Top tips for talking:
Use simple repetitive language - Keep sentences short:
Describe your everyday activities.  As you talk about what you are doing ("I'm washing the cup"), repeat your words for slowly and clearly.  Saying things more than once helps children to join in and pick up new words.

Makaton - Hello, Thank you, Children's Names and Fruits.

The story of Little Rabbit Foo Foo - lots of good storytellers and great actions too.  It's a good story that's easy to pick up due to the repetitiveness of the story - Have you heard it yet?

Messy play:
Moonsand - a mixture of sand and shaving foam.  This makes the sand easier to mould.  You can squeeze it, gather it up to make a mole hill or a volcano, swirl it around and oh it smells so lovely.

Hide and seek with the ducks - Ducks (of the plastic variety) were scattered around and each one had a number on the bottom, when a duck was found the child had to recognise the number and then find the hoop with the correct number in it.  Good for number recognition.  Then it was time to find out which hoop had the most ducks in and which had the least.  Good counting skills and lots of fun.

Forest club - Collecting flowers for Mothers Day, it was explained that flowers are not to be picked unless given permission and this time the adult says it's okay.  Talking about flowers - what they need to help them grow, some flowers were open and some were closed, we talked about how the sun makes the flowers open.

A visit to the church to watch Stanton Drew Primary School children and their Easter celebrations.  Lovely to see some of our old friends and good for our little ones to say hello to who will be some of their new teachers all too soon.  Thank you for the invitation and once again our little ones were on their very best behaviour and did you all proud.

Lots of bubbly water play inside, pouring, scooping, sinking and floating and trying to keep the water with in the tub - nearly successful, although some of us ended up looking like we had got in! still it was lots and lots of fun:-)

Many forms of weather lately - Rain, sun, wind, snow and ice!
Just remember to wrap up warm, its always easier to take off layers than not have enough and we are more than happy to help putting on boots and having spare shoes.  As for the older children who will soon be attending school, Velcro shoes are best in enabling them to have a go themselves in readiness for school.

Weekly Makaton Signs: Thank you, Good, Names and Fruits

Top tips for talking:
Join in with your child's play.  A Language and thinking will develop through interactions with others.  The arises naturally from a shared activity which provides something of interest to talk about and gives a clear context for words and meanings.

Top tips for 2 year olds:
I can do it myself! Even though it may take me ages to do something and I may not get it right; its really important I have a go.  I may become frustrated if everything is done for me.  You'd be surprised how much I can do given the chance.

Chinese new year:  Thank you to all those that came to join us in our celebrations with noodles, rice, spring rolls, trying out chopsticks.  We hope you all enjoyed our story of the Chinese Emperor and how the animals had a race to become which year.  It is the year of the dog.
This term we are looking at the story of "Little Rabbit Foo Foo"  The story will be told firstly with the book, but this will progress onto telling the story without the book and using actions.  The story and the props for this will be out so the children can access the story as and when they want to, being able to share it amongst themselves.  The children have also been adding to the props by making additional items, such as a hammer, a bike and a wiggly worm.  However this has also led onto making other things such as tools for the toolbox.   Stories are such a great way of inspiring the imagination, leading into other areas for their creative thinking.

Forest Club:  Lots of tree rubbings and footprints using crayons in many colours, learning how to hold the crayon on its side works best
and with our muddy boots stepping onto paper to see the many different patterns our boots make.
We then played hide and seek.  We teach the children about "1, 2, 3 Where are you?" When the finders call this out, the hiders shout back "we're over here"  This helps the children to understand that although it is ok to hide, sometimes when parents can't find them and call out, they need to help in being found.  It also encourages good listening skills, as those finding have to listen and follow the direction of voices.

Lego - good for fine motor skills, managing to construct by pushing the small bricks.  Lots of chatter, discussing what they are building, what pieces are needed, asking one another for help and to pass things.  Good imagination creating airports and hangers to put planes in, because the airport is for people and not for planes.  Creating houses, for this we had to have doors and windows, oh and don't forget the roof otherwise the rain will get in - Good idea!