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Our before pictures
The Garden Classroom: The Next Journey
Tag: Seedlings
Working Together To Preparing The Garden Ready For The Big Build
We had one last fun day at the end of the garden before getting the area ready for the work to start. The children played with the sand and water, bubbles and enjoyed hide and seek games. We then packed everything up to store till the work was done.
We all worked together to move the plants to a safe space, until we are ready to replant them in a new position. This was to protect them while the building work was happening. Some of the flowers like the poppies, hot poker and foxgloves have gone to seed, so we carefully collected the teeny tiny seeds and saved them in paper bags, ready to sow for next year.
Once the area was all clear we put away the toys, cleared the rubbish and put the rest of the weeds in the composter ready for the work to commence.
Planning The ‘Garden Classroom’ With The Children
We started our project by having lots of different discussions around our hopes and dreams of our Classroom I involved my family, staff and the children. I am making sure every one within the setting will be involved in the project.
We used various types of planning discussions, this included active discussions, where we discussed what the main outcome will be and how we are going to get there. We used critical thinking discussions to include challenges that may come up, (moving the bug house) and how we are going to source the materials. Active learning discussions to include why, where and what we are doing and included continuous feedback with all who is involved. (Family, Staff and children)
We all got emerged and excited participating in lots of different fun learning activities. We designing our own treehouses, had a Bug log moving day, Storytime in the garden about the bad tempered ladybird (we made up our own reasons why she would be bad tempered if she knew we were moving her home) , we completed a Wildlife audit so we could make sure all our mini beasts are protected and have a temporary home until we can place them into a permanent position.
Everything about the project we were mindful to include the 17 sustainability goals https://sdgs.un.org/goals we did this through constant discussions within the planning process by deciding about how we are going to be energy efficient, collecting and using recycled materials, location and construction, waste reduction and water conservation.
We had fun talking about our perfect dream treehouse, Jack wanted a tall building so he could use a Zip wire to travel from the tree top to the house. This made us use problem solving skills as I explained you can’t use a zip wire to get back up! Jack said ‘ thats what the door is for!” how silly of me not to think of that! Lottie wanted a big funfair, this caused a discussion on power and we came to the conclusion it would not be easy using solar with all the power it would take up. Lottie decided to have a Unicorn play area instead. (much more manageable!) Elliott wants a slide which I thought would be fun. Jack reminded us we can use the door to go into the classroom to get to the slide and the zip wire. Gemma had an idea to make the classroom out of a greenhouse, unfortunately we all thought it would be too hot to play in, in the summertime.
The amazing dream everyone had was to make sure we still had areas in the garden for bugs, birds, vegetables, fruit and flower growing. This reinforced to me that we are all on the same wavelength and all the activities we provide are being absorbed by the children.
This Week In The Garden Classroom
We have loved getting outdoors and sowing some salad crops. We mixed the peat free compost, filled the pots, sowed the seeds and gently watered them in to germinate.
We had fun looking around the garden for bugs, we found snails, ants, butterflies, a dragonfly, wood louse, worm and Fizzy our cat asleep in the shade. Mable and Elliott thought the yellow poppies were pretty.
We had a lovely time in the garden, we are excited to see our seeds germinate and turn into delicious salad crops, so we can have them for lunch.
Stanley Park
Today we had a lovely day at Stanley Park. We walked through the rose garden to the play park.
Ayrn was so clever and determined to climb the stairs to go down the slide.
Mable and Elliott loved playing and are both confident enough to climb up and go down the slide independently.
Alba enjoyed using the climbing wall, pole and ropes.
After we left the play park we went for a walk to find as many different coloured plants and flowers as we can.
The children looked everywhere, up high, down low, near the pond, over the bridge and through the wildflower meadow. (Sounds like the makings of a brilliant book lol)These photos above are the plants we found.
We decided next to have a race on the playing field.
After our race we all needed to have a rest, some water and a biscuit. What a lovely sunny day out we had.
Ladybirds And Friends
We all absolutely loved the story sack ‘What the ladybird heard’ themed activity last week. We decided to extend our knowledge around the little red bugs.
First we decided to go on a hunt to see if we can find any ladybirds in our garden.
Tracie put together an activity tray for us to explore all about Ladybirds, what they eat, where they live, parts of their bodies and their lifecycle.
We were all very inquisitive looking through a magnifying glass, and seeing the detail on their bodies.
