Welcome back to Butterflies and to 2023!

We have been very busy settling all the children back in and welcoming lots of new faces, children and Staff. the last two weeks we've focused on settling the children, getting them used to the environment and letting them make their own choices for favoured activities.

Last week in the mark making area the children started writing letters and wanted to post them to their families, so this week we added stamps that they had to cut themselves, envelopes and lots of different material they can use to make their letters. The children enjoyed using the scissors to cut the stamps they wanted. Some children used sticky notes and created their own stamps. For some children just making a mark with the pens and pencils means a great deal to them so it is lovely to see what creations every child comes up with.

The children have enjoyed using the construction area for farm animals and dinosaurs. Small world play, as well as being fun, is the ideal platform for nurturing children's imagination from a young age. We also encourage lots of loose part play in each area of the room. Loose parts play helps kids develop creative and critical thinking skills by encouraging them to use their imagination and experiment with new ideas freely. They can use loose parts to create anything they wish, the imaginative play is endless.

We have had a continuous resource of painting and sticking this week which the children have loved. Some of the children used brushes and other materials to create marks, and some children loved using their hands to create their picture.They can feel the texture of there paint and use that to experiment with colours and marks they make.

In the large tuff tray we had a mixture of different sized tubs and different materials to create instruments. We used boxes, tubes and other items to fill with different materials such as lentils, pasta, buttons and rice to create different sounds.
As the week progressed there children enjoyed filling and emptying there large tubes, exploring the sounds it makes and how many it takes to fill. It was great fun emptying them all and watching buttons fly everywhere, but this also promoted more opportunities to hear them fall to the floor, watch them and explore 😅.

In the Maths area we have seen some great fine motor development with the threading.
Threading is an excellent way to strengthen the finger muscles and learn to control the fingers as they work together. Starting with the larger beads, helps stabilise their hand eye coordination before having the control to use smaller beads.

This week has been very wet and the children have loved splashing through the puddles. Please can you provide spare clothes for this kind of weather.
We would also like to ask if you can label your child's shoes and welly boots please we cannot always monitor or remember were your child has taken them off, so being labelled will make much easier to maintain.
Thank You.

The Butterfly team 🦋

Week ending Friday 23rd December 22

Christmas has slowly crept into Butterflies this week.
We gradually introduce Christmas activities so that It isn’t so overwhelming for the children.

The maths area we focused on posting, stacking and simple inset puzzles. We have multiple of continuous provision resources for the children to independently access throughout the session too. Fine motor activities help develop their hand eye coordination as well as fine motor grip skills.

Some of the children have been really into putting different creatures and animals into the water tray, so we added lots of different sea creatures this week. Watching the children create lots of play sequences in the water with the different creatures has been lovely to see.

We made Calendars in the art room with plenty of paint, these will be sent home soon with the cards that we will be making next week.

In the Tuff tray we have had a treasure basket and loose parts. The centre feature of a treasure basket is a child’s natural curiosity in objects. A treasure basket provides an independent form of play, where children are allowed to investigate and examine the items however they like.

The floor had the train track and trains but left it open for the children to create their own train track and their own play scenarios. We saw some lovely games played with the train tracks, colour matching the trains to the carts. Making sure that the tracks fitted correctly by working together to find the right pieces. I love seeing what the children create and how they use the small world area, building stories and playing imaginatively.

Magazines, scissors, glue and stickers have been a popular activity this week in the mark making area. The children have enjoyed using their scissor skills to carefully cut the magazines out and glue them to the paper. Some of the children enjoyed using the stickers, these are great for fine motor grip as you have to pinch between your fingers to pull them up, being all shapes and sizes!

Next week we will be decorating the room with all of the Christmas decorations.

We have two weeks left until the Christmas Holidays 🎄 exciting!

As always like and comment so we know you’ve read it ✨

Have a wonderful weekend, see you Monday!

The Butterfly Team 🦋

Friday 18th November 2022

We have had spots, stripes and even pyjamas!

The children have been busy making Pudsey bear out of playdough, using different sized bear cutters and materials to create his bandana. In the art area we have used the dabbers to create Pudsey masks and have had loads of fun with stickers. We all enjoyed decorating a yummy biscuit using icing, jelly tots and smarties (I'm sure some were eaten along the way). I hoped they all enjoyed earing these at home 😀 We made the water yellow and added milk bottle tops to create the spotty effect andwe also got creative and made a Pudsey out of yellow rice. Lots of fun had by all. Enjoy your weekend 😀

Week ending Friday 11th November 2022

What a colourful week we’ve had in butterflies this week.

