Nursery tots throw caution to the wind in colour festival

Three and four-year-olds at St Maria Goretti Catholic Primary’s pre-school in Ribbleton have been learning all about the Hindu festival of colours and having great fun in the process.

Pre-school teacher at the Acorns Nursery Emma Dyer said: “We have been learning all about Holi week, the Hindu festival and looked at a wide range of different activities to tie it in with the children’s education.”

The traditional Hindu festival marks the end of winter and start of spring and includes a free-for-all festival of colours, where people smear each other with colours and drench each other. Water guns and water-filled balloons are also used to play and colour each other.

Emma added: “We had our own coloured powder to throw, which we made using cornflour, water and food colouring, which tied in with science..

“The children have blended into powder form. We will be throwing it at each other to celebrate Holi and the start of spring.”

The children had planned to throw the coloured paints at each other to mark the first day of spring but bad weather meant they couldn’t play outside so they had to wait.

The nursery was recently awarded Spread The Happiness status and used the Holi week topic to demonstrate a host of fun ways to learn.

Emma added that besides throwing the home made paint, the 25 children at the nursery took advantage of the sunshine to dance and play music outdoors as well as playing different textures like with rice and lentils and reading books.