Holiday activities
Whilst it is the school holidays, we know that many of you continue to work. Here are a few family activities to try together. Have fun!
Build an indoor or outdoor den
It could be a majestic hidden castle, mysterious bear cave or a magnificent space rocket. Let your imagination run wild. We thought these den building ideas in the form of IKEA instructions were funny!
Parents/carers- Den building offers a range of advantages to children of all ages, from physical development to problem solving skills.
Bake Off
Have a look at some child friendly recipes on the BBC’s Good Food website. You could choose a family favourite or find something new to try. It’s always good to try new foods and discover new flavours.
Parents/carers- Following a recipe helps children to learn to read for a purpose and follow instructions.
Go on a treasure hunt
Ask an adult to hide a range of similar objects (treasure) in the garden or home for you to find, count and order.
Parents/carers- You could tell children that you have hidden 3 of one type of item. When they find one, you can talk about how many are left to find. For example, “We need 2 more now!”
Painting With Ice
We enjoy making marks and drawing with all sorts of different things at Nursery. This is always a popular activity and waiting overnight for your ice paints to be ready adds to the fun.
What you need:
1 cup of water
Food colouring
Lollipop sticks
Ice cube tray
https://www.easypeasyandfun.com/painting-with-ice/
Blowing Bubbles!
Everyone loves bubbles! Why don’t you have a go at making your own bubble mixture. Here are some instructions for you to follow or you could have a go at making a bubble snake.
Make Homemade Lemonade
See the recipe and instructions sheet below.
Parents- This activity can support your child to gain a range of skills, especially in Maths.
You can also view the bubble mixture and lemonade recipes using this link. Lemonade and bubbles
Finally, in a few weeks time, we’re going to read ‘The Very Hungry Caterpillar’ and learn about the life cycle of a butterfly. Sadly, we’re not at Nursery to do this with real caterpillars, but if you wanted to, you could order your own from insectlore. If you haven’t done this before, it’s very easy and a great experience. You’ll need a starter kit which includes a butterfly net.
Story Time
We can’t quite believe that this is the last Friday before half term. Some days and weeks have flown by, others have been harder to get through. We hope that you’ve enjoyed some of our ideas and suggestions for your learning at home. We’ve loved reading all about your adventures and can see how much you’re all learning and growing.
Our final story for this half term is read by Miss Morris. It’s called ‘Alfie in the garden’ and is written by Debi Gliori.
Alfie had a good imagination in the story; he enjoyed pretending to be different animals.
- Can you remember which animals he pretended to be?
- What noise did the rainstorm make?
- The grass made a ‘swish swash’ noise in the breeze. Can you think of another story where the grass makes the same sound?
We’ll post some holiday activities soon; these will be there for you as ideas or in case you are stuck for something to do one day and need some inspiration. We hope that you enjoy your half term, even if it isn’t quite the half term that we may have had planned or hoped for. Stay safe and well.
Home Learning
Finally, we know you all love to see photos of your friends so here are some of their smiling faces to end the week.
Can you spot…?
- a chocolate caterpillar
- a back-to-front jigsaw
- some of No-Bot the Robot’s friends
- some sheep
Shape hunt
We loved listening to ‘No-Bot the Robot with No Bottom’ on Monday. Did you? Thank you for sending in some photographs of your robots; we’ve seen some super robots so far. It’s not too late to send us an e-mail if you’ve built one too. When we looked at your robots, we could see lots of different shapes.
Today, we’d like you to go on a shape hunt around your house or when you go out for a walk.
You might want to draw the shapes and tick them off when you see them, or you could take a picture of the different shapes that you find.
Talk about the properties of shapes. How do you know it’s a triangle? Can you count the number of sides and corners?
Let us know how many shapes you find. Remember to visit us again on Friday. Until then, we’ll leave you with this shape song to watch!
No-Bot the Robot with No Bottom
This week’s story is another one by Sue Hendra and Phil Linnet– No-Bot the Robot with No Bottom. It’s a funny story and we think that you will enjoy it.
Watch it on the link or if you have it at home read it together.
