Parachutes, Snow and Ducks!

The older children have loved exploring our new jungle and safari animals along with the jungle animal reference book. They have also been learning about animals that are now extinct. At tea time, Sienna had seen out of the window that it had started to get dark and said to her friends, “It’s nearly night time, but it’s ok, there are no wolves!”. Parker replied, “Of course there isn’t, wolves are ‘resist’ (extinct) we don’t see them any more”.

They went over to play football on the pitches and as they arrived, Ella suddenly stopped running with the ball and called out, “Where are the goals? Now we can’t shoot any goals” and started to laugh. Oscar said to Ella, “It’s ok, I will be the goalkeeper, but I will save all of the balls”. The children had so much fun kicking the ball around the field and trying to score goals.

We have also enjoyed parachute play, allowing the wind to capture the parachute as the children lifted it up in to the air. Ellie said “It’s so windy under here, we might blow away”! They also had a great time trying to balance the balls on the parachute and flipping them into the air, catching and counting them.

This week the toddlers have enjoyed learning about animals. The toddlers explored the different noises farm animals make during a messy winter wonderland activity. The toddlers were asked what noise a horse may make and Zachary said “Neeeighhh” and Harry made a clipperty clop noise with his mouth. The toddlers enjoyed making all different farm animals sounds while throwing “snow” around the room. Tiana particularly enjoyed this, laughing as the ‘snow’ covered her friends’ hands. Zac got covered head to toe but didn’t mind in the slightest as he wore a very proud smile on his face. Zachary used the cow to make marks in the ‘snow’, drawing circles and leaving footprints. The toddlers also made some winter owls using glue and tissue paper. Tiana said “Owl” for the first time and Ari said “Twit, twoo”.

The toddlers really enjoyed using the glue sticks this week but didn’t enjoy getting the tissue paper stuck to their fingers! Chloe kept shaking her hand as hard as she could but could not get the tissue paper off. The toddlers all laughed. One of our activities included making some superhero masks. We cut the basic shape out of paper plates and the toddlers decorated them using felt tip pens, and were very excited knowing they were going to become superheroes, especially Oliver and Wren. who were running around shouting, “Super Ollie and super Wren”!

This week in babies they took a long walk to the duck ponds, throwing the ducks some bread and peas. Harriet became so excited when the ducks swam close pointing saying “Duck, duck, duck” Finley also became very excited flapping his hands and pointing.

The babies have been very creative with art work this week, exploring finger painting, dipping their fingers into the paint to make marks. When Sophie realised that she could put her fingers into the pot of paint that was on the table as much as she liked she smiled and picked up a handful of paint and put it on her picture! Sophie, Harriet and Isla enjoyed the activity so much that they were given an extra piece of papers to continue the fun.

Babies have also been taking advantage of the early dark evening, turning off the lights and turning on the light up shakers and the projector, even having a party with some moving about using the shakers to make our own sounds. As Sylvie was holding her shaker she looked up at the ceiling at the projector, spinning around to follow the deer she saw, then fell down laughing!