HALLOWEEN

Halloween is a magical time for children and adults

It's a time when their imaginations run wild with thoughts of witches, monsters, fairies and hereos. It's a perfect time to introduce lots of new activities to excite and challenge them.

Art is a great way to express individuality so colouring and painting all sorts of creatures is a must.

This year instead of just carving our pumpkin we decided to begin by learning The Life Cycle of the Pumpkin. I found some wonderful posters and guides on pinterest and it followed on naturally from our Life Cycle of the Apple that we did last month.

I also found a chart which asks the children to consider: 

• How many seeds are in the pumpkin?
• How many lines?
• Will it sink or float?

We recorded all their answers in advance and then got to work on our class pumpkin.

We also decided to paint one of the pumpkins- we simply took our classroom paint with some PVA glue and everyone got a turn to add some colour. To finish off we added some glitter and watched it shine✨ 

By the way our class pumpkin is named PARKER PUMPKIN. Alexandra Galway's choice was picked from the hat after everyone gave their suggestions.

Another favourite of mine all year round are the sensory bins.

For halloween we created 2. One is filled with coloured rice, spiders, bats, spoons and  cups. The other has shredded paper, magnifying glass, tongs and body parts such as fingers, eyes, ears and a heart ðŸ˜±

These are open ended activities which can lead to great discussions while the children work on their fine motor skills.

One of my favourite links for ideas right now is happyhooligans.ca       

My pumpkin investigation records were at mpmschoolsupplies.com             

To make the coloured rice simply

1. Add dry rice to a plastic bag (ziploc are perfect)
2. Then add a few drops of your favourite coloured paint.
3. Seal the bag and mix the colour around. The children love the feel of the rice and wet paint mixing.
4. Once all the rice is coated spread it out on some greaseproof paper or tray- leave to dry for a few hours.
5. Once dry it lasts forever and can be used for all sorts of spooning, pouring activities.

We added some to plastic bottles to make colourful shakers while working on our recycling theme. 

Finally Little Hands decided to have a healthy halloween this year so instead of giving the children a sweet party we decided to use some healthy tasty treats instead and gave them a halloween twist. For this we got bananas and oranges and the children made some sacry ghosts and pumpkins. The children loved this as they were involved in making the treats and enjoyed eating them afterwards. We also got some crackers and cut out ghosts shapes made out of cheese for our breakfast.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN FROM MONTESSORI B