This week our pre-school children received some special friends to the nursery in the form of little knitted mice, kindly made and donated by Mrs Williamson’s mum! These little mice are all unique and stay in our dookits in nursery while we are not here. When we are at nursery they can join us on our many play adventures and can learn alongside us. Some of our mice have interesting names such as Rainbow, Miss Diamond, Sonic, Ironman, Fi Fi, Pinkie and Sparkle. They will join us into Primary 1 as part of our transition.
This week some mice enjoyed exploring and playing in a “Swiss cheese world” constructed from the big blocks.
Ross and Jackson listened to each other’s ideas and discussed different ways to create the world for their mice. Listening to other’s ideas and sharing your own ideas is part of literacy learning. Jackson explained to Ross that the cheese had to be “Swiss cheese becis the blocks hae holes in them.” Ross agreed this was a good idea and said “We can bigg it really strong with the cheese.”
Part of the discussion revolved around where to position each block. Jackson though it would be good to have “the sam number on each side”, Ross listened and constructed it in this way. Using the blocks in this way develops our numeracy skills in understanding counting, symmetry, shape and position. Carrying these heavy blocks helps our physical development and co-ordination.
They spent time deciding which direction each hole should face so that the mice could “go in different ways and directions and be able to hide in some bits” (Ross).
The big blocks were also used to build a motorhome/speedboat this week which led to a lot of interesting adventures such as trips to America and visits to volcanoes!
Constructing large builds like this helps to develop our awareness of how to work with each other when playing together. Discussing and debating together helps us to recognise each other’s emotions and to develop skills in how to resolve conflicts.
We organised ourselves onto the motorhome boat independently, figuring out where we could sit, giving each other space, discussing and debating who would be at the front, middle and back. These types of interactions are fundamental for our language learning and our social and emotional development.
After some time most of us had been on some kind of journey in the motorhome boat and there was only four of us left. The passengers could now stretch their legs out and each person could have their travel wish met by driver James. Elsie decided that she would try to balance a block on head while the boat went “really fast”. Ali was excited to see if it would stay on when they hit the waves. Having space and time like this to deepen our play and to explore it until it’s end point helps to develop our confidence and creativity.
Our mice were also part of small construction play this week. The large wedge of cheese that appeared in the nursery was very popular among our mice. They thought it was delicious! David’s mouse ate inside every hole. We counted how many holes there were – 14!
James and Jackson used the cheese to make a mousetrap. They found a crate and a wooden block. Once the trap was completed they tried it out and realised that it didn’t work without string being attached to the block. Experimenting through play develops our problem solving skills. Once string was attached the trap worked perfectly and mice were trapped! They shared what they had made with their friends. Freya and Ross asked a lot of questions about how they had made it and how the trap worked.
Building, problem solving and construction occurred outdoors this week too.
Ross, Lewis and James made a “mighty dam” by digging a hole with the digger and a spade and filling buckets full of sand. Being outdoors using tools to dig encourages us to move our bodies in different ways which helps develop our co-ordination, gross motor strength and balance.
When the started to flood they discussed how to stop the water. James thought “maybe adding more bricks will stop it”. After adding more bricks they tested their hypothesis by adding more water and checking the level it rose to. Understanding concepts such as more and less and exploring volume through play teaches us important numeracy skills.
Maisie, Micah, Henry and David used a variety of large hollow blocks, flat planks and differently coloured cones to make two different building sites. Being able to access resources like these encourage open- ended experimentation which in turn develops our scientific understanding of the world and our literacy and numeracy skills through play.
Harry and Jordie pretended they were digger and truck drivers in the sand pit where they made a lot of different noises to coincide with the play. They filled the trucks with sand to “big hooses wi”. Jordie took turns at filling both trucks while Harry steered them closer to the digger.
Ross, Henry and Lewis used the gravel area to fill trucks with stones to “lay doon a road”. The different sized trucks held different amounts of stones. With the help of an adult they moved large slate slabs to create ramps where they trucks could pick up and drop off their loads.
This week the children chose to listen to “The Gruffalo” as our group story. This story has a little mouse in it so our nursery mice were also interested in it! Through learning about dinosaurs we learned that the Gruffalo is a predator…but more on that next week. The story inspired paintings, re-telling of the story through play and drawings associated with the characters.
Some of us wanted to paint pictures for our mice after thinking about, and listening to, the story.
Emmie drew a Gruffalo. She copied the lines and shapes that she could see on the front cover of the book. Maisie used the colour purple, “Just lik the Gruffalo prickles” to create her picture.
Freya and Maggie shared pens and paper to draw a picture together. They discussed the features that they wanted in the picture and took turns to add these. Freya said “dis is a picture to hang up in nursery so wir mice can look at it.”
This week has also seen us do our sponsored walk. A HUGE thank you to everybody who has sponsored us. We’ve really enjoyed our walks this week! We will update you with a total soon. Walking around the loop gives us an understanding of where we stay in relation to other places on the island and develops our awareness of the world around us. It’s also been a great way to acknowledge and appreciate nature as we listened for bees and birds as we walked.
Finally we celebrated a big 5th birthday on Monday. Happy Birthday Freddie! Freddie’s fabulous photo is on the I-pad and we haven’t yet managed to download it so it will be posted next week instead.
