For Mother’s day this year all the children planted some sunflower seeds for their mummies. They placed all their soil into the little plant pot, carefully planted the seed in the middle and put some soil on top of it. They did a great job! With all the rain and shine we’ve had over the past few months, our sunflower seeds have blossomed and look really big! They have grown out of their old home so it was time to move them into a bigger house so they can grow even bigger! NM, AD and I worked hard to put some new soil into the plant pot. We used all different types of methods, for example, spades, our hands, diggers etc.

The children really got into it and showed great enthusiasm! When I started to move the flowers over, NM asked me if she could help to move them. Look at our sunflowers now, from a little seed they’ve grown so much in such a short time! We look forward to sharing the life of the sunflower with our little burrowers next week!

Not only are activities like this fun because they allow us to work with natural materials with our hands, they tell me a lot about the children’s interests and learning styles. Whilst they’re busy digging, I’ll be questioning them, encouraging their language development and understanding of the world.Such as, ”How much more soil do you think we’ll need?’ “I wonder how many days it will take until the Sunflowers flower?” “What else do we need to make the Sunflowers happy and grow?’ I also stand back and allow them to make these decisions themselves and facilitate their learning when needed.

When growing anything, the lesson of delayed gratification is involved. Patience and nurturing skills are needed to help a sunflower grow and through doing this themselves our little ones slowly realise that some things just take time and a little care. So what have you been planting in your gardens?

Lauren