- Can you remember some of the things that Bernard thought was his bottom?
- Where did Bernard find his bottom at the end of the story?
- Do you like going to the beach and making sandcastles?
Here are some activities that you can try that are linked to the story.
Creative – Can you make your own robot? Use some empty boxes and sellotape or glue. Cereal boxes work well if you want to make a big robot. You might paint your robot or cover him in foil. What are you going to call your robot?
Physical – Can you move like a robot? Your arms and legs need to be quite stiff to do this. Join in with this robot action dance, its lots of fun.
Mathematics – No- Bot the robot’s head is a square shape. Can you find any squares in your house? Let’s see if you can sort shapes by playing this game.
Creative – Here is a song that we sing in Nursery to help us to think about 2D shapes and their properties. Can you remember it? Join in if you can.
Creative mark making – Can you make an “artbot”? Attach 3 pens to an upturned plastic cup with sellotape. You can add eyes and be as creative as you like. What does your “artbot” draw? Can you try some zigzag patterns or swirls and spirals? Let us know how you get on.
Fine motor skills – Can you colour and trace the shapes? Don’t forget to use your “froggy fingers” when you hold your pen. If you have a printer, you can use this one. If not, you could draw your own.
There will be another activity added on Wednesday, so keep a look out for that. We are enjoying seeing your photos, but just an email would be great. Let us know if your child is enjoying the activities or if there is something that they are missing and we will do our best to recreate these on line.
Our email address is [email protected]. We would love to hear about what you have been doing. Also we are happy to answer any of your questions too.
Have fun!
Home Learning
Thank you to everyone who sent us an e-mail this week. We love reading about the things that you have been doing at home and seeing your photographs.
This week, we’ve seen some super home made birthday and Eid cards. We’re sure that your friends and family loved receiving them.
Some of you have been dressing up, riding bikes and drawing pictures. We love to see all of your smiling faces! If you haven’t been in touch for a while, please send us a quick email if you can; we’d love to hear from you.
Story Time
It’s Friday again! Well done for making it through another week of being in lockdown. We know that many of you are enjoying our Friday Story Time so we hope that you enjoy this one. Today’s story is read by Mrs Beesley and it was a book that was popular when we came back to Nursery after Christmas. It’s about a very hungry creature, but it’s not a caterpillar! This animal has stripes and he arrives at a little girl’s house just in time for tea…
‘The Tiger Who Came To Tea’ is written by Judith Kerr and published by HarperCollins. Here are some things to talk about when you’ve listened to the story.
- How do you think Sophie felt when she opened the door?
- Can you remember some of the things that the tiger ate?
- What did the tiger drink?
- What happened at the end of the story?
- Did you like the story? What was your favourite part?
- If you could have an animal to tea at your house, which animal would you choose? Why?
If you enjoyed the story and would like some activities to do at home, here are a few ideas.
- Invite one of your soft toy animals to tea. Can you make an invitation? Write a list of the food that you’d like and set the table for a tea party. We hope that your animal isn’t as hungry as the tiger!
- Can you paint a tiger? Ask your grown up to draw an outline and then have a go at painting the stripes on it. Orange, black, orange, black…
- Andy’s Wild Adventures has an episode all about tigers. Watch it here.
- If you have a printer, there are some printable activities and colouring sheets that you can download on this website.
- Sadly, the Channel 4 film adaptation of the story isn’t available to view at the moment but perhaps you recorded it or have access to it on Amazon.
If you haven’t been in touch with us for a while, please send us a quick email to let us know how you are. We hope that you have a lovely weekend and find somewhere new to explore now that we have a little more freedom to visit parks.
Can you spot the animals?
Did you have a go at counting all of the animals from Monday’s ‘I spy zoo animals’ activity? Today, we thought that you might like to play another game of I-spy, but this time, your Nursery teachers need your help! Can you help them to find all of the different creatures that are hiding? Look carefully!
Can you remember which animals you saw?
- Did you spot the wrinkly elephant that was perched on top of Mrs Beesley’s fence?
