Early Learning
Book Week
Last week, all of our Kinder groups celebrated Book Week! Our Kinder was full of different animals, princesses, dinosaurs, dragons, heroes, villains and even a car! It was a great opportunity to share favourite books, find other people with similar interests, and share a love of reading. Thank you to our Kinder families for organising such fun and creative costumes.
Bees
"An intelligent heart acquires knowledge, and the ear of the wise seeks knowledge".
Proverbs 18:15
In the Bee group, we have been developing our metacognitive skills as we think and learn about learning. Children shared their ideas about what learning is. Lewis shared that his baby sister had just learned to clap, that morning! Others in the group shared that learning means finding out things, or knowing things. We discussed how asking questions is a good way of finding out more information. Children have been asking questions and answering them through play based activities and some wonderful books.
We have learned that rainbows appear when there is water and light, and we made our own rainbow using a glass of water and the sun. We have been learning a lot about different animals from books and observations, and we asked parents to help us learn how to make a balcony! We learned that we unfortunately can’t actually make a teleporting machine.
While testing the magnetic properties of some random objects, Harry observed “don’t you need water to make pasta?” In following up this question we were very grateful to have Mrs Pritchard come over from the senior school and teach us how to make our own pasta! Children cut up herbs from our garden to put in the sauce and mixed, kneaded, ripped, rolled and squished the pasta dough, before rolling it into long pieces, cutting it, and shaping it on Gnocchi boards. The type of pasta we made was called Cavatelli, and it was delicious! Thank you Mrs Pritchard for sharing your expertise with us.
Here is a video of our pasta making experience:
In the Bee group we have also been learning from the parables Jesus told. A favourite has been The Good Samaritan. The teachings within this parable are reflected in Outcome 2 of the VEYLDF which describes children as helping and showing concern for others, and learning to respect those who are different from them.
Monday Wombats
In the Monday Wombat Group we have been learning about different stories and fairy tales. Children have acted out the stories of The Three Billy Goats Gruff and The Three Little Pigs. Children have been beginning to incorporate more storytelling into their play, as they act out different situations in dramatic play. The large map on the wall was a focus as children used the pictures of animals and people to make up stories about different characters living in different places.
Outside, nearly everybody joined in with dramatic play of a car wash. Our bikes were very clean afterwards.
Children have also been learning how to sequence ABAB patterns, with the Hungry Caterpillar as inspiration.
We have talked about how some stories are real and some are made up. The Wombat Group are learning that the Bible contains real stories and teaches us that God loves us. One of our favourite songs is the butterfly song, where we thank God “for making me, me”.
Wednesday Wombats
The Wednesday Wombat Group have been creating self portraits with water colour paints. These visual representations of their identity are a reminder of ways in which we are similar and different.
The VEYLDF Outcome 1 describes children’s identity as being aligned with belonging, the sense of feeling included and secure in the social settings that are part of everyday life. Throughout the year, we have noticed our 3-year-old groups grow in their sense of belonging to our Kinder community. Children are often using each other’s names when they talk to each other, and are moving from associate play to cooperative play.
Beth Parker
Head of Early Learning
Friday Wombats
During Science Week (13th - 21st August) the Wombat group had fun doing some experiments. We poured some full fat milk into a shallow tray and then put drops of food dye in. We then added some drops of detergent, which reacted with the milk fat, dispersing the food dye in all directions and creating a rainbow effect. The children described it as “so cool” and “amazing!”.
We also read Alexander’s Outing by Pamela Allen, which touches on the concepts of gravity, volume and floating. The children took turns to rescue Alexander by tipping water into a glass jar to help Alexander float to the top. They all quacked and flapped with delight when Alexander popped out of the hole!
Bronwyn Wicks
Early Learning Teacher