Its beginning to look a lot like Christmas!
https://www.bbc.co.uk/cbeebies/watch/presenters-nativity-story
What a fantastic time we are having in Elmers. The children are full of excitement for all that is happening in and around school. Our 'Wriggley Natvity' has come to an end. The children were amazing in their role as Donkey's. They listened well, joined in with the songs and performed like superstars. Well Done to all the Elmers.
Literacy
After listening to the story of the first Christmas, we tried to remember a different key part to the story each day. We began with the stable and made our own out of a cardboard box and thought about who was missing from the stable. The Elmers did a great job of remembering the characters.
Expressive Arts and Design
We didn't have all the characters that we needed for our stable so some of them we had to make. The children really enjoyed making the edible sheep. A chance to talk about the Christmas story, the science of melting chocolate and also maths for counting to make sure our sheep had the right number of legs.
We also needed a chorus of Angels. Unfortunately we couldn't eat these however we did manage to make them fly above the stable with a bit of fishing wire!
Maths
We have been focusing on our counting skills in Maths and the children have really enjoyed counting the buttons on the Gingerbread man and trying to find the matching numeral.
Click the link below to have a go at home.
https://www.topmarks.co.uk/learning-to-count/gingerbread-man-game
Physical Development
The children love our playdough area and are always keen to practise their fine motor skills here. This week's activity was 'Can you make a Raindeer?' The children copied Mrs English example and used the loose parts available to create their own Rudolphs. Lots of finger strengthening opportunities - rolling the dough, pushing in the eyes and the antlers.
The World
The children loved colouring the Peppa Pig picture on the big board. They chose their own colours from the colour pallet and tried to carefully colour within the lines. It was also a great chance to talk with them about what they do at Christmas with their own families.
Snow is Falling...
Winter is upon us, Christmas is just around the corner and the Elmers are enjoying all that this time of year brings!
Literacy
Our book of the week has been Kippers Birthday. The children enjoyed listening to the story and talking about their own experiences of having a Birthday.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mm1BXicbFeU
We talked about the different features of a Birthday celebration and decided to make our own Birthday cakes. We had to read the recipe carefully and follow the instructions in the correct order. The cakes we made were DELICIOUS!
Maths
We like to make sure that our Maths area keeps up to date with the changes too and this week with the cold weather, we have new snowman numbers. The children have enjoyed counting the snowmen on the washing line and also working hard to put them in the right order.
The World
Although snow wasn't part of the planning this week, we couldn't help but have a play in it. The children talked lots about what the snow felt like, what happens to it when it gets colder and warmer and also where it had come from in the first place.
PSED
Lots of playing together, sharing and working as a team. The children make a great shape design using the magnetic shapes. They took turns to place them into the pattern and talked clearly about the pattern they were making.
As part of our Kippers Birthday we played some party games. Here we are playing Keep It Up. Trying to stop the balloon touching the floor.
Expressive Arts and Design
The snow provided us with so many different opportunities. The white gave us a beautiful canvas to explore colours and colour mixing as we used it to paint on.
Lets Celebrate
We began this half term thinking about the different celebrations taking place around the world.
We listened to the story of Rama and Sita and made our own Edible Diva lights to help them find their way home.
We have also had Bonfire night. The children were eager to talk to us about the fireworks they had seen. A great opportunity to develop our language skills using group discussions and using our voices to make the sounds of the fireworks.
Literacy
Our literacy focus has been the story of Rama and Sita. The children listen to the story and have been learning about the celebrations of Diwali and what exciting things people do to celebrate this Hindu festival.
Click the link below to watch and listen to the story at home.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/cbeebies/stories/lets-celebrate-diwaliperformance
The World
Here we are using our fine motor skills to spread the cheese on our crackers.
Communication and Language
Lots of talk happening in the mud kitchen today. Talking about who is coming for dinner, where they will sit and what they will eat. The children are great at using their imaginations to think up some amazingly creative concoctions.
Physical Development
Strengthening our finger muscles in the Playdough Area by making our very own fireworks. Rolling the dough, selecting the materials and using pincer grip to push into the dough.
Maths
Sometimes are numbers are a little taller than us. The children used the large wooden bricks to build a step to be able to touch count all the numbers - recognising and counting to 10
Expressive Art and Design
Bonfire night and Diwali are celebrations that really allow us to explore our creative sides. We have used lots of colours and techniques. Splatter painting was a firm favourite to create our class firework picture. The children loved exploring firework sounds as they splattered the paint onto the paper - and themselves, oops :)
We also had great fun making our chocolate sparklers and getting time to talk to Mrs Laver about our own experiences of Bonfire night.
PSED
Its always lovely to sit back and observe the children finding common interest with their peers and making fiends. Theses opportunities allow the children to talk, share, turn take and develop their social skills