Tag Archives: Outdoor Learning

Stick Man

The bairns found a stick in the playground one day a few weeks ago and thought it looked like Stick Man. We listened to the Stick Man Story and decided to make this our transitional story for our pre-schoolers moving up to P1. We have since watched and listened to the story and played with Stick Man in nursery. He was having so much fun with the bairns taking good care of him, they even selected the perfect new arm and fixed him when his arm broke! Since then Stick Man has relaxed a little more in nursery. He disappeared a couple of weeks ago and we received a video message from him the other day and another today. Here we have included the full video for you to see. It shows Stick Man is ready to move on from nursery up to primary 1 and he meets a few people on his adventure to find the primary 1 classroom. All the nursery bairns have really engaged with Stick Man, they have been recalling the story, writing messages for him, drawing maps and looking for footprints. They were delighted to see he finally found his way to primary 1!

 

 

 

Busy Start to Term 4

Where has the first 3 weeks of term 4 gone?!? It was lovely to welcome everyone back to nursery after the Easter break. We have all been soooo busy, so here is a quick catch up of what we have been up to!

On our first day back we went on a walk to find a Spring thing! There was lovely daffodils around nursery and someone wondered if the trees in the forest had turned green with their leaves yet so we headed there for a look. There wasn’t any leaves but there was different kinds of buds that will turn into leaves soon.

We went to check on the tadpoles at the pond and there were so many! We brought buckets and nets so we could catch them and keep them in a tank in nursery to watch the life cycle of a frog. The children have been feeding them fish food along with the pond weed  that we caught. Ruby thinks we caught 100 tadpoles!

We have enjoyed some beautiful days out in the sunshine in the playground with bubbles, bikes and scooters, water fights, potion making, different physical skills, painting the sandpit, some games all together and walks to the playpark and down to the shore! It has been warm enough to have snack on the bus too! With the weather getting better, could parents please remember to put sunscreen on their children before coming to nursery. Thank you!

Inside everybody has been busy planting sunflower seeds! The children wrapped their little sunflower seed in a wet kitchen roll sheet and left it in a greenhouse in the window and within 2 weeks some were ready to be potted! When we took the seedlings out, we looked at the roots in more detail and talked about the germination  process.

One afternoon, some of us planted seeds from more flowers in trays, including Nasturtiums, Marigolds, Violas, Pansy and Petunias. The children were every interested in why we were wearing gloves, what compost was and what was inside it as they found lots of different ‘bits’ in it.  So we had lots of discussion and then we compared the different flower seeds. The children were astonished how tiny the petunia seeds were and how weird the marigold seeds were. “They don’t really look like seeds”  “I don’t think they’ll grow”.   The bairn’s also wondered if the size of the seed will reflect in the size of the flower – big seeds produce big flowers, little seeds little flowers etc.   We discussed what plants need to grow and the best place to put them and everyone agreed to put them in the window because they need sun, warmth and water.   

Inside, everyone has also been very busy at the craft table, making their own lovely creations, flowers for the flower shop, their own stories or making their own PJ mask!

And finally, everyone has loved building, messy play and our vets inside!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Term 3!

Term 3 started off very different this year with some children learning from home and some at nursery within the hubs. Then we were all reunited in February back at nursery and it was non stop fun until the holidays! Here are a few highlights from term 3.

We had great fun playing outside last term in all sorts of weather.  We went on some lovely walks down to the shore to see the swans and other wildlife and walked all the way to the crofthouse! We visited the pond lots to see the frogs and frogspawn. We spoke about the life cycle of a frog and other animals as Spring was approaching and we thought about how to stay safe around the pond.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Water play was very popular this term, we made puddles to splash in, painted the sheds, had water fights, made potions with paint and made rivers with the pipes. We used little boats to have races with.

Trips to the forest have been great fun playing hide and seek and climbing trees! The children have also made houses and cafes which was perfect to hide under when it was raining! We brought out our gardening equipment and de-weeded our planters so we were ready for planting after the holidays.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Inside we really loved having the soft play, the craft table was always very busy and the sand and rice activities were very popular using the scales and measuring jugs. The children loved packing suitcases so we had a little Airport in nursery, there were holidays to Disneyland and South Africa!  We used the check in tags and stickers we were kindly donated from Sumburgh Airport. The kids also put on a super frozen performance for the teachers to enjoy and on the last day of term we treated ourselves to a pajama and movie day!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Fun this week and a sad farewell to Mrs Fraser

Some of our learning in week 2 looked like this….

Team work and tall towers!
Building at height
Creating complex structures
Off we go in our boat!


BLOCK PLAY

How many different ways can a block be used?

“Lets make a campfire”
Cooking on the campfire

 

“Can I go inside?”

S A N D

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

W A T E R

 

Mrs Fraser donated a trampoline to Nursery!

 

Bonfire and fireworks

Messy, messaging, mark making and…

M A P S!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Following our interest last term of treasure hunting and maps some of us decided to make our own treasure maps! 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We followed them to see if we could find X marks the spot…

T R E A S U R E !

