Well, we had some old pens that barely worked – and I’ve noticed with old pens, that if you dip them in water, they work for just a little bit more time.
So, instead of throwing them straight in the bin, while Ted was having a moment of craziness, I used them as a basis for ‘an invitation to play’…..
It worked very well thank you! A moment of peace AND creativity! 😉🎨
It’s been a week of Valentines here, starting with the making and decorating of heart shape cookies in English Club….
…with the change of the sensory tray to a Valentines theme…
..with various books. This one, a very basic one for Ted, explaining what Valentines day is…
..this wonderful story, also for Ted, about a baby who is just loved SO much. Alfie loved this when he was smaller, especially when the baby’s cousin loved him so much he wanted to fight him! 😉 It seemed Ted shared this love of the book, and asked me to read it many times! Excellent!
This one, for Alfie’s age and older, a humorous story about the facts of love. What is love? How does it feel? Who can love? What can you love? Is love a good or a bad feeling? Brilliant! And yes, there is an english translation!
Finally, this book, for Alfie’s age and older. A factual book explaining about the organ ‘the heart’ and how it works. This was detailed, but simple, and a very good first human biology book.
Then, of course, we painted hearts…
…and decorated them…
We played ‘keep the balloon off the ground’ with our lovely heart shaped balloons…
…and had a simple Valentine themed math ‘centre’…
I thought I had bought small decorative hearts (I found these in a garden shop), but it turned out they were made of chocolate – and it didn’t take Alfie long to find out! So now we just have the paper hearts left!
Finally, we had a Valentines waffle breakfast..
…and our lovely Maya, arranged the traditional family Valentines dinner, all by herself….
…burgers in heart shapes, pink pasta, red ‘love’ sauce, cherry tomatoes, and red peppers in heart shapes…
…lets just see those heart shaped peppers again..
What a wonderful surprise!
We hope you had a happy Valentines too! ❤️
By mixing dried green split peas and dried white beans, this made for a nice ‘Christmas tree’ mix (think evergreen and snow!). I also added some Christmas sequins which added shine and a festive feel – but unfortunately they can’t be seen in the picture as they were hidden underneath…
I also added a Christmas tree baking tray, and an uncut strip of tinsel – plus scissors…
…a tall green tin thermos (think of that lovely clanging sound when the dried peas/beans are dropped into it), and lots of tools – a funnel, tongs, measuring cups, a spaghetti scoop and a metal ladle…
I left it open ended to see what would happen….having the tray near the play kitchen encouraged extra role play….first he used the ladle to scoop the material into the baking tray, to make ‘goulash soup’…
Later using fingers…and trying the tongs when he spilled (very tricky)…
The play plates came out for serving…
…before moving on to scooping the peas/beans through the funnel into the thermos…
To be fair, we’ve had this sensory tray out for a week or so now, and it’s been very popular and used in many ways. Although the sense of the peas/beans spilling through hands is wonderful, the practise of using different tools is both important and fun for Ted – as well as the role play of course! 😉
More great ideas for little ones, from another great blog ‘Teach Preschool’ – this time, experimenting with ‘peppermint’ – in other words, candy canes! 😉
Firstly, a shaving foam/peppermint aroma/red food colouring mix…
…makes for wonderful sensory fun..!
Secondly, experimenting with a real candy cane in water, made for super exciting observation…
Ted tried to ‘blow’ the candy cane smaller (see picture!), and predicted that the candy cane would get smaller and smaller. He ‘sounded out’ his vision of the candy cane’s red colour disappearing in to the water (you could actually see this happening), and we talked about it ‘dissolving’.
Thirdly, our candy cane picture, outlined by myself, with masking tape spread in stripes across it, and painted red by Ted…
…which looked brilliant when cut out with
the tape removed…
Great fun! 🍭
I saw this on ‘No Time For Flashcards’ (what a fabulous blog for ideas with littles!) – and I thought we’d give it a try…
A folded piece of paper, opened up, with the painted ‘sketch’ of a Christmas tree on one side – and baubles (which Ted added)….
..fold it carefully back over, and smooth it out (Ted liked this bit)…
…and open it up (Ted liked this bit even more!)…
Fabulous! And don’t forget to add glitter!
Of course we had to try this again (and again and again and again…) 🙂
Great fun! 🎨
Ted is truly a musical child – he just loves singing and dancing….
This week we’ve been putting on the Christmas songs and dancing around to the music with our homemade Christmas instruments…
….jingle bells…
…a Christmas coloured rice shaker…
…and a Christmas drum…
….Christmas instruments….
🙂
Some weeks ago we concluded our primary colours by going on a ‘blue walk’…
We discovered there were lots of blue things about… 😉
We found lots of books with blue related things….
…’The Blue Balloon’ was our favourite…
….which meant playing with them of course…
…and the blue rice was a hit too…
Beautiful brilliant blue! I think we may have our colours now! 😉
Last week we were playing with the colour yellow..
Collecting yellow..
Bathing in yellow..
Reading books about yellow things…
Eating yellow…
Learning about the yellow sun…
Creating yellow (suns perhaps?)…
..writing in yellow shaving foam..
Playing with yellow water beads..
..and appreciating yellow…
This week we’re discovering blue… 🙂
I’ve noticed that Ted’s still a little unsure about his colours – I’m not sure if he’s mixing colour names and languages, but, although he has a better idea now, I decided to try to make it a little more concrete…starting with the colour red….
Every day we read a (swedish) book, appropriately named ‘Nicholas’ Red Day’…
…a charming book about a little boy who discovers how the colour red can make people happy…
Nicholas discovered that his favourite fruit was red (strawberries), that red roses smelt wonderful, and that the red traffic light means ‘Stop’, among other things.
Ted and I went for a walk spotting red things – cars, buses, signposts, berries on trees, and a red traffic light. We stopped, and we didn’t cross till the light turned green. We went to the shop and chose red things for lunch – strawberries, red currants, cherry tomatoes and red peppers…
A little later we made a red collage – red paint, red glue, and lots of red items to choose from…
During the week we picked red plums (yes, ours are really more red than purple!)…
..we made red rose petal play dough…
….we played with red stones in a red tray with red containers….
…and the small boys had a red bath too ! 😉
I think we’ve got red covered! 🙂
Ted is certainly one who likes to move around – and move THINGS around – a lot. So it’s nice, on the odd occasion, to find something with a little ‘staying power’…..;)
And that’s water of course!
An assortment of tools, and a big paddling pool…
However, it was the wild sea animals that kept him amused…
Throwing them in to the pool..
…and fishing them out with a net…
…before leaving them out to dry…
Ted saw this as a serious mission – rescuing the sea animals, and then setting them all out in the sun – seeing the water drops slowly disappear was a simple science observation, while fishing them out was a gross motor skill being practised… 😉
Squashed Tomatoes 