Caterpillars!

Over the last couple of weeks the toddlers have been very excited at the arrival of some tiny caterpillars that they will get to watch as they go through the cycle of cocooning and turning into a butterfly. A small group of children gathered around a table to get an up close look of the caterpillars, sitting on their knees and resting their faces against the table to be eye level with them.  They watched quietly with intrigue as their eyes moved across the pots of caterpillars when all of a sudden one of the caterpillars moved, eliciting squeals of excitement from a few children and a comment of, “Ahhh he’s moving” followed by another child joining in with a statement of, “He’s so wiggly… like this” as they give a little giggle on the spot. Later on in the week the children were making their own wiggly caterpillars with sticks and pipe cleaners, winding the pipe cleaners around the sticks and adding eye stickers. One child began stroking their caterpillar once they had finished making it, “Ooh, it’s so soft” and invited their friend to feel it too as they giggled together. They then took their caterpillars to the nature tray where they began wiggling them amongst the grass and over the logs.

The Toddlers have been loving their spring themed walks around the Imber Court grounds where they have been making their own nature frames and bracelets. The children who chose to make bracelets so had some tape placed around their coat clad wrist with the sticky side out and those who chose to make the frame held onto their cardboard shapes with a sticky centre as they all began foraging for items to attach to them. A few children began adding fallen leaves to their creation while a couple found a small collection of daisies and purple flowers which they carefully began plucking and very carefully pressing down onto their bracelets and frames. One child was very happy with their bracelet and showed it to all of their friends, “I got so many pretty flowers” while another child held up their frame, “look I made this with all its leaves on.”

Over the last couple of weeks the under 2s have been exploring colours through a range of different activities. One of the activities the children got very involved with was body painting where they were able to explore the texture of the paint using tools or different parts of their bodies, including their hands and feet. The children had a selection of canvases to choose from including paper, cardboard, and themselves! A couple of the children quickly worked out how to create their own hand and footprints and did a great job painting their hands and feet and pressing them down to create their art. Some of the other children preferred to use the range of tools they were offered, and did a great job mixing the different colours together to see what they could create. One of the children created a handprint and then looked up with a smile, before pointing back at it and shouting “Red!’. Another child followed this up by pointing to a footprint and shouted “Blue!”, which led to the children making their way along the pots of paint and correctly identifying each of the colours. The children have also shown their fantastic knowledge of colours through coloured play dough, which they managed to correctly name. A couple of the children took it a step further by exploring the room until they found the duplo blocks, rifling through them until they found a colour that matched the play dough. The children were encouraged to continue this as the box of blocks were brought over to the play dough,  and they continued to match the blocks to the coloured dough. 

Out in the garden, the children have been exploring the new tube which has been added to the sandpit. Some of the children picked up the tube at each end, and began to peer at each other through, giggling. They followed this up by shouting down “Hello!” to each other through the tube, before dropping it whilst laughing. Some of the other children brought over a selection of balls which they began to drop down the tube, lifting up one end and clapping as they came out the other end. After successfully dropping down a few of the different balls, one of the children tried to feed through a larger ball, and a small group gathered and watched in confusion at why the ball wouldn’t go down the tube. When one of the practitioners let them know that it was too big, a few of the children echoed “Too big”, before going back to the smaller balls. 

Mother's Day Tea Party!

The preschool children have been so excited in the build up to this years Mothers Day Tea Party and have been hard at work creating gifts and cards, as well as busy baking blueberry muffins for their Mummies. The children helped to weigh the ingredients before mixing them together, ready to be placed in muffin cases and baked in the oven. Conversations were flowing with comments of, “I can’t wait for my Mummy to eat her muffin!” and “Yeah, they are going to be so yummy!” The excitement continued to build as all the decorations went up around the nursery with children asking, “Are the flags for the party?” And pointing to the vases of flowers “I like the flowers!”

