Making use of the good weather – outside activity this week

Today Barn Owls Red have been outside cloud watching in the garden!
We sat down on the grass and looked up into the sky at the clouds! One Barn Owl said we shouldn’t look at the sun because “the sun is so bright”!
Whilst looking at the clouds, a Barn Owl said that she could see “a princess castle” and a “ballerina”!
Another Barn Owl said that he could see a “massive flower” as well as “loads of snow”
We all had a great time looking out for different shapes and faces in the clouds! Some of the Barn Owls even carried on the activity through the window after we came inside!
Well done Barn Owls , can you spot any more familiar animals and faces in the clouds?

At our Scarning setting our practitioners have been participating in a ’Scarning Garden Challenge’ over the last few weeks which was set by the management team to enhance areas of our outdoor environment. Practitioners worked in pairs to share ideas to extend and enhance an area of outdoor provision. It allows the practitioners ownership as well as the feeling of being valued to implement their own ideas and vision within the provision that they spend everyday in with the children. They had to link it to children’s interests as well as looking at the intent, implementation and impact that their design would have on the children.
Here are a few of the revamped areas within our grass garden for you all to see! A few more areas plus the road garden to complete!

Today our Toftwood Barn Owls took a walk over to do some pond dipping.

We were all very good walking over, holding onto the rope and using our listening ears.
We listened to the pond rules before we began to see what we could find in the pond.
We found some very big tadpoles, the children said they would turn into frogs very soon . We also found some froglets and newts. Sharon held them on her hand so we could get a closer look. They were very squirmy and kept jumping off back into the pond.
Some of our Barn Owls found a frog but they were very jumpy and hopped back in the pond. The children found it very funny when they jumped back in.
The children were very excited with all the things we found.
”He looks like a lizard”
“I found a frog”
“He went ‘plop’ back in”
”Look, a tadpole, it’s a big tadpole”
“He’s going to be a frog soon”
“He’ll go ‘Ribbit, ribbit’l
“There’s lots of seaweed”
“Can I stroke him”
“I don’t want to hold it, it’s slimy”

This morning a handful of Tawny Owls and Snowy Owls made the most of the beautiful sunny weather and went on a lovely trip together to the lake!
On arrival to the lake we all sat down together and enjoyed a lovely snack of fruit, veg and a breadstick whilst seeing what we could spot in a around the lake side
We spotted lots of lovely birds such as a tall standing herring and two geese with five babies we also spotted some ducks and some fish swimming on the waters edge
We all had such a lovely time together, exploring our surroundings and holding lovely conversations with our familiar adults and friends about our trip out of nursery

Today our Tawny Owls had a wonderful time creating hand-print frogs during craft, inkeeping with our topic of the week; Growth and Nature! The babies thoroughly enjoyed getting stuck in and using their hands to create magnificent masterpieces! The children loved learning about how tadpoles grow in to frogs when they grow up, and how they like to splash in water! We discussed how the paint felt cold & ticklish being painted on to their hands, and the children had a whale of a time making frog noises, and we discussed how frogs love to jump!