Whalsay Early Years Blog 2021/22

This week we would like to share some of the ways that we develop a functional and dynamic pencil grasp through our play in the nursery.

Having a functional and dynamic pencil grasp is important because it means that we will find writing comfortable and we will be able to write without getting tired. A functional grip helps our writing to be easy to read by other people. Traditionally children were taught to hold pencils in a tripod grasp however this is not the only effective grasp for writing and it is much more important that we can write legibly and for long periods comfortably throughout our lives.

As you can see from our “make your mark” sheet, which we use to sign in each day, we are using a variety of grasps at this very early stage of mark making. Our grasps are very much still developing at this young age.

You may have seen this X-ray picture on social media. The left side image shows a fully developed hand (this usually happens around the age of 7) and the right image shows what our hands are like at nursery age. Or carpal bones have not fully formed and our tendons are still lax. 

As we near school age adults may help us to make subtle changes to any grasps that we find uncomfortable but the most important thing, at this stage, is for us to enjoy mark making and using mark making materials. If we are motivated to make marks and explore writing materials we are more likely to become writers in the future. 

It is very important for us to develop hand, finger and wrist strength so that we can develop a functional and dynamic pencil grasp. This uses our thumbs and fingers, rather than our wrists or elbows. These movements are usually established by age 5-6 but can be later. Others features of a functional grasp is where the ring and little fingers are tucked into the palm of the hand and where there is an open webspace between the thumb and index finger, forming a C-shape.

The best way we can learn all of this is through play, particularly play that involves using our fine motor control. Here are some examples, from this week, of play that helps develop our pencil grasp.

We hope you’ve enjoyed seeing some of the ways we’ve been working hard on developing our fine motor skills and our future pencil grasp and look forward to sharing more our learning with you next week. 

Wow! It’s great to be back to nursery after our break! On Wednesday Lucas said “I want to go for a walk to the pier and find litter”. What a good idea! We found out that ten more people wanted to walk to the pier too. What else did we want to see/do on our walk? “See the ferry”, “Look for the Antaras”, “Watch the cars coming aff o the ferry”, “Look at the marina”.

We got a litter bag and lots of gloves ready before we left. Why did we need to wear gloves for litter picking? “We might get dirty hands”, “so we dunoo get germs on dem.”

Picking up litter around our local community develops our self-worth and confidence. It allows us to contribute to and participate positively to our island which is great for our health and wellbeing and helps us become responsible citizens of the future.

On the way to the pier we noticed that there was no ferry at the ramp. “Where is the ferries gone?” “They go to Laxo” “Sometimes Vidlin” “I’m’ going on the ferry next week” “I saw dee on the ferry Miss Sandison”. We noticed a really peerie boat. It had lots of seagulls around it. “What do you think it’s doing?” “Catching fish”, “Floating on the water”, “Feeding the big birds”. We agreed that the boat must have caught some fish and the birds were waiting to eat some.

As well as picking up litter we did a lot of number work. We counted how many cars came off the ferry, how many were in the booked and unbooked queues, how many boats there were. Whether there was more or less cars than trucks. There was a big truck with gravel, bricks and sand on the back. “Maybe it’s going to nursery becis we need sand at nursery” thought Alfie.

We had fish cakes for lunch. “Did dis come fae yun peerie boat?” we wondered. We spoke about where fish go once they are caught. “Dey get landed”, “We eat dem”, “My Daa takes some heem.”

The next day we looked at the litter we had found. “Dir is a lot o litter oh yuk”, “D animals will get sick on dis litter .” With help we sorted it into different piles while learning about materials such as plastic, tin and paper. When we collect objects, ask questions about them and organise them we are learning how to analyse data and handle information mathematically.

We looked for symbols on the litter, we learned what the recycling symbol and “put it in the bin” symbols look like. As part of our science and technologies curriculum it is important for us to discuss how to reduce, re-use and recycle and to understand what these words mean. Being able to read symbols and signs is also very important for early reading development.

