Natural Nursery Blog

Singing with babies and children feel so natural, they love the rhythm, the stories, the facial expressions you can exaggerate. Very soon, they can join in and repeat a few words. As their vocabulary grows, so does their enjoyment and repertoire. Here are a few ideas to continue singing with your baby.

Sing and Sign allows babies and parents to learn songs and sign language together. Sign language is a simple method to teach children to express themselves before they can talk. The signs are widely used by nurseries and childcare providers. It starts with just a few signs, milk, more, nappy, tired. As the child starts to respond, more signs can be added, always keeping it simple. The Sing and Sign songs are cheerful, from traditional nursery rhymes to new songs.

Colourstrings offers classes teaching music, rhythm, and singing from 6 months to 5 years. Fun, lovely music and great teachers. The materials are colourful, stimulating and entice children to embark on musical adventures that will enable each of them to fulfill their musical potential through fun and creativity, without pressure. It is an extension of the Kodály philosophy: everything starts with singing to develop inner hearing.

Monkey Music introduces music to very young children in a way they can easily understand and enjoy. Monkey Music was founded in London in 1993 by Angie Davies for her first newborn baby daughter. As a trained classical musician and experienced teacher, Angie was aware that all babies have an innate love of music and as a keen new mum she looked for local music classes to attend. She decided to write an original music curriculum that was fun and interactive for everyone! Monkey Music classes are now held weekly across the UK and Ireland.

Jo Jingles music classes are also held around the UK in more than 500 locations. The movement classes are for babies and children aged 3 months to 5 years of age (up to 7 or 8 in some areas). The music classes are fun, interactive music, with lots of singing and movement.

Prepare the next generation of babywearers!

Children love colouring pictures, and familiar pictures in particular. These images of mums carrying babies in their baby slings will appeal to them.

Award-winning British artist Susan Cook of Picture Dreams, has produced these beautiful drawings of babies in baby slings for your little ones to colour-in.

You can download the A4 version as a jpg (right click on the large image and choose print) or as as pdf. If you don’t have a printer, email us your address and we’ll be happy to pop some in the post for you.

Can be reproduced only for personal home use. For group use, please contact us.

Click on the images to see the high resolutions:

Today, let’s look at more more ideas of things to do at home with children: paper beads and stringing beads into necklaces, garlands or bracelets.

Material:

- Paper. You can buy fancy colour paper for this activity but reclaimed paper will work just as well. Take a look at your recycling bin to put aside brightly coloured paper. Larger or thicker paper will be better for small children.

- Glue stick. We tried glue stick and PVA glue. Both work but the stick was easier.

- Scissors or a paper guillotine. Watch your fingers, guillotines are incredibly sharp. Put it away as soon as you have finished cutting the paper.

- Something to roll the paper around: pencils, straws, chopsticks. For younger children, they need to be fairly wide. Older children will do fine with something thiner.

- String or elastic

The activity can be adapted for children of all ages. Older children can most likely do everything themselves apart from using the guillotine. Younger children will enjoy threading the beads an adult or a sibling will have made for them. They will also love unraveling the beads you have painstakingly made for them. The beads harden when they dry.

- Cut strips of brightly coloured paper, adjust the width to the age of the children. Younger children will find bigger beads (1″-2.5cm) easier to manipulate.

- Spread the glue on the paper, leaving an inch or so at one end.

- Place the end without glue around your pencil or chopstick then start rolling the paper around, keeping it nicely straight.

- When you get to the end, add a bit more glue then roll the bead between your fingers a few more times.

- If it’s easy to remove from the chopstick, remove it now. If not, you can leave it to dry and harden

- String the beads onto the elastic or string. Make sure that the children aren’t left unattended with the string.

Enjoy!

A big Thank you to Moss Green Children’s Books for developing these cute colouring pages for children.

Organised by age with an increasing level of detail and information, the colouring sheets are drawings of fruit, vegetable plants and the vegetable patch. We particularly like the fact that the plant is shown as a whole, helping children understand where their food comes from. This is an essential step in educating children in healthy eating. The sheet shows how the vegetable and fruit are used in the kitchen.

