Graduation tea!

The pre school children have really enjoyed playing football games and setting up their own goals. Ezra and Eddie worked really well together to set up a goal which included a ramp for the football to go up. The children then took it in turns to “Score a goal!” be the goal keeper and were really celebrating each other’s shots and cheering each other on. Benjamin quickly realised that the ball kept going too high and knocking the top post down and cleverly suggested, “I know, we need to make it taller so the ball doesn’t knock the goal down”.

 The children have also been aeroplane spotting on a cloudy day. They were listening out for when they could hear an aeroplane approaching and then working out which direction they thought it was going to come from. Ada called out, “Guys, if you are quiet, you can hear one coming now”. Tom said, “I can hear it, I think it’s coming from that direction”, pointing in the right way. The children were also counting how many aeroplanes that were flying below the clouds that they could see and how many were above the clouds that they could hear. They then enjoyed doing some observational drawings of aeroplanes.

 We held a graduation picnic tea to celebrate the children that are going off to school. All be it there were thunderstorms so we moved inside, the children all had fun and were in a party spirit. They were given a certificate and a book about starting school. Each of the children confidently stood in front of their friends to receive their book and certificate and let everyone know what they are most excited about when starting school. Oscar told everyone, “I’m so excited to see all of the new toys and to see my friends from nursery”. When reading the story about school, Edie noticed that quite a few of the school activities and routines of the day were “Just the same as nursery”.

This week the toddlers have started their “holiday” theme due to the summer holidays starting. Some of the toddlers went abroad and decorated paper aeroplanes. To go on the aeroplanes the toddlers needed a passport. Together with an adult Harry and Charlotte wrote their names and signed their signature. In the messy tray the toddlers went to a foam party where Alastair got covered head to toe and came out with purple highlights in his hair! Sammy and Zac roared loudly as they enjoyed visiting the dinosaur museum where they saw dinosaurs in their sandy habitat. At story time Blake said she goes to the “farm” when she goes on holiday so the toddlers listened to ‘The Farmers Away!’. Rhys spotted the horse in the book and went and found a toy horse from the drawer to show his friends while saying “horsey neigh neigh”. Jonny tried some seaweed at the beach which he thoroughly enjoyed and asked for “more”, whereas most of his friends disliked the taste and spat it out as quickly as they could! 

 Outside the toddlers have enjoyed going on a walk round Imber court to collect leaves for a leaf printing activity. Ethan couldn’t wait to get out of nursery and run as fast as he could to find the first leaf in his tracks, “Found one!” he shouted as he picked it up off the floor. Immy was very proud of herself when she found two leaves, “One, two” she said and put them in the bucket. Back at nursery, the toddlers loved painting the leaves they found and printed them on the paper. “Wow” Amelia said as she saw her leaf appear in the paint. Sophia became a teacher repeating instructions to the other children “Make sure you cover it all” and “press down hard”. 

The under twos have had fun this week playing with the new car mat and the new cars, pushing them over the rug and pulling the large removable parts off and trying to put them back on again, Chloe, Daniel and Olivia gave some of the parts to the staff team to help them put the parts back onto the car. Ada was able to put one piece on the car with out any adult help. Rafferty pushed his car off of the car mat causing it to fall over, Rafferty laughed and said “Oh no, fell over” and pointed to the car.

Sophie, Ada and Olivia have really enjoyed exploring the new books, taking turns to sit on an adult lap to listen to the story being read to them. Their favourites were Rabbit’s nap, A squash and a squeeze and Dear Zoo lift the flap book. While they waited for their turn they listened to the other stories and chose new books from the book case ready for their next turn.

 Outside the children have enjoyed playing with the sensory basket, banging the large pebbles together and enjoying the tapping sound. Zack enjoyed taking all of the small wooden sticks out of the basket and dropping them on the floor as he got another. Sadie, Chloe and Ada enjoyed digging in the sand pit using their hands and the spades. Sophie was fascinated by her game of lifting hand fulls of sand and throwing them over her head, laughing at her new game.

Bug Hunts!

This week the older children have been on a hunt for nature and bugs. They started of in the woodland gardens looking for horses and ducks. Xanthe found the horses and she quickly called her friends over to explore. Xanthe and Wilfred began to neigh at the horse as they counted them and spoke about their different coats, pointing out one that looked like a cow because of its markings. As we got further into the park, the children found a log and began to look for some insects. They managed to find a woodlouse and some ants. Hlenhaze stopped to count the ant’s legs but it was a little bit difficult as they were so fast. The children spotted lots of butterflies, Sophia remembered how butterflies grow from when we had butterflies in the nursery. Eve added that when they had changed from caterpillars they flew away. The children then began to run around like butterflies flapping their wings.

