Whalsay Early Years Blog 2021/22

Self-regulation skills are important for learning. People who can self-regulate are able to control and manage their behaviours, focus, problem solve and manage challenges successfully. Children and adults who have good self-regulation skills are aware of their own reactions and behaviours and can control and direct these.

Achieving a good level of self-regulation in our pre-school years has been shown to have lots of advantages. Some of these advantages include being able to cope with school, being better able to make friends and maintain friendships, developing confidence about learning, understanding and problem solving and developing a good level of emotional well-being.

There are a number of ways in which we develop self-regulation skills in nursery. One of these ways is to explore and develop our communication skills during play. Often, when we are little, we use our bodies to communicate rather than verbal language. In nursery we are supported by staff to use words to say what we want/don’t want, what we feel and what we think during play situations. Play is hard work and often we feel frustrated, angry, sad, happy and excited in short spaces of time! All of these feelings are normal and natural and our adults help us work through them in our play, when we need them to. We are supported to link our behaviours with our feelings and to listen to what our peers are saying with their words and with their bodies as we play.  Becoming aware of our own feelings and behaviours during play helps us to develop self-regulation.

Another factor that helps us develop self-regulations skills in nursery is that the adults around us help us to feel that we have control over our world, which in turn supports us to control our behaviours even when we have rules to follow. In some situations in nursery we are offered controlled choices. This means that we are given a few options on how to complete certain tasks or how we want to take part in something. Example of these choices would be “Do you want to take your hat off first or your coat?” if we were finding this part of our morning routine tricky and “Would you like a banana or grapes?” during snack when we would really want something less healthy that is not on the menu! Giving us the power to make choices allows us to take part in decision-making processes which increases our engagement and helps us to negotiate our world calmly. In nursery we are free to take our play in directions of our choosing, with adults offering guidance, support and challenge to our learning within this.

Another important way in which we develop our self-regulation skills in nursery is through following routines. Routines create a clear structure for us to follow and help us to organise ourselves. Examples of these in the nursery include hanging our coats up on our pegs, washing hands, signing/marking on the “I’m here” sheet, brushing teeth, waiting our turn at snack times, sharing resources during snack and group play. Within these routines, the adults around us create spaces for us to gain independence and to become more responsible for our own decision making and support us to gradually develop regulation within routines that we find difficult.

Finally, the play based approach in nursery means that we are offered high levels of physical and intellectual challenge as we negotiate, co-operate and problem solve. Being challenged within our play has been linked with developing good self-regulation skills. Through play we learn how to persevere and we develop independence and resilience as we “figure things out”. We learn to collaborate with others, to resist urges that disrupt our play and naturally learn about other people’s feelings and behaviours as well as our own.

Thank you for having a look at our blog for this week. If there’s any specific “themes” you would like to find out more about please do get in touch. For anyone who wants to read a bit more about the importance of developing self-regulation in the early years here are a few links below.

https://education.gov.scot/media/3bjpr3wa/realisingtheambition.pdf (pg 23)

Self-regulation

Learning

Our Christmas themed play has continued this week linking our real life experiences with our imaginations. Imaginary play helps foster our creativity and develops our ability to take on different perspectives and roles. We have been reindeers, elves, mums, dads and other family members and we have included Santie visits to the house, Santie’s helicopter visiting the ferry, parties and Christmas preparations in our play. By playing together in the home corner and using small world resources we develop our language and communication skills as we talk and listen to each other during our play. Playing together helps develop important self-regulation skills as we experience, and learn to manage, our emotions and co-operate with each other.

Santie, families and Christmas have also been topics of conversations in our mark making this week as we made Christmas cards and decorations and wrote letters to Santie. Other mark making has included painting, chalk drawing and “writing” TV programmes, shopping lists and instructions as well as decorating a “house” and “spaceship”. Mark making as part of our play allows us to represent our thoughts and ideas, express our feelings and, this week, has enabled us to create gifts for people we love. Being motivated to make marks, and feeling successful in our mark making, early in our lives helps us become confident and motivated writers of the future.

The Smartboard has been used to learn about shapes and number through games on Smartboard. Creating gingerbread men has stimulated discussion around 2D shape, decorating Christmas trees and giving Teddy presents have been great ways to develop our counting skills and links with our current interest around Christmas.

