Little Dolphins Childminding

Happy Dinosaur Day!!

This week our focus topic is on dinosaurs 🦖 🦕

In this fun dinosaur themed activity, the children explored real grass using their senses, touch, sight and even imagination! They were encouraged to describe how the grass feels, talk about its colour, and think about what it might be like for a dinosaur to walk through it. This activity supports sensory development, language skills, and imaginative thinking, all while sparking curiosity about the natural world.

This activity covers several key areas of learning:

• Sensory Development: Directly addressed by encouraging children to use their senses of touch and sight to explore the grass. This helps them develop their sensory processing skills.

• Language and Communication Skills: Children are encouraged to “describe how the grass feels” and “talk about its colour,” which promotes vocabulary development, descriptive language, and the ability to articulate their observations.

• Imaginative Thinking/Creative Development: The prompt explicitly states they were encouraged to “think about what it might be like for a dinosaur to walk through it,” which fosters imaginative play, creative problem-solving, and the ability to think abstractly.

• Understanding the World (Natural World/Science): By exploring real grass and discussing its properties, children are engaging with the natural environment and beginning to observe and understand aspects of the world around them. This sparks curiosity about nature.

• Cognitive Development (Observation & Description): Children are asked to observe the grass closely and describe its characteristics, which hones their observational skills and ability to articulate what they perceive.

To whoever has been removing my leaflets and posters at Sainsbury’s and other local areas to replace it with theirs - I want you to know I’ve noticed.

While I understand everyone has their reasons, I believe we’re all better served by supporting each other rather than competing.

Let’s lift each other up and foster a community of kindness and encouragement.

Wishing you all the best!

Our new reading / chill out corner 📚😎🧘‍♀️

The little ones found themselves a cosy corner to relax, read book and even a place to practice their mindfulness..

PART 1 - Q&A 🎤 for #parents on 15 & 30 hour childcare funding. #earlyyears #eyfs #childcareprovider #childcare #preschool #nurseryschool #nursery #childcarefunding #parents #parentinghacks #parentingtips #education #childcarelife #parentingtips

This activity was for 2-4 years old to recognise alphabets, their task was to identify the alphabets and the colour. Pick one up, show to other children and read out the colour and alphabet then put it on their head without dropping and dropping it the froggy’s mouth on the other table.

This activity covered literacy, colours, turn taking, patience, PSED (physical social Emotional Development), confidence, independence and many more areas of learning.

SCHOOL READINESS

From a young age, we teach children to recognise their name and the alphabet by doing several repeated simple tasks daily e.g finding their names on the shoe box, or the coat peg etc. By the time they are 3 years old, we begin preparing them for primary school and teaching them how to write their names and helping them achieve many other important developmental milestones.

This early groundwork ensures they have a strong foundation before starting primary school, a level of readiness that many nurseries may not have the capacity to offer. Our small class sizes and low teacher-to-student ratios allow us to provide the individualised support needed for each child to flourish during their early years.

Number matching and counting with 24 months old 1️⃣2️⃣3️⃣

Another touching card and a very special ornament 🥹♥️

Difficult end of this week.. All our babies have now grown into young schoolers and ready for their new path.. A very touching message from one of our babies that is now ready to start school ♥️ it has been an incredible past few years having them with me like my own children.. It has been difficult we’ve had ups and downs however it has been the most rewarding watching those babies grow and learning so much for us..

“Put them in water or take them outside.”

It was the first useful parenting advice I ever got.

“Sleep when the baby sleeps”?

I think the polite word for that gem is poppycock. But this particular axiom has saved me many times over.

I don’t remember how old my son was when I called my mom in tears because I couldn’t stop his, but his age was probably measured in weeks. Maybe days.

“Nothing is working; I don’t know what else to try,” I sobbed.

“He’s not hungry or sleepy or wet.”

“Try giving him a bath,” she suggested. “Or bundle him up and take him outside for some fresh air. I always say to take them outside or put them in water, and usually, the grumpiness goes away.”

It worked that day, and it’s worked many times since. We’ve done baths at 10 a.m. I’ve paced our driveway with a baby in my arms at 2 a.m. And today, at 5:15 p.m. when my children were fighting for the 17th time since they got home from school and I was about to lose it, instead I put one in the bath and I sent the other outside and now maybe all three of us will survive until Dad gets home.

Almost nine years later, it still works.

I can’t give you advice about sleep schedules or feedings or Montessori-approved toys. I don’t know what we’re gonna do about TikTok and Snapchat in a few years. But when they’re falling apart at the seams for no apparent reason, take them outside or put them in water.

Oh, and it works on grown-ups, too.

Shared with permission from Jenn Batchelor
https://www.instagram.com/jennbatchelor/

Her View From Home

☀️🌻 For support in your gentle parenting journey, pick up a copy of our beautiful bumper summer issue with gorgeous free Baby's First Year Journal. Grab your copy from supermarkets throughout NZ and newsagents throughout Australia! To find your local stockist, or to subscribe, visit https://linktr.ee/TheNaturalParentMagazine ☀️🌻