It's all about chickens!!

 Here come the chickens, here come the chickens, book, book, book, book, book!!!!

Only two more sleeps and we just can't wait, this is our favourite experience each year!   We are going to be hatching chicks once again.

This week we have been drawing chickens, painting chickens, talking about chickens, watching chickens hatch (and emu's and parrots too!).  And we discovered that we actually know quite a bit already about chickens.  For some of our tamariki this is going to be their 3rd time hatching chicks!

Here are some of idea's.... What we know about chickens........

- they lay eggs

- they live on a farm

- they hatch our of an egg

- they are brown and white

- they have a double cage

- they have two legs

- they make a book book sound

- they have wings

- they eat salad

- they use their beak to eat

We just can't wait for them to arrive on Monday, I wonder how many girls or boys we might have?

Mamma chick

The Uxbridge Helpers!

What a busy day outside!  Didn't we have some super helpers on the job.  We are lucky to have great kaitiaki here at Uxbridge that help to look after our environment.

 Ka pai tamariki ma.

  You filled both wheelbarrows and two big buckets full of leaves.  It is looking great for Levi's party!

Balloon Basketball

 A bit of splashy fun was had at the water trough today as we put the basketball hoop over it. For balls we used balloons filled with water. Some of the children had incredible aim as they took turns to shoot the ball through the hoop. 

Because the balloons were filled with water the tamariki enjoyed the feel of squishing them between their hands. 

"It's slippery" Odette said

Levi felt his and then felt Michaels "My one is heavier than your one Michael! " he said as he then gave his to Michael for comparison. "Yes" Michael said back.

Michelle enjoyed aiming the water balloons into the hoop but didn't enjoy the splashes afterwards so had to step back fast!

Ava enjoyed the feel, "so squishy!"

Rory counted his shots "1,2,3!""

What fun can be had with a simple change of position of a resource!

 

Snowing in Summer?

Today the tamariki enjoyed exploring fake snow. It was "so soft" Hallie said.

It felt a bit like kinetic sand, you could mould it easily. If you are keen to try this at home it was made from two simple ingredients - baking soda and a blob of shaving foam. 

It was great to see the children enjoy the texture and use this as a base for their imaginative play. We also saw lots of great communication and sharing. Fantastic work friends.

Here is what they thought of it:

"This is icy." Ted added

"I crash it." Rory told us as he continued to make castles and crush them just like at the beach. 

Chinese New Year

We have had a wonderful week celebrating Chinese New Year. This year is the year of the Ox. We have been looking at what animal is was on the year we were born. 

We have explored using chopsticks and making noodles and Chinese patterns at the playdough table. 

We also have made some beautiful Chinese lanterns and fans. The children showed us their impressive skills using the stapler, painting and using the hot guns through this process. 

We had a special Chinese new year Mat time where our friendly puppet Lee joined us to tell us about some of the ways we can celebrate Chinese New year through, food, having a feast, fireworks and spending time with family. 

We danced with scarves to some beautiful traditional Chinese music. 

We had a bit of a feast of our own as we mad our own Rice Paper rolls with yummy vegetables and noodles. Using the tongs we filled our rice paper and folded the paper up into a roll. We enjoyed eating these with some special sauce! Yummy! Its great to try new food from different cultures. 

Happy Chinese New Year to everyone!!

 

Celebrating Waitangi Day

 Last week and this week we shared the message of Waitangi which is such an important part of our heritage here in Aotearoa. 

The Tamariki enjoyed learning about our special culture through art, clay, stories and waiata. 

Some of us made beautiful taonga to display on the wall. We explored art that represents the unique animals, birds and plants of Aotearoa and shared in the story of the Treaty by following Little Kiwi's treaty story.