This week at The Children’s House we will be starting to learn about the beginning of the universe, and doing an experiment to demonstrate the Big Bang almost 14 million years ago, and we will be talking about how we are all made of stardust! Later in the week the children will be making their own pictures of the Big Bang, we will do some philosophising and have a discussion about what everyone imagines the world might have been like in the very beginning….then we will also be doing some drama – moving to music with different coloured ribbons to represent all the particles swirling about after the Big Bang.

As well as this we will be talking about the change of month from January to February, which also means that Spring is officially here!! We will celebrate St Brigid’s day on 1st March by making St Brigid’s crosses, and listen to Spring from Vivaldi’s Four Seasons (there is a beautiful reimagining of it by Max Richter, here is the link for anyone who is interested – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WaCib0B8T24); so a busy week ahead!!

93 Percent Stardust – Nikita Gill

We have calcium in our bones, iron in our veins,
Carbon in our souls, and nitrogen in our brains,
93 percent stardust, with souls made of flames,
We are all just stars that have people names.

Twinkle Twinkle Little Star

Twinkle twinkle little star,
How I wonder what you are!
Up above the world so high, like a diamond in the sky,
Twinkle twinkle little star,
How I wonder what you are!

After a great week discussing dental hygiene and learning all about our teeth, we will be continuing on to do a healthy eating theme this week at The Children’s House – we will start off the week with a discussion with the children on why they might think it’s important to eat healthily, talk about what our bodies need from food and which foods are best for us, and continue from there to look at the food pyramid. After this we will introduce practical activities such as matching sample jars of food to the food pyramid, art activities, and sugar experiments, as well as doing some healthy cooking of soup!

We emphasise the importance of having a good balanced diet and a healthy relationship with food – to know which foods are healthy and which are not, but to stress that having a treat is not a bad thing either!

Oh, Do You Eat Your Vegetables (tune of Muffin Man)

Oh, do you eat your vegetables, vegetables, vegetables?
Oh, do you eat your vegetables, each and every day?

Oh, yes we eat our vegetables, vegetables, vegetables;
Oh, yes we eat our vegetables, each and every day!

Another busy week ahead in The Children’s House!! We will be learning all about teeth as our topic is dental hygiene, so we will be talking about the importance of dental hygiene and why we look after our teeth, and discussing what might happen if we didn’t do so – in a non-scary way, we don’t intend to add to anyone’s fear of the dentist!! We will then be examining our tooth model and looking in the mirror at our own teeth and learning the names of them, as well as talking about why we lose our teeth and learning about the parts of the mouth.

We will also discuss how to brush our teeth using toothpaste & brush, and finally talk about foods that are healthy for our teeth – especially crunchy foods like apples and carrots, and calcium-containing foods which strengthen our teeth such as milk, cheese and yoghurts – and foods that aren’t.

Brushing Song (tune of Twinkle Twinkle)

Brushing, brushing, brush this way,
Keeps our teeth clean every day.
Once in the morning, then at noon,
And at night when we see the moon.
Brushing, brushing, brush this way,
Keeps our teeth clean every day!

Happy new year everyone!! We’re so excited to welcome you all back at the beginning of a brand new year! Hope all the children had a great break and are ready to get back to the routine of exploring and learning with their friends!! This week at The Children’s House we will be focussing on our families; we are asking all children to bring in a family photo that they can put up on the wall as part of their family trees and we will be discussing what makes each of our families so special and different, as part of the process of getting the children to see themselves as unique individuals in their own community.

We will also be talking about the new month January and the new year 2019, as well as doing some yoga and mindfulness – these are important tools to learn how to use when we need to calm ourselves down, and good to practice on a regular basis, so we will be starting off the year on a positive foot!

Families (Poem)