The nursery children have been busy in imaginary worlds of dinosaurs, fairies and robots:
“Look, come and see – someone lives behind this door…. It’s a spider!”
“Tinkerbell lives there.”
“Look, I found these magic beans. If I plant them they will grow into a beanstalk.”
“The dinosaurs can make footprints in the sand.”
“That one’s triceratops, that’s tyrannosaurus.”
“We need to make buttons for the robot.”
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During Scottish Literacy & Burns week, we have been busy in the nursery exploring different aspects of Scottish culture:
We are learning about Robert Burns and his life;
We’ve been dancing to Scottish music in gym and the playrooms;
We are cooking and sampling porridge, haggis, neeps and other Scottish foods.
The children have loved learning to sing “Three Craws sat upon a Wall”, making their own crow masks and spotting “craws” on the school roof.
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We had a Wild Time in Busby Church Gardens:
– looking for birds and bugs, and ticking them off on our charts
– making “nests” and a “camp fire” with twigs and stones
– experimenting with balloons in the wind
– running free!
In Skills Academy today, some of the children read the book, “The Dot” by Peter Reynolds. They then tried guessing which household utensils created which marks… and then experimented at making their own marks in many very original ways.
“I think the fork made that mark…”
“That one was the sponge.”
“I think this brush did that one.”
“Look we can use this lid to make a dot.”
“I’m going to try that one. It’s for scraping car windows.”
“If you press the straw here, it makes a line.”
“I like using the toothbrush.”
We all signed our work.
This week the children spent a long time experimenting in our
Spices Kitchen – smelling, mixing, pouring and describing as they made some very interesting potions, recipes and concoctions…
Some comments from our Young Cooks & Scientists:
“We’re mixing a new potion. Come on, let’s see what colour it makes. Potion No.1 & Potion No.2…”
“What happens when you put this in?… It’s turning yellow… now it’s turned orange.”
“How about this? This is going to be the spiciest one ever!”
“Smell ours, it’s the tastiest.”
“Now we’ve made soup…. and spicy potatoes. They smell yummy!”
“Smell the rosemary. I like that.”
“Look at our porridge. Let’s smell it. I like to put cinnamon in my porridge.”
“They turn squooshy in the water (oats)…
not crunchy.”
If anyone in the family has old/out-of-date spices not needed, please feel free to donate them for further experiments!
Outdoors this week we have had fun and used our creative skills to make and explore Scottish landscapes, with lochs, waterfalls and our very own Nessie.
We are learning all about Light and Dark.
Today we played in our new Dark Den with torches and Glow-in-the-dark pebbles. We read “Shark in the Dark” in there.
We are learning all about 2D and 3D shapes.
We have been making shapes outdoors with beans, peas and pipe cleaners.
“My favourite is the triangle.”
As STEM WEEK gets going, we have been thinking and learning all about our eyes, their shape and how we use them. We made our own eyeballs…
“Eyes are for looking.”
“That’s the pupil.” “It’s a hole”
If it’s too sunny… “I put my hand above my eye like this.”
“I put my hands over my eyes.”
“You can wear sunglasses.”
“If you’re cooking something with onions, your eyes cry.”
“People who can’t see have to feel.”
Thanks very much to all parents who came along to our information evening last Tuesday, May 2nd. This session shared details of 3 of our current initiatives, Skills Academy, Muddy Movers and Play Academy. For those who couldn’t make it, the attached Powerpoint file tells you a little about Muddy Movers, which is a programme of Physical activities designed to advance children’s physical skills and emotional resilience.
