Wellbeing Matters…

Hello Everyone!

We’ve had a lovely week in Green Room, we have been to Stamford Park, having a spa day and learning about Picasso.

On Muddy Morning, we went to Stamford Park to use the play equipment to not only use their gross motor skills but to support their understanding of manage risk. When we go to the park, we don’t want to discourage children from doing something they want to try but we teach them about how they can do it safely. The children wanted to climb and balance along the climbing frames so they were supported by an adult to do this safely. Some children also wanted to jump on and off the roundabout so again, they were shown how to do this safely. The children were also making their own games and playing hide and seek which is a great way of them developing their co-operative learning skills.

As it was Children’s Mental Health Week, we decided to treat the children to a spa day. The children came in in their pyjama’s and the Sensory Room was set up with warm, bubbly footbaths, refreshing cucumbers for their eyes, fresh juice and soothing music. They could also request a hand or a foot massage too. The children loved being pampered and we loved showing them how much we care.

The children have been taking a real interest in castles, so we decided to cut up one of our big boxes to make one! The children have been loving crawling through the castle door, peeping over turrets and even a telescope to spot enemies approaching in the distance!

From the sales of our Christmas cards, we were given some money to spend on resources, so we bought some different sized measuring cylinders for the Water Tray for the children to fill and empty.  We also added some food colouring to the water to make it more obvious to see through the different measuring cylinders.

As we continue to embed our understanding of shape, we read a book called ‘Shape Shift’, which uses shapes in different ways to make objects such as putting a rectangle and a triangle together to make a rocket. So, after reading the book, the children had a go at making their own pictures using the 2D shapes provided. They also used their gross and fine motor skills to draw round shapes.

This week we have introduced the children to the works of Picasso, as we have been asked to take part in an art project with Manchester Grammar School for World Book Day. The aim of the project is to combine an old book with new art work added to it. We decided we would use the art work of Picasso to inspire our interpretation of his take on self portraits. So the children used cut up features from newspapers and magazines to make their own portraits. Here is a sneak peak of the masterpieces they created and all of the portraits will be on display in Altrincham Library in the first week of March to coincide with World Book Day.

We have introduced to our bathroom a door bell to enable the children to ask for help if they need it when they are going to the toilet. Obviously, we only want the children to use it when they need help rather than for fun, so this was explained to them. It has quickly become know as the ‘poo bell’ between them which they think is hilarious!

Developing our rhyming skills, we read ‘Hairy Maclary from Donaldson’s Dairy’. The children showed a real interest in these stories so we got out all the stories we had by Lynley Dodd, and the children discussed their similarities and differences, because some have dogs and some have cats. They also love pretending to be us and reading to the class too!

To support our accuracy of counting we played a game with a dice. The children rolled the dice and then counted how many spots were on the dice, before then choosing to do an action eg, 5 star jumps, 2 claps. To add a bit more to the challenge, we then added another dice to the game to develop their counting on skills and counting accurately to higher numbers.

Last week we introduced playdough to our provision and the children were making cakes and pizza so this week we decided to make pizza in real life! The children had a choice of different toppings, using their chopping and sprinkling skills and then they got to eat them too! Delicious!

Next week we are looking forward to seeing you at Stay and Play at 10.30am on Valentines Day and therefore we have moved Muddy Morning to Wednesday.

Have a great weekend.

The Green Room Team