It was lovely to see such a great turnout this year, and the excitement amongst the children was palpable. There were lots of smiles and cheers as the children saw their Mummies arrive, followed by cuddles before heading to find some food. The party was filled with lots of socialising, activities and exploring. There were shouts of “My Mummy is here!” whilst others preferred to take full advantage of the buffet on offer in the preschool room! Thank you to everybody who was able to attend for making it another great Mothers Day Party; we can’t wait for the next event.

The toddlers were visibly excited for the party and for their mummies to come and play, talking about it for almost the whole week leading up to the tea party. In the days before, the toddlers painted and helped to string up bunting to decorate the room, carefully crafted their own Mother’s Day cards and painted their own pot which they filled with soil and planted some seeds in. As the afternoon began and the party music started there were lots of excited rumblings of, “My mummy’s coming now!” and “It’s nearly party time!” along with some squeals and giggles. As the Mummies began coming through the door the children’s smiles were beaming, with lots off cuddles. A lot of the toddlers gave their Mummies a tour of the whole nursery, exploring all of the rooms and resources, often ending up at the food table enjoying a plate of sandwiches and fruit. A couple of children showed their Mummies the garden, showing off how they use the balance beams and build sandcastles, as well as climb on the A-frames, jumping down with applause from their proud parents.

All week the Under 2s have been very busy crafting their Mummies a homemade gift and card. Each child took it in turns to print ‘footprint’ petals on their flower pots whilst choosing what colour they would like next. Some children were even able to talk about their Mummy whilst decorating. The our topic of conversation during morning circle time was about Mummies and one of the older children sat down and said, “For Mumma”, and then went on to say, “See Mummy, after sleep”. On Thursday afternoon, the children helped choose some of their favourite activities to set up for them and their Mummies. This included, a drawing table, cars on the car mat and Noah’s Ark with animals. Once the children’s Mummies began to arrive, each child greeted them with a huge smile and got stuck straight in with showing them around their room and introducing them to their new friends. 

World Book Day 2026!

The pre school children have been very excited to celebrate World book day this week and have been dressing up in wonderful outfits throughout the week including princesses, The Gruffalo, Tabby McTat, pirates and of course a couple of superheroes. The children have engaged in many story themed activities throughout the week such as creating 3D Elmer by using the coloured duplo blocks, dinosaur themed role play whilst creating their own helicopter stories and have also become authors and illustrators themselves, creating a story alongside some pictures in their individual homemade story books. The children have been very excited on the build up to their dress up day, discussing with each other what their outfits are going to be and couldn’t wait to show them off to each other. Whilst some children grouped off to join in with various story themed activities, some other children enjoyed a sing along to frozen whilst showing off their dancing and lovely singing to ‘Let it go’. At group times, the children have been exploring some of their favourite story books and using many story sacks to bring their stories to life. 

The toddlers were so excited for world book day and to see all of their friends dressed up. There were dragons, fairies, Paddington bears, Little Red Riding Hood, and many more! The children greeted each other with happy smiles and excited squeals as they recognised their characters. The children loved getting to read many of their favourite stories and explore lots of story sacks, using the different props and characters to role play. A few children retold the ‘Day monkey, Night Monkey’ story with the different characters; using lots of animal sounds to make the animals speak to each other, there was lots of ‘ribbiting’ for frogs and ‘oo oo ah ah’ for the monkeys. They also got to make their own stories with comments of, “I’m making a story for my mummy” and “mines got a dragon”. 

The under 2s celebrated World Book Day with lots of different stories and a “Handa’s surprise” themed food tasting. Whilst out on the daily walks, a group of the children excitedly sat down to listen as they saw the stories being taken from inside the buggies. They all sat very nicely as they listened to “3 little pigs”, “the wheels on the bus”, and “love”, joining in where they knew the words. 

The children did a great job exploring the feel and taste of lots of different fruits during the food tasting, including mango, passion fruit, and avocado. A couple of the children tucked straight in when they saw the avocado, with one shouting “Cado!”, and another giving the word ‘avocado’ their best shot! A couple of other children were more wary of the avocado, and a lot of them were slightly hesitant to try the passion fruit, however after a little bit of encouragement they all tried each of the fruits, and some of them polished off every tasty piece!