http://www.earleybird.org.uk

Please visit the website http://www.earleybird.org.uk/ for more information about the preschool I am now working for.

Party Fun!

Toddler Group Christmas Party - we had M.A.D acadamy come and do a party for us, and it was wonderful! The children had a wonderful time, with ribbons, parachutes, bubbles and dancing and singing.

It's been a long time...

Well! It's been a while, a long long while since I updated on here, and I do apologise! But I started working more hours from May, and when I looked, it is no coincidence that my last post on here was April!!!!

So of course, it is nearly that time again, Christmas!! The thing to do this year seems to be cooking - the after school children have already enjoyed making mini-fruit cakes, and marzipanning and icing/decorating them. Some got donated to the school christmas fayre raffle too.

We have shortbread biscuits to make, and biscuit stars to decorate with the littlies during the day. An outing to the local garden centre to see the festive decorations/themed areas, and a trip to the Bear Factory to help make some reindeers for us to play with. Toddler group christmas party is lucky to have the M.A.D Acadamy attending to host the event. The after school children this year are also looking forward to our christmas outing to Madhouse after school since i now have the 7 seater car and we can get there, we thought it would be fun to go out this year!

From caterpillar to Beautiful Butterflies!!

Following on from a foam crafty session of decorating butterflies, my 'hungry caterpillar' storysack came out, and we enjoyed 3 of Eric Carle's books as well as learning the days of the week, and about the symmetry of a butterfly by doing a butterfly puzzle. The lifecycle of a caterpillar into either a moth or a butterfly fascinated the children, and once again this children's classic book proves to be a wonderful educational and enjoyable resource opening up avenues upon avenues of activities for the children to have fun with.

Happy Shopper

Cranium Superfort is a brilliant piece of equiptment allowing the children to themselves build whatever they decide to build. My son built this construction, and then I decided to set it up as a shop for the children to enjoy role playing in. It proved very popular in the Spring/Easter Holidays. The Reception aged children have been learning about money at school so this role play area linked nicely into helping support their learning.

February Half Term Fun

My were we busy!! As well as playdough, cooking, dressing up and dancing, we went to Wellington Country Park, The London aquariam, and the REME Museum at Aborfield. The REME is a great place and I thoroughly recomend it for anyone from around this area - the children got to do a drill session with an army sergant, look at army vehicles, experiment with making paper helicopters and plastic parachutes (see pic). At the London aquarium, the stingrays were popular and of course the sharks!!

Oh Christmas Tree oh Christmas tree....

We had a christmas dinner after school, complete with our very own christmas tree desert. Made from croissent dough and decorated with cherries and sprinkles, it really did look the part, and they had a wonderful time making and decorating it...as well as eating it!

Library's 20th Birthday celebrations

After school today, we visited the lower earley library for the family story and craft session to help them celebrate their 20th birthday. The children enjoyed stories and made birthday cards and decorate birthday cake pictures that are proudly displayed on the library wall. But by far the biggest hit was the face painting - the lady did a wonderful job, and here is the line up when we got home....

Happy Halloween!!

We had a fantastic halloween party this year, J said it was the best halloween ever. We made chocolate covered apples, decorated with faces. Played pin the face on the pumpkin, musical statues to the Time Warp and Monster mash and listened to spookey stories. We trick or treated at friend's houses only, and enjoyed a tea of sausages, homemade wedges and beans.

Welcome!

As part of helping the children learn about caring for others and other living things, and taking responsibilty, we have a new edition to our household - 'Dale the snail' our Giant African Snail!

This term running alongside all the usual fun and games, arts and crafts, I am encouraging the children's personal and social development by getting them actively involved with caring for the snail, and talking about feelings and friendships. I have put together a 'feelings' bag with many books about specific feelings, and more general stories about friendships. There are some picture cards exploring emotions, a dvd called 'Transporters' which was designed with Autistic children in mind, but enjoyed by all children as it encourages them to learn about emotions/facial expressions. There is also a music cd all about feeling angry which we have had on and enjoyed.

We also have a large trampoline - exercise is vital to aid the physical development of children, and what better way than outdoors in the fresh air on a trampoline. I have a policy and permission forms in place, and it will only be used fully supervised and one at a time, with the safety net in place at all times. Its big enough for adults too ;-)

and now its the school holidays!!

Well, this last half term has just raced by! Of course I was lucky enough to be in Spain for 2 weeks of it, but even so, suddenly the summer holidays are almost upon us.

This last month has involved lots more water table play, this time in the garden, making the most of whenever it has not been raining heavily! Lots of football, and playdough outside too. Also chasing bubbles has been lots of fun, leading to washing up liquid top ups, which they ingeniously then used to 'wash the cars' in the garden. Kept them busy for hours, and my little tikes cars are nice and clean (until they get rained on again and again!)

We have also done some cooking, and father's day crafts before we went on holiday. Daddy's this year got decorated mugs and hand made cards.

Not working much over the summer holidays, but back in September with a full timetable, so watch this space for my plans!

Happy summer everyone x