We focused our activities around fireworks, space, light and dark. The children told us all about the fireworks they heard and saw over last weekend.
Our small world area consisted of space rockets, little men, and shiny loose parts.

Our Tuff tray had coloured salt with small mark making tools. The children used the tools to re make the firework patterns they saw in the sky 🎇✨ some used their hands and whole arms to create wonderful marks and some used the small fine motor tools.

The play dough was black with shiny loose parts so they could create their own rockets, stars, space and whatever their imaginations created. They manipulated the dough by squeezing, pulling, pushing and rolling to create their masterpieces. Play dough helps children develop hand eye coordination and build concepts of form and shape, and for some children it’s a simple sensory exploration.

This week we used the light box with different loose parts, sticks, Shapes and on Friday we added Poppy related activities for remembrance day.

The sensory tray we had black rice with small coloured pasta stars, tweezers, spoons and small star pots for the children to explore.

Friday we took the time to create some activities around remembrance day. We create activities using the Poppy, the Poppy symbolises remembering. In the Art room we had poppy collaging, we added extra materials to the coloured salt to create a large poppy shape and on the floor used small loose parts to create poppys.
The great thing about loose parts is that they can be anything, they can be moved, combined, transported, manipulated, lined up, mixed up and used in such a variety of ways.

We hope you have a lovely weekend.
Please like and comment so we know you’ve read this.

The butterfly Team 🦋

Week ending Friday 4th November 2022

Happy Halloween Everyone.

It has been lovely seeing all the children come back happily after the half term break. We heard lots about Halloween, I hear there were lots of witches, skeletons and princesses. Then some children explained they sat home with their Mummies and ate sweets, what a lovely Halloween evening you all had. We love hearing about the weekends and what everyone has been doing.

In the Mark Making area we have been making bats using black paper folded in half with an outline of a bat. The children had to use the scissors to cut around the outline, then when they opened the paper it made their own bat shape. The children worked so hard using good hand eye coordination and fine motor skills to cut across the paper. The art room has been a hive of activity this week with observational paintings of pumpkins, experimenting with colour mixing make the perfect orange. We have drizzled glue to make spiders webs, adding salt, glitter and flour to the glue and enjoyed using the paint dabbers on the easel.

On the floor we aim to use the children's curiosity with a mixture of loose parts, reels and natural resources. We have used our black blocks with chalk and the reels to create a representation of a haunted house. The chalk allows children to draw and explore the black bricks to make their own sculptures.

The water tray consisted of orange water with a pumpkin, then we added ice hands and the children used their fine motor skills to pipette the warm water and watch the ice melt.

The tuff tray consisted of a pumpkin with pasta and Rice. The children enjoyed hitting the pumpkin and watching it slowly start to crack open, then they filled the pumpkin full of pasta.
Sensory play includes any activity that stimulates your young child's senses: touch, smell, taste, movement, balance, sight and hearing. Sensory activities facilitate exploration and naturally encourage children to play, create, investigate and explore.

This week we have focused on settling the children back in and watching them explore each area. We have added photos of how the children explore and investigate their work and how the process evolves. Dripping glue, cutting the paper, hitting the pumpkins, holding a pencil.

Our songs this week have been Incy Wincy Spider, 5 Little Rockets, 5 little men in a flying saucer, The Rainbow song, The grand old duke of York and 12345.

We have had a lot of wet weather this week so please bring in wellies, spare clothes especially socks and wet weather clothes. We are out in all weathers. If you are able to provide a bag to put wet clothes in that would be great as we unfortunately do not have any.

Our family display is slowing growing, Thank you to everyone who has sent in your photos. If you haven't already please send your family photos to s.head-moss@lanterns.hants.sch.uk so we can add your photos to the wall. It's lovely to see children talk about their family, who's in their family and show their friends. Some of our children have noticed their photos and explained or used Makaton to sign their family members.

Next week we are continuing explore light and dark, and mostly about fireworks and the sounds they make. We look forward to hearing all about the fireworks you've all explored this weekend.

As always please like or comment so we know you’ve read it.

Have a lovely weekend and we will see you on Monday ✨
The butterflies Team 🦋

Week ending Friday 14th October 2022

This week we have explored so many different autumn themed activities and textures. The children have been so engaged in exploring all of the different items we’ve had. We look to provide inspirational play spaces full of opportunities to play learn and develop.