As part of our discussions about litter we watched a short video called “Whale’s Tale”. The poor whale got weighed down by all the litter in the sea. “He’s sad noo he canoo swim”, “It’s too heavy”, “He’s stuck” “His friends ir helping him!”, “Why did the dolphin eat yun?” “Why does the litter turn peerie?” We had a lot of discussion about how the sea breaks litter into tiny bits that sea creatures accidentally eat. We all agreed it is good to stop litter going into the sea. We also learned a little bit about how whales breathe.

We continue to be very aware if nature around us and eager to help look after nature. On our walk we noticed different types of that yellow flowers, “Dis is daffodils but no dis” We learned to spot some differences between daffodils and dandelions. We noticed some little insects around the flowers. Back at nursery some of us listened to “The very busy spider” story and linked it to what we had seen outside. We learned that we need to be nice to spiders because “They catch flies in their webs” “Birds can feed speeders to dir babies” “The flies dunoo go into wir food”, “Birds come in the lang girse and eat speeders and litter”

On Thursday during some time at the playpark we continued litter picking. We searched the perimeter of the playpark and all around to check it was clean. We noticed that the litter bin was very full. “Lots o folk ir been eating crisps”, “Lots o folk ir pitten dir litter in the bin”. We were happy that people are keeping the playpark tidy and using the bin. “The playpark is bonnie noo”, “It canoo blow into the sea” “D birds will not eat any o yun bruck noo”

Another week of outdoor enthusiasm as our interest in the signs of Spring continues to grow.

This week we discovered frogspawn in the pond. “Dir going to turn into tadpoles!”…”yeah and dan get leegs and be frogs!”. Learning about lifecycles, and observing these in real contexts, is important as it teaches us about growth and change in nature and helps us to become respectful and caring towards living things. On our way back from the pond we checked if any baby lambs have arrived yet and had time to count steps and creep through tunnels.

We have continued to find flowers peeping through the soil this week and were keen to plant our own bulbs. We selected shovels and worked hard to make small deep holes in the ground. We talked about the features of bulbs and used words like roots and petals. Some of us knew that “we need to dig a hole and pit dem in the ground and dan it will rain and sun and dan they will grow big and bigger.” We compared the depth and width of holes which helped develop our mathematical understanding. Digging holes is also great for strengthening our bodies and developing shoulder stability which we need for writing.

While planting bulbs we found some worms! All different sizes, some were long and fat, some were small and thin. We compared them, learning new adjectives and mathematical language such as “slimy”, “sticky”, “thick” and “shorter than/longer than”. We were very kind to the worms and handled them carefully. We collected them in a bucket. We counted 8 worms. We added them to our wormery. “Eat the leaves and chew chew”, “mak the soil good.”

There’s been lots of opportunities for us to be active and take part in different kinds of energetic play outdoors this week. This is important for our health and wellbeing. Managing and controlling our bodies and finding out how to use and share different space develops our physical and cognitive abilities which we need for formal learning later on. We flew a kite on the old pitch. We watched how high it went, “It’s going to the moon!”, “Wow it will touch the cloods!”. We took turns flying it and felt how strong the wind pulled it in our hands. We developed ball skills, kicking, throwing and catching throughout the week. We practised our balance skills in the playpark and in the play area behind the school. And of course we were on the look out for nature. We spotted starlings in the bushes and a friendly cat called Mittens.

During our walks we noticed a lot of litter lying about. We are very aware of this and understand that litter is ugly, unsafe, hurts animals and “seals and whales eat plastic and dan it’s bad for dem”. Some of us were very keen to pick up litter so on Wednesday we went on a litter pick.

Not only do we become responsible citizens through litter-picking, it also supports our scientific learning and understanding as we investigate and notice the properties of different pieces we collect, from sweetie wrappers, to cans to plastic. We used our numeracy skills to count the different pieces of litter and discussed the weight of the bags. At the end of the litter pick we had a play on the big steps and felt proud that all around the school looked clean. “The birds will be happy noo”, “no more litter!”, “sheep winoo eat it” “no sore belly”.