This week we also enjoyed a walk to see some nearby Christmas lights and celebrated Christmas jumper day and delicious Christmas lunch. Experiencing celebrations, such as Christmas, in our local environments develops our understanding of the world around us and helps us to link special events with seasons and months of the year.

The big blocks have been used as a stage a few times this week however our interests have moved on to creating new designs, including New York City and a home TV! During the construction phases we revealed a lot of our knowledge through our discussions with each other. “Dis is the statue of liberty, she is ower yunder, no near dis bit”, “I’m building the tallest skyscraper becis dir is peerie skyscrapers and really really tall ones”, “New York has lots of tall building”, “I’m going to New York when I am big”, “New York is very very far awa”. Miss Sandison put up some aerial views of New York on the Smartboard to further our interest and knowledge. When building the TV we discussed seating and the tv programmes we would watch which included a Christmas movie and a “funny film”. Other block play has included castles and boat engines.

It’s been rather wet outside this week which has meant a lot of our learning has naturally revolved around water play. We have explored how water seeps through cracks, is soaked up by sand and we have explored depth and size through puddle jumping and splashing. It is important for the adults around us to help us engender a joy of nature by allowing us to connect with nature in all weathers. When we play outdoors we form deeper connection and understanding of weather and nature and develop our understanding of the world through direct experience.

Indoors our interest in water has continued. Our water tray has been used for small world polar play which included a walrus. We learned that a walrus called Freya is visiting Shetland just now and that she has been swimming for a lots and lots of miles! We have also continued our families play through washing our babies in the tray, just as we did last week. This week we used a lot of bubbles and squeezy sponges and took turns washing babies. Squeezing and twisting sponges helps develop hand, finger and wrist strength for writing. Waiting for our turn and discussing the features of the babies as we washed them develops our emotional regulation and our knowledge of body parts.

Playdough has been as popular as ever this week too. We have created wraps, croissants, lollipops, pizzas and breads to name a few. We’ve “baked” our creations in the pretend oven and added features using loose parts such as cinnamon sticks, cloves and dried oranges. Our playdough play has helped us develop finger, hand, wrist and arm strength and has supported our talking and listening skills as we shared our ideas with each other as well as the playdough and loose parts. Our mathematics and numeracy skills were supported through our use of loose parts, exploration of shape, size, amount and quantity and use of measurement and time in our play. We learn so much when using playdough!

Other sensory play that has interested us this week is exploring kaleidoscopes. Kaleidoscopes are great for increasing curiosity, awareness of pattern, develops scientific understanding and help us become aware of our senses. Twisting the kaleidoscopes with our hands and fingers develops our fine motor control too. Miss Manson got some fabulous artistic photos of our exploration!

And finally books have played a big part in our week too. We have used them as part of family play, have relaxed with books and have shared stories together. Having books easily accessible around the setting which we can discuss with each other, “read” and listen to helps develop our love of reading which makes us motivated readers in the future. Playing with books, flipping pages from left to right, exploring words, pictures and sensory aspects of books develops understanding of books and our engagement in them.

So that’s our final blog of 2022! Next week we have the Christmas party on Monday and a streamed panto which children can watch if they want to on Tuesday. We hope you all have a lovely Christmas holiday and that Santie is good to you all.

This week we’ve been very keen on building stages and then performing to audiences. We loved performing “Jingle Bells” to you all when you visited on Tuesday and this enthusiasm to perform has continued throughout the week. Thank you for coming to see us play outside and for buying raffle tickets and homebakes!

The big blocks have been used to design a variety of stages. Some stages had steps and were high, other stages were larger and low. Working together, sharing our ideas, listening and talking with each other helps develop many of our literacy and numeracy skills. Moving the big heavy blocks also helps develop our shoulder and arm strength as well as our core which we need for sitting and for writing.

Performing to a range of audiences such as our family members, our friends and our teachers helps us become confident individuals and builds our self esteem. Singing songs, reciting nursery rhymes and telling our own stories are fantastic ways for us to develop awareness of syllables and rhyme, helps us learn new words, increase our vocabulary and encourages us to talk clearly.

Although it’s not been a great week of weather some of us have been keen to continue our play outdoors. We’ve explored measurement, developed our turn taking and sharing skills on the See-Saw, used natural resources at the mud kitchen to make soups, pies and hot drinks and developed our mark making skills using rollers to paint and to clean.

