Today the nursery children have explored how to create a marbling effect with their painting.Shaving foam was added to a tray of foil, the children were invited to add different food colouring using a pipet, they learned very quickly how to suck the liquid into the tube, as it can be very tricky for little fingers. Using a stick they swirled the mixture round, (good mark making practice), until they had created the effect they wanted, paper was placed on top of the foam and pressed down firmly.Holding the foil with one hand they peeled back the paper before laying it on the table, then using a ruler, with a little guidance, they scraped the foam off leaving a beautiful colourful effect on the paper.
Well done all 🙂
Nursery
Loose Parts Play
The children have been given the opportunity to explore loose parts play, both inside and especially outside.
What are loose parts?
Loose parts is the label given to any collection of natural or man-made materials that can be used to expand upon children’s play. Loose parts have no specific function or goal.Loose parts can be used in so many ways and the possibilities are as endless as is a child’s imagination.
Loose parts can cover every area of learning and development.
Personal, Social and Emotional Development – Independent play, making choices about what and how to play, sharing resources, playing alongside others.Physical Development – Fine and gross motor skills, learning how to lift and carry.Communication and Language – Speaking with other children during shared play, new language and vocabulary.Mathematics – Concepts such as shape, size, sequencing, sorting, counting, combining and measuring.Literacy – Mark making and storytelling narratives during play.Understanding the World – Using loose parts during role play; stones in the kitchen, wooden blocks as cars, testing ideas and theories.Expressive Arts and Media – Opportunity to explore media and materials, application of loose parts for creativity and art.
Here is an example of resources that can be used
Household items like cotton reels, curtain rings, blocks, beads, buttons, balls, tubes, tins, pots, springs, washers, marbles, bangles, tiles, pegs.Natural resources such as stones, sea shells, feathers, pine cones, leaves, sticks, conkers, acorns, sand.Fabrics such as scarves, ribbons, laces, scrunchies.
Why not try it at home and share on Tapestry.
Forest School Tuesday and looking after our mental health
Today the nursery children visited the Forest School site. We sang our ‘Welcome song’ around the fire circle before we entered the site, then discussed the rules and how to stay safe.The children spent time making bug houses to hang in the trees, filling tins up with sticks and grass before they were hung in the trees. Others climbed trees, played in the mud kitchen and ‘with an adult’ looked for frogs in the pond, unfortunately only a shark was seen.To finish the session we had a mindful few minutes, the children chose somewhere to sit quietly by themselves, we practiced our calm breaths and listened to all the wonderful sounds in nature.At the end of the session one little girl told me ‘ I love nature and all the things in nature’
Happy St Georges Day
Today we had a special visitor in the nursery to help us celebrate, ‘Dave the Dragon’.
The children were very busy this morning, making flags for the story. There was a lot of positional language used with this activity , e.g. on, under, over, behind. The children managed to follow the instructions well and cut out the shapes for the flags by themselves, Great work nursery !!
When they had finished Dave the Dragon helped to read the story, which we read several times at the childrens request.
World Book Day in Nursery
We love a good story in the nursery. So, we invited the children to come in dressed as a character from a book. It was lovely to see who they had chosen. Throughout the day, we read their stories together and they sat with their friends sharing their own books.Well done to you all.
Getting rid of the Virus
At the lunch table one of our children was talking about the virus and how he could not go out and see his friends. He told us he had to wash his hands to wash the virus away. He then came up with the idea of washing the ground and the air, he said ‘If I get a pipe with water I will wash the virus away’. After lunch we set up the hose pipe for him to act out his idea.
Tree Planting
We have two new apple trees in the nursery garden and the children were keen to get them planted, so we can eat the apples.
Nursery Day of Calm
Today the children in the nursery had a visit from Suzi. They all sat and listened as she spoke about mindfulness and being calm. The children practiced breathing slowly, they learnt how their tummies move up and down when they breathe in and out.We went on to learn some Tai Chi movements, using our calm breaths as we moved. The session finished with the children learning hand breaths and laying down for a short meditation.