We have also been to the woodland area in Carlisle Park and looked at the board that told us about some of the things we may find. After looking for the bugs they wanted to race as fast as the bugs they had found. Nyra started the race and she shouted that she was so fast! Back at nursery we went to the outdoor learning area where Zach found an ants home, he told everyone they must like the fruit the nursery has been growing. James and Zayne found some lovely worms and snails. James pointed to the snails shell and told Zayne the shell was the snails home.

With all the hot weather we have had lots of water play, Ritika and Lyra liked to pour the water down the marble run and watch it trickle down to the bottom. They both shouted “Yay!” when the marble came to a stop. They celebrated by splashing, but they accidentally splashed Alba who laughed and decided to splash back until there was water everywhere! Emily and Ellis instead decided to play in the sandpit, the built some lovely towers but they found much funnier to knock them down again and watch the building crumble and the sand spread everywhere.

In baby room, the babies became explorers searching for ancient, hidden dinosaurs. George loved the textured brown paper that the dinosaurs used for their beds in the messy tray. Grace let out big “roars” whilst Sidney investigated the scales of each colourful dinosaur. The little explorers painted their findings with a variety of colours and resources. Agnes chose a rectangular box and used long sweeping brush motions, Rouxx opted for a bumpy egg box which depicted the spikes of a stegosaurus’ spine. Edward was very proud of his masterpiece and gave his dinosaur a big kiss which left him wearing fabulous blue lipstick, Alex found this extremely funny and gave himself some lovely red highlights for the day.

Outside in the mud kitchen, the babies cooked food for their dinosaurs. Sidney used a wooden spoon to stir his leaves in a saucepan. Louis was sous chef and was very busy picking leaves and fetching pots and pans for chef Sidney. Ciana used a watering can to add stock to the leaves and mud that was bubbling on the hob. Eesa carefully placed the muffin tray in the oven so that the dinosaurs could have a sweet treat! Theo searched the ground and garden for any predators and Honor helped him keep lookout as she collected all the toy dinosaurs in the garden for dinner time.

Sports day at Molesey!

The pre school children really enjoyed sports day. There was an obstacle course set up where the children could practice all of their physical skills such as climbing, football games, parachute and tossing hoops. Henry absolutely loved playing football, he was running up to the ball and taking a big kick and laughing each time Joe pretended to miss the ball and he scored a goal. Henry would call out, “I scored a goal again, you missed it Joe”. Jasper really concentrated when trying to throw the hoops on to the sticks. Every time he was successful, he then stood a little bit further back, challenging himself from a further distance. Paige told him, “Well done Jasper, you did it” and jasper smiled back saying, “Thank you”.

 The children also have been making ‘The very hungry caterpillar’ display board. Millie particularly enjoyed the fruit printing on to paper plates. She was telling her friends around the table, “This is all of the fruit that the caterpillar eats”. Edie replied, “Yes because all of the fruit is good for you and then you won’t get a tummy ache”. Parker got stuck in to writing numbers 1 - 6 to display up on to the board. The children showed their great writing skills to help and write the days of the week.

The children also explored making a water flow system using the large wooden angled blocks. They helped each other to make it really tall next to the water tray and then Tom suggested, “Now I think it’s tall enough otherwise we won’t reach it if it’s too high”. They then placed the sloped block on the top. They were very engaged whilst watching the water flow down the blocks and Millie was quickly running around to the bottom to collect the water and the end to start the process over again.

The toddlers have loved being able to cool down in the new paddling pools this week. Sophie and Jonny were first to lay down in the water and pretended to swim, this caused lots of splashing which made their friends very wet. Luna enjoyed using jugs to collect water and then pour it over herself which made her giggle. Her friends Zoe and Isabelle liked this idea and copied her until they were soaked head to toe. 

The toddlers were lucky enjoying to participate in their own mini Sports day on the field where they got the chance to experience a giant obstacle course, running races, football, parachute games and hoop jump. Immy was first up to walk across the balance beam which was raised off the floor, she was very careful and watched her feet so she didn’t fall off.  Whereas fearless Ethan ran across the balance beam with no looking back. Sammy was by the football goal practising his penalty shoot out. 