We have been doing a lot of mark making indoors this week too as part of our play. We followed tracks with cars, wrote lists for our performances and rules for being on stage. We created lava sharks, weather pictures, aliens and “family photos” as part of our play. Drawing, writing and making marks together is very important as part of our literacy development. Talking to each other about our pictures and sharing our ideas enhances our imaginations, develops our confidence and skill in mark making and encourages us to become story tellers both verbally and on paper.

The home corner and blocks have been used a lot this week as part of “families” role play. There’s been Christmas tree decorating, Santa visits, babies being born and looked after and shopping trips. Taking on different roles in play develops many skills. Our language skills develop as we listen and talk to each other, co-operating and developing the play. Our social and emotional skills develop as we experiment with the social and emotional roles of life. We learn how to take turns and problem-solve. By acting out different characters and cooperating we learn about empathy and begin to understand other people’s feelings. Imaginary play is also great for our self-esteem as we can be anything we want to be!

Playdough, the Smartboard and the sand tray have also been incorporated into our “families” play. We’ve made pizzas for family members and smoothies of various flavours. Kneading, rolling, pinching dough and developing a tripod grasp when selecting smoothie ingredients are fundamental skills in pre-writing development. Creating pizzas on the Smartboard gave us ideas for toppings and developed early awareness of fractions. We also showed great awareness of safety by incorporating “oven gloves” into our play when taking our pizzas out of the “oven”.

The water tray has also been a popular place of learning this week. Our interest in polar bears, penguins and cold weather merged into ice exploration this week. We learned that polar bears and penguins live in very cold places and on glaciers, we learned that ice floats and we discovered that warm water melted the ice faster than cold water. We asked questions such as “why does the penguins no fall over on the ice?” and “Why is the ice hard?” Exploring and discovering how water changes from one form to another develops our scientific knowledge and an understanding of our world.

We used books to find answers to some of our questions and to listen to stories about polar lands and snow bears. Other books that were popular this week included “Aliens love Panta Cluase”, “The snail and the whale”, “Fancy dress Christmas” and “The Snowman”. We freely chose to explore these books together, to tell each other stories using pictures clues and to discuss different plots. Having easy access to a variety of books, comfortable spaces in which to read, time to freely choose books and opportunities to discuss books with adults and with each other are all very important in order for us to become engaged and successful readers in the future.

We look forward to sharing more of our learning with you next week 🙂

It’s been a very chilly week of weather but that hasn’t stopped us getting outdoors this week. On Tuesday some of us wanted to go to the playpark. We spoke about what kind of clothes we would need to wear on such a cold day. We dressed in warm winter suits, wooly hats and boots. Talking about the weather, noticing the weather and choosing appropriate clothes helps us develop awareness of the changing seasons and how different materials are used for different purposes.

We went on many adventures in the playpark including a very bumpy boat ride on the SeeSaw! “It’s a right coorse day!” “I’m sitting in near the window. I can see the sea, big waves!” We also went on calm ferry journeys, taking turns to be the skipper.

The playpark provided us with lots of opportunities to make big body movements through climbing, swinging and running up and down the hills. Big movements like these are essential for our whole body development, balance, spatial awareness and core strength all of which are needed for more formal learning later on. Playing on the different resources in the playpark is a great way for us to  develop our mathematical understanding as we explore speed, direction, force and height and develop our mathematical language using words such as “push, pull, up, down, fast, slower.”

We found ice at the playpark. It was very cold on our hands. We explored how it melted as we held it. “It’s going.” “It’s turning peerie.” We discussed how the ice melts and turns back into water when it warms up. We noticed areas in the playpark where the sun had melted the ice. Learning about scientific principles through real life experiences helps us to understand our world and link learning to life.

As we ran around we noticed our breaths were steaming! “I’m breathing smoke!”, “Look at my breathing!” We wondered why this was happening and learned that our breath is warm and wet and it was cold and dry outside which meant we could see our breath. Being curious, wondering about how things work and asking questions are essential components of learning.

