Tag Archives: mark making

At the car wash 🧼🫧🚙🫧

April 2, 2024 Mrs MacRae Leave a comment

Our children have been showing an interest in washing the cars in the water tray. We set up a tray to drive the cars through the mud. The children had great fun running their car’s though the shaving foam, exploring the different track marks their car made before dipping it into the water to wash with soap and sponges. We discussed if anyone had been though a car wash and decided to watch a short video of a car going though one.

After some of the children helped to make a car wash for the cars to drive though. Marking some lines on the wash cloth, the children were encouraged to cut along the lines. Then we stapled it onto the wooden frame.

“look at my track marks”

“My cars so dirty I need to give it a wash”

With the use of the sponges and soap dispensers, the children are developing all their muscle and co ordinations in their hand. The soap dispenser was tricky to use at first, but after a quick demonstration, they soon got the hang of it!

All are cars a sparkly clean, but I’m sure it won’t be long before they get all muddy again. 💦

Article 31 – I have the right to relax and play

Creativity

Shaping shaving foam

November 22, 2023 Mrs Miles Leave a comment

Within the sensory area we have been experimenting with mark making using a variety of resources. Today we chose shaving foam and have been using it to create shapes in different ways.

This has involved painting the shapes with the foam, drawing with fingers and paint brushes and even printing the shapes in our hands.

“I’m painting a triangle.”
”I can make a circle, a square, a triangle and an oval.”
“A circle, he’s a curly one.”
“I made a diamond on my hand.”

For some of our younger children, they enjoyed the feel of the foam, naming the colours and learning the names of the shapes. It is super, messy fun whatever age you are!

Article 13- You have the right to find out things and share what you think with others by talking, drawing and writing.

Uncategorized

Cornflour Creations

October 30, 2023 Mrs Miles Leave a comment

Throughout the week the children have been getting very excited about Halloween so today we decided to incorporate this in to the sensory area. We put some cornflour on the trays and selected a variety of mark making tools. Then we set about making our creepy creations…

“I’m making triangle eyes.”

“I’m making a spooky pumpkin with one circle eye and one triangle eye.”

“I’m making a spider and he’s coming after you!”

One of the boys experimented with moving the flour with the stick and realised he had made a bat wing! We experimented some more and worked out how to make two wings. He then took his time looking at the bat toy and added more features like a head and feet. Excellent work!

Some of the other children experimented with tracing around the Halloween toys and created some excellent pictures.

“I’m making a spider with only two legs and a pumpkin on his head.”

“My pumpkin has a silly face.”

Fantastic mark making and creativity skills from the children today!

Article 31- Every child has the right to take part in a wide range of cultural and artistic activities.

Literacy, Social Studies

DIY sensory emotion bags😀

September 27, 2023 Miss Brown Leave a comment

Today the children have been exploring emotions through their very own sensory bags.

We began by having a discussion about what kind of things we could put in our sensory bags while making the jelly mix.

“We could put beans in, they are squidgy”

“and cornflakes, my brother likes cornflakes they feel crunchy”

We collected a variety of different things to put in such as oats, cornflakes, shaving foam,beans, rice ,custard and jelly. The children helped to make up the custard by adding 200 ml of warm water (which we measured using a measuring jug) to the custard powder.

We used ziplock bags and stuck faces on them showing different emotions. The children then added each thing to each of the bags and closed the bag over.

Using their hands to feel and move the contents of each bag they were able to see the different emotions through the bag. They guessed what each one was and how it felt.

“It’s an angry face, it’s crunchy”

“ it’s happy face, it feels gooey”

”what’s that one I don’t know that”

As well as simple emotions we are beginning to look at more complex emotions.

”that is a surprised face, when might you feel surprised”

“ When someone pops a balloon ”

The children have enjoyed learning about emotions in different ways. During this sensory experience they have been developing their fine motor skills when using their hand muscles and learning some new vocabulary to describe what they feel.

Expressive Arts, Literacy

More than just a box………

August 11, 2023 Miss Campbell Leave a comment

What is a box? Is it just something to keep things in? Not according to our very clever creative children in the junk modelling area.

We have been so pleased with all your donations for our junk modelling area. We love turning an ordinary box into something completely different, creative and unique.

Today our children picked a box and I asked “what would you like to make?

We worked as a team to cut the box in half so we could share with our friend.

We discussed with our friends what we were designing.

One of our children was using his writing skills to paint their name on their box.

Another child was practicing his speed painting wondering how quickly he could paint the box.

One of our children seen a familiar face on one of the boxes. “Look it’s Bookbug can I paint it?”

Some of our children wanted to add things to their box. Using different boxes to create more detailed models.

Some children used the boxes to cut up and use parts of them to add to their masterpieces.

And of course we had to have a high speed chase in the police cars we made. It was the most fun in our studio room.

So as you can see, a box is not just a box.

Expressive Arts, Technologies

Upcycling project

July 13, 2023 Miss Brown Leave a comment

This week the children have been working very hard to start their up cycling project at the tinker table.

They began by looking for something around the playroom that they could ‘Up cycle’. They found an old storage drawer that had missing handles on the boxes. They collected loose materials such as buttons, pipe cleaners, beads, bottle lids, small wood chips and twigs to use as new handles for the boxes.

