Expressive Arts, Literacy, Outdoor Learning

A Day at the Beach!

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The recent sunny weather made the children think of summer days at the beach! They set up an area of the garden and made their very own beach! They used the big blue blanket as the sea and the yellow blanket was the sand!

First the children went for a swim in the sea and they gave me the very important job of being the lifeguard!

“I can swim so fast!”      “Ah, a shark is coming!”

The children then collected shells from the sea and took them to the beach for a closer look!

“My shell is so soft!”    “Look, I can hear the sea in mine!”

The children then decided it would be good fun to jump into the sea!
“Look how high I jump!”
We made big splash noises when we landed in the sea!

Using the crates the children pretended they were in pirate ships bouncing on the sea! “Ahoy captain!” They had someone standing on lookout! “Watch out for the tornado!!”, “It’s coming!!”

The children could see pirates coming so decided to build a bigger boat for themselves!   “We can hide in this!”,  “This boat is awesome!”

What great imaginations the children at Cart Mill have. They had great fun through role play and made up a whole story about their time at the beach! They really had great fun whilst developing their communication and  language skills. Role play allows the children to act out and make sense of real life situations which they really enjoyed doing.

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Ready, Steady, Go!

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Today in the Discovery room the children have been building ramps to see which car would go the fastest and win the race.

To explore this further, we decided to build a variety of different heights and level of ramps. We gathered together some of our planks of wood and different materials we could use to test and explore different types of forces.

The children took turns and predicted what ramp would be the fastest. We found the higher the ramp was, the faster the car would travel.

“high one is the best ,it’s the fastest”
”It is speedy”

”Watch mine zoom”

We added bubble wrap to one ramp to see how it affected the speed of the cars travelling down them.


We found that adding the bubble wrap this would make our cars slower and not travel so far.

”This makes it go too slow”

”Look how far mine went”

”My one is the fastest now”

To investigate time and distance further, we used a stop watch to time our cars travelling and a tape measure to see how far they could go.

Why not explore this at home! You could try using balls or pebbles to investigate force, distance and time.

 

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Milk and Germ Science Experiment

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It’s Friday, what better way to end the week with a science experiment. Well, it is British Science Week!

Today in the Discovery Room, in our technology area, we have decided to do a milk food colouring experiment on the light table. For this experiment  we gathered everything we needed-a bowl, milk, food colouring, fairy liquid and some cotton swabs.

We poured enough milk in a bowl to cover the surface with the depth of about a 1/4 inch. We then added a few drops of different food colouring in the centre of the bowl of milk quite close to each other.

Next for the fun bit ! We dipped the cotton swabs in a small amount of fairy liquid and then dipped it in the colours one at a time for around 10/15 seconds.
We were careful to move each swap onto one colour at a time, without disturbing the milk.
We were amazed to see how the colours swirled and changed in the milk especially when we placed the cotton swab on to the different colours .


Wow look at the burst of colours!

“ It’s like fireworks ”  “ It’s moving “

”It turned into a new colour” “ It has waves in it”

”The milk has changed colour “   “It looks like dynamite”

We developed our science skills by investigating the effects of adding substance together which cause a reaction.

Because we had so much fun, we decided to do a Germ Experiment.
We added a good coating of glitter into a bowl of water (if you don’t have glitter you can use pepper instead ). Whilst we did this, we discussed how the glitter represented the germs. We then dipped our fingertips into the water and watched how the glitter stuck to our finger, this showed us how germs stick to our hands if we don’t wash them with soap. The children then dipped their clean finger into soapy water before dipping it back into the bowl. The children were amazed to see how the glitter/germs spread  across the water avoiding their soapy finger.

“ Germs stuck to our finger”  “Germs don’t like soap”

We concluded that if we use soap to wash our hands, we can avoid germs. This experiment also developed our well-being skill by learning how to keep clean and healthy.

It was fun and enjoyable to create these  memorable science experiences for the children, so why not continue British science week at home over the weekend and perhaps send us some photographs of you budding scientists!

Outdoor Learning

Frozen gardens

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It’s science week at Cart Mill and we have been discussing the properties of water and the effect of the cold. We found out during our visit from Williamwood that water is a liquid and that it can move about in a container.

We gathered some containers and used scissors to cut up some foliage to add before we poured the water in, then off to the freezer we went.

The next day we were surprised by the appearance of the water “it’s gone hard” “it’s cold” The water had changed from a liquid – something that can move about in the container, to a solid – something that doesn’t move in the container. When the temperature of the water becomes very cold (below freezing) it turns to ice.

The children decided to add colour to the water, so, very carefully we used droppers to add some dye “it’s getting  darker”

 

The children wondered what would happen if we added more water to our ice. We added another layer of foliage and coloured water on top of our ice. The water sat like a different layer on top of the ice, it was very strange, the water moved but the ice didn’t! We all wondered what would happen if we put the container back in the freezer so off to the kitchen we went with our containers. What will happen? Watch this space…

Technologies

Science is Magical

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As it is Science Week, we decided to get some help from the experts! We invited Miss Mortimer and Deanna over from the Science department at Williamwood High School. They brought lots of equipment with them so that we could become scientists for the day!

We heard that sometimes scientists had to wear white coats and goggles to protect themselves when doing experiments but we were not going to be using any dangerous equipment so we didn’t need to.