Back inside the toddlers loved watching and listening to the thunder storms. Zac, Tristan, Amelia and Harry stood at the open door and watched the rain pouring down. Tristan pointed and said “Look” and Amelia said “Listen” holding her ears. The toddlers found it fascinating as they started to see the rain flooding their playground.  While the rain was pouring the toddlers were busy being creative at their art station using different materials to make their own creations. They used lots of different materials like cellophane, feathers, dabber pens, cotton wool and even some googley eyes. 

The children in the under twos room have had a lovely time exploring outside. They have been for walks to see the ducks, feeding them bread and getting excited when they came up close to the buggies. The children had fun playing with toddlers and went over the field where they sat and played with Lego and books in the shade to keep out of the sun. Out in the garden Olivia loved playing hide and seek through the tunnel, Daniel and Ada liked using spades and moulds in the sand pit.

The children have had so much fun with water play, splashing in the different trays of water, Chloe was using the boats and cars to pour, and Sophie and Rafferty loved paddling their feet and bounce balls, watching the water splash.

Inside the the room the children explored messy play with gloopy cornflour. Sadie liked mixing and pouring with the cooking utensils. When playing with peas, Rafferty was good at scooping them up with a small spoon into a larger cup. Olivia and Chloe enjoyed mark making with cotton buds and paint holding the buds in a pincer grip like a pencil, making dots and lines across the paper.

Obstacle courses and building!

This week the children really enjoyed taking part in our Shooting Star Hospice fundraiser. They helped to create an obstacle course using our new garden tunnel and climbing equipment. At circle time in the morning the team explained how our obstacle course was to raise money for charity and to help people. When the children were doing the obstacle course Xanthe said “Its like the floor is lava, you cant touch the floor!”. “Go, go, go !” Alba shouted as she watched her friends moving along, encouraging them along the way. Oliver stepped off of the balance beam and said “Uh oh” giggling to himself.

The children have been talking about where we live. In the garden William, Zach, Maxwell and James decided to build a house. “We need big strong bricks to build our house” Maxwell said as they stated to stack the bricks. The children all worked together to carefully build “I have a big house!” Zach excitedly told his friends. “Me too” exclaimed James. They then continued to stack the bricks on top of each other, “We need 1000 bricks!” Maxwell said enthusiastically. Imani then came over to play and added cones to the top of the house, “It’s a chimney on the roof!” she said. When it was finished, the childern clambered inside. William then shouted, “Now we’re not going to get wet from the rain!”. The childern were rightly proud of their building, and took it in turns to hide inside.

They have been learning how to look after animals and plants in the garden.  Thomas told his friends “Plants need water to grow”. After filling up all the watering cans everyone went off to water the fruit and vegetables. Oliver, Ellis and Alba found some Tadpoles in the pond using the magnifying glasses. “There will be lots of frogs in the garden going ribbit, ribbit” Ellis said happily. Ellis and his friends then hopped around the garden like frogs! Great fun!

The babies have been very busy being artists and explored lots of different colours. The babies used their paintbrushes to paint their masterpieces using the different primary colours. Emma shouted ‘Blueee’ while George’s favourite colour was red! George decided to rub paint over his lips! The toddlers learnt about colour mixing and what happens when they mix. Louis made purple out of red and blue while Sidney used blue and yellow to make light green! Emma kept smiling to the camera saying “Cheese” when the pictures were taken. Agnes giggled as  she dabbed her paintbrush all over the page. Ciana decided to paint her hands and rub them all over the paper. Grace observed her friends painting and then picked up he paintbrush to copy what they were doing. Theo loved getting messy and was very focused on the activity. George said “Ta daaa” when he was finished and Emma shouted “More!” when she was ready for a new piece of paper. Rouxx loved using sponges pressing them as hard as he could onto the paper. 

Outside, the babies explored in the garden. Emma practiced her tennis skills using the racquets and the balls while Sidney climbed over the bridge avoiding puddles. Emma hit the ball and shouted “Ball” waiting for Sidney to run after it! Rouxx and Alex used magnifying glasses to observe the plants and trees. The babies listened to “We’re Going on a Bear Hunt” and used their magnifying glasses to watch out for big grizzly bears. Rouxx ran over the bridge whilst Edward walked through the “Swishy swashy” grass. Rouxx used his binoculars to look for bears. “Roar!” Emma practiced her scary bear noises whilst Honor giggled loudly at her. Agnes built towers out of logs, she clapped her hands and then knocked it down ready to rebuild it. Busy!

Bug Hunts and Duck Walks!

