During the previous term, Albie and H have been learning about the stars and moon; in order to expand on this we made a space rocket so that the children could zoom up to the moon. Luckily I had a HUGE piece of cardboard and a LOT of tin foil! The children assisted in taping the foil to the cardboard, then the rocket was ready! We did discuss adding embellishments to the rocket in the form of painting it, adding jewels, buttons, glitter etc. The children chose not to do this - they wanted to play in it!!
Initially the rocket was used as a rocket - after that it became a prison, then it became a den, and it was always a great place to hide during hide and seek!
Alas the rocket is no more - it has zoomed off to the tip (there is only so long I can have a 5 foot tall tin foil covered piece of cardboard in the dining room before it drives me mad!) - but fear not, we have some more boxes to make other things out of soon!!
On the following photos it looks like the children are attacking M, they aren't, they are tickling him - rest assured - I never allow the torture of small children in my care!
I apologise for the quality of the photos - the children were far too excited to stand still and pose!
"Goodies and baddies" has been the favourite game here for a few weeks now, occasionally it veers off and the children play "Peter Pan", this is generally the same game but with character names! The children are all very good whilst playing their game; they know that they are not allowed to hurt anyone; only those involved in the game join in; they swap teams happily and include others in their play; and although they may "kill" each other and they may "die" and "be dead", somehow they always come back to life and this is an acceptable part of their play.
We decided to make shields to defend ourselves from the baddies - some of the shields contained "force fields" and "laser beams" - the imagination being used was fantastic!
The children cut pieces of sticky backed foam to decorate their shields - this was a good activity to develop children's fine motor skills and hand muscles. The children here have access to scissors from a young age, they are taught about scissor safety and are supervised appropriately. I believe that it is important to give children opportunities to use scissors and learn how to use them safely.
Albie, T and H were all playing "goodies and baddies" - this is a favourite game at the moment that is played most days. The boys take it in turns being the goodies and the baddies, they add imaginary "forcefields, jail, prison and dens" to their play, it is lovely to listen to them playing very nicely with each other.
I am going to put some thought in as to how I can extend and enhance their play over the half term holidays.
During a 2 hour period, Albie and J played with a cardboard box and had an amazing amount of fun. Albie directed the play, instructing J as to what the box now was - during their play the box was...
a fire engine (of course!)
a surf board
a car
a ballet dancing mat
a sofa
a kennel
a fire station
and finally, a fire engine again!
Unfortunately we now need a new box - luckily I have one lurking in the garage somewhere ready for next week!