Within the nursery grounds we have been very busy working together, sharing ideas, listening and talking and problem solving. We used the sand to make “cement” and to build  sand structures which we then poured water over to see what would happen. “oooh it’s melting”, “it’s disappearing”, “the water is made it go”. We learned new words such as “disintegrate” and “erosion” as we experimented with sand and water. We created “quarries” where materials were transported to and from and where vehicles got “bugged in” and needed towed. We used the long planks of wood as roads for our small vehicles. During this small world play we used our imaginations to make up stories, characters and plots and shared our thoughts and ideas with each other, “Doo is in yun car and I’m in dis car going to the dentist.” “I’m going to get the shopping but I need to park” “Doo parked ahint me ok?”, “stop we need to fix the road, it’s broken”…

We hope to see more of our friends return to nursery next week and hope everyone feels better soon.

It’s been very quiet at nursery this week. We hope that everyone is feeling better soon. Those of us who have been able to come have spent lots of time outdoors as signs of spring start to creep into our world.

We have done a lot of walking around our local area to look for signs of spring but on Monday we also had to go on an important trip to the shop to buy milk and snack ingredients. Miss Manson showed us the shopping list and we did a great job matching pictures and matching words to find what we needed. We counted how many pints of milk we needed and explored all of the environmental print we saw. We knew that we needed to pay for our errands too and watched Miss Manson count out the right amount of money.

Even though the weather is still cold, and we need to wrap up to keep warm, we have noticed signs of spring around us. Flowers such as crocuses, daffodils and snow drops have started to appear. We are learning to compare the colours and shapes of the petals and to be gentle to wild flowers. Even though some of us would like to pluck them we know it is best to leave them alone so that the insects and bees can get some early food. It is important for us to learn about the importance of nature and become responsible citizens in real life contexts.

We visited the pond to see if there was any frogspawn and popped into the polytunnel where we noticed little spider webs. We smelled rosemary and collected some to use back in the setting. We learned that it’s ok to take the herbs as they are different from wildflowers. It is important for us to learn about what is safe to eat and what is not. We carefully chopped the rosemary, cooked it gently and sprinkled it into our soup. Over the next few months we are very keen to grow our own herbs, flowers and vegetables.

We had plenty of time for relaxation and fun on our walks. On the windy days we pretended to be birds and aeroplanes as the wind blew us in different directions. Keeping our balance against the wind helps us to develop strong cores and leg muscles and develops our sensory systems. We found some great hills for rolling down! Rolling down hills is good for us as it helps develop our vestibular and proprioceptive systems. We also spent time in the playpark where we could further develop or strength, balance and vestibular systems.

Back inside the nursery grounds we found a worm! We discussed the worm’s length and shape and shared what we knew about worms, “They bide underground”, “they ir wiggly” “feel like grapes” “birds lik to eat dem.” We put the worm into a planter so it could help make the soil nice for our flowers. Miss Stewart wondered if we would like to make a house for worms, called a wormery. We all wanted to do this and worked together collecting leaves, sand and soil. We had time to pretend to be worms ourselves and to sing and dance along to worm songs too! We took turns to pour the sand and soil into the wormery and gently laid dead leaves on top for the worms to eat. We learned that worms love the dark so we wrapped the wormery up and will investigate what has happened next week.

We learned that worms like rain. Our water play this week certainly helped make the ground wet! We spent time filling large buckets and then making waves as we poured the water out. This is great for developing our knowledge of volume, weight and capacity as well as strengthening our back, arms and shoulders. We watched how the water ran down hill and discovered where it made puddles. We experimented with how the water moved around the bucket by putting floating corks on top. We spoke about whirlpools, forces, speed and direction. Some of us wanted to make “hoses” and “drain pipes” using the pipe selection. It was very interesting to watch the water run through the different pipes and to problem solve the best ways to do this. We also used our watering cans to water the flowers and give the (imaginary) bunny rabbit some water.

We have spent some time indoors too, mostly relaxing with number games, painting, mark making and playing together with trains and boats. We chose paint colours independently and spent time building strength in our hands and fingers by squeezing the bottles. A lot of our mark making has been done on the floor this week, a great way to develop shoulder stability to help us become formal writers of the future. We worked together, using our talking and listening skills to share our thoughts and ideas on how to build long and short train tracks and explored different scenarios and stories using the trains in imaginary play.

