Garden fun!

This week, the children have been making their own campfires. They scooped up some bark and collected small sticks. Florence found a stick and said “Mix it up, make a campfire. We can cook some soup!” Eve joined in by finding her own stick and saying, “We’re making muddy soup.” Xanthe grabbed a stick and started to dig around in the mud saying, “I’m looking for treasure.” Using the sticks, the children also wrote their sound of the week “P” in the mud. While writing, William said “P is for pirate”. Some of the younger children joined in by making various letter sounds. James very excitedly said “James” when he heard the letter J. Freddie picked up the letter “F” and said “It’s mine! Freddie!”.

The children made their own den. They crawled inside and sang songs loudly together. They have also been showing an interest in soup making this week. Using some herbs, fruit and vegetables, they had great fun thinking up different soups to make. Isla picked up a herb pot and said “It smells like flowers. Would you like to smell?” Isla then offered it to a friend. Using scissors Roma started to snip off pieces of the herb and placed them in a bowl for Douglas to mix together. “I’m mixing lettuce soup. We have lettuce in our garden.” she told him.

This week, the babies have shown a great interest in playing with the balls. On a walk to the park, we took the balls and the babies had a lot of fun kicking the balls around on the green, running after them and trying to sit on them. Oliver went straight for the orange ball, babbling as he pointed to the ball, before kicking it to Finlay. The babies used the balls to experiment with water. They found it funny when the balls were pushed under the water and bounced straight back up! Adeline threw the ball into water saying 'Ball! Splash!' then started pushing the ball around. She noticed the bubbles it made and started shouting happily 'Bubbles!'. Zayne started to copy her and then used his fingers to pop the bubbles saying, 'Pop!'.

Owen and Bodie found a cosy, little hideaway den to read some stories together. Bodie liked to push the buttons on the book listening to sounds. Owen pointed to different pictures and opened his mouth saying, 'Ooo'.

World book week and Holi at Hampton

This week, the children took part in activities for Holi. To celebrate the festival, they threw coloured paints up into air, covering themselves and the floor!  They had a lot of fun and were very enthusiastic! Xanthe jumped up and down with excitement as she watched the paint fall. James looked down at the floor and pointed as he had noticed that he had left footprints in the paint. Roma told her friends "Holi is a festival all about colours". The children then started to giggle as they noticed that everyone had brightly coloured hair. Ines chuckled and said, "I got blue hair". William shouted with excitement, "Look! I'm a rainbow". Molly waved her hands in the paint and began to sing "I'm pink, I'm pink". Eve pointed to the floor and said, "Look! All the colours are mixing. It's different colours".

The children went on a hunt for the letter "i" as this was the sound of the week. They searched high and low in the garden. Douglas found it hiding behind a branch. He picked it up and waved it in the air and said, as loud as he could, "I found it".  Following on from this, some of the children went around the garden with clipboards to see if they could find objects that start with the letter "i". Zach held up his drawing and told everyone, "I drew an ice cream; I like ice cream. It's too cold for ice cream". 

For World Book day, some of the children came dressed as their favourite book characters. They were very excited to tell their friends what character they were. During the day, the children took part in some book related activities and listened to some of the books that they had brought in to share.

This week, the babies have been exploring outdoors, taking part in different activities to play and learn. Jasper and Adeline explored the play park, climbing up the steps and sliding down the slide. Adeline loved spinning in the teacup and shouted 'weeee'. Jasper used the rocking toys, saying 'Oh!' over and over. Lyra explored outside, playing and kicking the leaves with Bodie before balancing on a fallen tree. Oliver and Zayne liked playing football in the park. Zayne kicked the ball then picked it up handing to Oliver. Oliver had fun trying to throw the ball over his head and laughing very loudly, with Jasper joining in with a big smile on his face. Douglas looked at him and said, “Silly Oliver”.

