Tree Planting in the Park

The children enjoyed joining the team from Urban Green for some tree planting in the park. The children enjoyed planting trees in a small piece of woodland at the back of the park. We hope they will grow big and strong just like us!

Our day didn’t end with planting. We had lots of fun walking the route past the river and met lots of friendly dogs. What a wonderful day we had. We are looking forward to visiting the park again soon.

How will we feed the bees?

The children looked at a short clip about mini beasts. We learned some new facts such as a woodlouse has 14 legs and an exoskeleton, a spider has eight eyes to match its eight legs and a worm has no lungs! After the clip we talked about the mini beasts we had identified and what we had learned about them.

“If we have no bees, a flower won’t be alive. We could give them something to make them feel good”

-R

“Water them and give them some respect”

- Alma

After listening to a child discussing what would happen if we did not have bees anymore, we wondered how we could attract more into our garden. Imogen explained that the bees need to pollinate so we need to give them some food. But where does the food come from? The children wanted to plant lots of flowers in the garden to attract lots of bees.

The children helped to plant some bulbs and seeds. We plan to grow them and plant them in our nursery garden to attract not only bees but lots of other minibeasts. We planted nasturtium, iris, marigolds, lobelia, geranium, gladioli and mesembryanthemum. Our garden is going to look beautiful when it is in full bloom this year. We chatted about how we will care for our garden and the children were unanimous in their ideas of water the seeds, give them sunlight and lots of fresh air!

“I planted daisy chains”

-Ted

“The bees will be sad because they won’t be able to get any pollen and they can’t make honey for us”

-Alma

Designing Our Own Bird Feeders

Once we had all the resources we needed, the children began to create their bird feeders. Some children added holes to their plastic bottles so they could push sticks through for the birds to sit on. Others created windows so the birds could fly inside and eat the bird seed. Pompoms and feathers were added to make their design look attractive. We then talked about how we would attach our bird feeders to the trees.

“This hangs on here and the bottle and then the other bit hangs in the tree. I had to tie the knot with some help”

-Henrietta

The children used their problem solving skills to ensure their bird feeders were exactly as they had planned. Felix wanted to create the correct sized hole for the birds and then tie his string to his bottle but it was proving difficult to do so however with some quick thinking he came up with another plan.

“I’ve done it. There’s a little bit of water but they might need that. The birds are really big so I need to make the hole go up. The string won’t reach the tree. I think it’s too low down. I need to make the hole bigger”.

“My idea didn’t work so I need to make this hole bigger and add more string”.

-Felix

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The Blue Giant and the Apple Tree

The children looked at the book ‘The Blue Giant’ together. It is a beautiful written story about our oceans becoming filled with rubbish and the effect this has on the sea life. The children began to discuss how to support the natural world and take care of our planet. The children knew how important sea life and the oceans are to our planet and seemed genuinely concerned. They began to discuss their ideas around how we can help.

“Rubbish was going in. If you put it in the your long term memory so you can remember to not put it in the sea”

- Child

“We could swim under the water to get the rubbish out”

- Edward

“A sweetie wrapper was on the birds beak, it can’t eat. Mum doesn’t like cars because they are polluted. They have diesel and petrol. We could make carrier bags into something new”.

- Alma

The practitioner asked the children what we could do to help at nursery. Ted began to talk about taking care of our nursery garden by watering the plants we already have. He also suggested that we could plant our apple seeds and grow new fruit trees. He pointed out we would have to water them and then we could eat the fruits which grow on them. The children thought this was a great idea and luckily we had all the items we needed to plant apple seeds. Hannah popped to the kitchen and collected two apples for us and we counted the seeds to make sure we had enough for everyone. There was even enough for the grown ups to grow their own tree! We carefully planted our apple seeds in small pots and Ted reassured us that they would be watered in order for them to grow.

What does a worm village look like?

Once we had finished our plans and collected all the resources we needed, the children got to work on their wormery’s. The children had chosen to use cardboard boxes and tubes as the initial construction of their wormery and then wanted to add leaves, sticks and soil to make them really cosy. As the morning progressed, the children’s discussions changed as they wanted to attract more mini beasts into their homes. They began to talk about some of the other mini beasts they may find in their wormerys.

