Today we all joined Old Macdonald’s band
We all chose an instrument we wanted to play…….
We had drums…
Triangles…
Bells and maracas ..
We all chose our instruments and the songs we wanted to sing, we sang loudly and quietly, quick and slow…..we even had a turn of Jingle Bells! 🎉
Today in the noisy quiet room we explored table top games. The children selected a couple of games to play throughout the morning. These games focused on matching, turn taking and developing our social skills. Bellow are some of the games we played.
We played snap with picture cards. We took turns to deal out the cards and then started the game. Everyone did very well taking turns with our friends when playing. When we found two cards the same we had to be very quick and say “SNAP! Everyone did super work and we have some very quick fingers!
“You need two the same”
“I’m going to be quick and snap them”
“I play this game at home and you need to get two the same”
In the game of smelly wellies we placed all the welly cards face down and took it in turns to flip over one left and one right (green & red) welly to try make a pair. We had to test our memory and remember where they were. Once we found a pair we added them to our board.
“Turn them over and get two the same”
“You take one red and one green”
“Two the same is pair”
”It’s your turn next”
“I remember where my one is”
As the sun came out on this beautiful Friday, Bookbug came to visit us to share some songs stories….
We all said ‘Hallo’ to Bookbug with a great big hug followed by
The Wheels On The Bus, our wipers were swooshing
The children jumping up and down on the bus
Sticking out our tongues being a Little Green Frog
We all enjoyed our interactive touchy freely story about a teddy bear
Finishing off with Little Bunnies!!!
The children love when Bookbug comes to visit and if you fancy joining us he’ll visit once a month morning and afternoon and you can come and join in the fun 😁
Today in nursery we had lots of fun making our own little letter hunt to develop our letter recognition. We created a little sensory bucket for our letters to hide in, and made it really colourful and sparkly!
Some children loved seeing all the different colours and shapes too.
Some children found different letters they recognised, They could relate the letters to different familiar words.
“That’s an M for mummy. And me!”
Other children loved finding all the letters in their names..
We had lots of fun exploring our fine motor skills too, using our hands as well as the tongs to develop our pincer grip and strengthen our little muscles to collect different letters and little sequins. The children loved helping each other find things and it spurred on lots of social conversations with each other.
“That’s an M. That’s in my mummy’s name too! What does your mummy’s name start with?”
“If you turn the M upside down it’s a W!”
”The O is like a little cats eye”
Well done everyone!
This type of learning experience would be perfect to try at home, and you’ll probably have everything you need in your cupboard. You could use sand, rice, lentils, crumpled or shredded paper for example. You may even try hiding numbers, hiding shapes, or even make your own shapes with different sensory resources! Good luck 😁🤩
Today the children were presented with a tray of interesting resources to explore and design their own models. 
With the natural feathers and pieces of wood the children decided to make some animals. I will make a owl with feathers. The children chatted about owls they have seen at the animal park and what noise they make.
Some of the children chose to make people using pegs for the legs. This is my mummy she is at work.
Todays activity has involved developing fine motor skills such as using scissors and glue sticks also picking up smaller parts especially when they stick to your fingers !
Todays fun at the tinker table has let the children ask and answer questions, talk to each other sharing experiences and ideas. We have extended our knowledge and understanding of how to use a variety of materials.
We have some great animals and models to admire . Well done 👍
We have been developing our mark making skills in the Studio room.
Our children enjoy exploring their mark making skills in a variety of fun, unique ways. Some of the ways we have been extending our mark making skills been using pastels, water paints and we experimented with marbling inks.
Mark making is a very important skill for our children to learn, but what is mark making? Mark making is a term used for the creation of different pattens, lines, textures and shapes. This can be done on a piece of paper, floor, outside in the garden or on an object or surface.
Mark making is a sensory and physical experience which can be enjoyed by all ages and abilities.
Today in the Studio we extended our mark making skills by using cardboard and a selection of mark making tools to create pictures of our favourite things.
We made race cars, ice creams, our family and our toys.
We enjoyed showing each other what we made, discussing what our favourite things were. We were proud of the work we created. We like to be responsible to the environment and reuse and recycle our cardboard.
Some of the children enjoyed using the easel to mark make using pens and chalks.
We have opportunities to mark make across each of the playrooms, through arts and crafts, shaving foam, mud kitchen, and playdough to name just a few. What mark making do you like to do at home?
Today the boys decided to play a game of snakes and ladders. This game encourages collaborative play, turn taking, patience!
Working together to set up the game encourages number recognition and colour recognition deciding which colour of counter you’d prefer.
Playing the game encourages touch counting, directional language forwards, backwards, up the ladder, down the snake.
“Your turn, my turn” rolling a six, gets another turn – understanding the rules of the game and developing an understanding that it may not always be your turn is a concept that some children can find very hard.
We then developed our learning experience by creating our own snakes and ladders boards.
Snakes and ladders is a fantastic game with many learning opportunities and can be lots of fun!🥰
Today the children explored a variety of materials and different textures in the sewing area.
We looked at cellophane,carpet, silk, felt, bubble wrap and hessian. The children were able to describe how these materials felt.
“This is a bit jaggy”
“It is so soft”
“This one is smooth”
“Oh that’s crinkly”
We cut the materials into squares and thought it would be a great idea to make our own texture board. The children chose the materials they wanted to use and were keen to create stitches on them, using good hand and eye co-ordination we were able to put together a selection of materials for our board.
We then displayed our work on the texture board in our sewing area.
The children were very proud of their hard work and the children invited their friends to come have a look and feel the different textures.
Today the children and Bookbug had an impromptu game of hide and seek!
The children took turns hiding Bookbug characters within in the room, then gave their friends clues using directional language forwards, backwards, in, under, over .
The children were using their problem solving skills to recall the clues and were working together to find the toy the quickest.
After such a busy game we were glad when it was time for snack!
Today in the noisy and quiet room the children were keen to act out the story of Jack and the Beanstalk.
First, we decided to read the story to familiarise ourselves with it.
The children enjoyed re-telling their favourite parts in the story.
”Fee-fi -foo-fum! Jack Pott, what have you done?
“Fee – fi -Foo – fum, I smell the blood of a Englishman. Be he alive, or be he dead, I’ll use his bones to grind my bread.”
The children each chose a character to play in the story and we used the props to help us re- tell the story.
“ want to be Jack so I can climb up the Beanstalk”
“ I am the goose that lays the golden eggs, Jack you have to rescue me from the giant”
“ I am Jack’s mummy and I am going to throw the magic beans out the window “
“Quick chop the beanstalk, the giant is after me”
The children had so much fun acting and developing their language skills by expressing various characters dialogue in the story.
They also developed their social skills by expressing their characters feelings and showing respect through turn taking, co-operating and sharing with each other.
Why not give it a try at home and re-tell your favourite story’s or make one up. Have fun! 😊
