Dragons and dancing, Elmer and ice. With focus on yellow as our colour of the week, we've learnt how to sign yellow in Makaton, and enjoyed colour scavenger hunts using our large, coloured die. A listening game of everyday sounds prompted an exploration of other sounds, of animals and dragons, percussion and singing. We became animals from all over the world, dancing and stomping, flying and slithering. We've all been very vocal practicing our sounds.
We've also been starting to explore the Lunar New Year. Following on from the children's enthusiasm for dragons we’ve been going on a dragon hunt, creating our own colourful versions and even making our very own Chinese Dragon for a dragon dance. We’ve been honing our singing and signing too, making Silly Soup to practice our rhyming; and listening, lots and lots of listening. Walking round the hall, dancing to the beat, clapping for a syllable and stomping with our feet.
After moving like an elephant, we all enjoyed story time. Elmer the elephant is a story we all love to read and listen to; and the children have been enjoying making our very own Elmer using all the colours of the rainbow. Which then led onto another well-loved story, that of the Rainbow Fish. We've been making our very own shiny fish, cutting and sticking on scales, to add to our polar world.
Continuing to explore the polar world we've been playing with our very own ice bergs. Wondering why do they float? why does the warm water make them melt? and what happens if we shake some salt on? We've examined the opaque ice inside and out, rescued the cars that were stuck and admired the leaves caught in the ice, trapped in their icy hard shell. We've stomped and cracked it, crunched it and held it. It's been an exciting material we've all been keen to explore. Pipettes and syringes transferred water with care, teaspoons and whisks moved ice and slush. Everyone focused and absorbed.
A wonderful plethora of recycled materials provided resources for containing. Collections of cars, slices of cake, balls of dough and quills of pasta. Containers big and small giving us diversity to explore volume and capacity, as well as being great fun for stacking and transporting. Biscuits were counted and given to friends, cars given garages and the animals had homes. All in all, it's been a busy third week of spring term, as we've all settled into our Stepping Stones routine.
