Last month in the Sunflower Room was full of creativity, celebration, and meaningful learning experiences. The children took part in a variety of activities inspired by Lunar New Year, including making colourful lanterns, decorating dragons, engaging in imaginative role play, exploring sensory materials, and creating beautiful cherry blossom prints.
We also enjoyed celebrating Pancake Day, where the children decorated their own pancakes at snack time. This was complemented by lots of pancake-themed sensory and role play, encouraging independence, creativity, and communication.
For Valentine’s Day, we spent time talking about love and relationships, sharing conversations about the special people in our lives and promoting kindness and connection.
A strong focus in February was on emotional development. The children explored different emotions, learning how to identify and communicate their feelings. During forest school sessions, they enjoyed discovering nature and using natural resources to represent emotions in creative ways. We also matched emotions to colours through fine motor activities, supporting both emotional awareness and hand strength.
Our large group music sessions were another highlight, with the children exploring a range of instruments and singing together for enjoyment. These sessions supported self-expression, listening skills, and confidence.
We’ve had such a fun and busy time learning about Chinese New Year!
🧧 In our Talking Tub, the children explored lots of different items linked to China and Chinese New Year. We looked closely at each object, talked about what it might be used for and shared our ideas. One of the highlights was trying on traditional Chinese clothing – the children absolutely loved it and were so excited to see how it looked and felt!
🐲We also worked together to make our very own large dragon. The children decorated paper using bright red and yellow crepe paper, choosing these colours because they represent good luck and happiness. Once our dragon was finished, we took part in a dragon dance – there were lots of smiles, laughter and fantastic teamwork as we brought it to life!
At Forest School, we got creative and made our own “ink” to draw Chinese symbols. First, we went on a stick hunt to find the perfect writing tool. Then we mixed mud, powder paint and water to make a gooey mixture. The children loved dipping their sticks into the mixture and experimenting with making different marks and symbols on paper.
❤️In the tuff tray, we dyed our sand red using food colouring and explored it in lots of different ways. The children used chopsticks to make marks, filled and emptied paper bags and used china dishes in their play.
✏️In our mark making area, we looked at different Chinese symbols, including numbers and animals. The children had a go at recreating the symbols using a variety of writing tools. We talked about how Chinese writing looks different from English writing and noticed how the symbols are formed.
🥢One of the favourite activities was our wonderful “Noodle Bar,” created by Mrs Robins. The children enjoyed role-playing with noodles, Chinese menus, chopsticks and silver trays. They had so much fun making and serving food to their friends, showing great imagination and teamwork.
Pancake Day has definitely been a firm favourite this week! 🥞 They have been so excited chatting all about pancakes to, of course, enjoying eating them!
We’ve been busy with lots of lovely pancake-themed activities…
Pancakes at Forest School
Mrs Stephenson treated us to delicious freshly cooked pancakes at forest school. The children loved choosing their own toppings, deciding between chocolate, jam or butter. They didn’t hang around for long!
The Great Big Pancake – Sand Story
Mrs Robins created a wonderful sand story based on The Great Big Pancake. Using special props linked to the story, she brought it to life and the children were completely engrossed. Afterwards, the props were added to provision so the children could retell and act out the story themselves.
Making Pancakes
This was definitely one of the highlights! We headed to the kitchen with Miss Hamilton and got stuck in weighing ingredients, cracking eggs, pouring milk and taking turns to whisk the mixture. The children were very impressed watching the pancakes being flipped in the pan! Once ready, they chose chocolate or jam for their topping… and let’s just say there were lots of clean plates 😂
Creative Pancakes
In our creative area, we used wooden chips, tissue paper, wool and lots of other materials to design our very own pancakes. As we decorated, we chatted about our favourite toppings, there were some very imaginative ideas!
Tuff Tray Fun
Another big hit was our messy tuff tray! With flour, sprinkles and water, the children mixed, scooped and squished to make their own, very sticky, pancake dough. There were lots of messy hands and even more smiles!
Shopping Lists
In the writing area, we created our own shopping lists. We talked about the different ingredients and toppings we would need for our pancakes and practiced our mark making skills too.
This week has been all about love and kindness throughout our provision — during small group times, large group times, and play 💕
We have been talking about feelings and how important it is for children to feel loved, as well as how we can show love and kindness to others. The children shared some beautiful ideas such as giving cuddles, helping each other, playing with friends, giving kisses to grown-ups, and using kind words ❤️
The children have been learning all about how hedgehogs survive the winter, what they like to eat, why they’re nocturnal, and how they protect themselves with their prickly spikes. This learning continued throughout the provision, as well as during small and large group times. We have had lots of hedgehog fun!
Throughout January, Daisies have been learning and exploring materials linked to birds, using acorns and bird food. They have been learning about Oral hygiene, through sensory play. They have decorated their own bears too!
Today, we enjoyed a Christmas dinner! We had vegetables, mash and chicken.
We made our own special place mats and we also had our own crackers that had a special treat inside, what a way to end the Christmas festivities
