Sun Sun-Catchers

Our plan for this week is to start our weather project, now according to the weather forecast when I looked yesterday, it said today was going to be some sun and cloud, so decided we would start this week with the sun! So today's weather has been overcast and lots of showers, so much for planning, note to self, it would of been better to of sorted out a rain craft as well as a sun craft. We've enjoyed a walk in a gentle shower, finding lots of puddles to jump in, then home to do some crafts.

Yesterday I cut on some sun shapes out of yellow card and some circles in tissue paper for the middle part and loads of pieces of kite paper, to make a collage with.

More Brown Bear Activities

Today we read Brown Bear, Brown Bear What Do You See? the children are really remembering the story and are joining in regularly as I read to them. We then made our own colour book based on the colours in the story, I used some stencils I already had but had to make some up for the frog, bear and duck. I read the page out from the book as we painted each animal.

When they were dry I wrote out each animal plus their colour and stapled the book together.

When the books were finished the little ones enjoyed sitting and reading their stories, making up various events as they went. Later on I used their books for a movement activity, as we read each page I asked the children how they thought that animal would move, to say there was lots of giggles was an understatement as they tried to decide how to move. There was some debate as to whether a dog and cat moved in the same way as not. They then decided to go through the book again this time adding the animal noise as they moved like the animal.

A favourite activity with my little ones is playing with my pots of coloured buttons, sometimes, making patterns, other times using our coloured bowls to sort colours. Today they did some colour sorting and counting.

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The Brown Bear story has been a big hit with the children. This morning, I had one little one, sitting with the book, turning each page and telling the story from memory. Last night when I put my own littlest to bed, I was asked to make a brown bear song instead of our normal bedtime song. it went something like this.

Brown Bear, Brown Bear 

What do you see

I see Mummy Bear

putting on L's music

Mummy Bear Mummy Bear

What do you see

I see Little L

all ready for Bed

Little L little L

what do you see

I see my cot waiting for me

Bread Making

I love to make bread either by myself or with the little ones, there is something very relaxing and enjoyable about the whole process, especially the yummy bread at the end. Having been chatting with a few people who said they would like to make bread but wouldn't know where to start, I thought I would attempt to put together a bread making tutorial, I hope it's helpful. This is my basic, quick bread rolls and makes 8 rolls.

Ingredients

500g strong flour

10ml (2tsp) sugar

2.5ml (1/2tsp)salt

5ml (1tsp) yeast

260ml water

30ml (2tbsp) olive oil

Mix all the dry ingredients in a bowl.

 Add the water and oil, I just use water straight out the tap, you don't need to worry about it being warm enough or too warm, the bread will rise.

Mix 

and turn out onto a clean worktop, yes it can look rather crumbly at this stage but don't worry it will all come together ok.

Knead well, takes about 10 minutes

It should something like this and when you gently press you finger into it, it should feel spring/spongy!

It could now be shaped into one loaf but we love rolls, so I divide it in half, then half again repeating

until I have 8 pieces of dough, now in the past we have shaped rolls into, rabbits, hedgehogs, teddy bear faces and dinosaurs as well as basic roll shapes

Arrange them on your baking tray and cover, I use a clean tea towel, now leave them to rise, now this depends on many factors so could take anywhere from 45 minutes to a couple of hours, so don't panic if you peek at an hour and they still look very small, they will rise eventually.

After they have risen.

 When they have roughly doubled in size, bake at Gas Mark 7 for 10 minutes, then turn down temperature and cook for a further 10 minutes at Gas Mark 4, if you tap the bottom of the rolls or loaf it should sound hollow.

Forgot to take a photo as they came out of the oven but remembered  just in time before they were all eaten.

More No Mess Painting

I've tried different types of no mess painting over the years, in ziploc bags, card wrapped in cling film but this has got to be the easiest and most robust that I have tried to date. I will state I have no problem with the mess that normal painting makes, it's about trying something different, seeing how paint etc moves.

Anyway last night my husband came in from work and thought I had finally lost the plot, as I was filling laminator pouches with paint and ironing them on the ironing board to seal them. I sealed two sides of the pouch, before I opened it out and poured a fair amount of paint in, then carefully lay it down and seal the other two sides with the iron on cool setting.

I had planned this activity for the babies but it wasn't long before the older ones joined in. They had fun, not just moving the paint around when the pouch was on the table, they held the pouch up and watched the paint move from one end to the other and then tipping it back the other way. Then they held them up on a sunny window and drew on them, it looked brilliant, an activity to do on a light box, me thinks. Definitely will be doing this again in the future, in the meantime, the pouches I've made will last a while.

Brown Bear

Today the children have enjoyed making their own brown bear to go with the story, Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Will You See?  I cut out a large paper plate for the body, used a smaller plate for the head, some foam for the eyes and nose.

 

One littleone decided it was more fun to paint their own hand brown all over and pretend to be a bear.

                            

                            

After the plates were dry, I glued the plates together and then the children made their bears faces.

I think they turned out very well, there was a point when I wondered if they would look like a bear, this was before the face was put on, I got the impression of a lion, with the edge of plate making a very good mane, will have to remember this if we do a story with lions in.

My oldest sorted out some old mobiles phones for the littleones to play with, they spent a lovely time, pretending to text their Mum's or each other about how their baby dolls were doing. I loved the fact that they were telling each other what they were texting to each other e.g. A asked B what they are doing and B replied "I'm texting you to tell you my baby had a big lunch and is having nap" and A replied "I've got your text, I'm texting you to tell you I'm going shopping for food." They ended up packing up two bags of clothes and bottles, then took their babies for a walk around the garden, telling them what they were doing.

Later on we had an animal and colours scavenger hunt. I had some animal picture cards, which I laid  out on the table, the children then went on a hunt through the toy boxes to find the animals to match the cards. When they had found all the animals, they wanted to do it again so I then hid the animals in the garden for them to find, at least doing it this way I know exactly how many animals I've hidden! 

They then wanted to match animals to these cards.

Then of to find things that matched the colours.

The cards came from 1+1+1=1 and can be found here , they are free and they have lots more activity cards and suggestions for you to enjoy.

Weather

We'll be finishing of our bear theme this week, with some activities based on Brown Bear, Brown Bear What Do You See?  I thought I would share my planning for our new theme the weather which we still maybe towards the end of this week or the beginning of next week, depending on how everything flows.

 I thought I would also share the words to some of the rhymes we will be using and learning.

I Hear Thunder

I hear thunder, I hear thunder

Hark don't you, hark, don't you

Pitter patter raindrops, pitter patter raindrops

I'm wet through, so are you!

I Can Sing A Rainbow

Red and yellow and pink and green

Purple and orange and blue,

I can sing a rainbow,

Sing a rainbow

Sing a rainbow too.

It's Snowing ( to ten little Indians)

Snowflakes falling down,down,down

Snowflakes falling down,down,down

Snowflakes falling down,down,down

Falling to the ground.

Children playing - snow is fun

Children playing - snow is fun

Children playing - snow is fun

When it hits the ground.

Whether The Weather

Weather the weather be fine

Or whether the weather be not,

Whether the weather be cold

Or whether the weather be hot,

We'll whether the weather

Whatever the weather

Whether we like it or not.

The Day Has Begun

Butterflies flutter

Baby birds twitter

Caterpillars awake

Leaves gently shake

And her comes the sun

The day has begun

The Lovely Sun

There is a big ball in the sky

I cannot reach it even if I try

All the day it shines so bright

But hides itself in the night

In the huge sky

There is only one

Yes it's the

Lovely yellow sun