Dragon dance!

The children celebrated Chinese New year and used brightly coloured streamers and lanterns to decorate the nursery inside and also out in the garden. They also made their own lanterns ‘ Let’s put them in the trees’ said Faith ‘ Yes to make it pretty’ replied Clara. ‘The birds will love this’ said Darcey as they hung them up outside.

They glued and painted a large boat ‘It’s a dragon boat!’ announced Damon. Let’s make dragons!’ suggested Zac, and so the children selected various resources including large boxes to make beautiful dragon masks as you can see. They danced the Dragon dance to Chinese music ‘ Move the dragons up and down!’ shouted Elara as she danced.

They children were able to taste and sample delicious Chinese foods. They decorated tables and pretended it was a Chinese restaurant, and ate home made stir fry, spring rolls and egg fried rice. Kung Hei Fat Choi! 恭喜发财 (Congratulations and be prosperous) to you all!

The babies and toddlers also celebrated the Year of The Pig. The little ones began by mark making with pens paints and hands onto paper and formed them into lovely lanterns, and also made pigs. They decided to tear the different paper and card into different sizes to use a decoration, and stuck these onto various shaped and sized materials.Joshua said ‘Oh dear!’ and covered his mouth with his hand during the tearing activity and James just laughed.

They also had the opportunity to taste and snack on Chinese food and Xanthe ate all her vegetables and noodles and wanted more! However Ines said ‘Yuk!’ after sampling the spring rolls. Emily loved the Chinese music which was playing over the meal and swayed in time to it, later dancing to it after the meal.

The new baby gym has proved very successful and popular. Thomas loved the slide in particular saying ‘Wheee!’ as he came down, and Hlenhaze was very interested in the ship’s wheel up on the platform.