Hot days invite water play, but with a group that is very much into social and role play, water play can have an original twist. On this day,the girls had set up a foot shop, where feet were bathed, wiped, sponged, cooled down and made beautiful.
Then they started on arms, too.
This play was gentle, caring and practical – one situation where water is soothing and calming. Not far away, in the “lake”, it was exuberant and satisfyingly splashy.
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We have a new helper for a few weeks, Mie. She is sharing some of her Japanese culture with us. This week we made sushi. The seaweed paper, as the children called it, was a new ingredient for our cooking, and a rather different vegetable! Most of the children didn’t know sushi- except for Blythe, who loves sushi! She recommends avocado but we didn’t have that. Some of the taste testers were not t at all keen on it, whilst others were very happy to eat the spares and everybody else’s too!
We have been looking after our carrots for months, it was exciting to finally be able to pull them up and enjoy them! We ate carrot sticks and dip (also celery sticks but they were not as popular.)
Every child had at least a taste, and some didn’t even open their own snack box, they were enjoying the kinder produce so much.
We made good use of the carrot tops, feeding them to the worms, and the chooks, and using some of them to do an experiment. We hope it will work.
We have a new helper at kinder sometimes. Her name is Mie and she is from Japan. Today she told us a little bit about Japan.
She also showed us how to make some animals by folding paper. We used big paper, not true origami paper.
And we practised using chopsticks! We are looking forward to learning lots more from Mie, and teaching her about Australia as well. Thanks for coming to our kinder!
Jolie used some cardboard rolls and other bits and pieces to create “3 in the bed” – and when she shared her creation with the rest of the group, there was a rush on cardboard rolls.
So much thought and enjoyment and personal involvement happens around self-chosen art and craft activities. I love the contagious creativity when children share ideas, the language that arises from sharing their stories, the problem-solving (eg in how to represent the knob on top of the radio antennae), the developing fine – motor skills involved in cutting, wrapping, drawing, decorating , and the happy hum of a busy craft table.
A new set of outside furniture, designed to withstand the rigours of the Australian sun, and to extend the sensory, fine motor and socio-dramatic play around the sandpit. Expensive, but finally achievable (thanks to some help from our local council), and worth waiting for.
We don’t bring any tools or toys to bush kinder but Rory brought his own binoculars and kindly shared them with other people so we could all have a look at the itchy caterpillar nest up in the tree. We didn’t know that any caterpillars build a nest !
We have been digging up some ground to shift our succulents. The ground has been pretty hard so sometimes we need a rest, but the satisfaction of doing things for themselves has kept the children going. (No tap nearby means they had to cart the water.)
This work will mean we can plant our vegies next term. From garden to plate.
Our special visitor, Willy, came for another visit and we used twig brushes to do some dot painting on little boomerangs. And we had fun with him – he showed us how he used to make a hopscotch game when he was little.
Thanks for another wonderful visit, Willy!
We’re going to visit the residents of Pattinson House, our local Hostel, on Monday so we are going to take a present, a picture to help them feel happy. It was a group project, with every child contributing in different ways – but they all wanted to add some bling with a “jewel” (recycled costume jewellery), sequins or glitter – these things certainly make the children happy!