To link in with our theme of the week, we decided to have our snack time on a boat. After washing our hands, we carefully boarded the boat and chose a seat. Miss McGinnes was the captain and told us to stay in our seats while the boat was moving. As we sailed, we ate our snack and sang some of the songs we have learnt this week: "The Big Ship Sails on the Alley Alley Oh" "I climbed aboard a Pirate Ship" and "Yellow Submarine." We used our imagination to talk about what we could see from the boat and then Miss McGinnes steered it back into the harbour. Before home time, we got back on the boat for our story time which was Lost and Found. 

As we have been talking about the summer time, today we made sunshine biscuits for our baking activity. Firstly, we talked about what ingredients we would need to make the icing and then the children carefully spooned icing sugar and water into a cup and then mixed it. There was lots of talk about how the icing sugar changed as it was mixed with the water. The children then had to use their careful fine motor skills to pour the icing onto their biscuit and then spread it with their spoon. Finally they added some mini smarties using the pincer grip to pick them up and carefully place them on top. 

Today we spoke about the seasons and learnt that it is no longer Spring, now it is Summer time. We found out that in the summer the weather is warmer, the sun shines more and we can wear our summer clothes. We also spoke about the importance of sun hats, sun glasses and sun cream to protect us from getting burnt. 
Some children decided to paint a sunny day picture in the painting area following our discussions. 

We have been working really hard with our early phonics skills in nursery. We have been listening carefully to hear the beginning sound in words and we are getting really good at this now. We use "My Turn Your Turn" to say c c caterpillar or b b bus. We have also been introduced to Fred the frog who can only speak in Fred talk (sounds). Fred says eg c-a-t and the children are fantastic at blending the sounds together to say the word- cat! We are also trying really hard to "say it like Fred" eg c-a-t cat. 
Today we learnt the sound c and after c c carpet time, the children were keen to spot the letter around our c c classroom! We found out that letters are EVERYWHERE!! 

We have loved using all our different small world vehicles to make up wonderful stories this week. We have had numbered racing cars with numbered parking bays in our Maths area, a road with lots of traffic in our tuff tray and lots of different vehicles in our construction area. 
We have used a large roll of paper to design our own map for our vehicles to travel along and there was so much talk and language. The children added the seaside, an airport, train station, police station, hospital and much more. Good job, Shooting Stars! 

This week we are focusing on travelling by boat. Our book of the week is "Mr Gumpy's Outing" by John Burningham. Today we read the story together and then we talked about Mr Gumpy travelling in a rowing boat and we learnt the word 'oars.' The children got their pretend oars and we sang "Row, row, row your boat" with Makaton signs. 
In the outdoor area, we made a boating lake and the children enjoyed rowing their own boats like Mr Gumpy in our story. Some children used their imagination and chose suitable items from our building area to use for their oars. The children talked about what they could see from their boat which promoted some lovely language, conversation and imagination. 

To link in with our learning about boats, we learnt that boats float on the water. Then we became Scientists and investigated floating and sinking in our water tray. We chose some objects and talked about whether we thought they would float or sink in the water. Some children tried to explain why they thought this and comments included "I think it will float 'cos it's flat" "sink because it's heavy" and "I think sink 'cos it's big." Then the children tested their ideas by putting the objects in water. Finally they sorted them into circles to show if they floated or sank. There was so much talk and thinking during this activity. 

Today we enjoyed a music session together. Each child selected their own instrument from our basket and we recapped and reinforced their names: bells, maracas, tambourine, castanets and triangle. We played a game using a lion and a mouse to help us learn about loud and quiet. We spoke about the lion being loud and the mouse being quiet and how the children could play their instruments loud and quiet too. When I held up the mouse, the children played quiet and when I held up the lion, they played loud. 
Then we moved onto using our instruments to play along to the beat of the Engine, Engine Number Nine rhyme that we learnt yesterday. 
​We love our music sessions in nursery! 

For our welly walk today, we boarded a magic train to travel to the nature reserve and then used our imagination to role play being in different lands- just like in our book of the week. 
First all the children bought a magic ticket and these were checked and stamped. We got on board our train and made our way to the nature reserve, chugging along and reciting the words from the story as we travelled. When we arrived, we talked about what magical lands the children would like to visit. Then we got out our dressing up box and the children loved dressing up and role playing different characters and scenarios. 

In our group time today, we have learnt a new rhyme to link with our train theme:

Engine, Engine, Number Nine,
Steaming down the Barnsley line, 
When he's polished, how he'll shine, 
Engine, Engine, Number Nine. 

Firstly, we learnt the words by reciting it a few times together and then we tapped the beat of the rhyme on our claves. 
Then we chose someone to be the engine and we added on numbered carriages. We knew the carriages needed to be in the correct order so we selected the correct number as one more carriage was added each time. This was great for developing our Mathematical skills as well as supporting our musical development.