas at Cart Mill

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As we said yesterday, this week at Cart Mill is full on festive. Today we enjoyed a special Christmas lunch with turkey and all the trimmings, followed by ice cream. We have also been busy writing letters to Santa and this afternoon we baked gingerbread biscuits.

When writing their letters, the children talked about all the gifts they were hoping for. We hope you know what they are hoping for too!

‘ I Would like a unicorn’ ‘Its quite hard to cut out the stamps because they are so small’

‘I’m posting my letter i have written lots in it’ ‘ I would like a diplodocus for for Christmas and a big T-Rex also a giraffe’

There has also been requests for a coffee machine for the bath, bubble machines, dolls and Spiderman. Let’s hope Santa is listening!

We then made our gingerbread men or angels. After seeing the play, we thought it would be so good to make our very own gingerbread! The centre was full of festive smells as the biscuits baked.


‘I measured out three table spoons of sugar’ ‘I think these will be tasty’ ‘I’m rolling it out flat’


Every day seems so busy at Cart Mill, it will be Christmas before we know it!

Expressive Arts, Special Event

Christmas is in Full Swing

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Christmas is certainly in full swing at Cart Mill. Just when we thought we couldn’t fit anymore in to our calendar, we had a visit from Clydebuilt Puppet Theatre in to do not one but two shows of The Gingerbread Man!

We all loved it. We laughed, shouted, squealed and sat so well. Bet you’re thinking oh no you didn’t, but OH YES WE DID!!!!

Tomorrow, it is Christmas lunch in the centre then later this week we are starting some Christmas baking and lots of rehearsing for the Cart Mill Christmas Concert. We also have Colette coming in for some Christmas dancing next week, pyjama/movie day and hopefully a visitor from the North Pole! 🎅
We will all be exhausted by Christmas!

Creativity

Being Festive with Loose Parts

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In the discovery room the children have been provided with resources to explore some Christmas themed loose parts play.

Using loose parts such as blocks, fabric, or natural materials encourages open-ended exploration and creativity. This unstructured play fosters problem-solving skills, spatial awareness, and enhances fine motor skills. It promotes imaginative thinking, as children can manipulate these parts in countless ways.

Some children showcased their creativity by crafting unique Christmas tree designs using triangles and an assortment of loose parts.

Using large blocks, some children explored concepts of size, sparking discussions as they navigated the process of filling the Christmas tree design on the floor. This hands-on activity prompted them to problem-solve, choosing which bricks to use and determining what would fit seamlessly into their creation.

 

 

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