Thank you to everyone who went on an autumn walk and brought in some wonderful items to share with everyone ☺️ We have used these for making patterns, exploring textures in the sensory tray and much more. 🍁🍂🥮

In the Tuff tray we used lots of natural materials and loose parts to create different faces. Ive attached some of the faces the children made, they’re amazing! The children focused and sustained their attention for such a long period of time attaching the mouths, eyes and even some had eyebrows. The detail was thoroughly thought out by all.

In the art room we used the conkers found by everyone to conker roll in paint! The patterns made were beautiful, the children had to use good hand eye coordination to hold the tray and move it side to side making the conkers roll.

The play dough consisted of brown dough, match sticks, cinnamon sticks and dots for the eyes to create hedgehogs. The children manipulated the dough to shape the hedgehog and using the materials provided to create their version of hedgehogs.

Our mark making area we used two pumpkins for the children to create observational drawings of. We had a variety of different writing materials, pens, pencils, crayons and all different shapes and sized. There are many benefits about observational drawing, it helps strengthen memory, remembering what they’ve seen to draw it after looking at the object. It helps strengthen fine motor skills and develop concentration and focus.

The small sensory tray consisted of orange lentils, popcorn kernels and various autumn objects to explore.
The water tray we continued with the interest the children had using rue stainless steel teapots and cups. So we added different flavoured tea bags, mixed berries, lemon and ginger and many more. This created a lovely variety of smells around the room, we also watched the water change colour the longer the tea bag’s were in there. The tea bags also split which causes a lumpy texture in the water tray which the children also liked to experience. They even helped scrape it all out when the water tray was empty.

The maths area consisted of Making autumn patterns. The children had to look at the pictures careful to match the correct items, conkers, leaves, acorns and lots more.
Creating sequencing patterns help with making predictions because they begin to understand what comes next.

We have heard some lovely language from the different materials we have heard.
“ its spiky outside, its soft now”, “ look shiny”, “ this leaf is orange” “ The conker is so small”, “ look how big”.

In the garden we have been making witches broomsticks with sticks snd string. Making the broomstick meant using great hand rye coordination and fine motor skills to wrap the string around the stick to make a broomstick.

We have been reading ‘Chicken Licken’ and ‘ whats the time Grandma wolf’. The children have really focused on their Makaton signing recently, learning all the signs for the animals.

Our songs were Miss Polly had a dolly, Humpty Dumpty, a Hedgehog is very prickly, Autumn Leaves, Clap your hands and Wiggle your fingers and 5 little monkeys jumping on the bed. I hope you’ve been hearing lots of these songs at home.

Thank you to everyone who has already brought in photo’s of the children and their family for our family wall. Please send in photos to my email ( In last weeks observation) or bring one in and we will add it to our wall.

Next week are exploring Diwali and More autumn/Halloween activities.
Next week is the last week before half term.
We look forward to seeing you all.

Have a wonderful weekend and we will see you next week.

The Butterflies Team 🦋

Wow what a wonderful first week back we’ve had.

Welcome to Butterflies all of the older children. They have all come back so happy and settled and we’ve loved hearing all about their summer holidays with surfing, beaches, being on aeroplanes and enjoying time at home with family.

We also welcome some brand new faces to butterflies, it’s been lovely getting to know you all!
Everyone has come in really happy. Even though we’ve had a few tears, it’s been lovely to see the relationships that are already being built with other children and key workers.
Building those strong relationships with the key person helps the child feel safe and secure in a new environment.

This week we’ve had simple activities out, using the continuous provision resources. This allows the children to thoroughly explore the room, getting a feel for each area.
We’ve seen some lovely engagement, language and friendships being built already. I’ve attached some photos of the amazing scenes the children have created. I hope you’ve heard all about it at home!

Here are some of the areas around the room we’ve had this week so you can see what children have been doing.

We’ve been reading ‘5 little ducks’ and the ‘ wheels on the bus ‘between both ends of the room. The children have loved, choosing the props for the story and joining in counting and signing along with the songs.

We are so proud of how well everyone had come in this week and we still have more faces to welcome next week.

Just a few reminders!
- Please can you bring in wet weather clothes/waterproofs and Welly boots for the we weather. You are more than welcome to keep spares here on their peg if that’s easier.
- Please label shoes and clothes as children like to take them off and leave when wherever and sometimes they cannot remember which ones are theirs.

We will be providing these updates weekly for you all to read, any questions please don’t hesitate to contact your key person or Myself and Liz the seniors of the room.