They used skills they had previously learned at the tinker table to join the new handles to the box.

“I can use the hammer and nails to put this wood on”

Once all the new handles were on the children noticed one of the drawers were missing. Using their problem solving skills one of the older children suggested making a sign to let everyone know that the new up cycled storage drawers belong to the tinker table.

The next job on the list is to up cycle our broken wormery, we are looking for longer pieces of wood if anyone has any lying about that they no longer need.

Expressive Arts

Let’s get painting 🎨

July 11, 2023 Mrs MacRae Leave a comment

In the studio today we have enjoyed exploring the paint using different utensils.

We have enjoyed stamping the potato mashers, forks and fish slice’s in the paint and splatting them onto the paper to create different shapes and pattern. As we continued painting we discovered different ways to use the utensil to get different effects with the paint.

The children are gaining confidence in exploring and experimenting with different resources using the tools to develop increased control of fine hand movements.

The children take ownership of their painting by writing their name on their pictures.

Here is some of the art we created

Article 13 – You have the right to find out things and say what you think, through making art, speaking and writing unless it breaks the rights of others

Expressive Arts, Outdoor Learning

Staying safe in the sun☀️

May 30, 2023 Miss Brown Leave a comment

What a wonderful day it is☀️.The children have been out enjoying the sunshine, but learning how to stay safe when the temperature is high. I asked the children if they knew what we can do to stay safe in the sun. They gave some great answers.

”Sun cream, my mum put some on me before I came to nursery”
“Wear my sun hat”

We discussed staying hydrated by drinking lots of water and taking regular breaks from the sun in the shade.

This is some of their favourite shaded areas to play in.

“We like to have pretend picnics on the bench”

”and read stories in the den”

We have been developing our fine motor skills through this mark making experience in the shade. The children are exploring letters and writing/ drawing in the sand.

We added 4 golf balls and powder paint with a splash of water to the tuff tray. The children used their strong muscles to lift the tray up and worked as a team to move the golf balls around in the tray to mix the colours and create patterns.

As some of the children went to play somewhere else, they noticed that the tray got heavier and tipped to one side.

“uh oh it fell, how do we get it back up?”

The children used their problem solving skills to figure out how to balance the tray and keep the golf balls from rolling off.

Who said you can’t have fun in the shade, the kids have had great fun outside while staying safe.

While this hot weather is due to continue, please make sure the children stay safe in the sun by putting sun cream on before they come to nursery, wearing a sun hat or cap and ensuring we have sun cream for them in the centre. We want to enjoy it while is lasts!

Literacy

Wednesdays are for visiting dinosaurs in far away lands🙂

March 23, 2023 Miss Mitchell Leave a comment

Today the children decided they would like to make a story map using dinosaurs. They had great fun creating different habitats for their dinosaurs to live in.“ I’m writing that it’s a dinosaur world we are making” “ I found my same stegosaurus in the book” “ I’m drawing some grass for my diplodocus to eat he’s hungry from walking for a long time”

”I’m drawing around the triceratops’s he’s quite big” “I drew a cave I wonder if my eight dinosaurs will fit in it” “ My dinosaur is going for a swim in the pond”

“This is my triceratops he’s going to eat the purple flower for his lunch.

“Oh no my dinosaur is on fire” “The volcano is to hot”

“It’s okay he can go to the pond he’s not hot now” “ He’s going for a swim”

“The pterodactyl is flying over his land” “ He might fly down on his friends and eat them “ The children were very imaginative with their story telling .

“ I have a sonic dinosaur he is very fast” We thought that next week we could move onto story’s about woodland animals.

Literacy

What can you SEE👀?

March 13, 2023 Miss Brown Leave a comment

It’s STEM week! (Science, Technology,Engineering, Mathematics)

Following on from learning about the sense of hearing in the science area we have been talking about how many senses there are and what they all are. We found out there are 5 senses. Today we discussed which of our senses we would like to focus on, we chose sight.

The children looked through the microscope to SEE the different specimens on the micro slides.

“I can see it, it looks like a little bit of grass from the garden”

“It’s tiny stones” “Now it is BIG”

Next we did an experiment to SEE if the items we chose would Sink or Float. We discussed each item before it went in the water. We predicted whether each individual item would float or sink, developing our critical thinking skills.

“The golf ball will sink”

“Why do you think it will sink?”

“Because it’s heavy”

“The pom pom will float”

“i know, it’s not heavy, it’s light”

”I can see it sinking all the way to the bottom”

We used our mark making skills to record our findings. The children made tally marks for each item and recorded them on a table.

“3 floated and 2 sinked”

For our final experiment, the children used pipettes (developing their fine motor skills and hand- eye co-ordination) to add different coloured food colouring to individual glases and then filled them up with water.

In each glass they added a paper towel so that half was in one glass and half in the one beside.

We watched as the coloured water transferred from one glass to another causing some of the colours to mix creating different colours in the empty glass.

“Look i can SEE it moving, the blue and yellow have turned green”

“They mix together”

The children have had lots of fun exploring their sight while being mini scientists.

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