The weeks are flying by and we've already done so much this half term. The children are all happy and flourishing and the new additions continue to settle into playgroup routines and are beginning to show their individual characteristics.
We had a great morning on our Autumn which was well attended and joined by two parent helpers. We explored the changing colours in the environment and talked about why some leaves change colour while others remain green. We collected a range of autumnal material including leaves and apples. We observed the decay of the apples over the following weeks and discovered if the apple was damaged it decayed much faster compared to another which still looked good enough to eat. We made pictures experimenting with the different seed heads we collected which led to vegetable printing and healthy eating discussions. We used dried pulses and pasta to create paper plate pictures which ranged from patterns to animal heads. Using colours we had observed we colour mixed to produce our own season tree display.
We have displayed our British Values and other cultural celebrations by talking about Diwali, looking at fact books to retell the story of Sita, Rama and the Hindu Monkey God Hanuman. We had a look at a real Diva lamp and making Diva lamp models to add to our Festival of Lights display board.
There has been lots of toil and trouble during our Halloween predictable theme with pumpkin pictures, pumpkin carving, making potions, casting wriggly worm spells in spaghetti using our phonic knowledge and re-enacting everyone's favourite story 'Room on a Broom' with the children all taking on a role using props and following their cues.
We celebrated Bonfire Night talking about safe use of sparklers and fire safety together with a fire drill practice. We erected our own 'bonfire' and using the different coloured leaves to symbolise the fire we'll discuss the welfare of our wildlife. The remainder of this term continues to emphasise around number work and phase 1 phonics as well as the usual in the moment planning around the children's interests.
