Activity of the Day – Letter or Number Reaction!

If you have an alphabet or number puzzle you could use pieces from that, if not you could write letters or numbers onto individual pieces of paper and stick them to a wall or spread them out on the floor. Call out a letter/number depending on what you are using (you might want to use the letters from your child’s name, or numbers 1-5, 1-10, depending on what you want them to work on) and using a spatula/fly swat/anything you have to hand, your child has to find that letter/number and hit it! Set a timer for 30 seconds, keep score of the amount they managed to hit and count the score at the end, then you could swap and your child could call out while you hit!

Links to the EYFS –

Personal, Social and Emotional Development – making relationships; self-confidence and self-awareness                                                                                                                                                   Communication and Language – listening and attention; understanding; speaking                Physical Development – moving and handling                                                                                                   Literacy – reading                                                                                                                                Mathematics – numbers

Mindfulness Activity of the Day – Heartbeat Exercise!

Set a timer for one minute and ask your child to either jump and down or do some star jumps until the timer runs out – join in too if you want to! At the end of the minute, ask your child to place their hand on their heart and pay attention to how their heartbeat and breathing feels.

Daily Walk Challenge of the Day – Be a Sound Detective!

Can you be a sound detective today?! Listen really hard, maybe even stand still and close your eyes – what sounds can you hear outdoors? Birds singing, dogs barking, crunching leaves, your grown ups talking to you, cars or buses driving by? Any other sounds? When you get home can you draw what made the sounds you heard?

Movement of the Day – Fitness Friday – Sticky Kids!

We love moving to Sticky Kids songs at Large Group Time – here are some of our favourites for you to share with your grown up!

Introduction and End song – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Fs6E8GuAtI

Let’s Go Walking – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cj-ouBZXd00&list=PLfcTZEc_3M1NMtEdx8uF-W2XnfP5c5PiR&index=2

Stand Up, Sit Down – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=adj0Dy0sETU

Funky Monkey – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9aBYLRhFW8&list=PLfcTZEc_3M1NMtEdx8uF-W2XnfP5c5PiR&index=3

Link of the Day – Sleepy Time Games

You’ve had a busy week and it is Friday, why not end the week by relaxing with these sleepy time games!

https://www.bbc.co.uk/tiny-happy-people/sleepy-time-games/zn86xyc

Activity of the Day – Scavenger Hunt

Why not send your child on a scavenger hunt around your home/garden? Can they find something round, something soft, something blue, a teddy or a doll, one shoe, something they wear etc. You could give them a list to tick off or paper and pen for them to make their own list. Once they have found all the items and counted how many things they have collected, why not play ‘Kim’s Game’ like we sometimes do in nursery. Ask your child to memorise what is there, before covering the items with a towel. Ask your child to close their eyes (NO PEEKING!) and take one item away. Can your child tell you what is missing? Make it trickier by taking more than one thing away, or maybe even double check they are paying attention by taking nothing away! Did they notice?! Now swap over and you close your eyes while your child hides something – can you remember what is missing?! Talk about the items – are they big, small, hard, soft etc.

Links to the EYFS –

Personal, Social and Emotional Development – making relationships; self-confidence and self-awareness                                                                                                                                                   Communication and Language – listening and attention; understanding; speaking                Physical Development – moving and handling                                                                                                   Literacy – writing                                                                                                                                 Mathematics – numbers; shape, space and number                                                                  Understanding the World

Mindfulness Activity of the Day – 5,4,3,2,1

This is a useful activity for grounding if you or your child are feeling anxious, or for just stopping and really taking in your surroundings for a moment. Look around – can you find:

• 5 things you can see
• 4 things you can touch
• 3 things you can hear
• 2 things you can smell
• 1 thing you can taste

Daily Walk Challenge of the Day – Car Colour Hunt

How many of each colour car can you spot on your daily walk today – can you draw a tally chart to show how many blue cars, red cars etc you have spotted? What is your favourite colour and how many of that colour car did you spot?