Hopefully a lot more of our friends will be better and ready to come back next week. We wish everyone a healthy weekend.

It was World Book Day on Thursday. We thoroughly enjoyed it! Some of us dressed up as story characters, some of us created costumes in the setting and P4/5 read us stories both in the nursery and in the school library. We loved sharing stories and listening to stories with the older children. Shared reading with older peers is a fantastic way to motivate us to become readers ourselves and helps us develop an awareness of the relevance of texts in our lives. Thank you P4/5!

Our recent weekly visits to the library has been great for increasing our motivation to read too. We have explored many different texts, listened to stories, shared stories with each other and learned library rules. On Thursday when we joined P4/5 in the library it was already a safe and familiar place where we could relax with books.

It’s not just on World book day or in the library where we celebrate books and learn to read. We do this every day in nursery too! Being free to choose and explore books and texts in all areas, as part of our play, develops our enjoyment and interest in books. It is important for us to be surrounded by a variety of books and texts and to be able to use these throughout the day as listening to stories at this age makes us much more likely to enjoy reading later at school. Often we create our own stories and explore events and characters from familiar books as part of role play and imaginary play. We need to play in this way in order to develop reading and writing skills for more formal learning later.

Before we can formally read we need to have a strong base in phonological awareness which is learning about sounds and spoken language. Some of the ways we develop these skills are by practising our listening and attention by following rules and routines each day and listening to staff and to our peers throughout play. We join group activities such as drumming, making playdough, trips to the playpark/community, snack and lunch. All of these are natural avenues where we learn to listen and pay attention.

Before we can read we need to be able to hear differences between a range of sounds. We learn this when playing outside, listening to environmental sounds and the sounds of nature. We also learn this through indoor play when we play with musical instruments, listen to stories from cd’s and explore ways to make sounds using different materials and resources across all areas of the setting.  It is also important for us to be able to hear words and remember what they mean. Often a visual support can help us link what we hear with meaning.  Using “stop” and “go” signs as part of our play this week is an example of how we learn to do this through play.

To become good readers it is important for us to be able to explore and play with patterns and sounds of language. One way we do this is through developing our skills in hearing and detecting rhyme. We sing nursery rhymes, make up silly rhymes and use rhymes in our play ever day at nursery.  We also learn to listen for beats in words when we play with any type of resource that can be used as beaters and also in our jumping and clapping games. Some recent examples below include “wheels on the bus” and various forms, “1o little monkeys”, “5 speckled frogs”, acting out and changing familiar story “Room on the broom”, “row row row your boat” (various destinations and animals), using sticks on varied surfaces for friends to follow beat and “ride a cock horse”

Often the first letters and words we learn to read are familiar ones from our environment. Every day we notice environmental print. We find our names when we come in to the setting and stick them up to show we are here. We learn what our friends names look like too. There are signs and symbols throughout the nursery that we use as part of our play every day too. When we go for trips in the community we look at car number plates to find our letters and read the road signs that we pass. By being interested in environmental print we also learn about the sounds of letters, what the beginning and end of words sound like and how blending letters together makes a full word.  Exploring sounds, letters and words helps us to discover how they work together which will help us become successful readers of the future.

This week we’d like you to have a general peek at some of our interests and learning that’s been evolving throughout the week.

Outdoors we have been very interested in digging. Digging puddles to make them deeper, digging out water to make puddles dry, digging in the sand to make rabbit holes and digging to create ditches  for different lengths of “water pipes”. Using tools to dig develops our hand eye co-ordination as well as core, shoulder, arm and wrist strength needed for writing. We also learn a lot about mathematics while digging as we explore depth, volume, measurement and amount. We’ve also been busy creating hot drinks, soups and fish dishes in the mud kitchen. This play has also seen us dig as well as scoop, stir, mix, count and explore measure, volume and weight.

Indoors we’ve been developing our finger and hand strength by baking healthy birthday banana muffins and creating pies, pizzas, pancakes and do-nuts at the playdough table. There has been some interesting concoctions in the home corner and sand tray, including pear smoothies, strawberry milkshake coffees and cup of hot blue soup for resting fire officers.

