Hedgehogs
Home Learning Area
We trust that the majority of the resources you need to complete these activities will be available in your homes or in most shops. Of course, almost anything can be purchased online too, but we would like to take this opportunity to encourage you to support local shops where you can. It is often possible to use alternatives to the specified resources in these activities that will work just as well.
The below websites are very useful for finding educational resources, such as worksheets or templates.
BBC Bitesize – Pre-school – https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/articles/zks4kmn
Twinkl – https://www.twinkl.co.uk/
- Peek-a-boo faces game – hide your face and reveal it with a different emotion each time, which your child has to name.
- My turn, your turn game – take turns playing with an object or toy to encourage your child to share.
- Create emotion flash cards using paper plates and show them to your child, asking them to name the emotion they see.
- Make a game of asking your child to name their body parts. You can sing ‘If you’re happy and you know it’ to do this.
- Playing with dollies is an excellent way of exploring emotions and helping children to understand more about themselves as young children.
- Create family photo books and look through these with your child, pointing out familiar faces to them.
- Singing nursery rhymes is an excellent way of developing children’s language and communication.
- Role play of situations and places to encourage your child to speak about different experiences, e.g. the dentist, doctors or restaurant.
- Use flash cards of a wide range of objects that your child has to name, and use these to prompt conversation and ask your child questions.
- Print an outline of an animal and have bits and pieces for your child to stick on. The animal can be a conversation prompt.
- Dressing up – this gives children the opportunity to pretend to be someone else and use appropriate language as they do so, e.g. pretending to be a doctor.
- Reading stories and poems
- Look at family photos and discuss your family with your child.
- Go for a walk in the local area and talk about what you see.
- Water play with different sized jugs.
- Play throwing and catching
- Set up an obstacle course
- Play the ‘different ways to move’ game – e.g. slither like a snake, jump like a frog.
- Textured sensory sticking – have different textures available for your child to explore and stick on paper, e.g. leaves, sandpaper, cotton wool
- Playing with dolls – this encourages fine motor skills as children try to dress/undress them, feed them etc.
- Sing if you’re happy and you know it to encourage your child to perform different actions
- Collect objects from nature and make a potion – simply mix them together in a bowl and encourage your child to explore the textures.
- Help your child to use scissors, cutting up old magazines or scrap paper.
- Shaving foam play – simply fill a bowl with shaving foam and let your child explore. You can also add some food colouring and let your child swirl it around with a paintbrush or similar implement.
- Read lots of stories to your child and let them choose what they want to read.
- Story sacks – create sacks with puppets/toys of the characters and encourage your child to use these as you read a story.
- Sing nursery rhymes – you can use puppets and your child can select a puppet to choose a rhyme to sing.
- Alphabet letter play – use magnetic or foam letters in water play or hide in sand for your child to find and explore. You can help them to find the letters of their name.
- Set up a letter hunt with magnetic or foam letters – hide these around a room and help your child to find certain letters.
- Print pictures of famous story characters and ask your child to match these to the correct book.
- Print recipes or use recipe books to look at with your child, particularly when doing kitchen/cooking role play.
- Shape sorting game.
- Shape sticking.
- Gather big and little objects and ask your child to identify which are big or small
- Two piece or four-piece puzzles
- Colour matching games
- Shape painting using resources such as wooden blocks or potatoes cut into different shapes
- Coloured water play – add food colouring to water and allow your child to explore the different colours
- Use bricks or blocks to build towers and practise counting
- Use number and shape flash cards and ask your child to name what they see
- Create your own farm and add toy animals. Take the opportunity to talk to your child about what food we get from farm animals.
- Look through family photos and discuss who/what you see.
- Go on a nature walk and collect things you find on your way.
- Go on a bug hunt and then make a bug hotel at home.
- Nature sticking/painting with leaves and twigs.
- Plant seeds of flowers and vegetables with your child and involve them in watching them grow.
- Set up an office role play where you allow your child to explore a computer (turned off), keyboard, mouse, paper, pens etc
- Make tree rubbings using bark
- Set up a food tasting session of different tastes (sweet, sour, bitter etc) or use foods from different cultures.
- Nature painting using sticks, leaves, bark etc
- Explore different musical instruments
- Dance to music – either child friendly or your own favourites!
- Use playdough to create models and shapes – you can make your own or buy sets online
- Drawing and painting
- Make moon sand using flour and oil (recipes online) and let your child explore the texture.
- Sand painting – add sand to paint to give the paint a rough texture
- Ice painting – simply freeze poster paint and use the ice cubes to paint with
- Water painting – on a sunny day give your child a paintbrush and a cup of water and let them ‘paint’ patio slabs or wood. The water quickly evaporates and they can just keep going!
- Sticking activity using any kind of stickers – this really encourages the development of fine motor skills.
Educational Framework
The EYFS is a statutory framework of education that all early years settings must deliver and it informs our everyday practice. The Development Matters document acts as a guide for nursery practitioners to help them understand how children should develop and identify when any child is exceeding or not meeting these developmental goals. However, it is very important to remember that the Development Matters framework is not a tick list and that all children develop at different rates.
Link to Early Years Foundation Stage document – Statutory framework for the early years foundation stage for group and school providers (publishing.service.gov.uk)
Development Matters in the EYFS – Development Matters – GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)
Birth to 5 Matters – Birthto5Matters-download.pdf