During the week it also snowed. Experiencing the snow falling was a great way for us to develop our vocabulary as we described how it felt, what it looked like, how it moved and we sang songs about it, “It’s cold.” “It’s white!”. “Whar’s it gone? It landed on my glove and noo it’s gone.”, “flakes and puckles.” “It’s coming doon slow fae the sky!” Some of us were very interested in how Laurence kept the paths clear. We learned more about the seasons and the months of the year through our songs, discussions and outdoor play.

We had some windy days too! A group of us were keen to see how things blew around the playground so we made some “kites” and attached them to string. Flying our kites helped us learn about wind direction and gusts. We developed a deeper understanding of different weather and scientific and mathematical concepts such as force, direction and speed.

We sing a lot in nursery, not just about the weather! A very popular songs this week was “Five speckled frogs”. Singing number songs helps us develop mathematical understanding and awareness of rhyme. We made logs out of blocks and listened carefully for our name to be sung before we jumped into the pond. We also learned that we needed to adapt the way we jumped depending on which log we were on as some of them were not supported by a wall behind. Being able to assess risks is an important life skill for us to develop.

Our boat play also continued throughout the week both indoors and out. We continued to go fishing, finding shoals of fish and other sea creatures such as crabs and scallops. As our play develops we are beginning to learn more about these creatures and where we can find them, “go deeper to get the fish”, “dir is a crab under d steen!”. After fishing many of us wanted to clean the boat. “It’s tied up at the pier so get wir brushes”. Cleaning the boat is a great way for us to develop our mark making skills as we use big shoulder movements and follow lines and shapes with the rollers and brushes.

Indoors we built the Zephyr and Research using a variety of big and small blocks. Our vocabulary continues to develop and our building becomes more refined as we re-visit this interest. This week we used words such as “crane”, “bow” and “hull”, “lower deck” and used a variety of tools to fix engines, leaks steering problems.

We also used tools as part of our play outdoors. There was a lot of vehicles getting “bugged in” in the sand pit this week. We worked together to create alternative routes for the vehicles and digging them out. We experimented with the depth of sand each wheel could turn/not turn in and how the sand consistency affected the grip.

Vehicles incidents continued indoors as well as cars and trucks slid off the road due to ice and snow. An important aspect of early years learning is for our outdoor and indoor experiences to flow as one “classroom”. The environment and spaces that we have available for us to use indoors and outdoors enables this to happen.

Other blocks that were used a lot this week were our Duplo ones. We created long and short trains, counted how many carriages we had and discussed where the train was going. We built towers and houses with doors in the roof. We named people from our families that were in the houses and made up stories as we built. Building together developed our literacy skills as we were encouraged us to share space and resources, be aware of each other and to listen to each other’s ideas.

Other big block building involved making a school. The school was a fantastic place for us to develop our mark making, listening and talking skills and our creativity as we made up scenarios, took on roles and co-operated as part of our play.

It wasn’t just in “the school” that we developed our mark making. We developed these skills throughout the setting in a variety of ways, using glue sticks, moving our hands and fingers in glitter gel, creating signs and pictures as part of our play and chopping, rolling and squeezing playdough.

We look forward to sharing more of our learning with you next week!

It’s been a marvelous week for mark making, exploring magnetism and much more through our play. Here’s a few highlights!

Using big movements and developing our shoulder strength and control using the Smartboard as part of our mark making has been a source of shared interest this week. Some of us shared the space, discussing our drawings, telling stories and comparing each others use of lines. We noticed a lot of rainbows outdoors this week which inspired some of us to create our own on the Smartboard using various colours. Recording personal experiences through creative play with mark making helps to motivate us to become engaged writers later on.

We also noticed a number 8 in outdoors! This has been used to steer vehicles around and to follow the path with our bodies.

Indoors we have also been over writing numbers and letters using chunky pens. Over writing helps us recognise the shapes of letters and numbers as well as develops our pencil control.

We have used a variety of different pens to create images, tell stories and share our ideas. We drew various sea creatures such as starfish, we drew boats with ropes included to tie up at the pier, compiled “notes” and wrote instructions for our friends as part of our play.

Some of us used hole punches as part of our message writing. Using these types of materials helps us develop finger and hand strength which is important for writing development.

Following from our interest in the magnetic aspects of our new ferry last week we had lots of opportunities this week to deepen this area of curiosity and explore magnetism using a variety of magnets and materials. By exploring different materials and selecting materials for different purposes we develop scientific knowledge and learn about the world around us.