 

Treasure!

 

Exploring the early concepts of coding

 

 

 

 

 

We are very sad to say goodbye to Mrs Fraser!

We wish her all the best in her new post. The bairns gave her a good send off…

 

Queen for the day!

They made her a crown and declared her Queen for the day!

She chose to listen to country music which everyone loved dancing too, we had cake for snack, played with bubbles and the bairns helped her follow clues on her treasure hunt in the afternoon.

 

A Lovely relaxing hand massage to finish off the day!

 

Thank you Mrs Fraser, we will miss you!

Week 6 and 7!

WOW – how can we be on week 7 already?!  Here’s a peerie look at what we’ve been up to the last 2 weeks……

Inspired by the different genres of music we’ve been learning about, we extended our music into learning about our Super Powers – SENSES!.  We have been exploring our sense of sight and hearing and loved using these music bells to make our own music as well as copt patterns and rhythms of other music.

We made glasses and played games where we had to use only our eyes or only our ears to play the game.  “Winky” was our favourite where we all had to choose someone to wink or blink at and swap places without anyone seeing.

As always we’ve had great fun outside with a mixed bag of weather.  We’ve been painting, exploring the forest while being mindful of what we could see and hear each time.  We loved the sound of the rustling leaves in the wind and the crunching leaves under our feet.  We took leaves back to Nursery and enjoyed, leaf printing, making our family trees and a big thank you tree for Paul, who helped us care for our forest.  We even used the leaves to make our Christmas cards!

Our forest gives us great opportunities to talk about Autumn and see the leaves changing.  We looked for different animals that might live in our forest and thought about the hedgehogs who may be looking for somewhere to hibernate.  We even made our own Autumn tree in the playground.

We’ve enjoyed sunshine at the playpark and rainy days for puddle splashing.  We went fishing in the puddles for fish and sea creatures.  We made homes and aquariums for each sea creature which developed into a fun “sinking and floating” experiment.

We worked together to make a water fall and use the water to move objects down the pipes and what better way to end the day, than with a water fight!!  Lots of fun was had by all.

Lots of fun in the mud kitchen and mark making…..

 

Mark making……

We’ve been busy learning about road safety on our walks and recreating these in the playground with trips on our “bus”, road works and bikes and scooters, whilst building roads and ramps inside with different materials.

Looking forward to see what next week brings………

Week 5!

We have had a super busy week and are now half way through  term 1 already!

We started off the week by making our family trees. We molded clay for our tree trunks and stuck in twigs from our forest. We left them to dry and will draw our family members on the leaves that we have gathered from the forest to stick to our twigs!

We have been making playdoh for baking in our kitchen and been for walks to the forest and play park. On Thursday we all got our waterproofs on and made a big puddle in our playground to splash in. We then decided to go on a puddle hunt to find a bigger puddle!

We have LOVED having the rice in the tuff tray to measure, pour, weigh, make rice cakes with and so much more!

We have been dancing and exploring to different genres of music, rock and Shetland dance was a firm favourite! We discussed how different types of music makes us feel and what it makes us want to do (run, jump, sleep). We then tried to match it to each of the colour monsters depending on how it made the children feel (happy, sad, calm, angry, love, scared).

On Friday we had the magnets out in our loose parts and watched a video about magnetism and why magnets repel and attract. We discovered lots of things in nursery that were magnetic and also found out that we could move the magnetic balls on the tuff tray with a magnet underneath which was very exciting!

In the afternoon we went to the OOSC garden and forest to play hide and seek and found 2 frogs! The one in the garden was a small frog so we decided to put it back to the pond. But the one in the forest was a big one so we left it in the long grass!

Exploring Ice

What amazing weather we’ve had for playing outdoors.  The bairns have really embraced all weathers an have been excited to be out to experience all weather types.

We had lots of fun collecting haily puckles…..who caught the most?….who caught the least? ……who had the best container for catching hail?……then they decided to gather their hail altogether and touch, feel, eat and play with it.

We had lots of mark making in the frost, using ice scrapers, sticks and spoons to make roads, draw, patterns, handprints and much more.

And of course smashing the ice was the most fun.  Our polar bears froze in the ice and we had to smash them out.  Some polar bears left a perfect pattern in the ice and we talked about fossils, felt the imprints with our fingers and discussed floating icebergs as the ice began to melt in the water.

The bairns were excited to tell us they could not find a circle shape amongst all the smashed frozen ice.  “It’s sharp”,  “it’s pointy”, “It’s like glass”, “it’s a triangle”, “mine has more points than a triangle”,  “mines is slidy”, “mine is smooth”, “it makes my hands sore”, “I don’t like it”, “I want to eat it”……….

Stay and Play

What a glorious day it was for our last Stay and Play day this term!

We were all very busy painting, sanding, watering and building while the sun shone, but the highlight was most definitely building our Fire Pit at the end of the day to toast marshmallows and eating “shmores”!

