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The pumpkins have been a wonderful feature of our classroom since the start of October. They continue to rot out in the garden and we watch and discuss this progress daily. The pumpkins have been lifted,stroked,sorted,written on and covered in jewels. They have been featured in stories,recipes and lists. They are so beautiful it seemed sad to cut them up but the resulting learning was fabulous. The seeds were extracted and have been saved to plant next year. The flesh was cut and examined. Some enjoyed running their fingers through the stringy bits. Others were not so sure.

Very happy learning

We have been exploring our feelings and giving names to how we feel. This has resulted in a lot of funny faces as we have experimented with expressions. Some of the Pioneers are masters of the sad face(see classroom for pictures) We took a look at one of our favourite books for a bit of veggie inspiration. The twin tomatoes have been very popular.

There may be a few of these in next weeks soup.

This week we took delivery of a beautiful blue whale to enhance our play and discussions about our world. and in particular our work around “Somebody Swallowed Stanley”. Previously we talked about Stanley in our forest and one Pioneer said,” Plastic bags don’t belong in the Forest.” Everyone agreed and we have all become more aware of our habits regarding litter. This week a Pioneer said,”Plastic bags don’t belong in the Jungle.”

When looking at our school fruit,another Pioneers said,”Bananas don’t belong in plastic bags. They belong in the bowl.” This was seconded by another voive,”Bananas belong in the bowl.We want them in the fruit bowl not in the bags.”

These are such wise words.

This week we have been working with some  glorious,beautiful seed heads  from Mrs McGill’s garden . They are beautiful structures and the Pioneers worked with delicate fingers extracting the seeds. The were almost silent as they discovered the various textures and patterns in the sunflower seed head. We looked at the beautiful book,” A Seed is Sleepy” and watched some timelapse video to complete the cycle.

We shall plant these seeds in the summer.

Our Pumpkin Patch has grown thanks to donations from family and friends. The interest has been huge. The discussions about texture and the changes we have been observing have been fascinating. Finding words to describe mould has become a favourite this week. Lots of children have got stuck in with their fingers and with the tweezers and have been very excited about what they can see. We also have fungus and a variety of rotting apples from the tree.

The decomposition is being charted daily.

Come in and have a look at it for yourself.

Smashing Pumpkins.

We have some new and beautiful texts to share. It is so exciting to see the interest in print and illustration. Readers can be spotted everyday totally engrossed in the detail.Some are reading alone.Some sit with friends. Others have taken to reading to the class.

Pop in and take a look.

Happy Reading

Every child in the school brought their library book to the hall to share with their friends,big and small. Together we made a chain,naming all the books and their authors. There was a great buzz about books. The Pioneers took all the small chains and made them into one big,long reading chain. This is now in the library and you can add a title to it when you return the book you have read. Paper,pens and glue are there for you. Adults,you can add your link too.

Very Happy Reading Everyone.

Stanley is a plastic bag. In the original story that we read together,Stanley falls into the ocean and is a threat to marine life. We discussed the book in detail,used it for story mapping ,in our class and with the whole school and acted out the story with soft toys. When we went to the forest,the Pioneers discovered that Stanley was also a threat to wildlife closer to home.We found and collected other rubbish that had also found its way into the forest. No one was very happy about this. Stanley was flapping in a tree and looked out of place and could easily been eaten by birds or badger. One Pioneer said,”Stanley needs to be rehomed.” Everyone agreed.

I think we need to write our own book about Stanley in the Forest.

After reading Children of the Forest one Pioneer spotted a face made from grass. It looked a bit like a troll. This creature was named as a Grass Meenie. We went out and collected and then pressed leaves and bits from our glorious school site. We turned these into wonderful leaf people. Once they were created they made their way to the forest. We had a lovely morning in the autumn sunshine searching for all the forest fairies. Along the way we found lots and lots of fungus and more acorns. Something had been digging holes. Perhaps it was The Rainbow Raccoon.

The forest is a fabulous place , rich with learning opportunities.