Let it snow
The weather outside was frightful, but for the children it was clearly delightful, on Monday there was no other place to go but Mount Carmel to enjoy the snow! Despite news of multiple school closures in the area we were busy on Sunday afternoon clearing snow in the car park ready for the children to come in the following day. Fortunately we had bought a petrol powered snowplough a few years ago which had never seen the light of day until last weekend when we put it through its paces.
On Monday the children had a wonderful time in the garden building snowmen, making snow angels and having snowball fights with their friends. The frosty fun didn’t end there as we transformed our messy table in the art room into a winter wonderland with real snow, reindeer and Father Christmas figurines. Some of the children said that they wanted to make ice creams so we took out the scoops and cones which we usually use with the sand and they pretended to make a variety of different flavours for their friends to try. There were chocolate, strawberry and vanilla ice cream but we were quite surprised when one girl turned to another and exclaimed “I’ve made raspberry nipple”!
As Christmas is a time for giving we wanted the preschool children to have the opportunity to make something delicious for somebody they love. In Tuesday’s cooking session they made Christmas cakes complete with a decorative box and had to decide who they wanted to give it to. A number of them struggled with the idea of giving their treat away and insisted that they would be eating it themselves! Christmas time provides us with many opportunities to teach children about the joys of giving and thinking of others before ourselves.
On Thursday and Friday we celebrated our nursery Christmas parties and the sessions were jam packed with games, puppet shows and prizes. The children couldn’t believe their eyes when they were visited by some very special guests. For our preschoolers Father Christmas took time out of his very busy schedule to meet the children and give them a small gift. Our Italian children were very impressed when Santa began speaking to them in their own language and he told them to leave out some panettone for him on Christmas eve! The younger children got to meet Elsa and Anna in the afternoon who had brought presents all the way from Arendelle!
On Friday we celebrated Christmas Jumper Day in aid of Save the Children. We saw a magnificent selection of jumpers ranging from fluffy penguins to illuminating Christmas trees. Through your kind donations we were able to raise £100 for this worthwhile cause.
We now find ourselves at the end of what has been a very busy Autumn term. We have been so impressed by the progress made by all of the children and grateful to all of our very supportive parents. The children are visibly excited for the festivities in the coming weeks but we hope that they find some time to relax. Being the last week of term this is the final blog of 2017. With that I join all of the staff at Mount Carmel Kindergarten in wishing you and your families a very merry Christmas and a happy New Year.