- A bouncing bunny rabbit had managed to jump all the way up into the tree at Miss Morris’ house.
- Miss Pennock’s shimmering seahorse wasn’t swimming in the sea, it was driving a little car!
- We’re sure you found the cheeky monkey playing peek-a-boo in Miss Logan’s playhouse.
- Did you see what gave Mrs Long a fright? That’s right, it was sneaky shark hiding behind the shower.
If you enjoyed this, maybe you could have a game of ‘I spy’ at home. You could hide animals or toys, just like we did, or you could play a game of colour I spy. I spy something that is … red/blue etc..
You could also practise your memory skills and concentration by playing a game of ‘Kim’s game’. Collect 5-6 items from around your house and put them together on the floor or on a tray. Ask your child to look at them for a short time and then cover them up with a cloth (e.g. tea towel). Remove an item without your child seeing and then uncover the objects. Can they spot which object is missing? This is great fun and children love to play it at Nursery. You can make it harder by adding more objects or reducing the amount of time that they can look for.
Don’t forget to visit our Class Page again on Friday for this week’s Story Time.
Keith the Cat with the Magic Hat
We hope that you all enjoyed the long weekend and had some fun for the VE Day celebrations. This week, we are sharing a story that some of you may know – ‘Keith the Cat with the Magic Hat’ by Sue Hendra and Paul Linnet.
Watch it on the link or if you have it at home, read it together. This is a story that has lots of rhyming words in it. Can you hear some of them?
Here are some activities that you can try that are linked to the story.
Creative – Can you make a magic hat or a wand?
- You could use a hat that you already have and add bits and pieces or you could make a paper hat and decorate it.
- Make a wand from a stick in the garden or roll up some paper to make a wand. What spell would you use to make magic? We like “Abracadabra” or “Hocus Pokus” in Nursery but you might know a different one. Let us know how you get on, what would your magic spell be?
Reading – Being able to listen carefully is an important skill when learning to read. The game below will help you to listen really carefully. It’s available on www.phonicsplay.co.uk. This website is free to access at the moment using the username: March20 and Password: home.
Once you have accessed the website, the game we would like you to play is called ‘Welcome to the zoo‘. Can you guess which animal is in the crate? Listen carefully to the sounds that you hear. Maybe you could practice making animal sounds yourself.
Mathematics- I spy zoo animals – How many of each animal can you see? Help your child to count carefully. It will be tricky to remember which one you have already counted, so draw a line through them as you go.
Please note- When you open this Twinkl PDF, there is a page to write down how many animals you counted. Don’t worry about completing this part; we don’t expect Nursery children to be able to write digits. Just focus on the ‘I spy’ page and careful counting.
You could maybe count your own toy animals at home if you have any, or the animals in a book. Count carefully pointing and saying the number name as you go.
Creative – Can you draw a cat? Use two circles, then add the features. If this is tricky, why not draw the circles for your child to add the legs, ears, eyes and whiskers. Remember to talk about how many you will need to draw.
How many legs has a cat got? Count with your child as they draw on the legs.
Role play – Could you create your own ice cream shop? Paper cones and old yogurt pots could be used for the cones or pots. You could use cotton wool balls, pom poms or play dough for the ice cream. The children could practise their mark making by taking orders and making menus. See how creative you can be; your child will love to help to set this up.
We did a quick search on Google images/Pinterest and there are lots of pictures if you need a bit more inspiration.
Watch – Have you ever wondered how ice cream cones are made? What do you think the ingredients are? Maddie finds out here.
Health and self- care –Encourage your child to put on their own coat and shoes before you go for your daily walk. These self-help skills will really help your child to become more independent. Use the extra time that you have in order to develop this important skill. When we get back to Nursery, we will be amazed at how independent the children have become!
There will be another activity added on Wednesday, so keep a look out for that. We are enjoying seeing your photos, but just an email would be great. Let us know if your child is enjoying the activities or if there is something that they are missing and we will do our best to recreate these on line. Any favourite books for story time on Fridays?
Our email address is [email protected]. We would love to hear about what you have been doing. Also we are happy to answer any of your questions too.
