This month the children have had a wonderful time with their activities and learning opportunities that have been set up throughout the month. The children have spent most of their time outside in the garden exploring and making the most of the warm sunny weather we have had, with this the children have enjoyed eating their picnics and ice lollies, spending time in our nature garden!



The children have been on scavenger trails, looking at nature in all its glorious colours, looking through nature themed windows to see what they could see, making snacks and feeders for the birds, having a picnic outdoors, making nature collages and a beautiful mobile, using nature items from the garden.
EYFS link:
Mathematics – shape, space and measure – 16-26 months: enjoys filling and emptying containers
Physical Development – Moving and Handling – 8-20 months: Enjoys the sensory experience of making marks in damp sand, paste or paint.
Understanding the World – The World – 30-50 months: Shows care and concern for living things and the environment.
Our Baby unit have spent the month looking at different textures all around us such as smooth, rough, bumpy and shiny. The children have enjoyed a variety of activities which consisted of water play, painting with sand, dipping potatoes into paint to make prints and even exploring gloop with spaghetti. The children have use both their fine and gross motor skills to complete these activities and had fun getting messy at the same time. They created a farm sensory tray which led onto the children learning the names of the animals, the sounds that they make and also singing different animal songs.



Our Babies have also been exploring life on the farm, learning about the different animals on the farm and using lots of different sensory and tactile materials to bring their playscapes to life. The babies have enjoyed listening to “Noisy Farm” by Rod Campbell, lifting the flaps to find the hidden animals.
EYFS link:
Personal, Social and Emotional Development – Making Relationships – 8-20 months: interact with others and explore new situations when supported by a familiar person.
Communication and Language – Listening and Attention – 8-20 months: has a strong exploratory impulse.
Understanding the world – the world – 8-20 months: closely observes what animals, people and vehicles do.
Expressive arts and design – exploring and using media and materials 8-20 months: notices and is interested in the effects of making movements which leave marks.
Our Toddler unit have been busy looking at different animals, focusing on jungle animals and minibeasts, where we can all explore these outsides in the garden and nature garden. The children have all been joining in with messy jungle animal trays, washing the animals and learning what they look like and what they might sound like. During the day the children have been listening and trying to join in with the different animal actions songs, which their favourite song was called Animal Fair. Out in the nature garden the children have been using the minibeast scavenger hunt cards to discuss what they might find.



Our Toddlers have also been learning about Transport and looking at all the different ways we can travel around. They have been building and constructing with the diggers and excavators, working together to build and construct the train tracks, to make the train go round and around. They have been building ramps to make the cars race down and they have made hot air balloon pictures. Following on from this our Toddlers have been creating seaside themed artwork to be displayed inside and outside their rooms. They have used handprints to create crabs and they have used sand to create textured paintings of the beach.



EYFS link:
Physical Development – Moving and handling – can copy some letters from their names (30-50 months)
Expressive Arts and design – Exploring and Using Media and Materials – 30-50mths: Explores colour and how they can be changed.
Literacy – Reading – 30-50 months: Joins in with repeated refrains and anticipates key events and phrases in rhymes and stories.
Communication and Language – Listening and Attention – 22-36 months: Listens with interest to the noises adults make when they read stories.
Our Pre-School unit have joined in with the 30day wild challenge, and as a group the children have thoroughly enjoyed and got stuck right into. They have been making daisy chains, cloud gazing and traying to catch the butterflies. To support their learning with this the children have explored a range of stories that link to minibeasts; ‘The Bad-Tempered Ladybird’, ‘The Hungry Caterpillar’ and ‘The Busy Spider’. The children have learnt about being kind and discussing what makes us happy or sad. For The Very Hungry Caterpillar, the children brought our their caterpillar eggs and followed the lifecycle of a butterfly, the children loved being able to see each stage of the lifecycle and release the butterflies into the wild from the nature garden. Lastly the Busy Spider has allowed the children to talk about how a spider spins their web and the patterns that they might make. We used wool to create their own spider webs and each child tried to cut the wool themselves. Each of the stories the children have become confident with reciting the stories and know what is going to happen next.



The Pre-schoolers have also been interested in Dinosaurs and they have been learning about the different species and how they moved, what they ate and whether they were Herbivores or Carnivores, they have been on an archaeological dig, digging up “bones” and counting them to see how many they have found. The children have created lots of different sensory play trays and used the small world dinosaurs to play and explore.



EYFS link:
Physical development – moving and handling – 30-50 months: uses one handed tools and equipment, e.g. makes snips in paper with child scissors.
Communication and language – understanding – 40-60 months: listens and responds to ideas expressed by others in conversation or discussion.
Literacy – Reading – 30-50 months: describes main story settings, events and principal characters
Understanding the world – the world – 30-50 months: can talk about some of the things they have observed such as plants, animals, natural and found objects.