Food Glorious Food!

What a busy time we have been having the past two months! So much learning and so much fun! The days don’t seem to be long enough! We have celebrated Autumn with a beautiful nature walk. The children made ‘nature bags’ to collect all the treasures they found. As we walked around the children observed many kinds of mushrooms growing. This led to a very interesting study of mushrooms back at school. On our nature walk we also had the amazing luck of coming across some beehives. A very friendly beekeeper gave us some explanations about the bees. We even had to keep back a little as we saw the bees exiting and entering their hives. There was one little bee that was very weak, so the children gave him some little flowers to suck out the nectar. What an amazing experience! Our study of nature didn’t end there we also did a special study on the oak tree that grows in our garden at school.

The children have become real ‘food specialists’ after our unit on food. It all began after our lovely entry point – a trip together to a vegetarian restaurant in Ghent. What made it so special was being able to go in the kitchen and choose their own food. Inspired by this we set up a restaurant in our classroom which the children called ‘The Red Moon’. Great place to eat! The children wrote their own menus, learnt how to keep their restaurant tidy and set the tables nicely. They even made a little fireplace where you could melt marshmallows!

The children are now very aware that fruit and vegetables are packed with vitamins and we should eat five portions a day! We made delicious fruit salad together! They learnt that fruit grows on trees and vegetables are different parts of a plant. They were curious to taste cinnamon and to learn it comes from the bark of the tree! They also enjoyed making and tasting ginger tea which comes from the root of the plant! They had to take care of their own plant when they planted cress seeds. The children also learnt about the different food groups. Now when they go for lunch instead of telling what food they have, they say, ‘look Miss Mia I have carbohydrates and protein!’. The children have loved preparing food at school especially squeezing oranges and lemons! During our study on carbohydrates they made ‘Irish bread’. I was so glad they loved it! As part of our study on food we read lots of food related stories. The loved the story of ‘The Enormous Turnip’ and had lots of fun acting it out!  The children have also been very artistic, they especially loved making their ‘Arcimboldo’ inspired pictures!

To end a wonderful unit on ‘Food’ we set up a hot dog stand and the children made and ate yummy ‘hot dogs’.

Besides all this work the children have been enjoying their jolly phonics work and learning to read. Exciting times in UPP! We also celebrated Laura’s fifth birthday. Congratulations Laura!

Unfortunately, we had to say good-bye to Ms. Laura this week. We will all miss her very much but wish her lots of happiness in her return to Spain.

Wishing you all very happy holidays with your family and see you in the new year! I hope you like the Christmas surprise your child made for you!

Love Ms. Mia