I wish the Government would leave us alone!

During the last week (months) there has been lots of articles in the press regarding pre-school children and the level of care they are receiving and what the children are actually learning - the news reports have mainly come from Elizabeth Truss and they have not been very favourable.  

I am not a political person; I am very easy going, I have certain beliefs (mainly concerning everyone taking care of each other and our surroundings, and showing respect to each other) which I believe lead to happy harmonious people.  However the bad press surrounding childcare is starting to make me feel despondent, and actually quite angry.

Childminding is my passion.  I discovered this 3 and a half years ago, and I cannot imagine doing anything else now.  But when I feel constantly put down by the Government, it is making me question what is my future long term.

I would love Elizabeth Truss to come and spend a day with us - she may actually realise that the children in my care are happy, thriving, and learning lots and lots.  And maybe she would like to concede that some childcare providers are doing a good job?  I hope so.

Anyway, for anyone caring to read this I would like to take you through our day so you can judge for yourself the level of care I provide.....

Today I have A (28 months) and O (33 months) in my care.  Both children arrive during the school run in the morning.  O was a little unsettled this morning as his Mummy is poorly, so we came home and I got out the craft things and we all made cards - the children painted a picture of their Mummy on the card and O had a very good attempt at writing his name inside the card copying his name that I had written on a piece of paper.  During this activity we talked about the colours we used, we talked about what our mummies look like, we looked at our names and sounded out the letters in our names, and we had lots of fun!

After this we washed our hands and the children had a snack whilst sat at the table.  After snack they had free play for about half an hour.  The children chose the toys they wanted to play with out of the toy cupboard.  During their free play they built towers of wooden bricks, played with the cars and the post box.

We then walked to our regular Friday morning group.  We met up with another childminder and her children - the children all see each other every week and are forming friendships.  O walked all of the way there, A walked part of the way there and was in the pram for some of the way.  During our journey the children were reminded about the road and road safety.

At the group the children each pay for themselves, this involves talking to Vicky who runs the group, counting, and using our manners.  We sit down and listen to a story.  After the story we sing and dance along to various action songs - some of the songs involve counting, some involve parts of the body, they all involve listening and following instructions.  At the end of the group we sit in a circle and each child chooses a song they would like us all to sing.  This involves the children sitting quietly and listening to the other children, taking it in turns to choose a song, to think about their song choice, and to speak in front of everyone else.

When the group finished we walked home, A walked a lot longer on the way home than on the way there, the children had lots of fun climbing on a gate partway home.  When we got home the children asked to play out in the back garden so they did.  They had free access to the play house, slides, swing, see-saw, trampoline, easel with chalks and magnetic letters, mud kitchen, sand pit, cars, scooters, bats and balls and various other outside toys.  During their play time outside the boys spent quite a bit of time in the play house chattering to each other and laughing.  They discovered a snail on the grass and we all spent a lot of time watching it before I moved it to safety.  They also followed each other on the scooters.  The children choose to eat their lunch outside in the sunshine.

After a couple of hours playing outside the children chose to come inside (the door is open for all of the time that they are outside so they can come and go as they please).  I read the children a story and we had (another) look at the caterpillars that we are looking after - I got out the caterpillar/butterfly life cycle figures and we all looked at and talked about them, comparing them to the caterpillars we have.

The children then continued their free play.

During this day there have been many learning opportunities for the children - many of which I hadn't planned, they just happened and I extended these learning opportunities that arose.  I consider that today has been a lovely day - both the children and myself have enjoyed ourselves and I feel that the children have learnt things along the way.

How lovely would it be if the Government took some time to actually think about the positives in many childcare settings.

Soapy Gloop

This morning I decided to try a new sensory play experience with the children that two of my childminder friends were talking about at playgroup.  It was so simple, and a really lovely activity, and as an added bonus the cleaning up afterwards was a doodle!!

Mix together cornflour and washing up liquid - that is it, done!  I didn't know the quantities so I just guessed and got there in the end - my advice is add the washing up liquid slowly and mix it with your hands - eventually it will come together and form a sort of dough.  

The (newly named) soap gloop was a fabulous sensory experience - you can mould it into shapes, squish it, snap it and stretch it - and it smells fabulous!  And when you have finished playing all you need is running water to wash your hands and they are then squeaky clean!  The children loved it, and so did I!

