In the garden , the children have been discussing Halloween and have been intrigued by pumpkins especially!
After we discussed what we could do with pumpkins we had a great idea of making pumpkin soup!
We collected lots of different ingredients we wanted to add to our yummy soup!
we even added some red food colouring to give it a nice colour!
Once the soup was made we sat down together and ate it all up… yum yum!!
Today the children used pipettes to draw up coloured ink and then dropped it onto the paper. They then used a straw to blow patterns. The children noticed the colours changing as the inks merged. They also noticed that the ink behaved differently on different materials eg “ It’s more watery on the tin foil” “ It doesn’t make patterns on the bubble wrap”
The children talked about the colours they were using and which was their favourite they were able to work together and showed great turn taking skills waiting for their turn of the pipettes.
In preparation for Halloween the children asked for something slimy and gooey to explore. The children decided that jelly would be best. The toddlers helped to make the jelly on Thursday evening, they measured and stirred following my instructions closely. The children then hid some natural autumnal items and some not so natural inspired by Halloween in the jelly.
The children used all five senses to explore the jelly. Some used tweezers to take the objects out of the jelly developing their fine motor skills, others dived straight in with their hands. The children used lots of descriptive language. “”So sticky and cold””Jelly is delicious “ I’ve got an orange jelly” “I see a pumpkin “”This one has a pine cone in it” “This jelly feels good it’s wobbly and wet” “A bug it’s hard and black” “let’s see how many flowers we can get out”” I see three spiders they are tiny”.
This morning in the Discovery room there was a spooky Halloween science experiment going on. The children had all expressed an interest in concocting a witches brew so we all put on our witches hats and got to work.
The learning experience behind this fun activity was to introduce the children to weighing and measuring as well as continue our learning of colours and numbers. The children had to weigh out their ingredients and listen and follow verbal instructions.
The children’s fine motor skills were tested whilst using tea spoons and pipettes to get very small quantities of ingredients for their brew.
Lots of fun was had watching the children’s reactions when the chemicals came together and caused a bubbling sensation of colourful foam.
Why not try making Witches brews or potions at home with your little wizard or witch.
The children are very excited as it’s nearly Halloween 👻. Today we listened to a story about Pumpkin Jack, a boy who had a Halloween pumpkin. After Halloween he put the pumpkin in the garden and over time the pumpkin began to rot away into the ground. The following year he watched a stalk grow from the ground and the leaves got bigger and bigger and a new pumpkin grew and was ready to use again for another Halloween.
The children had a look at our own pumpkins. We had different sizes, shapes and colours. We discussed how some were heavier than others, the smaller ones were bumpy and rough and the bigger ones were smooth and soft. The pumpkins felt cold and smelled like “pumpkins and witches“.
The children then designed their own pumpkin pictures This helped develop their creativity and fine motor skills using our art resources. They were able to choose their own art materials to create great pumpkin pictures. Well done.
Next week we are going to open the pumpkins and look inside!!!!. What do you think we will discover?
It’s almost Halloween and we have lots of experiences planned as well as lots of dressing up. Please read our latest newsletter for all the up to date information
Today in the garden the children had great fun at the water area! They used the hose to fill up bottles and jugs! They each added a different colour of food colouring to their water using pipettes to see what happened! This helps to develop their fine motor skills.
“The water is all blue!”
”My water has all orange swirls!”
The children thought it would be fun to mix colours together! They added the blue food colouring to the orange water!
”Its turned green!!!”
The blue food colouring was added to the red! “It’s made purple!!!”
The children then just had fun pouring all the different coloured water into different jugs and tubs and finding out what colours they could make!
“They all make brown!!”
What amazing colour mixing and colour recognition!
Today in our toddler garden we have been super busy. The children have been very interested in pumpkins. Some of the children have been talking about seeing them in the shops, in their homes and within our nursery. So today we have came up with a brilliant idea to plant our very own pumpkin seeds.
“I have this big pumpkin at home, I made it into a ghost”
The children were very engaged today exploring the autumn provocation, filled with lots of loose parts and different sizes, colours and textures of pumpkins. The children were asking where pumpkins come from and why there are different colours, so this is where we got the idea to grow our own.
“we water them, they grow so big”
Here we are, super busy digging and planting the seeds, the children said that we must come out and water our seeds everyday to make them grow big.
Today, the boys and girls have been discussing Halloween and the things associated with it.
We had a look at some pumpkins online and some we had at Cart Mill. We discussed the different shapes and colours.
After discussing the pumpkins, the children decided they wanted to make their own pumpkins, so we thought we would make some orange pumpkin playdough!
We even added in some cinnamon!
Once the playdough was made, it was time to create our own pumpkins…
This morning in the discovery room the children decided to make a track for the bee bots to move around on.
They used different shaped blocks to create a track that was flat enough for the bee bots to move along .
We looked at the arrows on top and discussed what they mean.
”This button means forward”
”what is this one mean?”
“backwards backwards”
The children used the direction cards and placed them along the track.
“Let’s go forward like this card”
”The green one is go”
They used their numeracy skills as they counted how many times they pressed the forwards button and how many places the bee moved forward.
In the end they raced the bees to see who would move the furthest, it was a lot of fun cheering on the bees.
The toddlers decided to go for a walk and to keep ourselves safe we had a chat about our safety rules, holding hands and listening to the adults. As we were crossing a road, we had to be extra careful to look and listen at the side of the road.
On our walk we had to look up, down and all around. We looked at all the autumn colours of the leaves and we collected the leaves that had fallen on the ground in our special bags. We listened to the birds and saw a squirrel but it was too fast for us to take a photo 😁
After we collected our leaves we played hide and seek, had some races and saw a most interesting van that came off its back wheels and stretched nearly to the moon 😳
We then brought all our autumn goodies back to nursery where the children enjoyed decorating their autumn bags with their leaves. Some chose to paint and we shared them with our friends who may not have been able to come on our walk. We transferred our leaves to the playdough where the children were leaf printing.
Autumn is here and is providing glorious colours, textures, temperatures for us all to enjoy 😁
