This week the children have been learning about Ramadan and to support our learning we chose the Topic book Under the Ramadan Moon by Sylvia Whitman, which has helped the children’s understanding of the celebration ‘Ramadan.
Ramadan is one of the most special months of the year; a time to pray, fast and help those in need. This is a delightful picture story book which describes the month long Muslim observance of Ramadan by a modern family.
On Monday we had a wonderful workshop presented by Miss Saira who very kindly brought in items from home to share with the children including a prayer book and mat, pictures of the Mosque and pretty bangles and a dress she would wear for a party during Eid. The children listened attentively and loved wearing the pretty bangles. The children extended their vocabulary by learning new words such as suhoor ( breakfast), ajar ( the morning prayer) and iftar ( evening meal ).
In other Ramadan focused activities the children made tea and cake for Iftar, and they loved dressing up in the pretty outfits, wearing bangles and getting ready for the big party at the end of Ramadan. The children also enjoyed making patterns using the coloured beads when taking part in their Focus Maths Lesson and worked collaboratively with the Magnatiles to build Mosques. We had some wonderful tall Mosques that the children had built together.
In cooking the children used their fine motor skills and hand eye coordination to make energy balls. The children used scissors to cut the dates and apricots before adding oats, raisins and coconut oil. The children then used the blenders to combine the ingredients together. The mixture was nice and sticky for the children to mould into small sweet balls.
In our Write Dance session the children all went on a journey on the train to the Mosque to meet up with family and friends. The were brilliant at staying in a line, making a train while moving their arms in time to the music and creating large circular movements. They used the scarves, scrunching them up into balls and throwing them up into the air to make the steam from the steam train.