Handa's Fruits & Vegetables
Over the last couple of weeks the toddlers have been loving the book of the month ‘Handa’s surprise’ and have been choosing to read it at circle times and throughout the day. As the book requires the pictures to tell the underlying plot of the story the toddlers loving shouting out to make sure the staff know what is happening. Kitty pointed and shouted “Parrot has taken the juicy passion fruit!” while Eva gasped and said “Oh no”. Isabelle pointed and exclaimed “That’s a cheeky elephant he’s taken the mango”.
Outside the toddlers enjoyed taking on the role of being farmers and planting, digging and investigating the mini vegetable garden in one of the trays. Although once the rain started and it turned into more of a mud pit than vegetable pit India and Amelie couldn’t be pulled away! India dug her arms in the mud all the way up to her elbows and Amelie painted her hand in the mixture. Joshua saw the fun and ran over getting stuck in straight away “Look my hands!”.
The toddlers have been trying some of the fruits from the story during fruit tasting sessions at snack time and also during exploratory sensory play, including a squeeze, smell and taste activity which encouraged the toddlers to use all of their senses. Iris was very keen to join in with this activity and reached straight for the limes, bringing them close to her nose for a smell, followed by a quick lick and then a taste with a long “Mmmmmm” sound and a happy face. Oliver saw this and went for a lick of the lime too, but having a completely different reaction... he gave a surprised “Ahhh” followed by a swipe of the mouth and a contorted face which made it clear that he was not a fan. Ellie stuck with the broccoli and after shaking it around said “I’m going to eat it up and be strong and have big muscles” and put the whole head of her piece of broccoli in her mouth! Yum!
Over the last few weeks the under twos have been looking at buildings and transportation. Whilst out on a walk to visit the train station to count the trains, Harry got very excited in the pushchair as he saw a train go over the bridge. He began pointing and shouting, “Train train!“. At the station lots of trains went speeding past which was very exciting for the little ones. Alice said “That was fast” and Harry copied, “Fast train”. Monty was waving and smiling as the train went flying by. The next stop was to look at the bus stop and see if the bus was coming. Monty was pointing at the cars, so Amie started to count as the cars drove past. Harry copied Amie and Amelie then in a loud voice said, “One!”.
Back at nursery, the children had the opportunity to paint their own big buses using sponge dabbers. Eva was very keen to get involved and asked, “Eva dab?“ Eva was smiling away she pressed the sponge onto her paper, whilst saying “Dab dab!” Whilst the children were very engaged in their painting, Harry kept looking at the paint on the paper and was calling out, ‘Red!’ and clapping away!
The children in the under twos room really love to get messy with various messy play and this week’s activity was crazy foam on a hunt for hidden stickle bricks. Monty ran over to the messy tray when he saw the crazy foam and shouted, “Ooooh!” whilst he approached. When he found the first stickle brick, Monty carefully put it to the side and started to search for the next one and once he had found a few, he began to stick them together, with a look of concentration on his face.
Streams and woods adventures!
Over the last couple of weeks, the pre school children have thoroughly enjoyed embracing the outside space around the nursery in their waterproofs. After discovering an enclosed area just behind the nursery grounds, the children have very much enjoyed using the space to do lots of exploring. The children were amazed when they saw a waterfall, Isla asking her friends, “Doesn’t it look so beautiful?” Tristan replied saying, “The water is running along the rocks and it does look very beautiful”. The children particularly loved the fishing and crabbing. Florence called out very excitedly, “Guys, come quick, there’s a real life crab!” before using her net to try and fish the crab who was too quick!
Whilst some of the children dedicated their time to do some fishing, some of the other children went off to investigate beyond some rocks they had found, working very well together to help each other over the rocks. Alastair very cautiously climbed over and once he had reached the other side, he did a little relieved giggle and said, “That was tricky, be careful everyone”.
