Tag Archives: #outdoorlearning

Outdoor Learning

Let it snow ❄️

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Today in The Studio we had a discussion about the change in weather over the weekend as we noticed our garden was very icy.

“ it’s very icy and slippy, you need to be careful not to fall”

“it was snowing in my garden yesterday”

”there wasn’t enough snow to make a snowman, it was just little snow flakes”

After speaking about the snow the children decided they wanted to make their own snow flakes, so they collected the materials they needed and got started.


While we waited on our snowflakes drying we got wrapped up in our jackets, hats and scarves to go outside and explore the ice in the garden. We spoke about how slippy the ice was and how to stay safe.

”don’t run because you will fall and bump yourself”

”don’t throw the ice, it is jaggy”

We only stayed out for a short time because it was so cold 🥶 the children had a great time exploring the ice. “It sounds crunchy” “it’s freeze” They described the sounds the ice made when they walked on it and how it felt to touch.

Expressive Arts, Literacy, Outdoor Learning, Social Studies, Special Event

Firework Splat Painting!

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Today In the garden we created some firework pictures in preparation for bonfire night this weekend.

The children selected some paint and resources that they could spray and splat. We picked a selection of different spray bottles and pipettes to spray at the large plastic sheet and create our firework picture.

The spray bottles and pipettes helped us to develop our fine motor skills. We demonstrated good skill when filling them up and spaying them.

We then used the paint and sponges to throw the paint at the ground to make splats that resembled fireworks. This was a good way to get our bodies moving and develop our gross motor skills while being creative.


While we were painting we talking about fireworks and how we can stay safe.  These are some of the children’s comments. 😊

“You don’t touch the fire”

“Fireworks and very hot so you need to stay away”

“They go in the sky”

“Only adults do the fireworks”

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Garden fun at Cart Mill

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We have been having lots of fun in our garden this week at Cart Mill. The children have been extremely busy and creative using their imagination in their play…

On Monday, we opened the ‘Cart Mill Cafe’ where macaroni cheese, chips and ice cream were the speciality! The children used various pots and pans, spoons and bowls and lots of mud to create their meals in the cafe. Throughout this experience the children were developing their role play and imagination skills and using real life experiences in their play.

What would you like from the ‘Cart Mill Cafe’ the next time you visit the nursery?

                              ”I’m making you some macaroni cheese”

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”I need to mix the cake, you scoop up the cake and mix it together in the bowl, it needs to go in the oven”

” Here’s ice cream, it has a flake in the top and chocolate sauce”

Then, today, we got a special show performance on our stage in the garden! The children treated us to a performance of ”5 little monkey’s jumping on the bed”. We had to be patient and wait for the curtains to open and for the show to begin…

”It’s nearly time for the show to begin”

     

The children had so much fun putting on a show for their friends, we even had some music on to dance along to!

Outdoor Learning

Balancing skills

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This morning in the garden we have been working on our balancing skills. We used loose parts to create our Muddy Movers course which helps us strengthen and improve our gross motor skills. We are becoming very confident in our balancing skills, so we decided it was time to make the course a little more challenging! We had a look in our cupboard and found some bean bags and some egg and spoons! We decided to challenge ourselves and see if we could balance the beanbags on our heads and the egg on the spoon as we walked around the course.

We started by discussing what it means to be balanced;

“It means you don’t wobble.”

“You need to practice.”

”You put your hands out to help.”

The course is designed in a way that helps us to assess our own risk and abilities.

We like to use our loose parts to make changes to our course every day. We can choose to walk along the plank on the ground or if we are feeling confident, we can step up and walk along the bridge.


By keeping a beanbag on our heads, this encourages us to keep our heads up, or the beanbag will fall off! This helps us improve our balancing skills.

We had to walk really carefully to make sure the egg didn’t fall off the spoon!

We demonstrated excellent balancing today! We were getting faster and more confident each time we competed the course.

We had so much fun!

Expressive Arts, Literacy, Outdoor Learning

Ice cream parlour🍦

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What a beautiful day it is🌞

After discussions last week on how to keep cool in the sun, the children decided they wanted to open their own ice cream parlour.

we used:

  • Shaving foam
  • Food Colouring
  • Chocolate powder
  • Sprinkles


The children used different sized spoons and bowls to mix the foam and chocolate power to make chocolate ice cream. They then mixed red food colouring to make strawberry ice cream.

“We need to add more chocolate powder, I cant smell it properly”

“I’m going to have a pink cone”

”I’m scooping the ice cream, it’s very slippy”

” I made a unicorn Ice cream, it’s gooey”

We made our ice cream cones in the shade while we had a break from the sun.

The children used their senses to smell and touch the foam with their hands.

They used their counting skills to count how many scoops of ice cream it took to fill the cone.