Playing with magnets helps us learn about simple forces such as pull, push and twist and what affect these forces have. Through our experimental play, supported by adults, we also learned new vocabulary such as “attract” and “repel”.

As we put pieces of magnetic toys on various surfaces we developed our spatial awareness, hand eye co-ordination and fine motor skills in our hands and fingers.

Magnets teach us about “cause and effect” and help develop problem solving skills and mathematical knowledge as we explore more and less, on and off and quantity.

Construction play has also helped develop our hand eye co-ordination and fine motor skills and our mathematical knowledge and literacy skills.

Many of us chose to build towers and lines using cubes from the curiosity shelves. It was hard work pushing them together and required a lot of perseverance as well as finger and hand control! We talked with each other about which colours we were using, how many cubes there were and explored early pattern making together.

In the water tray this week we did a lot of squeezing by using small pipettes, filled containers with water and chose small floating objects to “go swimming”.

And at the woodwork area carefully hammering nails into wood helped develop our hand-eye co-ordination, concentration and risk awareness.

There has also been a lot of big block building this week. Our interest in boats have continued as we built “fishing boats”, “fast boats” “peerie boats” and “cruise ships.” Using blocks to represent structures from our real lives helps us explore our world. Including design elements in our structures that are more intricate reveals our ever growing cognitive understanding of spatial awareness.

“I’m going super fast. 100 fast.”

“I hae steps so you can come in to my boat.”

“Dis is my big massive cruise ship, wir going to Aberdeen.”

“Dis bit cuts through d water.” (L)

There was a lot of imaginary and symbolic play incorporated into our block play. “The boat is broken, the steering is broken” (L), “tow it to the pier” A), “It’s windy!” (A) “My daddy is an engineer on his boat. I can be an engineer on dis boat.” (L) “Use dis to tak the screws aff” (A) “Ok we need a screwdriver” (L) “Dis pipe can lift it up.” (A)

And as is usually the case our indoor play naturally linked with our outdoor play too as we caught fish, landed fish, froze fish, defrosted them and used imaginary implements and our hands to chop them up for eating!

We look forward to sharing more of our learning with you next week.

This week at nursery a lot of learning has continued to revolve around ferry play. Exploring aspects of our real lives in our play is  very natural and a great way for us to develop our social and emotional skills as well as explore what local services mean to us.

We continued to use blocks and cones and booked/unbooked queues in our play this week. Re-visiting play in this way allows us to

We extended our ferry play by adding funnels, engines and life rafts to our designs as well mark making our own signs for people to read. Co-ordinating play in this way refines our skills leading to consolidation of our learning as we apply what we learn in familiar and in new situations.

A highlight of the week was the arrival of a new ferry made by Brian Mair! This ferry helped us to engage very deeply in imaginary play together. We discussed new words as we explored the new ferry and all it’s aspects and compared it to our older ferries. We asked each other questions and taught each other new vocabulary “Why does the ramp stick up?” “Becis dir is magnets sticking it.” “What is magnets?” “Dis sticky things.” This interest in magnetism will be something we can play with and explore next week. We created signs for Vidlin and Laxo, talked about the weather and which pier we would go to. We counted how many cars could fit on the ferry and whether there were more or less cars on the other ferries and discussed which vehicles were too long, too tall, too wide. We made tickets to pay the ferrymen/women and drew chains to secure the vehicles in bad weather. We even had a few emergencies where the passengers had to to on the life rafts and the ferry needed a tow hitch so it could be dragged to safety.

Ferries were not the only boats we discussed, built and used as a basis for role play. Fishing boats were also quite popular. We took on roles and learned new words such as “skipper” and “engineer”. We travelled north and to far away places such as Africa with our fishing boats. Next week we will be able to find out more about the places that we included in our role play. Designing and constructing models in this way helps develop our technology and mathematical skills as well as strengthens our bodies in preparation for writing activities later on.

Other block play this week included the building of piers, connecting roads and houses and some complex structures. Having the freedom to build creatively with blocks helps develop our imaginations and literacy skills as well as our scientific knowledge as we use our blocks to tell stories and experiment with mass, weight and balance.  We go through various stages of block play as we develop and often combine several stages in our play. This week there’s been complex stacking, making enclosure, creating bridges and arches, combining, making patterns and building structures that represent objects for pretend play.

