People Who Help Us: Police Officers

Following my Firefighters post as a continuation of the theme "people who help us" at the Stay and Play group we go to yesterday we had a visit from a police car and a police community support officer.

The children got to climb all over her police van (standing in the "cell" at the back and pretending to drive it), seeing the lights flash, hearing the siren (again a few tears!) and trying on her hat. She also spent time playing with the children to show them that police officers are approachable and people they should go to if they need help.

People Who Help Us: Firefighters

At the Stay and Play group we go to we currently have the theme "people who help us" and yesterday we had a visit from a fire engine - cue lots of excited toddlers! They got to see the hose and squirt at a plastic traffic cone and hear the siren (a fair few tears!). The fireman talked to the children about who he was, what he did and explained that fire is dangerous and there was lots of literature for parents to take away about fire safety and stickers for the children. Obviously we can't all have a fire engine visit us at home with real firemen to talk to our children but we can encompass the theme of people who help us into our children's play.

New Product: Nursery Rhyme Puppets

We have just taken delivery of this fabulous nursery rhyme finger puppet set at Littlesheep Learning and all three of our children think it looks great - the youngest eagerly pointed out the animals and immediately said "Tinkle Tinkle idle tar", the middle one was pleased he knew all the word and the eldest can manipulate the puppets. We are inclined to agree that it is a great addition to our collection of puppets to support first songs and rhymes.

This six puppet contains finger puppets representing the main characters from each of these popular nursery rhymes: Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, Baa Baa Black Sheep, Humpty Dumpty, 1,2,3,4,5 Once I Caught a Fish Alive, Hickory Dickory Dock and Incy Wincy Spider and comes with a detailed song card to help you if you do not know the words!

Goldilocks and the Three Bears

A little while back I answered a tweet on Twitter from @babysigningmum who was looking for some puppets - specifically Goldilocks and the Three Bears and I showed her these ones and promised to order them in as a special for her.

They arrived this week in a lovely big fabric drawstring bag (ideal for a story sack) and I have to say they are FABULOUS and look even better in real life. I am going to be ordering some more - so watch the website's new products page or contact me directly if you want a set!

Hot Cross Buns, Currant Buns and other cakes!

Today is Good Friday or "Hot Cross Bun day" as my five year old has declared it (they are one of his favourite foods so I think he is planning on them for breakfast, lunch and dinner!).

Whilst thinking about hot cross buns (the spicy fruit buns that have a white cross on the top traditionally eaten on Good Friday) the little rhyme popped into my head - don't forget to share it with your children today.

Hot cross buns!
Hot cross buns!
One ha' penny, two ha' penny,
Hot cross buns!
If you have no daughters,
Give them to your sons
One ha' penny,
Two ha' penny,
Hot Cross Buns!

So thinking about rhymes and cakes then reminded me of the five currant bun song and song mitt puppet that is a favourite in our house... This is also a great song for teaching counting skills.

Five currant buns in a baker’s shop.
Round and fat with a cherry on the top,
Along came a boy with a penny one day,
Bought a currant bun and took it away.

Four currant buns in a baker’s shop.
Round and fat with a cherry on the top,
Along came a boy with a penny one day,
Bought a currant bun and took it away.

Three currant buns in a baker’s shop.
Round and fat with a cherry on the top,
Along came a boy with a penny one day,
Bought a currant bun and took it away.

Two currant buns in a baker’s shop.
Round and fat with a cherry on the top,
Along came a boy with a penny one day,
Bought a currant bun and took it away.

One currant bun in a baker’s shop.
Round and fat with a cherry on the top,
Along came a boy with a penny one day,
Bought the currant bun and took it away.

If you wanted to keep the song Hot Cross Bun themed you could change the words to Round and Fat with a cross put on the top.

Other songs including cakes are: The Queen of Hearts, Pat-a-Cake and Little Jack Horner... let me know if you need the words - and please share any other cake songs you know!