Through play and colouring, children have the opportunity to learn about seasonal products. Why brussels sprout are a classic in a traditional Christmas dinner but never mentioned for summer barbecues. Why we have to wait for summer to feast on raspberries the garden… Older children will also learn about pests attacking the fruit and vegetables which can lead to interesting discussions about organic growing, pesticides…

Enjoy!

This is our version of the BBC yummy carrot cake. There is slightly less sugar to make it more suitable for the kids. Also less cinnamon, more nutmeg and more orange zest which gives the cake a crisp springy taste. It’s moist, yummy, keeps well. And most of all super easy.

When cooking with the children, it is fun to let them participate. Get them a child apron or use already stained clothes (old daddy shirts with the sleeves cut off are perfect!) so you don’t have to worry about the mess. The mixture of this cake is light and slightly runny so it is easy for the children to mix.

• 150g light muscovado sugar
• 170ml sunflower oil
• 3 large eggs, lightly beaten
• 150g grated carrots (finely or coarsely depending on your taste)
• grated zest of 2 oranges
• 175g self-raising flour (or 170g of plain flour and 3 tsp baking powder)
• 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
• ½ tsp ground cinnamon
• ½ to 1 tsp nutmeg
• a 18cm (7”) square cake tin or 20cm (8”) round cake tin

1.  Preheat the oven to 180C/Gas 4/fan 160C. Oil and line the base and sides of your cake tin with baking parchment.

2.  Break the hard lumps in the sugar if there are any, add the oil and the eggs. Mix thoroughly then add in the grated carrots and orange zest.
3.  Mix the flour, bicarbonate of soda, cinnamon and nutmeg together. Mix with the egg, oil and sugar mixture. The mixture will be fairly soft and almost runny.
4.  Pour into the tin and bake for 40- 45 minutes, until the tip of knife comes out clean. If you’re not sure the temperature of your oven is even, turn the cake every 10/15 minutes. While it’s cooking, let the children do the dishes.
5.  Cool in the tin for a few minutes, then remove the baking parchment and cool on a wire rack.

You can easily double the recipe for a larger cake. In that case, use a 30cm (12″) square tin or 34 cm round cake tin.

For a child-friendly version (i.e not too much sugar), try serving with yoghurt instead of icing. A glass of juice or herbal tea for the kids. A cup of tea or a coffee for the grown-ups… All yummy

Home made hobby horse

It’s raining, kids are bored, they seem to be bored with the mountain of toys in their bedroom, what shall we do?

I regularly buy new small toys or plan activities in advance so I can turn a boring day into magical fun within minutes. Sometimes, you just have to improvise.

Today, I remember that my little boy played with his friend’s hobby horse a whole afternoon last time we visited them. No hobby horse around here, no way I’m trekking to the shops on a rainy to get one. I’m also not keen on buying toys that will only be played with a handful of times. Even if traditional hobby horses look lovely with their soft fur and cute eyes, there won’t be space in their room to keep it.

Out comes the trusted cardboard!

Supplies:

• A small pole or stick
• Packing tape
• Some ribbons, paper strips, gift string
• Eyes were from the local supermarket or you can draw them with felt pens
• Scissors

Print out the hobby horse head.
Cut around it
Draw the shape of the head on the cardboard (twice)
Ask an adult to cut the cardboard head shapes
Stick them together with packing tape leave a small space on one corner for the pole
Slide the pole in and secure it with tape
Draw or glue the eyes
Ask an adult to cut a couple of small holes with a sharp knife or a knitting needle through the cardboard. Thread the ribbons and tie.

Et voila! Now you can make a second to whiz around and race with a friend!

It’s not the prettiest toy ever and not meant to last but making it taught the children to draw a shape, cut, stick, and will keep them entertained for the rest of the afternoon. When they’re done with, take it apart, reuse what can be reuse and recycle the rest.