We have also been creative with playdough this week. With support we made our own. We read the recipe, counted the right number of scoops for each ingredient and shared turns mixing. Once ready we created many things such as ice cream, biscuits, chicken kebabs, sweeties, gingerbread men, sandwiches, snowmen and worms. Making choices like these helps develop our social and imaginative skills as well as numeracy skills as we talk about and describe our creations, share our ideas, count, explore quantities, recognise numbers and explore shapes.

Our playdough cupcake creations carried through to some Smartboard numeracy games too.

There was also a lot of baking and making in the home corner and outdoors in the mud kitchen. We made pasta, pizza, pies and rice dishes. Exploring resources in the home corner helps to develop our curiosity for language and literacy as we notice environmental print on labels and packaging and share our ideas about what to create. Playing in the mud kitchen develops our understanding of the world as we play with natural resources and experiment with changing textures. We develop a lot of numeracy skills playing in the home corner and mud kitchen too as we explore size, shape, volume, weight, time and number concepts through our play.

As children we have our own ideas and plans, and our brains and bodies are good at seeking out the kinds of activities that we need to help our development. This week we have been keen to use art and craft materials to create images and objects linked to our play. Having freedom to create images in our own ways helps us to develop confidence and raises our self-esteem. Creating together is a great way for us to share our experiences, feelings and ideas in practical ways and to develop fine motor control, hand and wrist strength. Many of us used shiny materials such as bio-degradable glitter on darker paper, or brighter coloured paints this week linking our current interest in space, stars, fireworks and fire.

We look forward to sharing more of our learning with you next week!

It’s been a busy first full week at nursery which has included exploring some of our previous interests, such as ferries and boats, while also expanding into new areas of wonder such as Space!

On Monday there was a lot of shared enthusiasm about travelling to various places in Shetland on the “ferry”. Playing in this way helps us to explore and learn about aspects of familiar life as we act out roles such as “ferryman/woman”, “truck driver”, “car driver” and “skipper”. Negotiating play in larger groups develops our communication skills, social and emotional abilities.

The drivers listened to the ferry workers as they signalled them on board and directed them where to park. This type of play develops our literacy and numeracy skills as we use positional language such as forwards, backwards, stop, start, up, reverse and turn around.

Once the ferry arrived at the pier it was important to wait until the ramp was down and the barrier removed before disembarking. Talking about time in this way helps us to connect time to real life contexts and to link words such as minutes, seconds, hours to time.

We travelled to a lot of places around Shetland, showing our knowledge and sense of local places. We went on board a variety of ferries to get to these places too.

There was a lot of discussion about having a booking, forming queues, waiting and what time the ferry was leaving and arriving.

Indoors the transport theme continued with some boat building. Tommy and Sophie created a fishing boat. It was “going to catch herring. It has masts and it’s great big.” (Tommy) Harry and Lewis measured aspects of their boat to make sure the gap was “big enough for fish to get in.”

Outdoors Alfie, Elsie, Lewis and Lucas took the punt to Veivo. Lucas did a great job securing the boat to the pier. Pulling at big ropes like these helps develop core strength and shoulder, arm and hand strength which we need for writing activities.

By mid week the mode of travel and destination had changed when some of us decided to create a rocket and blast off to the moon! During our play we were asked some questions to extend our learning and promote our thinking.

How long is it going to take you to reach the moon? “96 days” (Ali), “1 day” (Annie).

What do you think you’ll find when you get there? “Water” (Ali), “Moonsteens” (Sonny), “Cheese!” giggled Alfie.

Once the rocket was ready we did a count down from 10 to blast off into space. Annie phoned ground control and put the codes in before we left. Using number in this way helps us to learn about numbers before and after as well as counting on and back.

We also had some questions of our own about the moon…

“Why is there big holes on the moon?” (Sophia)

“Is there volcanoes on the moon?” (Lewis)

“Why do you float on the moon?” (Elsie)

It is important for us that we have resources readily available to us that link to the questions we are trying to explore. We looked at some books, and the Smartboard, to find out some answers and will continue to find out more answers to our questions next week through our play.

We found out there is less gravity on the moon so we are not pulled down as much. Some of us tried walking lightly and slowly when we landed on the moon.