Police and Fire officers have been a topic of conversation, interest and play this week. Miss Sandison, Miss Manson and Miss Stewart found some books and Smartboard clips on the topic and gathered some interesting objects linked to police and fire officers to stimulate discussion about what these people do and how they help us. We want to find out more about police dogs, police horses and how police arrest “baddies” next week. During the week we have cordoned off dangerous areas, taken notes about crimes, directed traffic, driven police cars to find baddies, made multiple arrests and taken on different roles as part of prison play.

Our police and fire play extended throughout the nursery setting. We built “jails” and “police offices”, fire engines and police cars using the blocks and used the home corner as a police station, fire station and prison. Our note taking expanded into other creative avenues too as we painted stories about police and fire and made notes, signs and pictures to enhance parts of other role play and imaginative play during the week.

And of course our blocks were extensively used as part of our continued ferry and boat play this week too! We created long roads, ramps, piers and berthing areas as part of our play. Some of us also chose to make walkways and stepping stones and to build obstacles to balance on and step over. Using the blocks as part of group play helps us to develop very important talking and listening skills and teaches us how to negotiate and co-operate.

As you can see there’s been a lot of learning going on across all areas of the curriculum through our play! We would like to wish you all a happy long weekend 🙂

This week we’d like to share with you how play in our early years helps us to develop into well rounded, academically able and emotionally intelligent adults with good mental health!

Every day in nursery, through our play, we experience a wide range of emotions and feelings. Emotions are our bodily reactions that are activated by our brain and feelings are our conscious experience of these bodily reactions. Enabling us to become aware of our emotions and to express feelings during play is very important for our social and academic development.

Nursery is a safe place where we can explore negative emotions and feelings, such as fear, frustration, anger and aggression through our play. When expressing these emotions, and when witnessing other people express these, we learn about our own feelings and about empathy and how to understand others. It is important for us to deal with negative feelings and emotions within a safe play environment so that we learn and understand that these are normal and that there are ways to cope with them. Sometimes during play with others we come across times where we feel angry and frustrated. Adults support us to learn how to find words to explain our feelings and to understand them. Over time, sometimes with support, and always through our play, we learn to control anger and frustration because we want to keep playing. Through real life play experiences we learn which behaviours lead to continued play and which behaviours end play. Understanding our emotions and feelings and learning how to control these are crucial life skills which helps us socially and academically throughout our lives.

Being young children we love to play in emotionally exciting ways. We naturally seek out experiences that our bodies and minds need in order for us to learn about risk, fear and excitement. Visits to the playpark and play within the setting that involves spinning, swinging, balancing, leaping and climbing teaches us about natural levels of fear and excitement that we can tolerate. In this way we learn how to manage strong emotions and how to prevent these from stopping us learn both physically and academically. We learn that strong emotions are normal and healthy and something we can control and overcome. It is play such as this that allows us to grow up able to manage our emotions rather than succumb to them.

We also practice emotional regulation in our make-believe, fantasy play where we explore a wide range of emotions and feelings. When we play we create imaginary worlds, characters and plots that match our emotional states and help us learn to express and regulate our feelings. Free play allows us to fully express ourselves without anyone or anything holding us back. This week our nursery resources have magically turned into many things including boats, cars, lunch trolleys and houses. Expressing our feelings as we play in these imaginary ways allows us to work through real life scenarios. In doing this, we form a base for healthy emotional, mental, social, and physical well-being as we learn how to manage our emotions in a socially acceptable ways. During imaginative play we are able to “pretend” we are experiencing events that stir up mixed emotions.

As we cognitively develop we seek out more instances of group play. Playing together with others is hugely important for teaching us about real-life relationships. When we develop and test relationships in our play, we learn self-control and negotiation skills. We also learn survival skills, independence and acceptable group behaviour which we build on as we grow up. Group play helps us prepare for a lifetime of interacting with others. Playing with others gives us a chance to pretend to be other people and to fulfil roles we wouldn’t normally get to in real life. Recently we have been ferry crew, firefighters, police officers, train drivers, skippers, fishermen and women. Role play helps us see the world through others eyes and develop empathy. Research has shown that when we engage in socio-dramatic play we develop better social skills, more empathy, more imagination, and more of the subtle capacity to know what others mean. We are also less aggressive and show more self-control and higher levels of thinking.