New Products: People Who Help Us Glove Puppets

We are pleased to announce that Littlesheep Learning now stock even more of the popular flat people who help us glove puppets adding the postman, keeper and farmer to the range, plus the bargain people who help us complete set of nine puppets.

These simple flat glove puppets are a fantastic resource for both role play and teaching about occupations / jobs people do and are great for inclusion in story sacks. Size 28cm tall.

New Products: Counting Song Mitts

Just a quick blog post to let everyone know the popular counting song mitts - 5 little ducks, 5 little speckled frogs and five little monkeys are all now back in stock at Littlesheep Learning AND we are now stocking the teaching song mitts for the favourite rhymes 5 little men in a flying saucer, 5 currant buns in a bakers shop and ten green bottles standing on the wall.

These puppets are great to assist children learning about numbers, counting, songs and rhymes - helping them to develop communication, imagination and fine motor skills and by providing a visual aid which makes songs and stories more enjoyable. They are fantastic as a material for acting out stories / the demonstration of different situations and role play scenarios and for including in story sacks.

Put on a Panto!

The pantomime is a great British Tradition and this Robsinson's Put On A Panto site contains a fun game that takes children through the steps of putting on their very own pantomime at home - from planning, to practising to performing.

It takes you through everything you need - first choose your favourite pantomime (Snow White, Peter Pan, Cinderella or Aladdin), then you can print the script, follow directions to make your own costumes and props, add your details to print out your poster or invitation. The site even takes you through practicing (younger children could mime along to this script rather than having to learn their lines!) with some fantastic special effect sounds.

Plus, it even features the chance to enter a competiton to win tickets to your local pantomime up to the value of £250. Oh yes, it does!! (Sorry - couldn't resist). Entering the competition is simple;

1. Simply take or dig out a photo of your favourite panto costume


2. E-mail the photo before 30th November 2009 to amodernmother (at) gmail (dot) com with PUT ON A PANTO in the subject line. The winner will be selected by a third party before 4th December 2009, and the winning entry gets tickets for 2 adults and 3 children to a 2009 local pantomime (or equivalent) worth up to £250.

Good luck (for full details see A modern mother).

If your children would rather put on a puppet show using the Cinderella script Littlesheep Learning have fairytale puppet sets including Cinderella (and lots of other ones too!).

New Products: Jobs People Do

We are pleased to announce that Littlesheep Learning is now stocking these lovely Jobs People Do books published by Usborne Books.

These books contain a story which follows the person through their working day, with plenty of excitement and drama along the way! They are written with experts in the field to ensure complete accuracy, creating an informative yet enjoyable idea of what people do at work. It is beautifully illustrated with Jo Litchfield’s model characters.

Book titles are: Daisy the Doctor, Frank the Farmer, Fred the Firefighter, Sam the Chef, Tessa the Teacher and Vicky the Vet.

These books can be found in our new People Who Help Us category along with a range of occupations glove puppets - look out for more new products in this category soon.

Birthday Celebrations

Today Littlesheep Learning celebrates it's fourth Birthday, thank you to all of our customers from the past four years.

To celebrate our fourth birthday we have four pieces of news to tell you about:

1. Spend £20 (excluding postage and after any discounts) and receive a free gift


2. Use the code 'birthday' to save 10%


3. Enter our fourth birthday competition to win a copy of 'Going to a Party' see the competitions page for more details


4. This month's special offer is a saving of 10% on all the People who Help us glove puppets the for the month.

All offers end 31st May 2009

10 in the Bed

There were ten in the bed and the little one said - roll over, roll over, so they all rolled over and one fell out...

This is one of our family's favourite rhymes, it's great fun to sing it when we are all in the bed together as a family on the weekend mornings to 'roll over' and make Daddy fall out.

This lovely Ten in the Bed book illustrating the song is published by Child's Play is bright and colourful and features ten children snuggled in bed. The book includes a cardboard wheel for the reader to turn at every page to tip one child at a time out of bed which is a great visual aid to show children the concept of taking one away each time.

