Week 6

In our last week before the Easter holidays, we have been exploring everything to do with Easter. We have had lots of Easter fun.

We have listened to two stories this week, the story of Easter and 'saving Easter'. We enjoyed both of these. Ally's class had the challenge of going on an Easter egg hunt around school, following clues to find hidden eggs!

In class we have had races using wind up toys to practice our fine motor skills and explored number to see who came 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th. We also had races using body boards to move plastic eggs from one side of the class to another, working in small teams. 

We had the challenge of trying to sink plastic eggs, with a tray of different materials. Ally's class experimented with floating and sinking, they were all very good at it and enjoyed trying to sink the eggs.

On Thursday we made Easter crowns, decorating them ourselves by colouring, cutting and sticking. We chose some Easter songs to have a dance to in class and even had a surprise visit from the Easter bunny!!

Enjoy the Easter break everyone! Happy Easter from Ally, Toni, Laura, Sean and Diane!

Week 5

This week in Ally's class we have been learning about the world around us. We have explored habitats in the rainforest, desert and ocean - identifying what animals live there. We did this using stories, pictures and tuff trays set up with different materials in them to explore.

We did some Art after we had looked at some famous landmarks around the world. The children each chose a landmark they would like to paint, they independently chose their colours and created some masterpieces!

The children have explored capacity through different sensory activities, we have been filling and emptying jars with pom poms, blocks and marbles. They could match their jars to symbols showing whether it was full, empty or half full. We also used the water tray outside to fill different sized tubs.

The children have also enjoyed spending time on the sensory park, taking turns to use equipment. They have also shared equipment and explored the equipment in different ways by climbing, running and jumping.

Our favourite activity was making mini egg brownies. The children chose what they would like to make this week and identified what ingredients they would need. Today we made the brownies, following the recipe. The children were able to measure, cut, mix and break eggs into the mixture. Then we got to the best bit, this afternoon we ate the brownies. It was a massive thumbs up all round. 

Week 4

This week in Ally's class we welcomed some new members in the form of our class caterpillars! We have enjoyed watching them grow, move and climb this week and can't wait to see them change into beautiful butterflies. To work with the arrival of our caterpillars, our class story this week was 'The cautious caterpillar'. We enjoyed this story and learned a lot about life cycles. We have done lots of activities related to caterpillars and life cycles this week including junk model caterpillars and playdough butterflies! Also we practised our number skills by using butterfly pasta to complete sums, we made caterpillar sums using our fingerprints to make colourful caterpillars. 

Ally's class are becoming really independent and confident at breakfast time, we have a daily rota of jobs and the children look forward to it being their turn to make snack. They can confidently use the toaster and make sure we have all our plates and cups ready. This week we also followed recipes to make waffles at breakfast time, we measured our ingredients out, took turns to follow instructions and carefully used a jug to pour the mixture into the machine. 

Our educational visit this week took us to the park, we have visited this park before and the children really enjoy the opportunity to run, climb, spin and swing. It is a great place to go to practice their gross motor skills, the children have the opportunity to explore a different park with different equipment. We had really good fun. In the afternoon we held our Mother's day afternoon tea, it was lovely to welcome you into our class. We hope you enjoyed the treats and guided tour of our new classroom!

On Friday we participated in lots of red nose day activities. In the morning we had the chance to throw some sponges at Gaz and explore his playground, we all enjoyed experiencing this. We then had some sensory fun in the hall decorating biscuits, playing with rice and climbing on the equipment. In the afternoon we had more messy fun! Our sensory story was similar to 'Bear hunt' but we went on a hunt for red noses through some slimy sensory trays, the children that wanted to join in had lots of fun using their hands or feet to explore the trays, some children chose to listen to the story and stay outside with their friends. We then had a game of pie face, the children that wanted to play had lots of fun! We chose the flavour of cream we wanted and most of the children hoped it went off on their go. We had lots of laughs playing this game. 

Week 3

This week in Ally's class we have been exploring and learning about the life cycles of plants and trees. Our story 'the little acorn' showed us how from a little seed a big tree can grow, but it can take a long time to grow. We also explored what they need to help them grow.

We have painted our own trees using different tools, including paintbrushes and Lego blocks to print the leaves. We also did some planting to put in our greenhouse and explored sensory potion making using natural resources.

For our PE session this week we practised some football skills including passing the ball carefully to another person, moving a ball around cones and we had a little game of football with each other.

We have enjoyed playing games with each other this week both on the laptops and board games. This helps us practice our turn taking, communication and number skills. 

On Friday we enjoyed the snow, wearing our greens to keep us dry we went onto the field. The children attempted to make snowmen, roll big balls of snow and played on the sledges. Everybody had a good time and helped each other by working together to pull the sledges or roll the snowballs!

Week 2

We have had a busy week this week learning all about the farm. We looked at what animals live there, food that is grown or made there and done lots of activities related to the farm.

This week we have read two stories one called 'Wake up time on bumble farm' where we learnt about animals and explored messy play activities related to the story. We also used farm small world toys to tell our own short farm stories. Our second story was Supertato vs Evil pea, where we learnt about different vegetables. We have planted our own vegetable seeds including tomatoes, beans, carrots and spring onions, we will be looking after them in our little greenhouse. The children also wrote about what happened in the story using pictures to support them. They were all really good at remembering the story and loved the Evil pea! We also went for a walk in the community to look at prices and different fruits and vegetables in the shop. Our educational visit this week was a visit to the farm. We saw animals we had been learning about, we were able to feed them and stroke them. 

On Friday we did world book day and shared some of our favourite stories throughout the day, the children picked stories and we read them as a class. Our class story was Captain Underpants, we made our own gingerbread people and decorated them with brightly coloured underpants. We listened to some the story of captain underpants then whilst we ate our Captain underpants biscuits we watched some clips of the Captain underpants film to finish the day. Everybody looked amazing in their clothes and costumes. Well done on a great week! 

Week 1

This week in Ally's class we have been looking at 'Our garden'. We are planning to make a gardening area outside and to start off, we have planted some sunflower seeds in pots. The children will look after them and hopefully soon they will start to grow.

Our story this week was 'Willbee the bumble bee', it showed us how bee's collect pollen and nectar from flowers, to make honey. We did some activities about bee's and made pattern tiles using playdough shapes to look like a beehive. Each child made a tile and put their own patterns on it. We also had some small world play using flower toys, all of the children enjoyed exploring them and making their own variations of a flower garden. The children  independently made patterns using size, colour and shapes, they were all very proud of their gardens.

We also made pancakes this week, for pancake day. The children enjoyed weighing out and mixing the ingredients. They also had the chance to flip a pancake, which was great fun. Everyone made a pancake face using their own choice of topping.

For sensory baking this week we used honey to make some flapjacks. Everybody helped to make or decorate the pancakes. The children listened to instructions well, followed instructions and the finished result looked delicious!