A Colour Hunt - Never Gets Old

A New Year with our Grandfriends

We have started a new school year and will once again visit 

our grandfriends each week.

This year our visits will be shorter.

I open the centre first for just over an hour then whoever wishes

follows me to the seniors home.

I love watching the connections that are being made between all the generations.

We play together for about a half an hour then we have music.

Julia is a music therapist that works at the Lodge.

She joins us every week for about a half an hour and leads us in song

with her guitar.

We are so lucky.

I've learned new songs from her that we sing 

back at our centre.

I look forward to the year to come and introducing

more families to this experience.

Apple Pie Roll Ups

Yesterday the children cooked their own snack. 

They made Apple Pie Roll Ups.

I found the original recipe at Spend With Pennies

I modified it slightly by using an electric frying pan

instead of the oven.

A finished roll up.

Here is how we made them.

 Flatten a slice of crustless bread with a rolling pin.

 Add a spoonful of chopped apples that already have a bit of cinnamon sugar on them.

Roll it up and squish to hold it together.

 Brush on butter,

 then sprinkle with cinnamon sugar.

Cook it in the frying pan till crispy and eat!

It was a hit.

In An Apple Tree

Our families have been sharing their harvest with us,

which is great for our snack table.

To build on the harvest concept I set up a small apple orchard.

 I placed two of our fake trees in a big box, that I covered with a green blanket.

I put them in the box in hopes that it will corral the apples and they will

not be rolling around the room.

So far so good.

 Over the years I've collected a variety of fake apples

and I placed most of them under the trees.

But some I hid in the trees.

To encourage the children to look up in the trees I sang this fingerplay

"Way up high in the apple tree,

two little apples smiled at me.

I shook that tree as hard as I could.

Down came the apples

Mmmm, mmmm good!

They enjoyed shaking the trees to see the apples fall.

They also enjoyed hiding the apples back in the trees.

 Once they picked their apples they could wash them.

An amazingly simple idea of water, apples and toothbrushes

can keep children busy for some time.

How Does a Baster Work?

Turkey basters - how do they work?

 We've used eye droppers a lot at the art table

and it's a challenge for most of the children.

This week I put turkey basters in the water table expecting them to be a challenge too.

I was impressed how much easier they seemed to be able to work the basters

compared to eye droppers.

Is it because they are that much bigger and they can use their whole hand?

 

The parents were wonderful modeling how the baster works and sitting back and letting their child try over and over again.

Here's a photo study of concentration.

After a week of using the baster we will use eye droppers again soon.

Hunting for Teeny Tiny

Last week we went for our first walk in the forest behind our school.  We weren't going to be outside too long so I decided to have them go on a hunt for small items that can be used in our fairy play area.

As a measurement tool we used empty raisin boxes.

This helped the children to really look around and think "what can fit in this box?"

Once they filled their boxes we headed back to the school.

Inside we emptied the boxes at our Fairy table and started to play.

As the children collected their bits outside I overheard a couple of things they imagined they could be; like a stove or a blanket.

I'll be watching and listening for more of their ideas.