What are Loose Parts? If you are someone who is interested in play, or early years education, then you may have come across the term Loose Parts. This is a term coined by architect Simon Nicholson in his 1971 article How NOT to Cheat Children: The Theory of Loose Parts. It can refer to both large, […]
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Outdoor Noughts and Crosses
If you read my blog or follow me on social media you might know that getting outside is a big part of our day to day lives. At the moment, we tend to spend the morning outside. Our current morning routine is to have breakfast, do a couple of quick activities together, and then get […]
Messy Play: The Beginnings of a Mud Kitchen
I’ve been keen to make a mud kitchen for T for a long time. They’re such a fun way to spend time outdoors, and are brilliant for all kinds of learning opportunities: sensory development; imaginative play; language development; learning about capacity and measuring; and scientific exploration as they mix different materials. When T started at […]
Garden Sensory Play
It is so lovely that Spring is finally here! I love the beautiful sunshine we’ve been having and have been admiring the beautiful cherry blossoms coming out down our road. We’ve been doing a few jobs in the garden to get it ready for summer and it’s lovely to be spending more time outside again. […]
Tessellating Prints
I was inspired recently to make some geometric patterned paper with T. I had an idea in mind of what I was hoping we could achieve, but in order to enable her to really grasp the activity and be able to succeed, I needed to lay the groundwork by teaching her about tessellation.
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Sweet Shop Role Play
Role play is a brilliant activity for children as it promotes the use of language; applying specific skills (such as counting or writing) in context; is great for social development; and best of all is lots of FUN! For T’s 4th birthday we gave her a ‘shop front’, and for one of her party activities, […]
8 French Activities for Preschoolers
In the past T and I have often themed our week of play as I find it helps me to be a bit more intentional and creative about how we spend our time together. Recently though, I haven’t been great at getting my act together and taking the time to plan ahead. However, after reading […]
Bienvenue sur Le Marché: French Market Role Play
As you may have seen if you follow me on Instagram, this week we’ve had a French theme to our play. One of my favourite things to do when in France is to visit the local market, so I decided to set up a simple market role play for T to play with. To set […]
Brilliant Books: Bears in the Night
Hands up if you read this book as a child! My husband and I came across it at a jumble sale and we both had fond memories of enjoying it as kids, so we picked it up for T. A few months later we discovered another copy at my parents house! We really love this book […]
Top Toys: Pin-A-Shape
For Christmas, we bought T Pin-A-Shape, made by Bigjigs toys. This is something I used regularly as a Reception class teacher and it has been on my mental ‘to buy’ list for T for a long time. I just needed to wait until she was old enough to be able to play safely with the […]