Looking for Leaves
9/28/2018
We're going on a leaf hunt...As a transition into our study of trees, this wonderful week of Autumn was a fantastic opportunity to get out and collect leaves and take a closer look. Our Adventurers set out collecting the leaves they found most interesting to use for many activities throughout the week. Taking a closer look...After having discussed the shapes, colours and sizes of the leaves we had found, the children were very keen to use their tracing skills to draw the leaves. Some were able to sketch them. The Autumn coloured paint then really brought their drawing to life. There were many leaves to spare, so the children wanted to find a way to display their special ones. They gave careful thought to arranging and creating their own window pictures. Chatting about changesThe children understood that Fall begins as the leaves are changing, which began a discussion about growing and creatures and plants that grow.
One of the stories about plants we had on our book shelf was Jack and the beanstalk. The children really enjoyed trying to retell the story using puppets and are looking forward to learning it more next week. We also read "Jim and the Beanstalk" in which Jim encounters a giant of a more friendlier kind. This story involves measuring, so the children were then keen to measure their leaves. Instead of using a ruler or measuring tape we talked about which objects we could use from around the classroom. After learning the rules for accurate measuring they set about recording the lengths of their leaves and comparing sizes. Ready to Read
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Friendship Fish
9/21/2018
Now that we have settled into our new classroom and have learnt the routines, we have been thinking of ways to help us all get along, understand how to look after our things and work together as a team. We have tried hard to show good manners to each other and be polite. This was our focus story this week. We discussed what it means to share. Not that we have to give things up straight away, nor that we should snatch them away, but make sure we use things fairly and offer them to others when we have finished. We created a class book to celebrate our morning question of how we like to be a good friend. This now sits pride of place in our bookshelf for everyone to enjoy and as a reminder of our important learning this week. We also practiced our good manners and greetings by asking one another for special beads to create our friendship bracelets. The Rainbow Fish was so proud of the way we had been sharing and working together that he left us our own shimmering scales to use on our salt dough fish ornaments.
After carefully working together to decode and read the recipe, we used our measuring, mixing, pouring and shaping skills to create these wonderful Rainbow Fish shapes. Our little fingers were exercising well, pinching up all the decorations.. Cookie, Candy, Clocks
9/15/2018
This week was all about getting to know our daily routines and when things happen during our time in school. In order to do that, the children became very interested in clocks and the times that each of our changes happened. So as you can tell, our week consisted of many time related activities. We played "What's the time Mr Wolf?", sang the nursery rhyme Hickory Hickory Dock and many other days and time related songs. The children created their own clocks by ordering numbers to 12. Some were confident in writing these numbers and some were also able to begin step counting in 5s for the minutes to 60. They chose the materials they would need for their art project. There were lots of teaching opportunities to order and record numbers this week for our clocks. We wrote them on hoops, on rocks... As a Friday treat the children were let loose to design their own candy cookie clock! This meant that they needed to count the correct amount of dots (sweets), which was very tricky when they were so tempted to nibble a few! On the whole, there was some very accurate counting happening. They then also needed to use their measuring skills to cut a long and short string of licorice to represent the clock hands. After all those skills were put in place they turned out pretty yummy! Some more snaps from this week...Purposeful Play
9/7/2018
This week the children have really settled in to the classroom and taken ownership of the provision. After talking about our families we moved on to discover which pets children had at home. We used our listening skills well during circle time and heard about the animals the children had before filling in the survey and painting our own pet pictures. The children are now becoming resourceful learners and accessing the paints they need and mixing their own colours. More discussion led to children requesting a trip to the pet shop. As we had no time to arrange a visit, we decided to create our own here in the classroom. The children arranged the furniture and thought about the things they would need to put in the center. The new stimulus even encouraged some of our more reluctant writers to pick up a pen or crayon to design signs and notices for the area. We have had great fun learning how to talk to the customers and about the jobs the vet and groomers would be doing. In the construction area it was a chance to build and create our own houses for the animals. We are loving the sunny outdoors. Picnic time gave us a chance to chat with our friends. We then went exploring in the woods and looked at the shapes of the leaves. We got to choose one leaf ready for our art job back in class. We look forward to more nature walks and seeing what happens to the leaves this season.
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Melissa SmithMs. Smith has a degree in Early Childhood Education and has taught kindergarten for many years. Alaska has been home to Ms. Smith for 28 years, and she can't imagine living anywhere else! She has four children, a dog and two cats. She loves reading, camping, gardening, and genealogy! Archives
April 2021
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