PELC - Fairhaven

Exploring Clay!

Schoolers showed their interest in clay sculpture. One day I found the clay in the cupboard and decided to show them after school to see how they would react and if they were interested.
As soon as I put out the tools and clay in front of them, they all got so excited to make something with the clay. I gave them instructions on how to use the clay and they all listened attentively and followed my guidance.

To begin, they dipped their fingertips in water and molded the clay into their desired shapes. They created different shapes such as mushrooms, flowers, hearts, etc.
They all asked if they could colour their creations once they dried, and I agreed. However, the next day, they found one or two of their creations broken, which made them feel sad.
I asked them how they thought we could fix it, and one child suggested using water to reshape the clay. Surprisingly, it worked!

After this, they decided to make pendants for Mother’s Day. They inscribed messages for their mothers such as “U da best Mom” “I Love You Mom” and so on using the clay tools. They had a lot of fun during this activity.

Making Butter!

Many questions have been asked at lunches and snack times such as:
How is milk made? How is jam made? How do the bees make honey? Where do crackers come from?

This has sparked us to provide new recipes and new experiences for the children to support their interests.

This week, when Koden asked how jam was made, Brittany looked up the recipes and decided to have the children make homemade jam and butter on Wednesday and Thursday and then Collene would make buns with them on Friday to have something to put their butter and jam on.

To make the butter, we ordered heavy whipping cream and poured it into three jars. We tightened the lids, and the children took turns shaking the jars as we discussed the process of how the liquid cream would turn into solid butter.

As the children continued shaking the jars, they could feel the liquid getting thicker. Brittany took the lid off a few times so everyone could see how the cream was looking like and the transformation that was happening, which really intrigued Kipton as he is always building things that can transform.
They also wanted to smell it, Kyuss said it was fresh. Kipton said it smelt like popcorn.

Brittany told them that we needed to put the lids back on and shake the jars some more to continue the transformation.

A few of the children said it was taking too long and wanted to go play, others stayed until the end and as they shook it, they started to feel a hard ball hit the sides of the jar.
Kyson also said that he heard splashing. Brittany explained to them that the liquid was called “whey” and that it was separating from the fat, which was the butter!

We drained the liquid whey from the butter and added it all to a container.

The children could see the final product and they expressed how excited they were to eat it!

Just a reminder that All Preston Early Learning Centre's will be Closed on Friday, March 29, 2024, for the Easter long weekend.

Wishing everyone a wonderful long weekend!