When we start nursery, and as we develop cognitively, it is also very important for us to have time to play alone and to watch others play. By observing peers play, and listening to them play around us, we learn about social cues and interactions without becoming overwhelmed by our own emotions.

We hope you’ve enjoyed finding out about some of the ways that we develop the very important skill of emotional intelligence through play 🙂

There has been a recurring interest over the past few months which we have included in much of our play and have explored in different ways. That interest is…boats. Many different kinds of boats – ferries, fishing, sailing, lifeboats, cruise ships…we never tire of boats!

This week the staff in the setting have tried to deepen our learning about boats and answer some of our questions by putting provocations and learning enhancements in the water tray for us to explore and use in our play.

Some questions we have recently asked have been “why  does the big boat float?” “Why does the ferry not sink?” “Why did the Titanic sink?” The water tray has been a great resource for us to find out some answers!

At the beginning of the week we explored floating through experimenting with differently shaped “boats”. Some of us were interested to learn the word buoyancy too. We tried different shaped boats and different weights. We noticed that light boats floated but also some heavy boats did too, just like the boats we see in real life! Some of us tried to make plasticine and blu-tac heavy boats but some sank while others floated. We wondered why? As we explored with each other, and sometimes with the support of an adult, we learned that the shape of the heavy boats made a difference to whether it floated or sank. With the help of the Smartboard and books we learned that the shape of the boat is important for pushing water to the side. We thought about, and discussed, all the boats we know and how they have similar shapes. We added cars and stones and people onto our boats to see what would happen and how many we could add before the boats got too heavy. We played ferry games and rescue missions using these resources.

Mid week we explored ice. Some of us learned about icebergs. We know they are very cold! We learned that they float on water, they are very hard and that they melt. We used the ice in the water play to enhance our small world play and to recreate stories. There was also ice outdoors this week. We took some balls of snow and pieces of ice inside to see how quickly they would melt into the water and used snow and ice outdoors to make “ice soup”, “ice tea” and “ingredients”. We noticed the haily puckles floated on the surface of the water, just like tiny icebergs.

At the end of the week we explored density by experimenting with the weight of different objects in the water. We explored feathers, stones and balloons. One of us commented that “balloons hae air in dem and they float on water so boats maybe hae air in dem.” The staff helped us explore this by providing balloons filled with air and balloons filled with water. Many of us were fascinated to link how the air inside helped the balloon float but when the air leaves, perhaps through a hole, and water gets in, the balloon sinks.

We have learned so much science, literacy and numeracy through our water play this week and we have found answers to some of our questions.

If you have any questions, or would like us to show you anything specific in our blogs please get in touch 🙂

This week’s blog is all about some of the things we learn when we play with playdough. Playdough is a very popular resource and, most days, at least a few of us will ask for help to make some. Making playdough together and using the dough as part of our play teaches us many things. Here are just a few!

Creativity and Imagination:

Playdough is great for developing our creativity and imaginations. We often pretend the dough is something else, such as food to serve our friends, which develops our symbolic thinking. There are no right or wrong ways to create with playdough which means we are free to experiment and to express our ideas. We can try different approaches and ideas and problem solve until we find something that works. These are important skills we will need in school. Playdough creations can range from simple sausages to more complex things such as feathered saddles for animals!

When we play with friends our creations often become more intricate and meaningful as we work together and explore ideas. Playing in this way is an important part of cognitive development and curiosity.