“I’m going to make a rocket ship for the worms. They crawl through the tube and come out the little hole. I will glue the circle on. It’s for the light. My house is for ants”.

-Ewan

“That’s the box and the tube makes the tunnel so they can get through. This tube is a chimney. The leaves are for hiding. It’s going to be for ladybirds!”

- Rory

Some of the children chose to work together and connect their homes together to make a ‘super home’. They discussed what the mini beasts might do in their houses and where they could be placed in our garden. Theo wanted to add pompoms to his wormery so the creatures inside would feel warm and comfortable. Another child decided to fill their home with leaves, soil and sticks. We quickly ran out of the natural resources but luckily our garden is plentiful in natural materials so we quickly collected more so we could continue with our plans. One child added more and more natural resources he became very excited. He had spotted a mini beast already in his wormery.

“There’s already a bug in mine.I don’t know what type. He’s crawling there, that one! There! That's a beetle. I think he likes it. He’s loving it! He’s loving it! Look, he likes it, look”.

““I’ve made a bed. It goes on the top. We could make a town, a little village with all of our houses. It’s got cushions to sleep on””

— Theo

How can we repurpose plastic bottles?

The children shared a book about the life of a plastic bottle and we discussed how we can recycle plastic bottles but also what else they could be used for before recycling.

“I’ve got two recycle bins. Brown and Brown. They have loads of rubbish. I has recycling. I has when things are broken. I recycle toys in the bin”

- Sebastian

Felix had an amazing suggestion of using the bottle to create a bird feeder which could attract wildlife to our garden. We began to plan our bird feeders and think about what materials we would need to construct them. The children were so proud of their work, they wanted to share it with their friends and family so we talked about making a copy of their drawing. Henrietta had already used our nursery photocopier and was excited to share this with her friends. The children each took turns to copy their picture. Sebastian was amazed when he looked at his identical drawings. We had all the resources we required except plastic bottles. The children suggested they bring in a bottle from home. We were now ready to create our bird feeders. The following day the children proudly walked into nursery with their bottles ready to get started but we had forgotten a major part of our bird feeder… the bird seed!

Luke suggested we pop to the shops. He knew exactly where we could buy the bird seed from as he had visited the shop many times. “It’s a green shop” he explained. Luke led the group out of the nursery gate, across the university and down through the shopping centre where he pointed out the large shopping store, Fenwicks. He was adamant we would find bird seed there. We walked around the store and were guided to several departments by members of staff but sadly they had no bird seed available. We left the store and began heading back towards nursery when we spotted another green shop. Could this one sell bird seed? We headed in and immediately found various bags of bird food. We decided to take one of each and carry it back to nursery ready for our bird feeders. What a successful shopping trip. Well done Luke!

It's time to get sustainable!

The children have been talking a lot recently about what it means to be sustainable and what effects this has on our environment. The children visited the atelier in their key groups where we discussed what we can do as a nursery to support our local area and the environment as a whole. The first group of children read a story about the life of a cardboard box and a conversation ensued about what and how we can recycle. The children identified how they recycle at home and we talked about the different coloured bins we might have for waste.

““I have brown and a blue and green, the brown is cardboard, blue is for bottles and green is for plastic”.”

— Yunus

This discussion then led to the children thinking about how we can support the environment in our nursery garden. The children became fascinated by how worms can help the environment and wanted to create worm homes. They drew a plan of how they would create their worm homes and we set to work collecting the resources we would need to build them.

““I have brown and a blue and green and one is yellow. I have one under the dishwasher inside and you can put glass in it””

— Lottie

There’s a troll in the park!

This week our trip to the park really sparked the children's imagination. We returned to an area of the park we had visited before. The area is a secluded part of the park containing large boulders and wooden bridges. The children began to play a game involving billy goats and trolls. One child took on the role of head troll and stamped and shouted as she crossed the bridge. She scrunched up her face as she got into the troll character. She stamped over the bridge yelling “who tripping, trapping?” as she went. The children ran from the troll and hid as she stomped around the park searching for goats. They attempted to climb across the other bridges which were bumpy and difficult to navigate. One child used her magic binoculars to search for the troll, knowing she was able to capture an excellent view sat on the top of her boulder.

