Hedgehogs Childminding Services

Arhhh!! It be Pirate Week at Hedgehogs!! We have had a ball this week playing with the Piratical resources, lots of dressing up and games as well as playdoh and drawing/writing opportunities. The Playmobil pirate ship went down a treat as did the Woodland visit with our friends from Sunny Starts and Kidz Corner where we read pirate stories and did a treasure hunt. The children decided that one of the sea monsters in the story needed feeding so off to the mud kitchen we went t...o make them some food. We also used tools in the digging patch to look for buried treasure and generally get muddy 😀
Sunny Starts kindly hosted an amazing Pirate Themed sensory play activity which the children explored. The younger children enjoyed feeling the different textures of rice, sand, coins and shells and the older children’s imagination was fired up with ideas of pirate ships and golden treasure. We also had a ball on their amazing play structure and in their sand pit, using their gross and fine motor skills whilst playing with a great group of children improving social skills and making friends. It’s such a shame we can’t take pictures of their interactions (for obvious reasons) as this is what it’s really all about, giving children those opportunities to explore and expand their social world whilst feeling safe and supported by the excellent adult-to-child ratio that childminders offer.
I can’t believe there is only one week of school to go - lots more fun planned before the holidays begin!
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Fun in the sun! We followed on on from our seaside theme this week with lots of water based activities. We scooped up sea creatures, singing ‘Down at the Bottom of the Deep Blue Sea” a firm favourite as well as “1,2,3,4,5 once I caught a fish alive”. We made predictions about what would happen to different items when dropped - would they sink or float? We also enjoyed sand play, talking about the differences between dry and wet sand and favourite ice cream flavours when using... the cone moulds. Lots of opportunities for language development and connecting ideas for the little ones.
We also ran our annual Beach Day with den building, water and sand play and a tent and ‘campfire’ for role play activities. We even tried a new ice lolly recipe from Eat Well for Less - Orange and Carrot would you believe it?! We decorated our Ice Cream Shop with lollies and ice creams that we coloured ourselves and enjoyed role-playing with our friends.
Some other fun activities this week were our car wash, where we cleaned everything in sight. We also enjoyed lots of balancing activities enhancing our gross motor skills and self confidence. We have been super busy, full of fun activities and learning 😀
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So, last week we had the theme of “Fun and Games” giving children some ideas on making their own board games and Word Searches. They took on the challenge with a vengeance! We also played lots of different games, including “Out-Foxed” a co-operative board game for Primary school children where children play together to beat the fox. They win or lose together and this gives a very different feeling, with children encouraging each other and providing support if it looks like th...ey are not going to beat the fox in time. Definitively recommend! Another part of our ‘fun and games’ was a sensory experience with Sunny Starts in the Upperthong J&I School Bungalow - the jelly, custard, flour, grass and rice were great fun for all!
This week we have started our “Beside the Seaside” theme, reading the story “The Rainbowfish” and then using food based paints to recreate the fish in the story who shares out his shiny scales to his friends. We also had fun singing songs related to the sea and sea creatures - baby shark was an obvious favourite! We also had fun using water play, pouring water into different containers and the water wheel, scooping up fish in nets, watching the water fall from the watering cans and learning how to use the giant pipettes. The water table was a gift and after a good old clean up looks as good as new. More seaside based fun planned for next week 😀
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Keeping Our Setting (and our planet) Green!
For some time we have been taking care of the things we buy in setting and opting for choices which have less impact for example organic milk and butter, sustainably caught fish and free range eggs. Our electricity and gas supplier Bulb uses wind farms, solar and other renewable sources for all their electricity supply and part of their gas supply is similarly ‘green’.
We started a long term sustainability project some time ago, whe...re I have been changing over some of our purchases for example our dustbin liners are now made from recycled plastic and we ensure consumables (like printer paper and hand towels) are from sustainable managed forests/recycled paper. We also use less harmful cleaning products made from more natural ingredients.
Some time ago we noticed how many wipes we were using and it troubled me so we now use cotton facecloths combined with the below biodegradable wipes and have just recently purchased Dettol biodegradable anti-bac wipes.
To put this all into context, have a watch of Hugh’s War on Plastics which may shock, and is one of the reasons we have been working towards a more sustainable practice over the years - https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-enviro nment-48581669
Amazon Brand - Mama Bear Ultra Sensitive Baby Wipes 12x60 (720 wipes-100% biodegradable fabric ) https://www.amazon.co.uk/…/B07BLDG76K/r ef=cm_sw_r_cp_tai_vl…
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Have a great day all you Super Dads 😀