Literacy:

Using playdough is great for developing our literacy skills. Through our play we practice listening to and talking with friends and adults. Materials like playdough help us to build our vocabulary as we explain what we are doing and talk our actions out loud. For example saying “chop!” or “slice” or “cut” while performing the action. We also learn descriptive words as we explore the textures of playdough, such as “sticky”, “lumpy”, “smooth” and “gooey.” As we play we often comment about our work and ask each other questions such as “What is doo making?” “Can doo make me some fish and I will mak the chips?” Interactions like these help our language development. As we play together we learn to compare and contrast objects and experiences, for example “I’m made a lang sausage roll and doo is made a short een”, “I’m making a muffin so it’s big and round and doo make a flat pancake.” These types of experiences help us to learn new words and to communicate our thoughts and ideas which are skills that we need as we learn to read and write.

We use language to invent stories about our playdough creations. Often we use facts or ideas from books and familiar stories or real life events as we create. For instance over the past few weeks we have been pizza makers, cooks on boats, dads, mums and grannies providing meals. We have also been the “teachers” preparing lunch.

Creating “food” with playdough is a great way for us to develop reading skills as we use pictures and recipes for inspiration. We learn about recipes and “pretend” to read as we play. Using print as part of our play and developing an understanding that print carries meaning is a hugely important factor before we learn to formally read. Recognising environmental print is one of the first things we learn to do as readers.

Mathematics:

Playing with playdough is great for our mathematical development and thinking. Measuring and counting as we make playdough together, filling cups and comparing sizes of teaspoons and tablespoons are just some examples.

When we play with the dough we naturally note changes in shape and size as we comment on, compare, and contrast the objects they make “I made a triangle” and “Mine is a tiny ball and yours is big”. Often we notice who has more or less playdough too! During our play we often count how many pieces we are making or arrange our creations by size or colour.

Fine Motor Development:

We perform a lot of actions when playing with dough. These include rolling, poking, squishing, pushing, pulling, squashing, squeezing, chopping and cutting! As we perform these actions we build strength in our small hands and finger muscles and improve our dexterity. These muscles are essential for writing and for holding a pencil in pincer grasp and need to be strong. We also learn hand-eye coordination as we use our hands to shape the dough which is another essential component to writing.

Social and emotional development:

Creating with playdough helps us feel competent and increases our confidence as there are no rules and no right or wrong way to create. We develop thoughts such as “I’m good at rolling the dough” and pride in our accomplishments, “Hey look I made a right lot of fish on dis tray for everybody!” Using playdough as part of role play helps us to develop awareness of others and other perspectives as we discuss, collaborate and negotiate on what we are making to enhance our games.

Pounding, flattening, squeezing dough are also healthy and safe outlets for any extra energy and a good way for us to release strong feelings such as frustration.

We hope you’ve enjoyed seeing some of the ways we’ve been learning through our use of playdough and look forward to sharing more learning with you next week!

This week we would like to share how and what we have been learning through our outdoor play.

On Tuesday a couple of us said “We would like to go to the pier for a walk!” The staff wondered if anyone else might like to join the walk, they asked what we might see on our way and what we would find at the pier. After asking our friends if they would like to join we had a total of eight willing explorers. There were many ideas of what we might see on our walk such as “massive boats, peerie boats, the marina, labsters, crabs, fish and the ferry.”

Our learning experiences are part of our environment. The local community and the outdoors are fantastic places for us to learn across the whole curriculum in meaningful, active and engaged ways. Finding enjoyment in walking and being outdoors in our early years helps to establish patterns of health and wellbeing which we can sustain into adult life.

Going for a walk requires us to use our listening skills and to develop our understanding of risks and road safety. Walking in our local community teaches us to assess and manage risks and develops our understanding of the impact of risk-taking behaviour. During the walk we stayed on the pavements, lined up and followed road crossing rules, kept hold of our partner’s hands and walked as part of our group following the couple in front.

During our walk we looked around us and spotted some important signs. We looked to see if there were any letters/numbers in the signs that we might recognise and learned what the signs said. Being able to recognise environmental print is one of the ways we develop knowledge of letters and words and learn to read.

As we stopped to look at signs we also noticed other interesting features around us. We learned about the “Auld man’s beard” lichen and talked about how it felt to touch, we heard different bird noises and talked about the animals we could see. We looked at lobster creels and noticed that they were empty, this led to a lot of discussion about how to catch lobsters, crabs and scallops. We shared our ideas with each other as we talked and listened. Being able to explain our thinking and learning new vocabulary in contexts that make sense to us is an important part of developing literacy skills for reading, writing, listening and talking.

