Learning & Development: Activities - Our bright idea - Wedding bells

I am the lead for learning in the Bumbles room for threeto five-year-olds at Busy Bees Nursery in Durham. The children have been very interested in my wedding plans and began to use the 'clothes shop' to dress up and pretend to go to a wedding. So we decided to build on this interest by planning experiences and activities with a wedding theme.

We started by discussing as a team how best to ensure that all the children were included in the plan. The questions we raised were:

• - How can we create real-life experiences?
• - How can we be sure that boys are included in these experiences?
• - Would the provision be inclusive for everyone?

We then listed what we wanted to achieve through the activities, and realised that they presented a good opportunity to involve the children's parents, their grandparents and members of the community.

Next, we discussed the theme with parents and staff members, who brought in their own wedding photographs, dresses and other keepsakes from their special day.

We transformed the clothes shop into 'Busy Bees Bridal Boutique', displaying bouquets, wedding cakes, hats, shoes and dressing-up outfits that we bought from the local charity shop. We also provided resources for the children to get involved in making confetti, wedding cake (cup-cake style) and lucky horseshoes, as well as designing and making a dress and bouquets.

One of our parents is a deacon at our local church and she invited us to the church to act out a traditional Christian wedding ceremony, and then we held a 'reception' back at the nursery reception, where many of the parents joined us for an afternoon snack and party music.

We plan to introduce the children to the wedding customs of other cultures, as two of our families recently attended a Hindu wedding, while another family went to a wedding in Africa.

To support the children's interest, we used the following books:

• - A wedding, Why is this day special? by Jillian Powell (Franklin Watts)
• - Once There Were Giants by Martin Waddell (Walker Books)
• - Big Book of Families by Catherine and Laurence Anholt (Walker Books)
• - Encyclopaedia of Religion (Dorling Kindersley)

LEARNING INTENTIONS

• - Seek delight in new experiences.
• - Maintain a positive approach to activities.
• - Use talk, actions and objects to recall and relive past experiences.
• - Use talk to connect ideas, explain what is happening and anticipate what might happen next.
• - Use shapes appropriately for tasks.
• - Encourage expression of feelings about significant personal events.
• - Describe and talk about what the children see.
• - Show increasing control over clothing and fastening.
• - Manipulate materials to achieve planned effect.
• - Engage in imaginative play and role-play based on own first-hand experiences.
• - Use available resources to create props to support role-play.

Emma Scales is lead for learning with the 'Bumbles' at Busy Bees Children's Day Nursery, Durham. She spoke to Jean Evans.