Another brilliant visual prompt for this song are these lovely 10 in the Bed Song Mitts. Designed to fit an adult’s hand, song teaching mitts are perfect for using with young children and will provide hours of fun. This pair of glove puppets come with a song card in case you need help with the words and will help children join in the rhyme and learn counting skills.

Grandma bought the boys Penny Dale's book Ten in the Bed and it has quickly become a firm favourite. This lovely adaptation features 'the little one' and his soft toys all squashed into bed (sound familiar?). One by one, nine friends roll over and fall out of his bed with a bang, a thump, or a plop until... "I’m cold! I miss you!" the boy says, and back in the bed they all go and snuggle down to sleep. This book has lovely colourful illustrations with lots of detail and things to spot.





Other activities to go with this song:

• talk about bedtime, what you need, what happens
• sequence a set of 'bedtime routine' photos / pictures
• match together things in the bedtime routine - milk and biscuit, pyjama top and trousers, toothbrush and tooth paste, pillow and duvet
• sequence the numbers 1-10 (and 10-1)
• make up a 'bed' on the floor and act out the song

Got any more ideas? please comment on this post and share them wih us.

New Product: 5 Little Monkeys

This Five Little Monkeys lovely song mitt is the latest puppet to join our collection of teaching mitts at Littlesheep Learning.

Designed to fit an adult’s hand, teaching mitts are perfect for using with young children and will provide hours of fun. This one features the popular counting song '5 little monkeys' and will help children join in the rhyme and learn counting skills.

The puppet comes with a card showing the words of the rhyme Five Little Monkeys Jumping on the Bed but it could also be used for Five Cheeky Monkeys sitting in a tree - you can find the words to that rhyme here.

New Products: Animal Finger Puppet Sets

We are pleased to announce the arrival of three new sets of animal finger puppets at Littlesheep Learning - Farm Animals, Zoo (African) Animals and Zoo Animals finger puppets.

These lovely boxed sets of four animal finger puppets are a great to be given as a gift but are also a great learning tool. The puppets are a great resource for children learning animals names and sounds or beginning to develop role play skills and are ideal for including in story sacks.

Each puppet has elastic at the bottom so that they stay on the finger and don’t fall off and they have corded legs so when you move your finger they can walk! They are approximately 12cm tall.

Puppets Back in Stock

Just a quick blog post to let everyone know the popular puppet story sets, song mitts and teaching mitts are all now back in stock at Littlesheep Learning - buy yours today!

These puppets are great to assist children's learning, helping them to develop communication, imagination and fine motor skills and by providing a visual aid which makes songs and stories more enjoyable. They are fantastic as a material for acting out stories / the demonstration of different situations and role play scenarios and for including in story sacks.

Check out my Squidoo Lense all about Learning and Playing with Puppets for even more tips and suggestions.

Operation Play Time - Pretend Play

It's Operation Playtime again an today's focus is Pretend Play. Pretend play is an important part of creative development.

Today we played with puppets acting out the traditional tales but also being imaginative making up other stories and adventures for the characters. Later, I found some of them 'living' in a lego house so I think they'd been used as 'play people' too.

Another favourite activity is having a teddy bears picnic, this has multiple learning oportunities. First we get out a blanket and the box of pretend food / tea-set. The teddies are set up round the edge and then we need to share out the tea-set - this can be an exercise in learning colours, matching, counting and sharing. Then we share out the food - labelling foods, talking about meals / healthy foods etc. All learning whilst having fun and no realising it!

Operation Play Time - Nursery Rhymes

It's day two of Operation Playtime - and todays challenge is Record a nursery rhyme or song.

We love songs and rhymes and have a special game that we play to choose which ones to sing so I thought I would share it with you!

We have a bag - a song sack (a drawstring bag - like the type children use to store PE kit in at school) and in it we put a collection of objects that relate to nursery rhymes. We take them out one by one and the children have to 'guess the rhyme' and then we sing.