Bears, bears, everywhere!! We had a bear themed week this week looking first at “Goldilocks and the Three Bears” with various resources to support reenacting the story. We also played with porridge oats pouring them and feeling the texture. We used them to make patterns and draw numbers shapes and letters.
Next we covered “We’re going on a Bear Hunt” with a woodland trip where we read the story and searched for some of the story points, the swishy grass, forest and cave were ...a synch, the river and mud we had to create which the children thoroughly enjoyed splashing around joyously!
Finally we went on a teddy bears picnic with our friends at Sunny Starts in Robert Ashton Park. We fed our bears, talked about the numbers on the laminated bears we hid around the park, and had fun exploring and chasing and enjoying the playground equipment.
Not everything we do is on a particular theme, we also have an ongoing project of growing our own food and making our own meals. To this end the children used the salad leaves they grew to make some wraps for lunch. This helps us to talk about eating balanced meals, following instructions and fine motor skills snipping with scissors and turning a crank to grate carrots. All of this in turn extends understood and spoken language and self confidence 😀 Phew, what a week!!
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So we have been talking to the children about the food that we have at Hedgehogs this week, and wanted to share with you some of the items we currently serve to our mindees. We believe in giving the children in our care the very best start, using quality ingredients (many of which are organic) thinking about sustainability and health benefits throughout. I spend many hours researching ways of improving our fayre, recent additions are the natural sugars only jelly, wonderful cornbread and a tuna pasta bake. Hope I don’t make you too hungry with my selection of food based pics!! 😀

Oh Help! Oh no! It’s a Gruffalo!! We focussed on the Gruffalo story this week, enjoying lots of different resources and activities including a Gruffalo hunt in the woodland, making masks and colouring pictures as well as exploring playdough and putting together jigsaws. This gave us plenty of opportunities to have a great learning experience through listening to sounds and relating them to words, predicting what happened next and guessing what everone’s favourite food was.
Al...ongside this was our usual outdoor play, including a great session with our waterwall, playing in the mud kitchen, caring for our plants and seedlings and finding some amazing creatures including a beautiful frog who was super bouncy!
We also had House Meetings with our mindees this week, asking for their feedback on their time at Hedgehehogs including what meals they enjoy, and any activities they would like to do whilst in our setting. It is important to us that children feel autonomous and empowered whilst at Hedgehogs, and this is part of our efforts to involve them in choosing how we run our services. Looking forward to getting some further feedback from parents too on our return from the bank holiday, many thanks for those who have already responded it’s very much appreciated 😀
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Just randomly came across this and I lurve it!! 😀

Its National Vegetarian Week and we have used this as an opportunity to extend our discussions about food from ‘field to fork’. We touched on differences between people, and the older children explored their ideas about what vegetarians could eat and how this differed to vegans.
Linking in to the topic of where food comes from, we have looked after our seedlings which are growing well. We also explored the established plants some of which we use in our cookery - the herbs are a particular favourite with lots of different textures and scents.
We also enjoyed our trip with Sunny Starts Childminding to Anglers Country Park to do the Room on the Broom trail - following the story and talking about the effect of exercise on our bodies and how we need good food, fresh air and exercise to keep us healthy and strong. We have been busy bees!

https://draxe.com/agar-agar/
It’s National Vegetarian Week and we have been busy refining a vegan jelly recipe with no sugar or artificial sweeteners made simply with natural fruit juice and agar agar. Simply add 1tsp of powdered Agar agar to 600-700ml of 100% fruit juice then bring to the boil for 2 mins for 4-6 portions. We add chopped fresh fruit to the bottom of the bowl before adding the juice on top. It will stay set at room temperature in an hour or so, no need to refrigerate unless you prefer to eat it colder.
Here is some info about the health benefits of Agar - just think, a pudding with all these nutrients which the kids think is a treat! 😀

https://www.britishhedgehogs.org.uk/hedge hog-awareness-wee…/
Great website for tips for if you want to make your garden hedgehog friendly, or who to contact if you find an injured hog. They have some fun competitions on too!