The preschool children have been busy the last couple of weeks immersing themselves into a variety of messy play activities. The children made their own play dough portions using the different ingredients. Henry said to his friend Dylan “I like making play dough because it’s warm and very fun.” Dylan said, “I like mixing all the things together.” The children enjoyed using their hands to mix all the ingredients together and exploring the different textures. Joshua looked at the mixture on his hands, laughed and said, “I’m quite messy aren’t I ?” The children explored using the different tools and utensils to make shapes and cut the play dough into smaller pieces. Ari said, “I’m cutting up pizza” as used the cutter to cut his slices.

During the last couple of weeks, the children have had fun with colour sorting activities, number matching games, letter searching and a variety of mark making activities. One activity has them sorting the coloured bears and matching them to the appropriate number on the paper plates. Parker looked at his plate and said, “Woah that’s a big number!” after counting 7 small toys onto his plate, and after looking round the table said, “I think I need some more on here.” Rowan giggled and looked her plate, saw the number two and said, “I’m not two, I’m three years old!” Tom said to Rowan “You can have these two for your plate.” The children also immersed themselves into mark marking in the mud and salt. They enjoyed using paint brushes to make marks and copy the letters they could find amongst the different materials. Riley said, “Look I write my name Riley- see?” 

The preschool children had a great time when they went on a bug hunt around the grounds of nursery during the last couple of weeks. The children loved finding lots of different slugs and worms that had come up to the surface of the ground because of the rainy weather. Ellie said, “We’ve found babies and daddy slugs.” Eddie replied, “There is a lot of slugs out here in the water.” The children searched high and low for the different bugs that had emerged in the rain and enjoyed splashing in the puddles with their wellies. Max giggled when he found a big puddle and said, “That ones like a bath.” Ezra encouraged his friends to watch a slug and a snail race along the fence of nursery. Benjamin got very excited when the slug crossed the finish line before the snail. 

Over the last few weeks, the toddlers have been participating in music week, where they have had the opportunity to use lots of different instruments and see how they work. Rhys liked the instruments with the bells the most and said “Ding ding” as he shook them. Sammy enjoyed bashing the tambourine and asked his friends to listen as he played. The toddlers used their musical instruments at circle time where some tried to sing and play which required a lot of focus. Immy found it was easier to sing a line of ‘Miss Polly’ and then use her instrument for the next! Not only did the toddlers get to use lots of different instruments, they also had the opportunity to make their own maracas. Zac loved dancing round the room with a maraca in each hand saying, “Look at me, I’m dancing!” 

Outside, the toddlers were excited to give their baby dolls a bath. Blake said “Babies dirty” as she saw them in the water surrounded by bubbles. Harriet used sponges to wash her baby being very careful; she did not leave any part of her baby unclean. Isabelle was ecstatic splashing the water to create more bubbles, she said “Isabelle splashing water on baby”. When the rain stopped last week, they took full advantage of the nice weather and went for a play on the field with the frisbees and balls. Amelia loved watching the balls be kicked high in the sky and would run as fast as she could to retrieve them. Alastair preferred to relax by sitting on the bench alongside his friends Luna and Harry. 

Back inside, the toddlers have had a fun time with their climbing frame being transformed into a pirate ship. The toddlers were able to drive the boat with their pretend steering wheel and hunt for treasure using their telescopes. Ethan and Tristan found the treasure chest and took all the gold they could carry while Finley was more interested in pulling down the bunting so he could have a closer look at the pictures. 

The children in the under two’s room have had a very busy time outside. Olivia, Sophie and Daniel loved playing peek-a-boo together through the tunnel, crawling through the middle and waiting for each other on the other side, laughing and smiling as they emerged. When the children went for a walk around the grounds, they were fascinated to see the young ducklings which had really grown! Ada and Rafferty did a great job of tearing the bread and throwing it from the buggy to feed them. They were saying “Quack quack ducks!” and were giggling when the ducks quacked in response. 

Inside the room, the children loved investigating the feely-bags, using their senses to squeeze, smell and listen to the different textures inside. Sadie said “Mmmm” when she sniffed the bag containing raspberry conditioner, Isaac enjoyed squeezing the wet porridge oats and Emily squished the shaving foam. During a painting activity the children were using paint brushes to make marks, but Rafferty and Ada preferred to use their hands, using the brushes to paint their hands then used their hands to make marks on the paper. 

During circle time the children have been very interested in listening to stories, sitting nicely and looking at the pictures, Emily and Chloe liked pointing to the pig and lion in the books. The children loved singing the “Dingle dangle scarecrow” song, laying on cushions, with Sadie patting Chloe pretending to sleep then they all jumped up and danced around before sleeping again!