Planning for Spring Term 2016

(Medium term planning)

5th January – 24th March 2016

This term our theme will be ‘Growing and Nature’. Within this topic we will be learning about flowers, trees, plants we can eat and insects, whilst also celebrating various events throughout the spring term, and linking adult led and free play activities throughout each week.

If your child has any particular interest or concerns regarding the topic planned for next term please do not hesitate to contactRachaelor your child’s keyworker as soon as possible to enable us to support and plan for each child’s needs.

Week 1 (5/1/16-8/1/16)

Flowers– Cooking: Rice Krispie Cakes (Wed PM)

This will be our first week back after the Christmas holidays. We will start by looking at all different types of flowers, using our adult led time to explore the environment to match flowers to a colour chart. This will encourage children to explore colour variations and learn names of flowers and plants they may find. We will be making spring flower sensory bottles at the craft table, making perfume in the sensory tray using petals, water and whatever else the children may want to add!Weighing pine cones, leaves, stones and much more with the scales in the maths area, and developing our fine manipulative skills with play dough. In the garden will be the mud kitchen for role play, and playing with hula-hoops and balls to develop the children’s gross motor skills, and making flower prints with tubes and paints.

Week 2 (11/1/16-15/1/16)

Trees– Cooking: Tree Cookies (Tue PM)

In our second week we will be learning about trees, using computer games and books for reference. Adult led will be using the play dough to make tree shapes using play dough mats. We will also be mark making with paints on the tables covered over in cling film, this encourages children’s literacy early writing skills. Outside we will be playing rhyming pairs in small groups, role playing in our builder’s yard and making rubbings of the bark on the trees.

Week 3 (18/1/16-22/1/16)

Vegetables–Cooking: Vegetables Frittata (Tue AM)

This week will all be about vegetables. Using our own vegetable patch we will be helping to pick and plants vegetables, and using these in other activities throughout preschool. We will be using runner beans as paintbrushes and corn on the cobs as paint rollers, encouraging children’s creativity and imagination. We will also have a vegetable shop for the children to role play in and we will be weighing various sized carrots in the maths area, talking about their length, shape and weight. In the garden we will be listening to music, using vegetables as stampers in paint, and playing with the cars and the garage developing children’s imaginative skills.

Week 4 (25/1/16-29/1/16)

Seeds and Roots –Cooking: Fruit Salad (Tue PM)

We will have a seeds tray for adult led where children will be encouraged to distinguish between the different seeds and separate them using child tweezers. This develops fine manipulative skills and dexterity, developing pen control and handling. There will be a garden centre as our role play area and the dolls house and small world multicultural people. During circle time we will be talking about seeds and roots, and use our bodies to mimic the growth of a plant; curling up small to be a tiny seed, wiggling out like roots and growing up tall like a plant, using our hands to sway like leaves. We will also be telling the story of The Hungry Caterpillar and mark making on chalk boards. Outside will be the rhyming soup adult led activity, digging for worms and some more bark rubbings.

Week 5 (1/2/16-5/2/16)

Baby Animals– Cooking: Animal Shapes Sandwiches (Fri AM)

During adult led the children will be making caterpillar cress heads, talking about what the cress seeds will need to grow. Inside there will also be stencils of animals to draw around, encouraging children’s control over pens and pencils and we will be making paper plate Geese on the craft table. Our role play area will be a vets where children can re-enact stories or real life experiences of going to the vets. Farms, tractors and small animals will be available to play with as will play dough, lentils for sensory play, instruments and eggs in the nest counting activity. We will also be starting our Valentines craft this week. Outside we will be playing a chain game in small groups, throwing and kicking balls developing gross motor skills and hand eye co-ordination, and making a bird hide using binoculars and looking at books to identify which birds we may see.

Week 6 (8/2/16-12/2/16)

Caterpillars to Butterflies–Cooking: Pancakes (Tue AM & PM)

We will be reading the hungry caterpillar story this week, talking about how caterpillars turn into butterflies, and looking back at past photos of the butterflies we have released from Woodlands that the children cared for. The children will be encouraged to paint butterfly pictures, and go bug detecting in the sensory tray. This week we will also be celebrating Shrove Tuesday by eating some yummy pancakes and talking about the celebration. Also Chinese New Year will be celebrated, looking at the festivals and celebrations that take place, and talking about Chinese cultures and traditions. We will be reading Monkey Puzzle and making Monkey masks as it is the year of the monkey. In the garden we will be playing Grandmothers Footsteps in small groups and building in the construction area. There will be glittery shaving foam and green and red paints, spades and jugs and chalk boards for mark making.

