What a fun few months we have had.
We kick started the new year of 2022 with our New Years Resolutions and enjoyed exploring our 5 senses, the human body and the human skeleton, as well as the circus. Our children also loved National Puzzle Day and creating some very cool inventions during Inventors Day. In February, we celebrated Chinese New Year, St Valentines Day and enjoyed Balance Day and had so much fun for Carnival Day.
Keep an eye out on our Social Media Channels for photos of our daily activities.
In this newsletter, we have shared some insight into the activities from each of our rooms that has taken place during the month of January and February. We hope you enjoy browsing through them.
Joanne and Clara – Crèche Managers
Activities from our Baby Room
We had a great start to the year in Babies, we loved getting to know our new friends Sean and Feilim.
We helped make crowns for our new classmates and created cards for the parents to say Happy new year.
All the children loved to learn about our favourite animals (Tortoise, Chameleon and a frog) and our book of the month “a taste of the moon” which we also made a display of on our display board.
We used feather & sponges to paint our favourite animals and for the sea we crawled along the paint in our vest. It was very messy.
We also loved to have a puppet show with our finger puppets and getting to know all the animal sounds.
We loved to communicate with the phones in are room and all the babies loved to hear the phones ringing to say hello to mummy and daddy. We created phone frames for our grandparents and keychains for our mummy & Daddies.
We explored a lot about winter. We made a big mural using blue ice cubes, it was so cold on our hands. Some of us were not to keen.
We also enjoyed plenty of time in the garden playing with the snow (shredded paper).
February was a great month for us in Babies, we welcomed our new friend Hannah with a crown to celebrate her birthday.
If there is something we all like is to discover is new textures! We created a very big mural with sand, flour, porridge, feathers, paint… And a little board to bring home with sponges and different kinds of textures. Also, we travelled to the jungle, full of flowers, leaves and sand, it was so much fun!
Now that the days are starting to get longer, we can get to enjoy the sun more often in the garden. We love to bring outside our sensorial bags and explore the sticks, leaves and flowers. We enjoy the sunlight so much, and looking at there flections of the light in the mirrors and windows. The teachers bring CDs, lanterns and cellophane paper and we created a light box for the room. Also, we used Chinese shadows to project the book of the month: “What colour is a kiss?”
Since the new year, we are working with a different book every month. The book of February was “What colour is a kiss?” and it was great! We all love kisses! We painted blue with potatoes, yellow by stamping flowers, red with painted pasta,and green with our feet print. We made different colour boxes and a mobile with all the colours to bring home.
Stories from our Wonderful Wobbler Room
In the first week of January we loved to welcome new friends Frank & Peter who we made cards for with our fingersprints, and we loved seeing our SLE Laura return from Spain.
We all loved the lion king book this month, and dancing to ‘Hakuna Matata’ . We mailed a big collage of a lion with sticking paper with crepe paper.
In February we have been working through one of our favourite stories: “The very hungry caterpillar”. We made a very big caterpillar puppet and feed him with our favourite food. We also went to the garden to look at the caterpillar and other mini beasts, like the spiders and the ladybugs.
We also made a rainbow rain with colour paper strands, we cut the paper ourselves and we matched the colours of the paper with different toys in the room.
On the 14th, we celebrated St Valentine’s day making a bouquet of roses with pipe cleaner and crepe paper and explore our emotions painting while listening to music.
We love to listen to music, that’s why we really enjoyed getting ready for the carnival. We made a masquerade and a showroom with different costumes. We love to dress up and do roleplaying with our teachers!
Tales from our Toddler Room
All the toddlers were very excited to be back after Christmas. They all were talking about different presents that Santa brought for them.
The children loved to dance to mickey mouse club house, and we made them hats and masks to represent micky mouse, so they could all dress up together and enjoy a mickey mouse disco.
We loved dancing to baby shark as always and we made little sharks to play with in the water tray and a big shark our of paper Mache to stick on our display. All our hands were very sticky afterwards.
