This week in the classroom...
9th May
This week, we have continued exploring the story of ‘Daisy Duck and the Egg.’ By Jane Simmons.
The older children have been learning how to hear and blend the phonemes through words. We played a game called ‘cross the pond’ where each child held either a cat, dog, bug or ‘Pip’ the duckling. A piece of blue cloth was laid on the floor to represent the pond and then the children had to ask if they could cross the pond? Mamma Duck said ‘You can cross the deep blue pond if you are a b-u-g/c-at etc.’ The children blended the phonemes to make the word and knew if it was their turn to cross the pond.
The weather has been so lovely! All the children have been eager to investigate the activities outside. Many have discovered a variety of mini-beasts and we used the opportunity to describe and compare them. This can be quite a challenging activity for young children but it really helps develop their language skills by extending their vocabulary and encouraging them to listen to the ideas of others. We have also been really excited to notice, that the caterpillars we have been observing, have now become cocoons and we can’t wait to see them emerge as butterflies!
To support the children’s learning in Maths this week, they have been finding out about patterns. We used ducks and frogs to make a simple repeated ‘duck, frog, duck, frog’ pattern and practiced continuing patterns using coloured beads e.g. red, blue, red, blue or green, green, yellow. Perhaps you could look for different patterns on clothing, paper, curtains etc. Try making your own patterns using coloured bricks, strips of paper, toys, socks. Have fun, pattern detectives.
To finish the week, we all made up our own Duck dance, waddling, flapping and wiggling. As you can imagine, it was also very funny. I wonder who can do the best Duck dance in your house? You might enjoy watching the Cbeebies ballet of ‘The Ugly Duckling’ to inspire you. Click here.
Our children always enjoy joining in every day with ‘rhyme time’. The 2yr olds are learning to sit with others and listen to the rhymes, using their eyes to look at the adult. They have started to learn ‘Baa, Baa, Black Sheep’, copying the actions and remembering the words. The older children have begun to learn ‘Hey Diddle Diddle’ and ’One Two Buckle My Shoe’. You can find these rhymes and many more, on the ‘Little Wandle Letters and Sounds’ web site by clicking on the ‘For Parents’ tab on the top of the page and then selecting ‘Nursery Rhyme’ videos.
2nd May
This week, we have continued exploring the story of ‘Daisy Duck and the Egg.’ By Jane Simmons. We have been learning the book vocabulary; ‘front cover, title, author and illustrations and talked about the job of the illustrator.
The older children continued to practice recognizing where a word starts and finishes by trapping them with their fingers and we counted how many words in a sentence. They also began to think about sequencing the story; ‘What happened at the beginning, middle, and end of the story?’ This is a good activity to practice at home. You can use a story your child knows very well, or think about some of the things you have done that day e.g. at the beginning of the day we went shopping, in the middle of the day we had lunch and at the end the day we went to bed.
To support the children’s learning in Maths this week, they have continued to sing and act out the number song ‘5 Little Ducks’, matching their fingers to the number of ducklings and talking about ‘How many?’ ‘How many ducklings came back?’ ‘How many are lost?’ The older children have also been learning how to count actions through recognizing how many spots are on a dice or paper plate, and matching the correct number of claps/jumps/ nods. They practiced jumping along a number line outside and counting as they jumped. You might like to practice this at home, as you count the steps up the stairs or clap the number of times you choose. Remember to stop at the stopping number.
Outside, the children had great fun using different pieces of equipment to move around and over their ‘pond’. They talked about which pieces to use and experimented with how to place them so they didn’t fall in the ‘water’.
We have been thinking this week, about where Daisy Duck lived, in a big pond. We shared a video of some of the animals that you might find in or on a pond, learning about, frogs, frogspawn, tadpoles, pond snails and pond skaters. Some of the children used their cutting and tearing skills to make their own pond pictures from a range of materials.
Our children always enjoy joining in every day with ‘rhyme time’. The 2yr olds are learning to sit with others and listen to the rhymes, using their eyes to look at the adult. They have started to learn ‘Baa, Baa, Black Sheep’, copying the actions and remembering the words. The older children have begun to learn ‘Hey Diddle Diddle’ and ’One Two Buckle My Shoe’. You can find these rhymes and many more, on the ‘Little Wandle Letters and Sounds’ web site by clicking on the ‘For Parents’ tab on the top of the page and then selecting ‘Nursery Rhyme’ videos.