Painting!………..

Making trampolines……..

Sanding, ready to build……..

”We look like scientists!” (Maximus)

Gardening and making planters……

 

Making fire, toasting marshmallows…..yum!….

The Fire Pit was a big hit with staff, bairns and parents.  Providing children such experiences with real tools and fire allow our children to directly experience and gain knowledge about the nature these things and of open flames within a safe and controlled environment. They develop a respect for fire and the skills to keep themselves safe, which they can apply throughout their lives.

We all had a fabulous afternoon in the sunshine.  Big thanks to John the Janny and all the parents who donated items and came along to help.  Some even managed a sneaky marshmallow or two!

Outdoor Play and Forest Fun!

We love going to our forest to play.  There are so many things to discover in the forest and we find something new to do each time we go. It’s our favourite outdoor classroom!

We hold hands with a partner and practise crossing the carpark safely on our way to the forest.

The boys and girls in Nursery have been particularly interested lately in the signs they have found in the forest.  They have been using their sounds and letter skills that they have been learning in Nursery, to try to read the signs and discover what they say.

These barrels and trees make great shelters for animals and creatures in the forest, but they also provide great climbing and balancing fun.  Risky play really helps to develop our gross motor skills and allows our children to test and affirm their capabilities, as well as problem solve every day activities.

There are lots of exciting places to explore and hide, but some children have already begun to ponder……

” What will happen when the leaves grow? (Rory)”

“How will we get through the forest? (Owen)”

We found some more signs and worked together to find out what they said.  Anri and Maximus wondered why there were no signs to show us how to get to the forest and thought about ideas of what signs we might need and what they would say.

There are lots of amazing things to discover and find in the forest.  “What is this?  Where did it come from?” Lottie-Mae wanted to take what she had found back to Nursery to look at it a little more closely.

 

 

 

 

 

MUD…glorious mud!!!

 

 

 

 

 

We were having too much fun to leave the forest so we stopped for a quick picnic snack.

“Look what I found!  Is it a pine cone?  It’s very small. (Archie)”

Look at us climb!

“I’m the highest! (Johanne).”

“I’m like a monkey. (Anri).”

“I got up!  This tree must be very strong. (Lucille)”

Peek-a-boo!

“You have to put your head down low to get through.  I nearly got stuck. (Elsie).”

We loooove a muddy puddle….

1….2….3…juuuummmmppp!

“Squelch”……”splat”….”sticky”…

We visited our nature pond to see if the Frog spawn has hatched yet.  We hope to take some tadpoles to Nursery to look at more closely and see how they change into frogs.

Who will be first to spot a frog?

We found lots of frog spawn but still no tadpoles….

It’s hard work to walk through long grass and heather.  Sometimes we find it tricky and fall over but we are getting better at it and our legs are getting stronger.

Yay – we caught a frog!  It was great to take a closer look at the frogs.  They look tiny but when the frog was trying to jump out of the bucket, we saw it had really really long back legs.

“That’s so they can jump high” (Maximus).

“I can see another frog!” (Honor)

We also took a closer look at some frog spawn.  Some had black dots in the middle but some were beginning to uncurl into tiny tadpoles, getting ready to hatch.

Owen found a tiny caterpillar on the ground.  He carefully and kindly picked it up so as everyone cold have a closer look.

We love getting outdoors to play.  Even better when the sun is shining!

The bairns are really enjoying building their own obstacle courses.  It is fantastic to see them working together to build the obstacles and helping each other as they build their confidence with balancing.

“If you put your arms out like this, it helps you balance.” (Anri)

“I’m rocking!” (Anri)

“It looks like you’re surfing.” (Maximus)

“If we both go on we can do it like a see-saw.” (Lucille)

“Let’s see if we can all balance on it.” (Lucille)

A-hoy!!!

 

Learning without stabilisers…..

Sandpit fun…..

Mark making with chalk…..

Drawing around each other and our shadows.  Who is the biggest?

Building a house…..

Three cheers for SMUHA!

The sun was shining on SMUHA this morning and what a fantastic day we’ve had!

The Nursery were in great singing voice today as they marched in our school procession to the galley burning.

We threw our torches in…..

Our school Jarl did a fab job and we loved his galley!

Snack time.

It was great to see so many people come and join us.

Way-hey!!!!

 

Adventures in the forest

We had an adventure to the forest today.  We played hide and seek, climbed trees and found an old birds nest.

Rory brought his purple magnifying glass in today for p week.  He used it to identify what the nest was made from.

”There is grass, mud and sheeps’s wool”.

Rory let his friends have a look too.

”I can see string and paper too!”

We had a closer look when we got back to nursery and used the computer to identify which bird made the nest.  We think it was a black bird.

Some children drew pictures of the nest and some made their own nests.

Sydney made a nest for his chick using feathers and straw.

The chick tried out the birds nest from the forest but Sydney thought it was too small for the chick.