Finally, the summer is here! The days are getting brighter and the evenings are getting longer too. With restrictions changing and
people able to meet extended family members outdoors, it feels like a very welcoming change.
Our children had such fun during our monthly events in May. They were so engaging and took a real interest in our curriculum topics.
We loved Firefighter Day, International Nurses Day and World Baking Day and for Rock N Roll Day, we had such fun dancing and
singing! We are delighted now have all our children back together. Each day is different and we make such it is jam packed with lots of
fun. 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
May.
At the end of May, over 70 members from Team Links took part in a Links 10KM Fun Run, were over €2000 was raised for The Jack &
Jill Foundation. Thank you to you all for sponsoring and supporting us in raising these much needed funds for a very worthy cause.
Elaine Dunne – Crèche Manager
Activities from our Baby Room
Topic: Exploring books
Lately, our babies are spending a lot of time playing and looking at books, they have discovered their different pictures
and drawings and they like to explore their textures, so I decided to bring them books from other rooms in the crèche
and I told them about the pictures inside them and some of their stories. Among all of them, they really enjoyed a book
about pigs (how they live and what their characteristics are). In addition, we played with the children building towers,
bridges, houses and we added cars and balls into our game. They had fun pushing the towers and throwing balls under
the bridge of books.
They also made their own books of different shapes. One of them, a little four paged book which was painted by them.
First they dropped paint in a page and then, they turned the page and squashed it with their hands creating interesting
paint mixings and shapes. And the second one, they stuck on it different materials like paper, cardboard, pipe cleaners,
glitter foam, etc. on a cardboard rectangle, which I folded to create a book. Then, I made up different stories with them
for the children.
Topic: Different ways of painting
They are getting used to expressing themselves by using art and they enjoy exploring different materials, so last week
they were trying several ways of painting.
First of all, they did paintings with their hands and sandwich bags filled with a sheet of paper and paint. They enjoyed
observing how the colours mixed up and how they moved across the paper.
Secondly, they were painting with ice cubes made with water and paint. They were attractive for the children because
they could feel the cold. And they tried also to taste them a few times. This was a great sensory activity for the children.
After that, they painted with glue, salt, water and paint. I drew a moon with glue and they sprinkled salt on it, when it
was dry, they painted it with diluted paint with water. They enjoyed looking at the result of different colours mixing, and
they explored also its texture.
Finally, they used sponges for creating a new work of art. They used their hand-eye coordination to soak the sponges of
several shapes in paint with water and they squeezed those making beautiful colours and figures.
Activities from our Baby Room
Topic: Playing tag
They love playing tag and lately, even the youngest children are taking part in this game. That is why this week I have
organised several activities and games where they will have fun while they try to catch their friends, objects and toys.
We will start by pretending that we are different animals (dogs, cats, rabbits, mice…) and we will move across the room
chasing our friends. We will also try to catch cars and balls.
After that, they will walk and crawl on a path made of plastic, paper and paint, so when they see how the colours
change they will feel encouraged to move along it.
On the other hand, I will also create in our room a track with mats, boxes and ropes for them to walk or crawl through
it, and we will play tag outside, in the garden, using a house tent for children
Furthermore, we will dance and move with different actions songs, for example, “Walking, walking” (Super Simple
Songs) or “Action Song” (The Singing Walrus). And we will create a long painting with papers joined together and a lot of
small drops of paint on them, the children will crawl or walk on it.
Finally, we will celebrate Fire Fighters Day by painting a firemen team who are extinguishing a fire with their hand
prints.
Topic: Outdoor Activities
Our children love being outside in the garden, playing and enjoying the weather which is nicer at this moment of the
year. For this reason, this week we’ll do a lot of outdoor activities, for example, one of them will be walking and crawling
across different objects like mats, boxes, baskets. Another activity will consist of organising a lovely picnic in the garden
where we will also observe birds and insects. Furthermore, we will play different games with water as the main item, for
example, painting walls with a brush and water and looking at our drawings to see how the sun changes them; or
pretending that we are in the beach. We’ll have a lot of fun.
Our Wobbler & Toddler Room News
The children want to improve their balance constantly while playing, so the third week of April we learned about role play
and balance. Playing with big blocks we built a wall and the children were happily trying to walk on it. When they did it good
they started helping the children that were still trying. We also drew hopscotch on the floor, they had never interacted with
a game like this before, and so they were so excited jumping on it following the squares. On the other hand we painted a
line on the floor and did a role play like as if we were in the circus walking on a string, and doing a performance practicing
different ballet and yoga exercises. They enjoyed acting in the role play. Finally, we drew a big poster with all the balance
exercises we learned during the week.