We loved to get to know our knew friends, Tadgh Ola & Hugo and sang lots of songs to welcome then.
We loved creating a circus in our room we made lots of different things to represent a circus (Clown, elephant, hippo, lion, juggler and a big circus tent) We loved trying to juggle with the balls and doing gymnastics in activity street.
Even though February was a shorter month, it was very busy in our Toddler rooms.
We started talking about our family, as most of us have siblings in the Creche. We made a family house with sticks to bring home with a paint of our families inside and a family tree for the display board.
Our teachers know that we are fascinated by the universe, because every time we are in the garden at the evening we point at the sky when we see the moon and the stars. That’s why we made a telescope with paper and we used plates to paint all the planets, the moon and the sun.
For the mini beasts day, we did a treasure hunt in the garden! We run to find all the pictures of the little animals. There were ladybugs under the slide, and butterflies behind the kitchen! It was so much fun. We also collect lots of leaves, sticks, and flowers to put in our mystery box. Then, we had to put our hand inside and guess what were we touching without looking at it… We were all very excited.
For Carnival Day, we all made a masquerade, painting our masks and decorating them with feathers and glitter to make a big parade all over the creche, saying hello to our friends in the other rooms, while singing our favourite songs. We love to listen to music and to learn things through it. We talked about our feelings singing “If you are happy and you know it”, and the numbers with the “Five little monkeys” song.
Our senior toddler class have had a very busy couple of weeks, they we so happy coming back to creche and were so excited to tell of their friends about Santa coming and what presents they got for Christmas, they spoke about new year resolutions and what they can do to help their mammy and daddies at home, they drew pictures of what they can do to help and made lovely new years cards for their families.
They were learning all about road safety and what they have to do to be safe on the roads, they spoke about the traffic lights, the green man, and wearing a helmet when they’re using their scooters and bikes. They had loads of fun in the garden role playing and making their road and driving the bicycles.
One of the children had seen a fire engine beside their house and was so excited to tell their friend which sparked lots of interest in the class and had everyone talking about firemen, fires, and fire engines. They made their own fire extinguishers, helmets and fire display and had lots of fun role playing putting out the fires.
All of the children have been showing lots of interest in dinosaurs and what they eat and where they live. They have been learning all about the different dinosaur names and practicing how to say them. They made a dinosaur forest using dinosaurs from their animals and had lots of trees and leaves (from their nature box) for the dinosaurs to eat.
We had lots of birthdays in our senior toddler class this month and they all loved singing Happy Birthday for their friends, making them some cards and birthday crowns.
Pre-School & Naiscoil Room News
ur preschool classes had a very busy January with lots of activities and crafts.
Welcoming every one back into preschool after Christmas has been so much fun, all our preschool classes were super busy making a lovely new year’s display for our reception area. They spoke all about New years resolutions, what they mean and what different things we can do throughout the year at home, in creche, with our friends and with our family.
They have been learning all about the human skeleton and bones we had great fun making life size skeleton tracing around our friends bodies, x-rays of the bones in our arms using paint and sticks to represent our bones. We had lots of role play being doctors and nurses fixing broken bones, giving x-rays and making casts and slings. They shared stories about people they know who had to get a cast and talked all about what the doctors have todo to fix our bones. During our music and movement classes our pre-schoolers have been learning lots of songs and dances about our bodies, they’ve been singing head, shoulders, knees and toes, skeleton song and hokeypokey.
They have been doing lots of work on the five senses and have really enjoyed learning about all the different textures, smells and noises. They made sensory boxes filled with lots of different objects of different sizes, shapes, textures ad used a blindfold to guess what the object was in the box. They made their handprints and stuff lots of different textures on them. They learned all the different senses and spoke all about what we use our senses for and how they help us.