The first experiment we were shown was how to make marbling on water. Miss Mortimer explained that sometimes materials were ‘attracted’ to each other and sometimes they were not and they ‘repelled’. We had found this out when we had been looking at magnets and how they worked so the children said they knew that magnets liked things that were metal but didn’t like plastic cars!
We each picked a piece of black card, and Deanna put a basin of water in front of us. She then got a ‘pipette’ which Miss Mortimer explained was what scientists use to get small droplets of liquid. Deanna used the pipette to suck up some clear nail varnish and drop it on the water.

The nail varnish didn’t mix into the water, instead it sat on the top and made a sheen on the surface of the water! The children all got a turn to place their black card onto the nail varnish sheen and gently press the card into the water. When we lifted the card out, it was all shiny. We enjoyed doing this and all said we wanted to do it again using different colours of nail varnish.

The second experiment was AMAZING! Miss Mortimer explained that liquids moved about and that they fitted the shape of a container but she said that a solid didn’t, she told us our table was a solid. She then said there are things called gases and sometimes we have gas in our tummy that needs to escape!
Miss Mortimer and Deanna got a beaker of water and added food colouring. We chose blue. Then, we added some oil to the beaker. The oil did not mix into the water, instead it rose up to the top of the beaker and sat on top of the water.

Deanna then added a magic tablet (alka seltzer!) and we started to see some bubbles, the bubbles were the gases trying to escape! We could see the blue water bubbling up through the oil just like magic. We all took a turn of squeezing the pipette into the liquid to make our own bubbles. It was great fun.

We had the best morning being scientists. We loved our visit from Williamwood High School and can’t wait for them to come again. Why don’t you try creating these fun experiments at home, and if you know of any others then please let us know!

Digital Technology, Outdoor Learning

Hot and Cold “what happens ?”

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What happens to water when it’s freezing cold?
Freezing happens when molecules of liquid get so cold that they slow down enough to hook onto each other to form a solid crystal. We watched this happen in slow motion on our iPads.  It thought it looked like crocodiles, birds or leaves. We then made our own ice cubes, we poured the water into the trays and placed it in the freezer.

The ice cubes are sticky and cold. I see patterns inside them . They melt in my hand but they are still cold ..

That was something cold but what about hot things? What happens when you add heat to popcorn?

Popcorn pops because each kernel has a tiny bit of water inside it. When the kernels are heated up to the point where it exerts enough pressure, the kernel bursts open. The soft material inside puffs up as it explodes. This then cools and forms the odd shapes we know and love to eat.

The shapes got the children discussing some safety rules; “it is very hot”, “we wouldn’t touch it”. Then they started to chat about what shapes and textures had been produced. “Mine looks like a horse.”  “I found the seed, it is hard.” “My popcorn is crispy.”

As the popcorn comes from seeds we have decided to plant them and grow our own popcorn plant! We have put the seeds in the green house. Let’s see what happens next!

We have had a lot of fun today trying out our experiments for science week and learnt lots of new information. We have lots of different experiments to try out throughout the week and we cannot wait!

Digital Technology, Expressive Arts, Literacy, Technologies

Water Xylophone

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This week is Science Week and we will be exploring science themed experiences throughout all the different areas in each of the playrooms.

Today in our music area we made a water xylophone using some glass jars and food colouring.

We were developing our fine motor skills and hand-eye coordination as we used a pipette to pour the food colouring in to the jar after which, we added some water.

Once the children had added the water, they lined up all the jars and noticed that each jar had a different volume of water.

”that one is filled right to the top”

”the red one has just a little bit”

We used a beater on the jars to listen to the sounds it made.

”The blue one sounds really low and the red one sounds really high”

I asked if the children knew what made the sounds but they were unsure.

After searching the internet we learned that when we use the beater to tap the jar it causes sound waves which are vibrations that travel through the water to make the sound. When there is less water the pitch is higher.

We listened to the different pitches as we played our own music, we are going to collect some more jars to add lots of different sounds.

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Creative pendulum painting 🖼

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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!!

Literacy

Fishing for numbers!

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Today in the discovery room we looked at some interesting books about under the sea and the fish we can find there. This led us to share some wonderful stories about fishing trips we have been on and how to catch a fish.  🎣

We thought it would be a fun idea to bring fishing into our nursery room. We decided to collect some items together such as paper to make our own fish, sticks for rods and after some problem solving, we found that using paper clips and magnets would be helpful for us to catch our fish!  🎣

To show how we can recognise numbers and can sort them into order, we numbered our fish 1 -10. This made it a little bit trickier for us to catch, especially when we had a fun fishing race to see who could catch all their fish first!

We demonstrated good hand eye co ordination and used our motor skills when guiding our magnets on our rods to catch our fish. We also had to be very patient!

Our ‘fishing trip’ gave us lots of opportunities to sing a popular rhyme….

🐟 🐟 🐟 🐟 🐟

1,2,3,4,5,

Once I caught a fish alive!

6,7,8,9,10,

Then I let it go again,

Why did you let it go?

Because it bit my finger so!

Which finger did it bite ?

This little finger on my right!

🐟 🐟 🐟 🐟 🐟

Why not try fishing for numbers at home?  You could try catching some different under the sea creatures! 🦑🐠🦀🐋🦞🐳🦐🦈🐡

Outdoor Learning

Imaginative play in the garden

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Today in the garden the children had great fun using our giant polydron pieces.

They checked out some pictures for inspiration before drawing up their own plans.

The children worked really well as a team to create various designs, developing their problem solving skills and communicating their ideas.

“we made a train, all aboard “

“look at our house”

The possibilities are endless and through polydron activities it will help them to grow and develop to their full potential.

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