Yay, all our Buds are back from holidays!

10 September – Daily Journal

 We are so happy to have all our Buds back from holidays and had a fun day with old and new friends.

Today we finished making our faces so now everyone has a face on the wall showing off their creative flair. In the past we used glue sticks a lot but using the Japanese glue made from rice and having one finger or all our fingers spread the glue makes it more sensory and the children learn to not use too much glue and spread it around. The people figurines are very popular to play within our class. Sometimes Buds use them as Firemen and police officers and sometimes they are just people or Mums and Dads.

We borrowed a great sensory table activity from Petals which is also helping their fine and gross motor skills to improve as the hold spoons, scoop rice and pour into cups. Or make mountains and cakes etc. It also adds to our week about the 5 senses. Seeing the beautiful green and white colored rice, smelling the rosemary mixed in with the rice, hearing the sound of the rice hitting the sides of the containers, touching and feeling the differences between the rice and rosemary. It is kept in the fridge too so we could also feel that it is cold. We were careful to check that no tasting was involved!

We like to keep busy so while some Buds are washing hands others are reading books or listening to stories. A favorite book at the moment is an Eric Carle book where you have to guess which animal is coming next. (Will you be my friend?). At first Buds weren’t sure of all the animals names but they are quickly learning them and are so proud when they remember a new name. We also used our ears to listen to the xylophone and drum before having a turn. It was pleasantly surprising how well they could share the instruments too.

 We had a busy circle this morning with singing our name song, doing the weather chart, playing a listening game and dancing!

How’s the Weather? We decided in the morning that it was cloudy so we stuck our cloudy picture on our weather chart but at the park it turned sunny so (we put Bud’s hats on and kept playing) later we changed our weather chart to sunny and cloudy.

“Touch your ears”, everyone quickly touched their ears. “What are your ears for?” asked Sharee and Buds looked around a little unsure. “Are they for eating?” “No!” said a few children. For looking and seeing things I wonder…”No!” again said some Buds. “For listening and hearing”? “Yes” said our Buds. Which led to our game of ‘Listen to the animal noise and guess which animal is hiding in the box’.

On the way to the park we felt some drops of rain. Actually Buds were faster to notice than the teachers. “It’s raining” said Iva. We held out our hands to feel the rain and decide whether to continue or go back to school. We decided to continue because we could see the sun trying to come through the clouds.

While Buds were taking turns to wash hands before lunch we lay on our backs with our hands up and sang ‘Twinkle Twinkle Little Star’ and Skidaraminkadink’. It was a fun change to sing in this position. Since we were lying down we decided to do our ‘Sleeping animal’ game and Buds chose horses, pigs, cows and cats. The teachers added snakes and we slithered around.

Thank you

Sharee, Sayaka and Liezel