Down on the Farm

Ethan used to love playing on the model farm I picked up for £3 from a summer fete last year (mainly putting on the vehicles on it, sometimes adding pebbles too) but lately he hasn't been interested at all.  So while he was at nursery today I thought I would jazz it up a bit with some compost and hay (shhh, don't tell the guinea pigs!). I also got all the farm animals out, a tractor and some small model cats.

I had placed the pig in a box containing compost as it's pen.  Ethan said "How can the pig get out of there? I know, he can jump out!" and then he spotted Jess the cat and told me he needed Postman Pat and his van too.  It was lovely to see him engaging in play with this again after many months of being disinterested in it.  Adding natural materials was a great way to make this play a more sensory experience and Ethan enjoyed smelling and touching it.

Coloured Salt

Given the success of yesterday's invitation to play, I have decided to try and do one each day for Ethan. I have been meaning to do something with coloured salt ever since I saw it on the Imagination Tree website.  I poured some table salt into a tub, added quite a few drops of blue food colouring and then stirred it until it became a powdery blue.  I liked how sparkly the salt made it look and Ethan commented on that when he came down and found it presented in a blue (unused!) cat litter tray with a tool in.

Ethan thought it was sugar at first and ran straight over to investigate further.  At first he used the tool to drag through the salt.  Then he asked if he could make a hand print. Then I showed him how I could write an e in it for Ethan using my finger and he copied.

After this Ethan ran to get the cookie cutters to make shapes in the salt.  He made a hexagon and diamond and asked me what the shape names were.  He also made a crocodile and pig.

Then Ethan added the cars.

He had so much fun with the existing resources by utilising them in a new way with the salt.

Valentines Day Ideas

Inspired by these fab felt counting valentines at Itty Bitty Love I decided to make some out of corrugated card I picked up from my favourite discount store Wilkos! Ethan Bear finds numbers a bit tricky so I hope using some physical objects to aid counting will help him understand the meaning and relevance of numbers more.  Sticking the gems and foam shapes on and the tactile feel of the card all contribute to this being a very sensory experience of learning numbers.  I will update further how all the children get on with this new resource when introduced to it.

This links in with the EYFS in the following ways:

Mathematics - Numbers: Knows that numbers identify how many objects are in a set.
Shows curiosity about numbers by offering comments or asking questions.

I also made some strawberry jelly play dough, a very slight variation on the valentines play dough at The Imagination Tree.  It was really simple to make and turned out much nicer than the shop bought stuff.  Ethan loved using the rolling pin and heart cutters to play with the dough.  He made a giant cake by filling all the cutters with dough and stacking them on top of each other and moulded the dough round the rolling pin to make a turtle with rolling pin head.  He chattered away whilst playing getting the big cutters to talk to the little ones and putting on different voices.  Ethan got so much from this resource playing with it for hours before going to play with his duplo and then returning asking for it to be brought out again.  

Today I made some chocolate play dough  (another great recipe from Imagination Tree) to add to our collection.  I gave it to Ethan with some birthday candles and he had a ball.  He recently turned three so loved me singing happy birthday and then pretended to blow the candles out.  He made a spider cake (pictured below), horse cake, chocolate chicken, eggs and sausages.  These play dough experiments have really taken Ethan's imaginative play into a whole new dimension and the versatility of the dough means it can become anything at any time.  Big success :)

All the children have loved the play dough today.  They have offered me a cake and a cup of tea and set to work rolling it out and poking candles in before taking the candles out and putting them back in the holes.

This activity links to the EYFS in the following ways:

Expressive Arts & Design - Being Imaginative - Engages in imaginative role-play based on own first-hand experiences, Notices what adults do, imitating what is observed and then doing it spontaneously when the adult is not there, Uses available resources to create props to support role-play, Plays alongside other children who are engaged in the same theme.

Expressive Arts & Design - Exploring & Using Media & Materials:  Explores and experiments with a range of media through sensory exploration, and using whole body.

Communication & Language - Listening & Attention: Maintains attention, concentrates and sits quietly during appropriate activity.   

Communication & Language - Speaking:  Learns new words very rapidly and is able to use them in communicating, Introduces a storyline or narrative into their play.

Today we made Valentine's Jam Heart Tarts.  I was feeling lazy so bought some ready rolled pastry for the children to make them with but I'm sure they would be even nicer if you made that from scratch too and the children would love mixing the dough.  The children loved cutting the heart shapes out and then putting them in the baking tin.  They counted how many hearts there were when the tins were full and then spooned the jam out and cut out the hearts for the top.  We had some pastry left over so the children played with it (just as I remember playing with left over pastry dough as a child and loving it).

  


What are you up to for Valentines day?