After all of the excitement with exploring for an hour or so, the children decided it was time for a little rest and headed back to base where we had set up some blankets, story books and magnifying glasses. Ari settled down with his clipboard and magnifying glass and was having a good look in the trees and told his friends, “I’m looking to see if I can see any creatures or insects”. Charlie got himself a clipboard too and they both sat down together to do an observational drawing of a tree. What a fabulous time in the great outdoors!
Baking and outer space!
Over the last couple of weeks the toddlers have been learning about outer space and out of the many, many stories we read on a regular basis they have been particularly loving ‘The Tiger who came to Tea”. After a few discussions about story the toddlers decided to make there own houses that would entice the tiger to come over. This of course meant the house was made from... chocolate chip cookies! While mixing the ingredients together in their own bowls the toddlers were conversing about their likes and dislikes with Margot excitedly saying “I love chocolate!”. While enthusiastically stirring her bowl Sophie said “look, I mix it really fast!” which then started a contest into who was the most speedy chef. Oliver kept secretly dipping his fingers into the cooking mixture and tasting it while he thought no one was looking with a quiet “Mmmmm” each time. As Oliver wasn’t very stealthy this made Matilda and Jasper laugh as they caught him red handed! Once their cookies were ready to go onto the baking tray Luciano used his finger to push the mixture off of the spoon. As he was so concentrated on this task he didn’t immediately notice how caked his finger was in the mixture and shouted “Uh sticky!” with a big smile.
The toddlers loved exploring the galaxy sensory tray in the garden with multi-coloured sand, different coloured play dough and a variety of art materials to create their own outer space creatures. The toddlers were all giggling and very excited to get stuck in. Joshua headed straight for the green play dough and started making a pile of little pieces, Kitty shouted “look, there’s green and blue!” and started to squash the different colours together, noticing the change in colour as the two merged “it’s turning brown”. Amèlie was enjoying making marks in the sand with her finger, drawing large circles and squiggly lines while commenting “I making circles in the blue sand” this then made her friends join in with making marks of their own.
Over the last few weeks the under two’s have been looking at fruit and vegetables.The children really enjoyed experiencing tasting and investigating the different fruits.
Outside in the garden, the children were having fun playing with floating citrus fruits. Edward was really intrigued and began to poke his fingers into the lemons. Blair watched him for a moment and then started squeezing the oranges. After a few giggles between them both, Edward and Blair then started picking up individual items of fruit and placing them in their bowls. Amelie came to see what they were doing and picked up a bowl of water, it splashed everywhere and Harry shouted, “Oh dear Amelie!” which really made Blair laugh. Max was very intrigued at what his friends were up to pulled himself up to where they were playing, carefully standing himself at the water tray, trying to pick up the water with his hands before going on to to lick his fingers. Arlo got stuck in helping himself to slices of orange, letting the juices go everywhere.
In the mud garden, there were some vegetables hidden amongst the mud and Alex was showing the children the herb patch and giving them the opportunity to experience the individual smells. Amelie began to laugh as Alex held the herbs towards her as Ava was making, “Mmm mmm” sounds pretending to sniff the herbs. Monty was enjoying hunting out the vegetables that were hidden in the mud and using a spade began digging which gained Arthur’s attention. He saw what they were doing and came to join in sitting himself in the middle of the mud.
Inside there has been lots of beautiful fruits to taste. During snack times, the children have had the opportunity to give pineapple, kiwi, mango and papaya a try. Harry couldn’t take his eyes off the big pineapple and with big wide eyes said, “Wow “. Alex offered all of the children a touch of the pineapple. Monty was the first to be brave the touch and laughed as he did so which made Blair and Amelie giggle and want to investigate themselves. Arlo began to babble and point at the kiwi whilst Max was enjoying the texture of the papaya by poking his finger into it.
Of course there has been opportunities for the little ones to get messy with the different fruits including painting of sweet potatoes using sponges and brushes. Eva carefully dipped her paintbrush into the pot, whilst holding the paper to stop it from moving around. As some of the paint dropped on to the table, “Mess mess” shouted Harry.