Have fun!
Story Time, Home Learning and a Trick Shot!
It may be a special VE Day Bank Holiday, but we still thought you’d enjoy a story time with one of our Nursery team. Today’s story is read by Miss Pennock and we think it’s a story that many parents/carers will relate to right now. It’s called ‘Five Minutes’ Peace’ by Jill Murphy (published by Walker Books) and is all about the Large Family.
Here are a few questions you could talk about after you’ve listened to the story.
- Who are the characters? Can you remember any of their names?
- What did Mrs Large want to do? What did she put on her tray?
- Can you remember what tune Lester played on his recorder?
- Which story did Laura read to Mrs Large?
- How do you think Mrs Large felt when all of her children went into the bathroom?
- What was your favourite part of the story?
If you enjoyed the story and would like some activities to do at home, here are a few ideas.
- Sing along to ‘Elephants have wrinkles‘ at home. This is one of the songs we sometimes listen to before lunch at Nursery.
- Laura read Little Red Riding Hood to Mrs Large. Have you read this story? You might enjoy watching the CBeebies ballet which tells the story of Little Red Riding Hood through ballet dancing.
- Do you have any instruments at home? Try playing a tune or shaking along to ‘Twinkle Twinkle Little star’ like Lester. If you don’t have any instruments, have a go at making some. There are some suggestions to get you started here, but we’re sure you’ll have lots of your own ideas.
- If you have some little toy elephants (or other animals), you could put some bubbly water in a bowl and let them have a bath like Mrs Large.
- Why not help an adult at home to make a tray like Mrs Large did. You could could add a snack, a drink and find a book or magazine too. Then, sit down somewhere quiet and enjoy five minutes’ peace! (That’s Mrs Long’s plan later…)
Remember Nursery, try to give your grown-ups five minutes’ peace this weekend! Try to play somewhere by yourself for a little while or sit and look at a book quietly. Think about poor Mrs Large!
Home Learning
Thank you to everyone who has been able to email us with an update on how you all are. Lots of people seem to have found the previous week trickier than others. Perhaps the change in weather, or simply just that we’ve been at home for 7 weeks now – that’s tough! It’s longer than the summer holidays when we all have lots of plans, outings and gatherings with friends and family. Keep going! You’re all doing a great job. Please remember that our ideas are just suggestions and there are no expectations to complete them. From our own experiences of family life in lockdown, sometimes it’s good to take a step back and have a break too. Perhaps a movie, a cuddle on the sofa with a book or a walk in the sun.
Whatever you choose to do each day, we really do enjoy seeing your photos and reading about the things you have been getting up to. This week you have been really busy again.
- There were some brilliant tinfoil boats. We think the highest number of pennies in a boat was 67. However, we know that some of you ran out of 1p coins and had to use other, heavier coins as well. Well done, everyone!
- You created some fantastic fish to swim in the sea with Barry; we loved all of the different colours that you used.
- And a few more activities including glow-stick dancing in the dark, counting paper fingers, painting VE Day bunting and playing in the great outdoors.
- Finally, before we say goodbye for the long weekend, here is another entry into the Trick Shot Challenge. What a great shot!
Can you make a boat?
Did you enjoy reading about Barry the Fish with Fingers? We love that story. Today, we thought we’d challenge you to make a boat using tinfoil.
- How much foil do you need to use?
- Does it float or sink?
- How many coins (or similar items) can it hold before capsizing?
- Which boat held the fewest coins? Most coins?
If you enjoy this, you could have a go at making a different type of boat using junk modelling things. Think about which material would be best to use and why. What happens to cardboard when it gets wet? Does this boat hold more coins than the tinfoil boat?
Have fun, and remember to let us know how you get on. Send us an email to tell us how many pennies your boat held and we’ll see which boat held the most at the end of the week!
Trick Shot Challenge!
Did you see the Trick Shot Challenge video that we all made? Watch it here if you haven’t seen it yet. We were really pleased to see that we had inspired some of you to have a go at your own challenge. We loved watching this one when it arrived in our inbox yesterday. Well done!