Sophia learned that asteroids and meteorites hit the moon and made the holes that she’d noticed.

Once we landed on the moon there was a problem. “The engine is very broken, we need to go back to earth and bide there for 60 days and fix it.” (Ali) Being back on earth for sixty days allowed us to fix the rocket and to add more specialised equipment to it. There was a lot of discussion and sharing ideas during this time which are important literacy skills.

“We need a button and dan we need to stick dis bit in the square as weel.” (Annie) “I’m fixing this hole so we can fly.” (Ali)

“Dis is the fire” (Annie) “Dis is part of the engine” (Tommy)

Eventually the rocket was ready for another adventure…you’ll find out more next week!

Boats and rockets have not been the only constructions this week. Sophia made a magical castle and Annie and Harry made a bicycle garage. Both of these constructions taught us a lot about gravity as some parts fell over and we had to figure out how best to balance them!

It’s not all been fast paced space travel or building projects, there’s also been plenty of time to relax. Having a variety of spaces in our environment, which offer different experiences, helps our growth and development. We choose to relax in many ways at nursery, some examples include listening to stories, songs and rhymes, playing in the water and sand and playing with playdough. All of these activities can bring a sense of calm and quiet focus and engagement to parts of our day.

Listening to stories, songs and rhymes and exploring books with nurturing and responsive adults helps open up communication and connect literacy to our lives. Sharing books and stories together with our friends encourages us to see ourselves as readers and writers and helps develop our interest in learning about words, letters and pictures as we discuss what we see, ask each other questions and share our stories.

This week the sand wheels have been a great source of wonder and experimentation as well as a place where we have developed numeracy and literacy skills.

Annie and Ali explored how to make the wheels spin faster. They filled big containers full of sand and tried to tip them over the top really fast. The whole thing disappeared so we didn’t know if the wheel went faster but the “sand waterfall” was exciting to watch and to repeat! We counted scoops out loud to help us think about number and volume, and estimated how many scoops we thought might be needed to fill each container.

Following this Annie wanted to see what would happen if we blocked the hole. She snipped some paper into the top of the funnel. “It’ll get stuck” thought Jim, “It’ll no work anymore” said Ali. Predicting and hypothesising is an important scientific skill.

Were they right? Yes they were. Although some small grains of sand slid through there was not enough to make the wheel turn. An interesting discovery!

Lucas explored gravity and balance whilst playing in the sand. He balanced the whole sand toy on top of a cup and carefully poured sand to see if the cup would fill. “It’s gone in!” He exclaimed.

The large containers really helped us work on our literacy skills such as pre-handwriting skills, listening and talking. Lucas and Alfie took turns and worked together to fill the big container. “I want it to go dis high up ok Lucas.” (Alfie) “I pour more in for you.” (Lucas) “Yeah pour lots and dan it will go higher and higher and higher!” (Alfie).

Ali’s whole body worked hard to lift the heavy container and to keep it steady enough to pour gently. Using our muscles in this way and focussing on a task prepares us for formal writing activities when we get to school.

Having spaces where we can develop our gross and fine motor movements through play helps us become physically healthy individuals, develops our numeracy skills and also encourages us to practice moving our bodies in ways that will help us with handwriting later on.

Squeezing water out of sponges is a great way to develop hand, wrist and finger strength and control for writing. Sharing play as we wash babies encourages us to use mathematical and scientific language such as “wet, dry, squeeze, light, heavy” and helps us become gentle and caring as we role play looking after the babies.

At nursery, both indoors and out, there is a wide range of interesting resources to use for mark making. These encourage us to communicate our ideas through mark making, painting and drawing. This week paint sticks and chalk have been our most popular choices.

Trying to follow zigzag lines using bikes, scooters and our bodies was difficult but fun and a great way to work on our balance and awareness of our bodies in space!

We extended this playfulness into concrete resources too. Sophia, Thea and Alfie made “lines wi wid to follow” (Thea). We needed good balance skills to stay on the lines, especially the round tyre “oooh the tyre is wiggly” (Alfie)

There was also lots of mark making in the “office” and the “shop” this week in the form of Free Parking tickets, receipts and lists.

And finally a big warm welcome to Archie who started nursery this week. Welcome Archie!