Feeling colourful

It’s been a busy two weeks with the children enjoying lots of new activities at the nursery school.  Over the Summer break we developed part of the bark area in the garden into a woodland workshop.  A local tree surgeon donated several large tree stumps for the children to climb and build upon.  There are logs, conkers, pine cones and other natural resources to play with.  Last week we received an assortment of outdoor toys to test from our partners at Fundamentally Children.  As an accredited Play Partner we test toys for the organisation which then forms part of their “Good Toy Guide” and all the toys we test are donated to the nursery for the children to enjoy. They sent us a ride on JCB digger which sits proudly in the middle of the woodland workshop, and the children have loved wearing hard hats and hi-viz jackets and scooping up the bark.

This week Mrs Beechey made a recommendation of a new sensory resource known as aquabeads.  These tiny colourful balls swell up when water is added to them, creating a squishy and slimey material for the children to experiment with.  Many of the children compared them to frogspawn and peas.  If any of you come across an unusual and interesting resource please share this with us.

This week our preschool children have been getting in touch with their emotions and thinking about feelings.  In our circle time sessions they have been  discussing what makes them happy, sad, angry and scared.  Circle time is a fantastic activity where the children are encouraged to use a wide range of descriptive language and we are constantly surprised with their responses.  In the group who had their session just before lunch, several children commented that not only were they happy, but hungry as well!

In our cooking session the children made delicious cheese twists.  These are extremely easy to make with children and require just two ingredients – puff pastry and grated cheese.  The children rolled out the pastry, sprinkled on the cheese and then twisted them around which is an excellent way to develop their fine motor skills (and makes a tasty snack!)

In a few weeks time we will be planting bulbs, ready for next Spring. If anyone has any small flowerpots which they could donate please send them in.

Next week’s theme is bodies.