Monkeys Doodles: Easter Treasure Hunt

This week Essential Childminder Magazine have been kind enough to share one of their Easter fun ideas and we we be sharing a few more through out the week. So here is the first one for you to enjoy.

In preparation for this activity take your camera around the garden or outdoor area and take photos of random objects, spaces and places in the area. Print & laminate the photos to create re-usable resources, then place an Easter treat in each of the places you have taken a photo of.

Provide each child with a selection of photos and invite them to find that object or place in the garden to collect their Easter treats.

Effective Practice

During the activity help the children to look at the photos and work out what they can see and where it is in the garden. Discuss the objects shown in each photo, including the colour or any identifying features.

This activity is a fantastic way of ensuring each child finds their designated eggs without the normal mad rush by all of the children. It also helps to develop the children’s understanding of natural features in the world around them.

Extensions to the Activity

This activity has been written for an Easter egg hunt, however it can be carried out as a normal activity to promote development in the Knowledge & Understanding of the World aspect of the EYFS, simply replace the Easter eggs with other objects. It is also suitable for indoor or outdoor use. To extend the development opportunities further allow the children to take their own photos of the area for use in the activity.

For more Easter activity ideas and EYFS planning support please visit www.essentialchildminder.co.uk

We would love to see some of your great Easter ideas so please feel free to share.

Royal Wedding Crowns

Before P finished school for Easter her class made decorations ready for the royal wedding. To be honest I was a little disappoint with the quality of what she got to make,each child was given a piece of cloth the draw a bell, horse shoe or wedding cake on so that they could then be hung up as bunting for their disco.

Since the beginning of the holiday's she has been asking if we could make some bits at home for the wedding. We decided to make some crowns to wear at the picnic we are hoping to have. These are a simple but fun idea. Each crown can turn out completely different and they can be decorated as simply as just using crayons or as detailed as using collage materials.

P used a mixture of art materials to create two very different crowns for her a little man.

I had left it that P could do what ever she wanted and simply just laid out the boxes of art materials for her to pick from. With no plan or template to follow P still decided to create a pattern of colours using the paints, she repeated this pattern again below using a potato stamp.

Once P had finished painting her crown she added her choice of glitter and decorated it using pretty collage pieces. When she made little mans it was very similar but with circles on each of the points.

Monkeys Doodles: Eggtastic Pirate

Last week P had an egg decorating competition at school. I thought I would share her idea with you all. We wanted to stear away from the normal Easter theme and go for something completely different. Lady P decided that a pirate would be a great idea and know one else would think of that ideas especially if it had its own pirate ship! So thats what we went for. It was great fun and I think this week I may buy some more cheap eggs especially for doing these again.

I think you can dye eggs cant you?

There are some great ideas out there sheep, pigs, mice, bees, fairies and even racing car driver.

Monkeys Doodles: Through A Childs Eyes

Wasnt the weather lovely this weekend?! This week the children had come down with the terrible sickness bug that had been going around so by the weekend they were desperate to get out of the house run around and get some fresh air, so we took a trip to the park. While we were there P asked if she could use my phone camera to take some pictures of things we see. P lovely taking photo's and I have been meaning to buy a childrens camera so she can get snappy happy when ever she likes.

So here are some of here pictures, a few are a little random but I found it insightful to see what interested you as we walked around. P must of taken over forty all together.

I am thinking of doing another link up once a month through out the summer where we can let our little or big ones loose with the camera and take a selection of photos, sort of like a photo journal. What do you think?