They learned all about the sky and all of its aspects, they made clouds, rain, sun, snow and storms for their classroom display. They made airplanes, stars, planets, rockets, the moon and the sun. They spoke about space and all of the different planets and moons and they made their own telescopes to use when looking up to the sky at night to see the stars and planets. They spoke about how far away the moon and sun were and how long it would take to get there.
There has been a thief coming to the creche at night when everyone is gone home stealing books and hiding toys, thankfully we have lots of great detectives in preschool who have been busy making magnifying glasses and searching for clues to help us get to the bottom of this mystery. After a few days of searching high and low they found all of the missing toys and book and set out to make a trap to catch the thief. They haven’t managed to catch the thief yet but are thinking or new strategies every day.
Our preschool children love Thursdays because they know the bin lorry will be coming to take all of the rubbish away, they have been learning all about the different bins and what goes in what one. They made their own bin trucks, a recycling centre using recycled bottles and different recyclable materials. They’ve been learning all about what can go into the recycling bin and some classes have made their own recycling bins and have been making a big effort to separate all the paper and plastics.
Naíscoil have been very busy learning all about the 5 senses and have made a sensory box using different materials from the class. They had a lovely sensory day exploring their sense of touch with jelly, gloup, sprinkles, rainbow pasta, playing with the homemade sensory box using a blindfold and guessing what the different objects were in the box. They explored their sense of smell, smelling different spices, and using the nature box to see if there was any difference in the smell of different trees and plants. They’ve been learning lots of different Irish words associated with our senses (srón, béal, cluas, lámh, méar).
They have also been working on ceann, gúlainn, glúin is cos, (head shoulders knees and toes.)
We have
been learning all about bodies parts, the human skeleton and all of the bones in our bodies. The children made a life size skeleton puzzles, tracing around their friend’s bodies. They did some excavating for bones when playing with the sand using paint brushes to clean off dirt and sand. They sang lots of skeleton songs and spoke about what we can eat and do to help us grow and keep our bones and bodies healthy.
Our children have
been talking a lot about recycling and how we can keep our planet clean. They have been working on a recycling robot and discussing what he can and can’t eat. They spoke about the different colour bins we have in our houses and what goes into each one.
After-School Room News
Our after schoolers have had a very exciting and busy start to the New Year, they were sharing all of their new year resolutions with their friends and all everything they can do to help mums, dads, teachers, friends. This sparked a conversation about helping the planet and what they can do to help, lots of children said they were going to try and cycle, scoot or walk to school some days during the week to help with less cars on the roads, others said they were going to recycle more and make more of an effort to watch what they are putting in the bins and making sure everything goes in the right one.
They have been very interested in construction and building work. Some of the children shared that they had seen lots of building work happening near their homes and schools and have been very interested in all of the equipment needed on a building site and what all of the builders have to do and wear on a building site. They spoke all about sit safety and why builders need to be extra careful. They had great fun designing their own buildings and making their designs using all of the construction toys in the class. They made cranes to lift all of the blocks and diggers to make space for the new building.
They have been really enjoying their music and movement classes and have been practicing lots of new dances and playing lots of different music games and competitions, some of the children got involved in a talent show and had lots of fun encouraging and supporting their friends.
After schoolers had a very fun month in February, and they had a great competition running to create and design lots of sensory boxes. Lots of children got involved some in small groups and others wanted to get involved themselves, before drawing/ painting the boxes they drew their design sketch to make sure they had it right. We had lovely rainbows, formula 1 cars and police stations.
We had lots of roleplaying happening about marvel characters, police, pilots, and lots of different Harry Potters. Our afterschool children have a huge interest in Harry Potter so had a great time making their own spell books, magic wands, and different capes. We made potions and practiced lots of different magic tricks.
There has been a lot of construction happening in the afterschool class, they love building their own cities, skyscrapers, and towns mixing all of the blocks and construction equipment in the class. With a huge interest in construction, the educarers in the room have had lots of competitions going on in the room, they had to build the tallest tower, the most abstract, widest, and most unusual.
