Tag Archives: #healthandwellbeing

St. Andrews Day at Cartmill 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

It’s been a day full of fun at Cartmill, we have been celebrating St. Andrew’s day through a variety of exciting experiences.

In the home corner we have been reading Scottish books, learning new exciting things about castles, Nessie the Loch Ness  monster and singing our famous songs and rhymes.

In the studio we’ve loved listening to the Scottish music and having a dance with our friends. We even tried some ceilidh dancing which was lots of fun!

In our baking area we have been very busy preparing the potatoes for making potato scones! The children were learning new skills by peeling, chopping and mashing the potatoes. Now they are ready to be cooked on the fire in the garden.

We gathered round the fire pit, keeping a safe distance. We watched the fire being lit and waited to hear the cracking of the fire so we knew it was ready to use.

As it was so cold outside today, we all had a turn of sitting with Val at the firepit to see if we could heat up. We felt the heat from the fire on our hands and our faces, it was nice and cosy!

“It goes pop.”

It was now time to put the fire out safely.


“It’s like a steam train.”
“Wow, it’s going all the way up-to space.”

Article 31- I have the right to relax and play

Article 29 – I have the right to an education which develops my personality, respect for others and the environment.

Learning emotions through Clay

Over the last week, the children have been exploring different emotions at the clay area. They have been selecting various loose parts to create their faces and express their thoughts and feelings through their model making.

Learning about emotions helps children become more aware and understand their own and others emotions and also allow them to better regulate their own responses to strong emotions. Helping to support children in recognising and identifying their emotions is an important first step.

”Here is a happy face”

”This face is a sad one, I made it go down like that, the mouth goes down like this”

The children used different techniques such as rolling, cutting and moulding to create their different faces which also develops the fine motor movements in their hands and their fingers.

”I made lots of different faces, they are happy ones, my mummy will be happy when I show her too”

Article 29 – I have the right to an education which develops my personality, respect for others and the environment.

 

Home Corner Fun

This week in the home corner the children have been really busy enjoying role play acting out real world scenarios so far we have been:

Cooking, baking and cleaning in the kitchen

“ I’m the chef”

Putting on the washing before hanging it on the line to dry

“it needs to get dry”

Taking care of the babies

“I made breakfast “

Working from home

Some matching and sorting


“there’s lots of this one”

We even had a handyman in to fix the high chair

What a busy week we have had.

Role play is very popular in the nursery and all of theses activities help to encourage communication and language skills, it also helps to develop self esteem, creativity, social and problem solving skills as they collaborate with their peers.

Cart Mill Sports Day!

The children had so much fun today exploring the different stations of our sports day event. We had to listen really well and follow the instructions as we moved around each of the stations & at the end we had the famous Cart Mill water slide!

Here is some pictures.. enjoy!

We had a running race.. we can go so fast!

The sack race..

Hurdle jumping…

Egg and spoon race

and the famous water slide…

As you can understand it is super difficult to post all of the pictures on the blog.. We will have them on the tv screen in the reception area for you to have a look at at pick up or drop off time!

People who help us

In the home corner, the children have enjoyed exploring role play experiences acting out different jobs that people have. The children were able to describe some of the different kinds of work that people do in the community and have been exploring the wider world of work.

To begin with, some of the children enjoyed exploring playing in a restaurant and being the “cooks”. They decided that the speciality of the day was pasta bolognese!

“In a restaurant, they bring the food to your table for you to eat it” L

“They bring you cups of juice too, I like orange” K

Some other children decided they wanted to be workmen.

“Workmen phone important people, like my grandpa” P

“I have to write down what we need” A

“My daddy does work on a computer at school” P

One of the most popular jobs to pretend to be was a police officer. We found a police officers hat in our resource cupboard and the children enjoyed “searching for the stolen hat”. It really was an important case to solve!

Jump, Jump, Jump!

In the garden, we have been developing the skill of jumping! Jumping requires power and balance and children can develop this skill by showing they can bend their knees when landing, having their head up looking straight forward and using their arms to balance if they need to.

The children have been demonstrating their jumping skills from a height over a low beam.

They then increased the difficulty and the height of the beam and assessed whether they felt safe or not and as their confidence grew, the children were encouraged to jump from a greater height.

The children were able to guide their learning and decide how high they were able to feel comfortable and felt safe to jump over.

Some children then decided to use their problem solving skills and different materials to create a seesaw with equipment from the obstacle course. The children have decided that the next steps they want to take is practicing balancing and jumping on one foot.

What ways can you develop your jumping and balancing skills at home? Feel free to share your learning with us via twitter @cartmillcentre and email at schoolmail@cartmill.e-renfrew.sch.uk

Article 31: every child has the right to play and take part in a wide range of activities.

Fun at Forest School!

We were so excited at Cart Mill today as it was our first day back at Forest School! It was time for us to put on our special Forest School suits and wellies and head off on our adventure!
It was so important to listen to Val and Fiona and we knew to “stop, listen and look for cars” before we crossed the road.

As we walked along the path, we could see and hear the river! Val told us it goes all the way past our Forest School and that it’s called the River Cart, “same as Cart Mill!”.

There are lots of hazards we need to look out for when we are at the Forest. We learned that hazards might be “dangerous if we touch them”. We spotted nettles, barred wire, an old fire pit and some glass, so we made sure we were very careful!

It was so “so exciting” to arrive at our site.  There was a huge mountain, so we decided to challenge ourselves to see if we could “race up to the top”. It was “a wee bit tricky”, but we were soon expert “mountain climbers!” The river looked so far away from the top and it was “so fun” to “run really fast” and “roly poly” back down.

Being a mountain climber is such hard work, so it was time for us to “have a wee rest” and a snack!

There was just enough time to explore the river before we headed back to Cart Mill for lunch!

It was difficult to decide what our favourite part of Forest School was today..

”I liked climbing the mountain”, “I like throwing stones in the river”, we ran really fast down the hill, it was fun”, “I liked everything”.

Phew, what a busy, fun, exciting first day in the Forest, “when can we come back!”

“The best classroom and the richest cupboard is roofed only by the sky” . (McMillan, 1925).

Article 31 – Every child has the right to relax, play and take part in a wide range of activities.

Different ways to move our bodies 🤸🏻 🏃‍♂️

Today in the garden we had lots of fun moving our bodies in different ways and developing our gross motor skills! Gross motor skills are the skills which children develop using their whole body movements.

By increasing movements of their whole bodies, children become more flexible, confident and agile.

The children discovered a different way to cross the beam and move in and out the tyres… on their knees!!

R ” I can jump in and out the tyres”

M, R and P all practiced their balancing skills and demonstrated confidence when crossing the balancing beam on the obstacle course.. well done!!

Balancing helps children to understand concepts such as gravity and helps children to develop better concentration skills.

 

M demonstrated good use of her gross motor skills by balancing on the side of the tyres whilst crossing them. ”If I hold out my arms it helps me to balance”.

G showed confidence, strength and determination to climb up the climbing wall in the garden. She was able to use her hands to help her balance at the top whilst climbing onto the bars at the top with her knees. Well done G! Climbing plays a key role in early childhood gross motor skill development.

 

What ways can you develop your gross motor skills at home or out in the community? Share your pictures with us!

Article 6 : I have the right to live and grow. Article 31: I have a right to relax and play