All the children are fascinated with the planes we can see from the garden, so
we decided to learn more about them. During our daily morning chat we talked about the characteristics of the planes, the
children used this opportunity to talk about the planes they have seen, the ones they have taken and they talked about
their experiences with them. We introduced new words like contrails and they were so proud when they were able to
pronounce it properly. We painted a big box to build a plane. They always enjoy art work and messy painting and they were
so happy when we finished the plane and they could play with it. For that role play of piloting the plane we also made a
pilot hat. They were delighted with the plane and the hat, the children were saying “hi pilot” to the child using the plane.
Finally, they coloured their own planes using crayons and were so happy when they saw it hanging from the wall.
All children love to play with cars and do races with them, that is why we learned more about this topic the first week of
May. First of all, we took the small cars and played with them in the garden. Each child had their own car and they were so
happy exchanging it between them, to play with a new one all the time. Being in the garden we also did races between the
children and they were very excited running around the garden and with the big medal all of them got painted on their
hands. We also painted with chalks a big highway all over the class´s floor, so the children could drive their cars on the
road; they were so respectful playing, waiting for their turn so everyone could use the highway. We decided to build our
own race cars, so we took paper roll, we painted it and then the children stuck the wheels on we had made with cardboard.
They were so proud with the result and enjoy playing with them being careful to not break them. At the end we also did a
race with the small cars, but with a special rule, we couldn’t touch them! They only could move the cars blowing them; they
were delighted with this new rule. This week we celebrated the fire-fighter day on the 6th. We prepared a role play, where
the house in the garden was on fire and they, as the firemen, needed to put out the fire. We made a fire hose with a brush
and made a fire-fighter hat with cardboard. When we arrived to the garden we started asking for help, calling the firefighters
and they arrived and put out the fire using the fire hose. We also did some art work with the fire-fighter topic, they
painted with their hands 5 fire-fighters holding a hose, and the children were so happy bringing home this art work.
When playing in the garden the children want to ride the bikes and when they fall, they always ask their friends for help. So
the second week of May we will work the topic “Bikes and friends”. Through different games and songs they will learn the
importance of friendship. We will focus on the book “The little prince”, we will read it during story time and talk about what
is the book trying to say. We will do some messy play with corn flour and water, where the kids will put their foot on it and
they will be “stuck” so they will ask their friends for help. They will also learn what different types of bikes exist and they will
draw them in different ways and with various material to hang the art work on the wall of the class. We will show them an
adult bike and they will be able to play with it.
On the 12th we celebrated International Nurse’s Day and did role play and took turns playing nurses and patients.
Pre-school Room News
The children were learning all about monsters. They love to play monster´s game in the garden and
follow each other as if they were monster. The children made a monsters puppet painting them and choosing their style.
They loved to play with the puppet and pretend that they can talk and move. They also made a dream catcher with plates and
stickers to protect themselves from bad dreams. They also read a book about monsters “Where the Wild Things Are” to learn
more things about them. The children finished the week painting and decorating a monster box.
We worked on different art styles and literacy.
We saw and worked on some abstract, figurative and pop art styles. We talked about what the figures were like and the
composition of the colours. For pop art, we got inspiration on Andy Warhol’s paintings. We coloured some Mickey Mouse and
Marilyn Monroe drawings inspired in this style and made a recreation painting of our own pop art paintings. They loved
painting with colourful bright colours.
For abstract art, we got inspiration on Piet Mondrian’s paintings. We recreated the painting “Composition with red, blue and
yellow” and painted some animal figures inspired on it. They found painting Mondrian’s work very different to what they are
used to painting.
Also during this week, we had free outdoor painting were the kids painted on the walls (cardboard) while enjoying the great
weather. They choose one of the different cardboards that were displayed on the playground and by pairs or groups painted
what they wanted. They really enjoyed this activity and learned how to get orange, green and purple by mixing some of the
colours.
We celebrated Ava O’Leary and Alexander Gavrilas birthdays. Ava brought some Frozen hats and plates for
everybody and some family paper cut-outs for us to paint them. We decorated the classroom and sang Happy Birthday all
together at dinner time. Ava loved to have so much attention from everybody. We baked some cookies in her honour to
make a little birthday party and we made her a little book with drawings of all her friends as a present. Ava went home
feeling very special!
For the next day, we celebrated Alexander Gavrilas birthday! He brought Toy story drawings and stickers, birthday hats,
plates, cupcakes and cookies for everybody. We made a birthday party for him and baked a banana cake that we enjoyed
together.