The babies were keen to explore during the sparkle time activities with the various light toys. Jasper continuously banged and bounced the ball to make it light up. Adeline was very interested in putting the light shaker on the mirror tray and even noticed her own reflection, saying, "Adeline" as she pointed to herself smiling.

Happy Holi!

World Book day saw some different characters arriving at Preschool!  The children came dressed up as princesses, dinosaurs and even the dragon from ‘Zog’. Shyla was telling her friends, “I am the Very Hungry Caterpillar and I am going to eat all of the foods!”. Barnaby brought in ‘The Tiger Who Came to Tea’ book to go with his outfit, and proudly told everyone at circle time that he was the tiger.

The children were very excited at the arrival of our caterpillars.  We have talked about how we need to care for the caterpillars and the children are fascinated watching them change and grow bigger.

The Preschool children had so much fun celebrating the Holi festival this week. They watched a video to help them understand what the festival is about and who celebrates Holi. There were some very keen participants in the paint throwing around the garden with lots of laughter as everyone got covered in coloured paint! Ezra called to Zachary and Oliver saying, “This is so much fun, I wish we could do it every day”. Oliver replied, “But I have changed colour, I’m not Oliver anymore” and started to laugh.

This week for World Book Day some of the toddlers dressed up and brought their favourite books to share. They came as princesses, a flamingo, a scarecrow, a ladybird, the Stickman and even as a Spanish dancer, complete with little heeled shoes dancing shoes! The children enjoyed listening to lots of stories being read with their friends.

During one of the free flow sessions with Preschool, the Toddler room was transformed into an obstacle course. The children had to walk across the stepping stones, lie on the floor, slide through a tunnel, then crawl under two tables, onto the climbing frame, down the steps and finally jump onto cushions the floor. Some children liked challenging themselves to keep their balance and there was a lot of laughter when one of them wobbled and fell off!

The Toddlers went on a walk around the grounds of Imber Court and focussed on jumping in all the puddles they could find. On our walk this week, we showed the toddlers a small pathway over the bridge and showed them how they could walk along it. Some of the toddlers walked normally, others put their arms out to help keep their balance, some walked really slowly and Scarlett decided it was best to walk sideways. The children loved the freedom of playing with the balls in the big field, practising their catching and throwing skills. Salvador showed us his good hand-eye coordination by catching the ball every time. Vivienne enjoyed holding the ball after she caught it, while Charlie loved to kick the ball as hard as he could, watching as it rolled along the ground. Harry, Zachary and Arthur liked being in the goal best. 

The babies had lots of fun playing with the rice this week. Faris was busy filling up a metal cooking pot, listening to the sound it made, laughing with his friends.  Ari spent some time filling up a cup and pouring the rice out, watching as it sprinkled. The babies have also enjoyed mark making, using their fingers and the other equipment. They have also helped to make colourful pictures for our The Very Hungry Caterpillar display, using paint, sticking paper, pens and crayons. 

When playing in the garden Tristan and Zac chose to play on the bikes, pushing themselves around the garden. Tristan was very excited when he spotted the wind chime, pointing to it and babbling to Melissa. Zac was also very brave and crawled through the tunnel, stopping to peer through one of the windows at his friends, before crawling out the other side. Ari and Melissa played with the ball, throwing and kicking it to each other. Ari decided to kick the ball, saying "Kick, kick”.

The babies also liked the sensory experience painting with fruit tea bags. They tried feeling and tapping the tea bags on the table and squeezing out the water, smelling, and occasionally tasting, the different flavours.

Planting Seeds!

As part of World Book Day, the children have taken part in various activities based around books. They have created their own fish number line with Eve declaring “I can count all my numbers” and proceeded to count from 1 to 10. They also looked at the Gruffalo’s paw prints and compared the difference in size. Zach pointed to one paw print and said, “It’s big like me”. The children took a trip to Squires Garden Centre to look at the different types of vegetable seeds they could find. Ines became very excited when she saw all the seed packets and said, “Too many” and giggled. Thomas picked up some tomato seeds and started shaking the packet with excitement.