Movement of the Day – Goldilocks and the Three Bears Yoga

Miss Wadey is reading ‘Goldilocks and the Three Bears’ today – why not give this yoga a go! –

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j5jwPguqHnc

Links of the Day – CBeebies Creative App & Word Waves

Lots of open-ended fun including painting, making toys, building blocks, making music, and putting on a show with your child’s favourite CBeebies characters –  https://www.bbc.co.uk/cbeebies/watch/cbeebies-get-creative-app

Some stories and poems to listen to, with an animated wave helping to tell the story -https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/topics/zvyc7nb

Activity of the Day – Giant Tweezer Pick Up!

We love to use tweezers in nursery to pick up various items and place them in various containers – pom poms, pasta, small figures etc. It is a great way to practice fine motor skills and hand to eye coordination, which are vital skills for later handwriting! Placing the items into different containers is also good for mathematical development – making patterns, counting how many items are in each pile, 1:1 number correspondence.  If you do not have tweezers you could put your own spin on this activity by gathering a range of items from around your house – big, small, long, short etc and giving your child two spoons to pick the items up with – one spoon in each hand like a pair of giant tweezers!  Can your child pick the items up? Which shape items are the trickiest to pick up? Take it in turns, see who can pick up the most items and keep score (you could ask your child to do this!) – why not also set a timer to make it more of a challenge!

Links to the EYFS –

Personal, Social and Emotional Development – making relationships; self confidence and self awareness                                                                                                                                                      Communication and Language – listening and attention; understanding; speaking                      Physical Development – moving and handling (fine motor skills, gross motor skills, hand to eye co-ordination)                                                                                                                                                                     Literacy – writing                                                                                                                                          Mathematics – numbers; shape, space and measure                                                                                    Understanding the World

Mindfulness Activity of the Day – Sending good wishes

Ask your child to think of 5 people they would like to send good wishes to – you might even want to write them a letter or draw them a picture which you could post on your daily walk!

Daily Walk Challenge of the Day – Tree spotting

How many trees can you see on your walk? Are they big or small? Do they have leaves or have they all fallen off? If they have fallen off is there a big pile of leaves for you to walk in? How do they feel when you walk on them? Are they wet or dry, crunchy or soft?

Movement of the Day – Yoga

The Very Hungry Caterpillar yoga https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xhWDiQRrC1Y

Link of the Day – 5 Little Ducks

At Large Group Time, we love to sing number rhymes, such as Five Little Ducks. Why not follow this link, which has a listening activity, the 5 little ducks song and a story about Zack who has lost his quack!  https://www.bbc.co.uk/teach/school-radio/eyfs-listen-and-play-five-little-ducks/z7j9382

Activity of the day – Sink or Float

This is a classic science activity that explores the principle of buoyancy and can be done with even very young children. Get a large container (e.g. a bowl or plastic box), fill it with water, and with the children collect a range of objects from around the home. The children then drop an object into the water – after guessing whether it will sink or float. Be sure to ask questions about their predictions – why do you think this will sink/float? Did the last object sink or float? Why do you think that happened? Is this object heavy, do you think that means it will sink or float?

We love water play in nursery, but it is not possible at the moment due to COVID-19 risk assessments, so once you have finished this experiment why not provide your child with different containers to fill and empty (plastic cups, plastic jugs, plastic medicine syringes, bath toys, empty plastic bottles, anything you have lying around!) Filling and emptying is a good mathematical activity where children will learn about different amounts, quantities, cause and effect, all while having lots of fun – just make sure to put a towel down, it can get quite soggy!

Links to the EYFS –

Communication and Language – listening and attention, understanding, speaking                             Physical development – moving and handling (fine motor skills)                                                   Mathematics – shape, space and measure                                                                                       Understanding the world 

Mindfulness Activity of the day – Dragon Breathing

1. Sit up straight
2. Breathe in all the way
3. Stick your tongue out
4. Breathe out like a dragon!

Daily Walk Challenge of the day

Did you take part in the RSPB bird count at the weekend? If you did, how many birds did you see? If not, how many birds can you see on your walk today? Don’t forget to look high and low! Are the birds big or small? Are they flying or sitting on a rooftop? If you look really hard you might even see a nest in the trees! Maybe you could even take an old empty cardboard tube, like a kitchen roll tube, to use as homemade binoculars!

Movement of the day – Dance

Family Dance Workshop for kids aged 2 – 6: Little Red Riding Hood – Bing video

Link of the day – Playing catch with a twist!

https://www.bbc.co.uk/tiny-happy-people/3-to-4-year-old-child-development-activities