As we got closer to the pier we looked at sailing boats, measured how many children long they were and noticed where the sails went.  We were made aware of the very old pier that’s so old it’s crumbling into the sea. We spoke about “hundreds of years” and “the past”. The outdoors is a great place for us to develop numeracy skills and use natural events to explore measure, shape, size, time and number. Finding out about our history and heritage helps us to appreciate our local environment and develops our sense of belonging. We saw the cannon sticking up at the end of the old pier and imagined it came from a pirate ship! Using real life resources to stimulate story telling is an important part of early reading and writing. When we got to the Marina we noticed a lot of different colours of boats and that some boats had wheelhouses and some didn’t. We talked about our family members who had boats at the marina sharing our stories and news.

Eventually we made it to the big pier. “I see the Antaras!” We were excited to see the big fishing boat and to compare it’s size, shape and colour with the smaller boats we had seen on the way. As we spoke about the pelagic boats we saw the ferry arrive. “It’s the Fivla!” We went up the hill to see it come into the pier. We watched the ferry men attach the ferry to the pier and open the barrier. Learning about the jobs that people do in our community is important for our social understanding and our understanding of the world around us. We counted how many vehicles were on the ferry and were very excited when a big lorry beeped hello to us! There was 7 vehicles on the ferry, including cars, vans and a lorry.

Once we got back to nursery our play revealed just how inspired and engaged we had been on our walk. Our enthusiasm spread and friends who had chosen not to come on the walk found enjoyment in joining our play. We used the punt as a ferry and a variety of fishing boats throughout the week. Indoors we built boats using blocks and sorted small blocks into baskets of different types of fish such as haddocks, pilticks and mackerel. Our play extended into rescue missions using life-rafts, lifeboats and Oscar Charlie! Linking real life with our imaginary play helps us to process questions we might have and to explore our ideas, thoughts and feelings which are important Literacy and Health and Wellbeing skills.

Trucks featured heavily in our play too throughout the week. We boarded and alighted from our outdoor ferry with various loads. In the big sand pit we made cement together for “biggin’ hooses” and “fixing the roads.” When empty, these trucks often went on the ferry too. Our truck play relied on us to collaborate, co-operate and to take turns as well as develop our numeracy skills as we shared resources, compared load sizes, filled different sized shovels and buckets and discussed directions and position.

As our play progressed the truck became an “Essy Kert”. We worked together to collect “rubbish”, “bruck” and “litter”. We put it into the back of the essy kert so it could go to the dump. We made sure the essy kert had plenty of fuel for the journey too. Once we got to the dump our “sorting folk” categorised and sorted the bruck into piles. We created a pile of circles, a box of plastic, a pile of cones and a pile of wood. Collecting objects, matching, sorting and organising them and displaying our findings in different ways is an important aspect of developing understanding in numeracy.

The big sand pit and the mud kitchen  and puddles have also been well used this week to create a wide variety of smoothies, soups, hot and cold drinks and interesting recipes as part of our play. Creating in this way develops our social skills, fine motor skills and scientific knowledge as we discuss, share ideas, use our fingers, hands and full bodies and explore different textures and how materials interact. It’s also a great space for us to develop our concepts of quantity, shape, number and measurement.

And of course the weather has been teaching us a lot this week too! There’s been rain, wind and hailey puckles to explore. The hail stones were very noisy as they hit the roof of the school. We rushed outside to see them land on the ground and watched the ground change colour. It was very exciting to watch the grass turn white. We discovered how cold the hail stones are when they roll down the back of our necks and how quickly they melt as they turn warm in our palms. Learning like this is a great way to develop knowledge about the weather, the properties of water and the affects of temperature. On Thursday we realised that ice had formed over puddles and water areas. We felt how smooth and cold it was and investigated how hard and thick different areas of ice were as we used implements to break through it and measured thickness using our fingers. Being outdoors helps us to understand changing seasons and develops our interest in the world around us.

Thank you to the outdoors for being such a wonderful and interesting classroom!