The children explored balance, co-ordination and movement throughout their endeavours and developed their own self-esteem, resilience and confidence as they realised ‘we can do this!’.

Our Lending Library is complete!

The children have worked very hard over the last few weeks and our lending library is now finally finished! The walls of the library have been decorated with the children’s drawings and writing which makes it completely unique and a truly collaborative piece!

The lending library is located in the entrance hall and is available for everyone to enjoy.

Happy reading!

Decorating Our Lending Library

Today 3-4s visited the atelier to work on our lending library. The children got to work painting the house with a layer of white paint. The other children enjoyed using pens and tissue paper to create their own pieces of artwork which will later line our lending library walls. We chatted about how the library would work and the children are very excited at the prospect of borrowing books to take home and share with their families.

Exploring the Atelier

Today a group of children from 2-3s came to visit our atelier to help work on our lending library. The children were mesmerised by the amazing space but soon got to work painting the dolls house (this will become our lending library) and also create some beautiful wallpaper to decorate the insides. There was lots of painting, drizzling and splashing of paint to create a masterpiece. Some children decided to look at the books which have been donated and then decided which may be suitable for the baby section of our lending library.

Shelter building with 2-3's

Today 2-3’s continued their interest in building dens and created two magnificent shelters with our new shelter building kits. Our first shelter was a flat sheet tied to trees but we found it was too windy and the sheet flapped a lot in the wind. Our second shelter was triangular shaped and much closer to the ground which meant we could all fit inside and stay warm. The children chatted about what they could do in their shelter and it was decided that next week we could take our snack and some hot chocolate to keep us toasty!

One child found a nook in a bush to hide in.

Work continues on our Lending Library

The children have continued work on our lending library this week. They have enjoyed making their own wallpaper to decorate the old dolls house which we will be repurposing as our lending library.. We have talked a lot about what types of books we might donate which other children may enjoy. Next week the other units will start to join us in the atelier to help decorate more of our lending library.

Creating our Lending Library

Today we started our ‘lending library’ project. The children chatted about what they do with their old books at home and this led onto a conversation about reusing books and how we could create our own nursery lending library. The children decided to create their own wallpaper pictures to decorate the inside of an old donated dolls house which would be the perfect place to create our library . We used lots of bright colours which one child commented would make the library look beautiful and feel happy!

Preschool working hard on their ‘wallpaper’ designs for the lending library.

Den Building in the Great Outdoors with 2-3's

Today the children from 2-3’s visited a local outdoor space where we explored what damage the storms had left behind. We spotted lots of branches and broken sticks lying on the ground. We collected them together and began to build a den. The children carefully laid the sticks on top of each other and alongside one another to create the most amazing den!

2-3’s amazing den

A Trip to the Mouse House

Some of the toddler children enjoyed another trip to the Great North Museum where we explored the animal exhibitions before visiting the mouse house. Here the children enjoyed engaging in lots of physical play which included climbing through tunnels, peeking through port holes and kneeling on the seats to spot the animal statues. The children enjoyed playing peek a boo with one another and even our grown up Shona enjoyed getting involved in climbing through the tunnel which the children thought was hilarious!

Exploring the Great North Museum

Our toddlers enjoyed a visit to the Great North Museum where we explored the exhibits and the mouse house. The dinosaurs were a huge hit and the children enjoyed watching some small clips of dinosaurs interactions which had been projected onto the wall. We then met a T. Rex with very sharp teeth and spotted lots of dinosaur skeletons. We met Phillippe the Elephant who has been made using recycled flip flops before heading to the mouse house for some more exploring.

A Snowy Adventure in the Park with 2-3's

The children from 2-3’s recently enjoyed visiting our local park. When we arrived we were amazed to see the park was covered in snow! We stamped our feet into the snow and observed the marks they left behind before using our feet to push the snow aside to create different patterns. Theo found a huge stick and enjoyed hitting the trees allowing the snow and old leaves to fall before playing chasing games with the grown ups. We made huge snowballs and enjoyed throwing them at one another. Hugo thought it was hilarious!