Hello to our Poppies' parents and families! We thought it would be nice to put up some ideas and activities that you can try out at home during this isolation period which tie in with the Early Years Foundation Stage Curriculum. We hope you enjoy these activities and that it gives you some inspiration for ideas at home. These activities also link in with our planned stories for the upcoming weeks which you can also find on our website. We have  attached a timetable that you may like to look at which follows usual nursery daily routines. We can’t wait to see some of your creations and hear all about them when we see you soon! We wish you all the best and are looking forward to seeing you all soon. 

Keep safe and take care, Miss Begum and Miss Beedham.

Here is a video of the book of the week being read on YouTube, if you do not have the book at home:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oBJ-7lSPnW0

Personal, Social and Emotional Development (PSED)

Allow this time together to build on 1:1 opportunities with your children. To help this area develop your child may want to lead certain activities and show independence. This may involve playing games, and making decisions for themselves, such as what game they want to play. Encourage them to take turns and allow them to express their own feelings.

Examples of activities linking to our story:

• Story Time -talk the child to talk about lady birds or different mini beasts
• Role-Play- imitating the way the mini beasts may move, e.g flying or crawling
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Physical Development

Poppies are already fantastic with their physical skills and really enjoy practising different physical movements like, jumping, dancing, skipping. Physical development however can also involve things like discussing keeping safe and healthy, eating a healthy diet, using various tools and objects for fine motor development and many more!

Examples of activities linking to our story:

• Jump Start Jonny (webpage)
• Active 8 or PE with Joe wicks (youtube)
• Kicking or rolling a ball back and forth
• Practising catching and throwing a ball
• Cosmic Kids Yoga https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rnlDBKD2S78
• Water Play -if you have any animal toys or mini beasts you could put these in the bath or sink and pretend to wash them.
• Mark Making -using any mark making resource ask them to try and draw a mini beast starting with a circle, to then try drawing a spider or ladybird.
• Making Junk Models with left over packaging - you could attempt making your own mini beast with numerous legs or eyes!
• Collaging -this can be done with different coloured papers or fabrics and scraps from magazines and newspapers.

Communication and Language

Poppies really love our song time on a morning and afternoon and always join in with actions, try to let them choose their favourite nursery rhyme to sing. Encourage use of speech and using words rather than gesturing or pointing. Poppies enjoy talking about their day and love to talk about what they have done in the past, try this for even 10 minutes a day.

Examples of activities linking to our story:

• Stories -any animal or mini beast stories would be great so the child could talk about different animals or mini beasts.
• Nursery Rhymes -you could adapt nursery rhymes such as 'down in the jungle' to ‘down in the pond’ and add mini beats into the song. YouTube may also have age appropriate songs about mini beasts.
• Phonics Songs (Youtube)
• Listening for sounds (Youtube/you may be able to do an outdoor listening walk even in the back garden where possible)
• Our words for this story are 'suitcase' and 'friend' so try to focus on using these words and talk about what they mean.

Literacy

Take time each day to encourage your child to look at stories and encourage them to focus on the images and discuss what they can see and what they think is happening within the story. Try to focus on a word they may not know the meaning of and ask them what they think it may mean. They may have a favourite story that they love to read, if so, encourage them to repeat phrases and fill in missing gaps to see if they know the words.

Examples of activities linking to our story:

• Reading Stories -letting them choose their own story and getting them to describe what happens in the stories.
• Online Story songs  -Youtube, e.g. The Gruffalo, The Hungry Caterpillar or Incy Wincy Spider. 
• Story time on Cbeebies
• Making up a story with parents and families, take turns adding to the story. Start with once upon a time and add a sentence at a time. You could focus this on mini beasts, about a holiday or an aeroplane.
• Use animal or mini beast toys to re-enact your favourite stories.

Mathematics

Poppies have been building their maths skills and are starting to show number recognition as well as beginning to count 1-10 all by themselves. Counting can be done using everyday items and all around your household and you could even make this into a game, for example ‘count how many toys there are’. You could even use this as a sorting activity and ask them to group similar objects and then count them.

Examples of activities linking with our stories:

• Counting in Nursery Rhymes (Round and Round the garden like a spider, 1 step, 2 step etc..)
• Counting Pasta or food items before cooking 
• Looking for shapes around the house 
• Drawing around certain shapes
• Playing with jigsaws (if possible)
• Counting toys when tidying away

Understanding the World

Include your child in day to day activities as in Poppies we love to role-play and always pretend to carry out day to day activities such as washing the clothes and making dinner. Involve your children when cooking or serving food and allow them to play a 'role'. As previously mentioned water play is another great form of play and allows your child to explore and indoors and outdoors and encourages them to question, predict and observe.

Examples of activities linking to our story:

• Water play (if possible add food colouring/paint/diluted juice to change the colour of the water and pots and spoons to fill and empty) This could be carried out outside, in the bath, in the sink or even a bowl.
• Observing items in the garden (looking for grass, mud or insects)
• Helping with cooking or day to day routines (making mini beast biscuits, setting the table, stirring and mixing)
• Junk Modelling
• Papier Mache

Expressive, Arts and Design (EAD)

EAD is your children’s chance to explore, create and design in any form they can! Allow them to explore and express their own interests and decisions. This can be very stimulating for them and allow them to build skills through sensory exploration. The opportunities are endless and so much can be achieved with items in your household.

Examples of activities linking to our story:

• Steady Beat (turn a pan or bin upside and turn it into a drum, tap along with hands or fingers or any body part all to the beat of your favourite song!)
• Collaging
• Colouring in
• Painting (if possible)
• Homemade Playdough https://www.google.com/search?q=homemade+playdough+recipe&oq=home+made+play+rec&aqs=chrome.2.69i57j0l7.7935j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8#kpvalbx=_Kr-YXoXyFu2d1fAP6o25uAM43
• Homemade Gloop https://www.learning4kids.net/2012/05/02/how-to-make-gloop/
• Making musical instruments (shakers with bottles and rice or other household items)

Daily Routine

• 9.00-9.30             Physical Activity (Joe Wicks, Jump Start Jonny, Cosmic Kids)

• 9.30-10.00           Story Time

• 10.00-10.30         Mathematics Activities

• 10.30-11.30         Phonics Activity

• 11.30-12.30         Lunch

• 12.30-1.30           Physical Activity

• 1.30-2.00              Literacy Activity

• 2.00-3.00              EAD Activity