This week we have been concentrating on “growth and decay” and rain definitely did not stop play 😀 We planted some herb seeds outside and some lettuce seeds inside, giving an opportunity to talk about healthy eating as well as what seeds need to grow. We linked this to how the children have grown and how they will keep growing and changing over time drawing around each other with chalk using gross motor skills and comparing the size of the outlines we produced.
We also explo...red the environment for signs of spring, looking at the beautiful flowers in the woodland, and listening to the rain on the shelter, singing songs and generally enjoying this exciting season!
As always, there were plenty of opportunities to follow interests - cookery books are definitely a firm favourite at the moment, what a great way to link literacy, maths and understanding healthy lifestyles with a fun activity!
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The Easter holidays have been a busy time at Hedgehogs, getting ready for the new term with a particular focus on the outdoor spaces. We refreshed the chalk wall areas, with displays we can use to promote learning in the areas of numeracy, literacy and understanding the world.
We also did some further work on the Sensory Garden extending the usable space now that the new fencing has been erected and added some more plants too - as you can see the pear trees are becoming established and we hope to see some flowers soon 😀 We have also planted some seeds throughout the garden, lets hope the weather is kind to us!

What would we do without our little helpers?! Before we broke up for Easter we cleared out this growing patch and sowed some vegetable seeds carrying on our learning of ‘field to fork’. We found lots of our wiggly friends and talked about what would happen to the seeds as they grew, and that they would need to be covered in the soil, watered and the sun would need to shine to keep them healthy. This kind of conversation is one which is gently repeated over time as we look at ...the seedlings as they grow into strong healthy plants.
We have found lots of beautiful things in our garden, from the flowers and plants to an amazing nest which sadly had fallen during a windy night. The children have been totally entranced by the beautiful eggs, and it gave us an opportunity to get up close and talk about how we would usually not disturb a nest, that these eggs would not turn into chicks (one of our children repeated ‘it’s really sad’ a few times bless him) but that the bird would try again with a new nest and would have some babies very soon all being well!
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This week was our last week of term and our theme was Easter, we had a great time in the woodland doing an Easter egg hunt whilst getting some amazing experiences balancing, listening to nature sounds, understanding and following complex instructions, talking about colours and relative size as well as just having a great explore! We also had Easter eggs hunts in our garden where we support the children to make good decisions about how to organise themselves and play fairly.
...The mindees also got an opportunity to decorate biscuits and the little ones had fun at a party with our friends at Sunny Starts. We had lots of fun activities the most engaging being the ball pool and balloons - even these fun games are learning experiences working out trajectories, colours, relative size, counting and sharing.
We enjoyed our outdoor space this week, and I made a new resource which I mercilessly copied from Hogley’s Farm - thanks for the idea guys! We now have a ‘tic-tac’toe’ game for the garden area made from our natural resources 😀
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The churchyard is looking much better already - so much work has been done clearing many of the brambles away. Here is another chance to get involved in making a difference in your local area.

Spring has officially sprung! We joined our friends a Sunny Starts for a spring themed session including foam sensory play, planting opportunities, craft and reading in our cosy corner. Thanks again to Upperthong J&I for providing the wonderful space for us.
Back in setting, the older children enjoyed following written instructions on how to plant cress seeds and we talked with all the children about what plants need to grow, they were very proud of their little pots - should...n’t take long for them to grow so it’s great for little ones. It was lovely to be outside in the spring weather exploring the water and signs of spring in the garden. Our bulbs which we planted with the mindees last year have now flowered too.
Not everything we do is planned ahead of time, we also make sure we follow children’s emerging interests and we brought down the Gingerbread man story and puppet after a mindee showed an interest in the gingerbread recipe in our cookery books. One of the older children made a super connection between this and the Giant Pancake which has a similar story structure.
Finally, as an aside, Hedgehogs is now 6 years old - where did the time go? We look around the inside and outside of the setting and it is completely transformed. We have been working hard through the years to provide as engaging and enriching an experience as possible here and will keep at it going forward. Thanks to all our families past and present for sharing their amazing children with us at Hedgehogs 😀 🦔🎂
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