The Chimps have been exploring squishy strawberry smelling jelly and prodding it with straws. The team have been really practicing Makaton signing with the children and they are getting used to saying when they have had enough, want more etc. They have also been getting messy with bubble art. They have been making bubbly paint and popping and swirling different foamy bubbles and marvelling at the beautiful patterns on their paper. They have been listening to music from all different countries and shaking their sensory bottles and holding them up to the lights. They have been really enjoying the Jack in the Box this week too – giggling away when it pops up at the end.
This week the Howlers met ‘Spotty’ the giraffe. Spotty has been chosen for a brilliant ongoing activity. He will be taken home by the children one by one and ‘exploring’ life outside the nursery. He will be going on holidays, on day trips and anywhere else and the Howlers will be keeping a book with photographs and descriptions of his travels. Such a great way of learning about the environment and how other people live for the children. The Howlers have loved learning a host of new action songs this week and have started to learn yoga stretches which they will be really exploring a lot next week at music and movement time. They have been very busy cooking yummy Polish dumplings which were delicious! Also they have been getting the hang of colour matching and looking at and telling the difference between different patterns with lego bricks (and egg cartons?). Whilst waiting for the garden to be finished the Howlers took a trip to St Anne’s Wells park and enjoyed seeing birds and fish. They had a lovely picnic too.
This week the Baboons have been practicing being mummies and daddies with the babies in the small world area. They’ve been fed, bathed, changed and gently stoked to sleep. The Baboons have been joining the two areas in their room and taken the babies on trips to the hairdresses and washing, cutting and blow drying their hair! On the creative table this week they have been doing lots of exploring of texture and colour with colourful string painting and foamy sand paint. The Baboons get so excited when it is their turn to go the outside classroom and this week in there they have been focusing on their colours and counting skills by sorting, counting, weighing and talking about the sorting bears. They too took a trip out this week. They went on a lovely sunny walk to the beach for some fresh sea air and a play on the stones. At group times they was talking about faces and all their differences and similarities. They’re developed quite a funny interest in eyebrows.
The Gorillas have been cooking away baking ‘Cheddar and Chive Wafers’ this week which they were very proud to take home to their families. They have been learning new phonics, this week it has been D, R and G. They have also enjoyed exploring coloured ice blocks in water and watching the colours melt and swirl around each other. Mixing colours with paint was another learning experience this week, we have mixed red and yellow to make orange and blues and red to make purple. The Gorillas had their very first Italian lesson with Irene this week. She began by teahcing them words around the theme of their homes. They got their first list of words to take home and the chidlren absolutely adored their first taste of becoming bilingual! This really is a special thing that Young Friends is doing for the Gorillas – we hope you are pleased they are getting such a special opportunity. The Gorillas also went on a trip out to the beach this week – however it was a little wet so they all immediately got into snuggly dry clothes when they got back. At least they got some fresh air and they still had a lovely time full of learning and fun.
So the hill at the back of the garden has now been covered in artificial grass. Our original grass is still a little muddy from the mud from the original slope and all those muddy wellies playing on it but this will go in time as we continue to wash and sweep it away. It is surprising was a big space the slope is to play on now and the children will be really enjoying it next week. The outside classroom too has some additions – it has a new blackboard wall and magnet wall and a lego wall is about to go up too. It is such a lovely place to do small group work and the children feel really special and get lots out of playing in small focused groups. That’s it for now. Until next week…..
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