This week we continued focusing on the artist Henri Matisse. Inspired by his art and stories written about him, such as ‘Henri’s Scissors’ by Jeanette Winter and ‘Matisse’s Garden’ by Samantha Friedman, the children ‘painted with scissors’ to create their own works of art.

There was a lot of laughter coming from under the stairs as a range of ‘large’ minibeasts made their home in Matisse’s garden.

Throughout the week the song ‘Head, Thorax, Abdomen’, sung to the tune of ‘Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes’, could be heard as the garden extended into the letter room where swarms of ‘smaller’ insects came to visit. The children enjoyed making homes in the soil with logs, leaves and stones for these six-legged creatures. Matisse the snail has proved to be a very sociable and curious snail. He came back to visit us this week and seemed content to travel from one small eager hand to another.

In the number room we enjoyed rectangles both in the shape tray and in the catchy song, ‘There is a Shape That Has Four Sides’ sung to the tune of ‘B.I.N.G.O’. Inspired by the artist Piet Mondrian, the children created their own red, blue and yellow rectangle art.