Back at the nursery, the children planted the seeds that they had chosen in the growing area. Xanthe dug a hole in the soil and carefully placed her seeds in. She smiled and said, “I’m planting”. Roma was interested in the large plant pots and asked, “What are these for?” She also noticed a big bag of potatoes and studied the pictures on the front of the bag. The children helped to plant the potatoes making sure they were all covered in soil. Zach started to giggle and wave his hands in the air and said “My hands are really muddy”.

This week the babies have had fun working on their motor skills. They really enjoyed chasing and popping bubbles as well as waving floaty scarves around. Oliver used his fingers to poke at some bubbles before deciding to have a go using a scarf to pop them. Zayne and Abigail were very focussed playing with the large pegs and boards. Abigail tried to put the pegs into all the holes while Zayne decided he wanted to try to stack the pegs on top of each other. When Zayne’s tower fell over, Abigail laughed with him before helping to build it again, handing pieces saying 'Ta' each time.

The babies enjoyed the sensory experience of playing with flour and herbs mixed with different scents. Lyra crumbed the flour between her fingers and squashed some in her palms before bringing it to her face to smell. Lyra and Jasper laughed while giving did some floury high fives, spreading flour everywhere. Owen and Bodie built some towers together. Owen helped Bodie to straighten his tower and tried to stop it wobbling. Owen took some bricks to the park with him and, with his friend, built some towers to be as tall as the flowers.

Bubbles!

The preschool children have been very attentive doctors this week in our new doctor’s surgery role play area. Charlie was pretending to be the doctor, laying Elodie down and using the syringe saying, "I will make you better now". The children have explored x-ray pictures of parts of the body and Raegan identified the foot x-ray, telling Charlie, "My foot is hurt doctor". Barnaby took on the role of receptionist. He booked in appointments on the appointment card, asking Peter, "What time would you like to see the Doctor?"

The children also experimented with making huge bubbles in the tufty tray in the garden. They loved splashing in the bubbly water and then used the hoops to make huge bubbles with them inside. They were very intrigued as to how it was able to happen and were full of questions. Ida asked Chloe, "Wow, how did that happen?" Parker enjoyed popping the bubble as it formed around him. There was a lot of laughter during this fun science activity.

This week, the toddlers have experienced den building. They went into preschool to choose some materials to cover the climbing frame. Ada came back with army blankets and Tomas ran in with some green netting. The staff helped to cover the climbing frame to create a den. The toddlers then took turns to crawl around inside the den. George found it funny to hide behind the netting and poke his head around the side with a big smile on his face. Harry decided to join in and do the same.

The toddlers played with an obstacle course, testing their balancing skills on blocks as they moved around. They had to move really carefully so that they did not fall off the blocks. Scarlet, Vivienne and Jasper stretched out their arms wide to help them balance. Elena helped the children, who were struggling and kept falling off, by holding their hands which supported their balancing. Tomas shouted “Jump!” as he hopped off the end of the obstacle course. Oliver and Harry then said “Whee!” as they got off, sharing big smiles as they did.

This week, the babies they have enjoyed exploring the garden, kicking and throwing balls, peeking and crawling through the tunnel, popping bubbles, and digging in the sand using the buckets and spades.  Eve really liked playing with the sand, using her hands and a spade to fill a bucket while saying "Dig, dig, digging!" They have also had fun moving around the garden on the ride-ons.

During the messy play activities, the babies have explored the cloud dough by squishing, pushing and smelling it. Some of them liked breaking it up into little pieces. Faris, Chloe and Tristan loved playing with the tapioca, picking up handfuls and watching it as it dropped back into the tray. Faris tried a little taste of it and seemed to like it!

As part of our World Book day activities, the babies have been painting paper plates to make a caterpillar picture for the walls. They have also used crayons, pens and jelly to make their own pictures of different foods.