Mini Rangers 19th May 2015 - Duck Day!

On Monday we have a very special guest coming to talk to us about ducks, specifically our ducks in Etherow.

Her name is Cathy and she is a Badger expert, but is passionate about wildlife.  She is an ex RSPCA inspector and has been volunteering at Etherow Park for quite some time.  On Monday she is going to come along to talk to us about our ducks.

We will be looking at ways of making duck food from things we might find in our very own kitchens!  The children will enjoy running it through their fingers and making little bags of food up to feed the ducks on the way back to the car park.

We will be looking at cooking a special recipe of bananas with an option to put a piece of chocolate into it and see what happens.  Giving children the opportunity to wrap their banana in foil and either add chocolate or don't!

I will be hiding some more eggs around our area so keep a look out, and bring them to our circle time to show everyone what is inside!

So have a lovely weekend

and see you Monday rain or shine!

Melanie Commins, EYTS.

Mini Rangers Session - 10 am Monday 11th May 2015

Hope you all enjoyed the bank holiday!

So back again in Bug hunting season. This week we are going to be using magnifying glasses to hunt for more bugs, we should be finding caterpillars, ladybirds, snails and worms.  We have put many logs around the area to encourage more hiding places for the bugs so come down and see what we can find.

We will be having our what is in the box phonics session this week and we will be reading our favourite book the very hungry caterpillar.

Looking forward to seeing you all again,

until Monday

Melanie and the team

Mini Rangers 27 April 2015

Last week was truly amazing the first session this year that we have done in blazing sunshine!  Gorgeous may we have many more!  I know we are hardy and we will be mini rangers whatever the weather, but that was just lovely last week.

So with May nearly upon us we can start looking out for blue bells, the ferns uncurling, ladybirds flying, broken eggshells and dragonflies.

The Wild garlic is also rife in Etherow and for the more adventurous mini rangers we will be sending you off with your significant adult to pick a few Wild garlic leaves to add to our wild garlic soup!  Very exciting, so camp fire will be back this week!

We will also be checking on our seeds to see if anything has grown and if anyone has any seedlings that have grown a bit and want to add them to our planters that would be great.

I have a story for this week which I will be reading at 10.30 it is called 'mummy's little sunflower' I also have some sun flower seeds that it would be great if you could take home and cultivate into plants to put in our planters.

If your child is not ready for the story please feel free to go on enjoying exploring and adventuring around the area, children will come round to the idea of a story when they feel like it, the other experiences are just as valid.

Hopefully our soup will be ready for the snack again not compulsory!

So see you Monday, rain or shine!!!!!

Mel

Welcome Back to Mini Rangers 20th April 2015

Welcome back Mini Rangers.

We hope you have had a relaxing and fun Easter holiday.  Over these holidays we have been super busy, we have been working hard improving our educational area for you. We hope you enjoy exploring our improved discovery area.

This week will be our welcome back session! We can't wait to hear all about your Easter Holidays that you spent with your special people!

We will be reading 'jack and the bean stalk' this week to inspire the children's imagination whilst getting ready to plant our seeds in the new planters.

We will have a fruit snack, biscuits and coffee, come down and join us for Mini Rangers fun!

Mel x

This week lets look at Yoga in the outdoors - 23 March 2015

This week we are looking at Yoga in the outdoors.  Has your child tried posing like a mountain or enjoyed stretching out in the downward dog? Lets try it all together!

At the moment we are looking at the possibilities of rain showers during our session, so it is a good job that Marina has been out shopping for new tent pegs and props to support our shelter!  I am sure that our new shelter will be brilliant.

Please where your splash suits this week as a bit of rain never hurt anyone, but could make us feel uncomfortable.

Also I would like to thank anyone who has voted for us in the 'Mum's in the Know' competition and if you haven't yet voted please do I think it is this sort of validation that makes the whole idea of 'Etherow Mini Rangers' worth while.

http://www.mumsintheknow.co.uk/stockport/mitk-awards-2015-the-nominations-are/

Thanks everyone and see you there!

Mel

Winter is over lets go into the woods and explore! Monday 16 March 2015

Our phonics sound is 'w' this week and so without further ado a list of activities, snacks and a story!

This week lets have some waffles.

We are getting creative with our 3d web so get ready to get involved with some weaving of a spidery web!

Our book is called 'once upon a slime' and it is all about a spider who explores a little far from home one day.  Here are some spidery facts because the more you know about a spider, the less he will make you jump when he scuttles past your feet!

The silk web spiders weave is very strong in fact spider silk is five times stronger than most metals!
spiders spin webs to catch flies and bugs!
they wrap it tightly round food they have caught
they knit it together to make spider dens and egg sacs!

Don't worry though you are most likely not to find a spider in your house till august and september!

This is short and sweet today, its mothers day enjoy!!

Mel

Phonic sound 'v' as in volcano and Velociraptor - Monday 9 March 2015

Oh what a Monday last week was, being able to catch falling snow, making and eating jammy baguette, eating jelly and hearing about the terrible jumble bum who only appears in messy bedrooms, which reminds me must sort out house!!!  

We welcomed many new faces to our natural wonderland of ever changing terrain.  Seeing children begin to adjust their balance and using their whole body to negotiate the bumpy ground, sometimes falling, but using that intrinsic quality that motivates children to want to move their bodies and be active.

When I attended my own forest school training in 2010 I could immediately see the benefits that I had read about in the childhood and nature study commissioned in 2009 for supported play outside.  At Mini Rangers we are supporting our children in the type of play that we as adults took for granted when we were children.  Mud pie constructing encompasses a wide range of learning schemas, I am of course misleading you in the use of mud pies as they could be anything and the time that children take in collecting objects to put into the pots and spooning earth and leaves into them and then proudly showing this off means that to just call them mud pies is much too simple a term.

This week Pure Innovation team have been down to our area to clear some of the brambles off of the slopes surrounding us.  This means that more able children will be able to climb up the banks without getting cut!  So that should become a more exciting opportunity for older children.

Ranger Steve will not be coming and Neil has a dental appointment this week so I am hoping that my lovely volunteers Mark, Mark, Marina and Sam will be able to assist as usual.

So this week we are focusing on the letter sound 'v'.

We will be making some volcanos out of mole hills, some vegetable soup. Due to its volcanic connection we are going to have 'the dinosaur that pooped the past' by Tom Fletcher and Dougie Poynter.

So see you Monday for some more mini ranger fun.