Examples include:

Toy boat - Row, row, row the boat
Toy teapot - I'm a little teapot
Bath duck - Five little ducks
Pretend spider - Incy Wincy Spider
Toy bus - The Wheels on the Bus
'10 in the Bed' song Mitts - 10 in the bed
Star - Twinkle Twinkle Little Star
Doctor puppet - Miss Polly had a Dolly
Clock - Hickory Dickory Dock
Toy sheep - Baa Baa Black Sheep
Teddy - Round and round the Garden Like a Teddy Bear

I'm sure you get the idea!

Competition Reminder!

Don't forget to enter our 'Write a Review' competition to win a Knickerbocker Glory Game - it closes on Tuesday 11th November 2008. To enter all you need to do is to write a review of one of the products sold at Littlesheep Learning. You will get one entry for the draw for each review that is accepted and the winner will be chosen at random. To write a review of a product, log in (you may need to create an account if you don't already have one), choose the product to review, click on 'Write Review' and add your review! Please note: We will accept reviews of products we stock even if you haven't bought them from Littlesheep Learning.


Some of the reviews added so far:


Shopping List
Review added by Yvonne Crossland
A fantastic game for children of all ages, we have this game + 2 add on's for it. I have 2 children (age 2 & 9) this was originally bought for my eldest approx 3 years ago but still is played often now. My youngest is starting to regonise more & more every day items because of this game. We lost one of the pieces & when contacted 'Orchard Toys' the company that makes the game they replaced it free of charge which I was amazed at. So easy to play but still enough to keep the kids amused for a long time.
Rating: ***** [5 of 5 stars]





First Experiences: Going on a Plane
Review added by Tracy Gladman
This book is an excellent buy for anyone going on a plane for the first time with a young child. It makes the experience fun and they can look out for the things in the airport.Made the 9hr flight with my daughter "fly" by.
Rating: ***** [5 of 5 Stars]

Police Man Glove Puppet
Review added by Tracey Boyd
I USED THIS ITEM TO TEACH MY DAUGHTER ABOUT WHAT TO DO SHOULD SHE GET SEPARATED FROM ME, WE HAD GREAT FUN USING IT AS A ROLE PLAY AID AND MOST IMPORTANTLY SHE TOOK IN ALL THE LESSONS I WAS TRYING TO GET ACROSS!
Rating: ****** [5 of 5 Stars!]

Magnetic Words: Years 1 and 2 Key Words (Mega size)
Review added by Rebecca Mason
These magnetic words are fantastic. My son loves writing messages on the fridge, especially funny ones! I keep them in a box on top of the fridge and he chooses words to use each few days, developing his vocabulary. They are very hard wearing- when my two year old daughter gets hold of them they dont break or wear. A super product.
Rating: ***** [5 of 5 Stars!]

New Products: People Who Help Us Puppets

These lovely People Who Help Us Glove Puppets are a fantastic resource for both role play and teaching about occupations / jobs people do. They are simple flat hand puppets which can be used by adults or children. Doctor, Fireman, Lollipop Man, Nurse and Policeman available now!

New Products: Fantastic Fairy Tale Puppets

We have now added four new sets of story puppets - Sleeping Beauty, Cinderella, Jack and the Beanstalk and The Three Billy Goats Gruff to our range of puppets.

These fantastic puppet sets are come with a detailed story card to help you tell the story of the fairy tale and contains the main characters you would expect to find in the enchanting favourite story.



These puppet sets are great for children learning traditional tales, beginning role play activities and are ideal for giving as a gift coming in it's very own see-through PVC handy bag / carry case. They are also a great for inclusion in story sacks.

We also now have all of the other story sets: Three Little Pigs, Goldilocks and the Three Bears and Little Red Riding Hood back in stock.

Spring Competition Winner

Thank you to everyone who entered Littlesheep Learning's Spring Competition to win a set of 10 in the Bed Song Mitts - it certainly seemed popular.

The answer to the question "What number is shown on the dice?" is Five

And the lucky winner is - Ruth from Chesterfield.

Look out for more Competitions coming soon.