This week the children have been learning the importance of keeping clean. They have been learning all about ‘Germs and Nasties’ through the story ‘I don’t want to wash my hands!’

Lots of children chose to independently paint some gorgeous paintings of a very dirty little princess!

The children have also been examining magnified pictures of germs and nasties and replicating them on the ipads.

At the workshop table some children have been very creative and they have been collaging germ infested hands!

While some children chose to be creative in a different way at the workshop table by imaginatively creating some germs of their own.

To help the children understand the importance of keeping clean the children took part in a ‘hand wash’ experiment. Some children covered their hands with margarine and hundreds and thousands. (These were the germs and nasties.)

The children then tried to wash the germs and nasties off with just a towel but the germs and nasties were still there!

The children then tried to wash the germs and nasties off with cold water but the germs and nasties were still there!

We then tried to wash the germs and nasties off with soap and warm water. The germs and nasties disappeared! We have learnt that we must wash our hands with soap and water if we want them to be really clean.

As we are the Swans we have focused our learning this week on the story ‘The Ugly Duckling.’ We read the story and we watched the 1939 Walt Disney film. We then had great fun using props to help us retell the story.

The children have been discussing how we are all different on the outside but all the same on the inside and how it is important to be kind and friendly to each other. We all collaged a swan by ourselves and we all painted a swan of our own using our handprint as its body.

The children have also made nests for the mother duck’s eggs. They had to manipulate the play dough carefully so that the eggs did not fall out. They were also set the challenge of counting the eggs in each nest with one to one correspondence.

The children also attempted graphic representations for the number of ducklings they had chosen to place on the duck pond. Some children even wrote the corresponding numbers by themselves too.

Some children chose to draw Swans on the iPads. They were amazing at navigating themselves around the programme, selecting different tools and colours. We think their Swan drawings are amazing!

The children have also been encouraged to do some think writing this week. They drew illustrations from the story, think wrote a short sentence and attempted to write their name! Super work Swans.

All the children have now started Reception. They have settled in very well and they are beginning to become more familiar with our rules and routines. They are making new friends daily and they are already becoming quite independent with their learning across the environment. Here are our first day photographs. Don’t we all look smart?