Here at Kingswood, when we start a new term, we love to focus on ‘All About Me’ and engaging in many different activities to help support settling in our new friends and explore all of our senses. Here are some of the things that we have been up to in September.
All About Me!
In our Baby Room the children enjoyed exploring the mirrors, looking at, and pointing to, their eyes, nose, hair and looking through their All About Me booklets. They also enjoyed singing songs to identify their own body parts. A great one to sing for this is ‘Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes’!
Emergency Service Day!
On September 9th, the children enjoyed dressing up in our emergency service fancy dress, and using imaginative play in the role play areas to pretend to be doctors, nurses and police. The older children in our Pre-School and Toddler Rooms then held discussions around how these people help us, what to do in an emergency, and if they would like to do these jobs when they grow up.
Parent Information Packs
Here at Kingswood, we like to make sure we are supporting not only the children, but their families too. We have a range of information packs that can be borrowed and taken home to support you with things like Potty Training, Sleep Times, Ditching the Dummy, Toothbrushing and New Baby. If you need more information around these areas for your child, a great website which provides drop in and online events is https://www.sheffielddirectory.org.uk/start-well-sheffield-events/.
Nature Walks
The children love to get out and about! Here at Kingswood we love utilising our surroundings to explore. We have such a lovely woodland area opposite the building, where the children like to go on nature walks to collect lots of natural recourses to expand the curiosity approach and the loose parts areas of the rooms. Here are some examples of what they’ve been gathering recently:
Extending Activities
After the nature walk, the children loved to use what they had found in some exciting activities. Here you can see the children using the sticks to make marks with the paint; it is a great way to make the most of the natural resources and for them to progress their physical and literacy development. They also used their findings in a sensory way, by adding them to the playdough and talking about the different textures.
Activity Ideas to Try at Home
Here are a couple of activities that we set up for our children to enjoy. We love creating a great sensory experience for the children and they are nice and simple for you to have a go at home too. The tuff tray is playdough, adding the feathers for more textures. Like before, you can add anything to playdough to make it more exciting. Some good information on how to make playdough, and why it is a good play experience, can be found via the following link https://www.bbc.co.uk/tiny-happy-people/articles/z4tdd6f. The water activity is nice and simple too, adding fruit for the children to embrace their senses in touch, smell and even taste.