Category Archives: Social Studies
Life of a Leaf…Part 1
What you can do with one leaf is quite incredible. 
While you are out collect a leaf, it can be big or small. Then turn your leaf into a character. You might have more than one so you might create lots of characters.
Sing the Solar System Song
Creative Community
Create your own mini version of your local area, it is
the perfect way to get your wee ones talking about the people
and communities around their home.
What you need:
• A spare table or floor space
• Some coloured sheeting or paper
• Toy buildings and vehicles, children could create their own
• Mini figurines or objects the children choose
What to do:
1. This is a great activity to work on together and while doing so your children can happily talk and learn about their community.
2. You can build up a central
road, with buildings and vehicles dotted
around. These could be toys or even local
buildings printed from google maps and
then laminated and stuck to bits of board. Or if easier draw your own.
3. Your wee ones can also make or customise
mini-me figurines which they can move
around the town.
4. It’s perfect for endless discussion on
children’s knowledge of people and communities,
like ’Me and daddy Home Bargains to buy colouring things’.
5. You can also consider changing or adding
buildings after a trip to keep it at the top
of your wee ones minds.
Sow some Seeds
Planting seeds is great for fine motor control and
even better to help your wee ones learn about the natural world
around them.
What you need:
• Seeds
• Pots
• Water
• Compost
• Spoons
What to do:
1. Start by picking out your seeds.
Sunflowers, and sweet peas work well at
the start of spring, as well as nasturtiums
and calendula for attracting pollinating
bees and butterflies.
2. All you need to do is fill a
pot with compost, water it, and pop
the seeds in an inch or so down using a
spoon. You can reuse some shop-bought
starter pots or use old cartons, egg boxes
or old fruit peel.
3. Keep the packets! They’ll be packed full
of information that you can discuss with
your wee one such as what conditions
work best for the plants, the differences
between different plants and why some
will flower sooner than others.
Kids gone Wild!
The Life cycle of a butterfly
VE Day Anniversary
Magic Mud!
Mud is an adaptable and under rated material, it’s cheap and easy to find! It is used for a huge variety of purposes, such as building, beauty and medicinal purposes, making pots and art work.
Mud Sculptures
Create your own sculpture and embellish this with anything that comes to hand such as sticks, stones, bits of broken pottery, snail shells or anything else you might find in your garden or out on a walk.
Building Material
Create your very own building material by mixing grass or straw with mud then build your own structures using sticks and twigs before plastering the mud between your sticks to hold your structure together, a bit like the material you would have found between the timbers of timber framed houses.
Mud Artwork
Using sticks or forks draw some pictures or designs in the mud. Add leaves or petals to add some colour. Or simply paint a picture with the mud using a stick or paintbrush.
Hand prints
Place your wee hand in wet mud. You can place a ring made of paper or place a ring of stones or sticks around your print to allow it to dry.
Rock Art
Smooth a rock or stone with wet/damp mud and watch the cracks appear as it dries out.
Andy’s Wild Workouts
Andy travels the world to amazing places and learns to move like the animals he meets on his wild adventure.
Wildlife Woodpile Wonders
Create a simple woodpile in order to attract more wildlife
to the garden. Centipedes, ground and rove beetles are great visitors. If you would prefer not to have animals making your woodpile their home, you will need to raise the pile on a log rack or a foot or so off the ground.
What you need:
• Wood cuttings
• A shady spot outdoors
• A bucket (optional)
What to do:
1. Take some wood cuttings and sticks from
trees, shrubs or other herbaceous plants.
Logs about an adult fist-wide with the
bark still on are perfect.
2. Find a shady spot and pile the wood up.
You don’t want the spot to be too cold,
but the shade will help keep everything
damp.
3. Over time, the decaying wood will start
to attract insects and other wildlife into
your garden, a great way for your little
ones to explore nature in any space.
4. If you’re particularly short on space, a
bucket with holes in can be loaded up
with small twigs and leaves and it’ll do a
good job of attracting insects too.