We looked at other British bugs and the children took it in turns to point out our ladybird.
Some of the children handled the ladybird and snail. Others needed a bit more confidence and persuading to hold them.
We looked at other bugs including a snail that we found.
The children used descriptive words like squidgy, slimy, disgusting, slippery, tickly, spotty, antennae, small, red, black, shell.
When the bugs walked around the tray the younger children shrieked in excitement.
The children all gave the thumbs up for their activity because they enjoyed learning about their favourite little red bug.
Our Spring Growing Has Started
Last week we sowed our first ‘Salad Pots’
First we needed to clean the pots to get rid of any bacteria or decease from last years plants.
We then put coco disks into the pots and added the seeds.
We chose salad and herb crops because they are fast growing and we love cooking and eating them. We added water and watched as the disks filled out and firmed the seeds down.
We covered the pots with cling film to help them keep the humidity to germinate the seeds.
One Week Later….
We had a look in our salad pots to see if any of the seeds had germinated.
In Jacks pot we found a Cucumber seed had grown, it had reached over 1 inch tall.
Tracie very carefully picked up the seedlings in the coco disk and showed us the roots coming out of the disk.
Alba said ‘yuck they are long and wiggly like a worm!”
We then looked in Alba’s Salad Pot, we were surprised to see that her Cucumber had not started to grow. However she had two healthy Tomato plants growing. These were about 1/2 an inch tall.
We decided to move the Cucumber and Tomato seedlings into a bigger pot and leave the herbs in the long salad pots. This was to give them extra space to grow healthy root stock.
We recycled glass jars to cover the seedlings. This was to help them keep the plant warm and to encourage them to grow healthy and strong.
Once we had repotted the seedlings we covered the other coco disks with fresh nutrient rich soil to encourage them to start germinating.
What The Ladybird Heard
Today I read the story ‘What the ladybird heard‘ to the children. Jack asked me to get out the story sack for them to play with.
I laid the story sack out on the tuff tray for them to re tell the story themselves. We had the farmer, two robbers, the policemen, the duck, dog, hen, cow, two cats who went purr and meow and of course the Ladybird who never said a word.
All the children joined in, they used rich language from the story such as ‘ the ladybird never said a word” and “the cow said moo” and “the dog said woof”
Jack and Lottie helped each other count the wooden rounds and guess the bug on them.
Alba realised we didn’t have a pond that Lanky Len fell into. When Tracie went off to find something to use as a pond the younger children decided to tip all the shredded paper from the hen’s nests’ all over the floor.
They had such fun, Ben loved throwing it up in the air and letting it fall all over him. Holly joined in and helped Ben make even more mess.
Everyone helped to hoover it all up and put everything back on the tray.
Think we will extend the story by having a fact finding tray activity next week.
Easter Fun Tray
Over the next few weeks we will be celebrating Easter. We started the celebrations by having a tray activity.
We put together a tray of colourful items that we think of when talking about Easter time. We added a rainbow because the weather is rainy and sunny. We added a plant lifecycle so we could see how a plant grows from a seed to an adult plant.
You cant have an Easter tray without eggs, we added blue, purple, green, yellow and red ones.
Elliott made the hen a lovely nest, he also used the shredded paper to play hide and seek with the bumble bees.
Alba and Elliott played in the sand, digging for hidden eggs. They found other Easter shaped craft items such as pastel coloured shapes, flowers and stencils .
Alba said she enjoyed making mini Easter sand castles.
We are going to extend this activity by adding our farm animals, farm house and farmer. We will have sing and Rhyme time to include ‘10 big easter eggs’, ‘humpty Dumpty’ and ‘old McDonald’
Do You Wanna Build A Snowman?
Today when we all woke up we had a lovely surprise… snow! White fluffy snow.
Poppy was not very happy because she wanted to stay home and play in the snow! She had to walk to school as the bus was cancelled, but she enjoyed walking in the snow. When she got to school there was a big fun snowball fight.
Chloe was happy because her school was closed, she went to the park with her mum and brothers. Ben loved the Canada Geese, one went up to him and ate the bread from his hand. Jack and Chloe loved snow ball fighting, but didn’t like getting so cold.
After breakfast we all got our coats, scarves and gloves on and went for a walk in the back garden.
Martie made some amazing hand prints in the snow that had settled on a toy box.
Tracie's Treasures 