HALF TERM

Week 7 (22/2/16-26/2/16)

Insects –Cooking: Honey Hoops Cereal Bars (Wed PM)

This week we will be starting our Mother’s day craft. There will also be a spider web discovery basket, worm painting and play dough bug fossils. The rollerball letters will be available for children to start recognising letters and numbers and how they are formed. Dressing up and role playing in the children’s kitchen, re-enacting past experiences. The interest table will have various insects and books for children to explore, with scales for maths development. We will be reading The Very Busy Spider to develop out literacy skills and will be asking children to recall the story after, talking about the beginning, middle and end of the story and suggesting different endings. Outside will be rhyming puppets for a small group activity, Insey-Winsey spiders in the drain pipes in the water tray, sticking and gluing and balls and bats.

Week 8 (29/2/16-4/3/16)

Bees and Beehives – Cooking: Tortilla Pizzas (Thurs PM)

We will be focusing on bees and beehives this week, talking about what bees do and their hives. We will be reading and looking at books about bees and playing our bee ‘kerplunk’ game to enough maths language and concentration skills. At circle time we will also be playing ‘isn’t it funny how a bear likes honey’ game, something the children love to take in turns to hide the honey and be the bear. This week is also St David’s day on Tuesday, we will be talking about it and making daffodil pinwheels for adult led all week. Other activities will include Bee paper plate pictures for craft, straw threading and a garden centre role play area. The garden will have potato printing, train track, chalk boards, books and story sounds for adult led.

Week 9 (7/3/16-11/3/16)

Weather–Cooking: Rainbow Cupcakes (Fri AM)

For our adult led activity this week we will making a weather mobile. Also we will be filling out weather diarys and a weather station in our role play area. There will be sensory rainbow rice and scales with natural resources to weigh and measure. During circle time we will be singing ‘the sun has got his hat on’ and ‘it’s raining, it’s pouring’. We will be starting our Easter craft to send home in the following few weeks. The adult led activity in the garden will be ‘roly poly’ which will be encouraging speech and literacy development. There will be a Noah’s ark, construction building, sensory bags and yellow glittery water.

Week 10 (16/11/15-20/11/15)

Plants we can eat (berries/flour/vegetables etc) –Cooking: Puff pastry pizza flans (Mon AM) & Shamrock cookies Thurs AM & PM)

This week we will be looking at various food we can grow and using our vegetable patch to do some planting and picking. We will be using our adult led time to talk about where food comes from and what plants we can eat. There will also be vegetable printing, a farm shop role play area, and wooden bricks with people to build houses and farms for, soil in trays and Mr Bloom games on the computers. In the garden will be dressing up, balls and hoops to develop hand eye co-ordination and gross motor movements, watering cans, cornflour for sensory and mark making and happy street for small world play. This week we will be also talking about St Patrick’s Day on Thursday, making shamrock cookies and printing pictures with green peppers to make clovers.

Week 11 (21/3/16-24/3/16)

Easter–Cooking: Hungry Caterpillars (Fri PM)

This will be our last week of term before we break up for the Easter holidays. We will be having fun doing a nature scavenger hunt, finding lots of spring all around preschool, the field and the woods. There will also be leaf printing, vegetable painting, a garden centre role play area, the small world farm, threading and discovery baskets. During circle time we will be reading Jack and the Beanstalk. In the garden we will be drumming for adult led, listening to different sounds the objects in the garden make and developing rhythms and patterns with them. There will be craft to make which will be leaf wreaths and also making a wormery. Crayons and paper, happy street and green water will also be available.

EYFS learning intentions the planning is linked to:

Please remember to label all items that your child brings in, and to make sure it’s nothing too precious in case any items are misplaced.

Please fill this in and return, it’s really important to us that we have your input in our planning to benefit your Childs development whilst at Woodlands

Name of Child
Name of Parent/ Carer
Any information you would like to input into your child’s learning development

……………………………………………………………………………….

(Please print and cut this out to keep visible for an easy reminder)

Week / Show and Tell / Sign of the Week
Week 1 / Tell us about your Christmas holidays / Flower
Week 2 / An image of a tree / Tree
Week 3 / A vegetable you like to eat / Food
Week 4 / A book about growing/ gardens / Garden
Week 5 / Pictures of farm trips / Farm
Week 6 / Bring in small things you find on the way to school / Butterfly
Week 7 / Books about insects / Spider
Week 8 / Where does honey come from? / Bee
Week 9 / A picture of your favourite season / Sun/ Rain
Week 10 / Bring in a fruit or vegetable / ‘To eat’
Week 11 / Something you have grown or can grow / Growing

Mydocuments/planning/parents2016planningletter.doc