St David's Day

As the parents of the children in my care know, at the beginning of each year I produce a planning document detailing dates throughout the year that we may celebrate - I make it clear that I will always follow the current interests of the children, if a child is not interested in the things I had planned, or has other interests at that point in time then I will not plough ahead with my planning regardless.

Last Friday was St. David's Day - I was only caring for O, and on Fridays when it is much quieter than our very busy Thursdays, O likes to do activities that I plan, as well as going to our usual Friday morning group.  We talked about St. David's Day, and O was excited to tell me that he had been to Wales.  We talked about the daffodils and O made a lovely pinwheel daffodil - we also looked at the daffodils that O planted a very long time ago and were delighted to see that they were growing in their little pots.

After lunch O helped me to make some Welsh cakes - this was a great baking activity for O, as he doesn't really like the food mixer that we have used to make our fairy cakes in the past, and we didn't need the food mixer as we mixed everything by hand!  O helped me to weigh the ingredients, then he enjoyed the sensory experience of mixing everything with his hands - the butter was very squishy, and the eggs were slimy - it was very good fun!

I cooked the cakes, and O ate the first one when it was warm straight out of the pan - he said they were yummy!

Jack Frost

We have had lots of beautiful frosty mornings recently, the children have been excited by the twinkly white frosting everywhere.  Last week I bought some new books which I hadn't added to our bookshelf yet, one of which is called Jack Frost so I decided that it was perfect timing to read our new book.  It is a lovely story about a boy who makes friends with Jack Frost, and they spend all Winter together having lots of fun until the first snowdrops arrive in the Spring, when Jack Frost disappears in the wind, whispering that he will be back again next Winter to play again.  The children loved the pictures and laughed at the story.

When we were playing out we wrote in the frost with our fingers, but our hands became cold which the pre-schoolers didn't like!

The children made sparkly frosty pictures, we chatted about the frost and everyone agreed that they hope it will be frosty again tomorrow soon - I am sure they won't be disappointed!

Heuristic Play

E has been in my care a few months now, she has settled really well and makes her way about the house; she knows where the toys are that she can freely access and she does this when she chooses.  Each day I get out a different resource for the children to play with to provide variety and interest.

On Tuesday I decided that I would get out the heuristic play objects for E - we were having a morning at home followed by swimming in the early afternoon.  As it turned out E slept all morning, only waking in time for a quick lunch and then swimming.  After we returned home from swimming E eventually played with the heuristic play objects.  

E put virtually everything that she touched into her mouth - this was fine as everything was clean, a large enough size to not pose a choking hazard, and I was supervising her closely.  E was particularly drawn to the CDs, she preferred the shiny side and became quite vocal when she was holding them.  E also enjoyed banging the metal tins with her hands, creating quite a noise in the process.

I have J and O tomorrow who have never encountered the heuristic play - good job everything is still out in the lounge!!

Puffy Paint Poppies

I now have mainly very young children in my care during the day, which means that most of my celebration planning is now 'meaningless' - in that the children are oblivious to what we are celebrating and why.  However I feel that it is nice to tie in our activities to the celebration if possible.

Had I had older children in my care we would have been doing lots of talking and activities leading up to Remembrance Sunday, Albie is currently very interested in it and we have been doing lots of talking about it and looking at old photos from World Wars 1 and 2.

I decided today that we could do a painting activity as we haven't painted for a few weeks.  As E is 9 months old most things go in her mouth, so I decided to repeat an activity that we haven't done for a while - painting with home made puffy paint, which is 100% edible!  To tie the activity in with Remembrance Sunday (very loosely) I coloured the paint red and green - the same colours as the poppies.

The first thing that E did was suck on the paint brush!  Although the paint is edible, I don't imagine that it is tasty, so after the first time, E didn't attempt to taste the paint again!  E then had lots of fun squishing the paint over the paper.

Once E had finished her masterpiece I microwaved it for a few seconds to make it puff up - however as she had smeared the paint on on the paper it wasn't quite thick enough to puff up, so it just became hard and flaky - yay, I invented flaky paint, I just need to think of a use for it now!!!!

Just look at that smile, E does make me laugh!