Welcoming the Snow 12/22/17

It has snowed a lot lately!

The weather change made a big impact on the children's daily lives. Not only did their outside environment begin to look very different, but there were changes in their daily routine as well. The snow and cold temperatures meant that some days we had to stay in the classroom and other days it took a long time to put on our snow gear! As a class, we started to explore the snow and ice that had become a part of the world around us.

The children all gather to look out the window as the playground gets covered in snow.

Piles of snow are a unique canvas! They used eye
droppers to add color and watched as it
moved and spread.

If it is too cold to go to the snow, we can make the snow
come to us!

To inspire their building, we pretended it was snowing in the block area! This challenged the children to build structures that would keep their animals warm and dry. 

Reda figures out that a roof will keep his Tiger
safe from the snow. "They need a jacket", he
says while he builds.

Stella builds a home for her animal. "He needs
a roof to keep him nice and dry in winter time."

Abigail starts by creating walls all around to
keep the snow off of her zebra.

Jad and Talia work together to create a structure
with a roof. 

12-1-17

Recognizing our Names

The first word children learn to read and write is their name! We have created many opportunities for them to practice this skill in the classroom. 

Each day children should be finding their own nametags to put on their cubbies. 

After putting away their things and washing hands, we invite everyone to sign-in. We can help or this can be a special thing you do with your child before saying good-bye! 

At the back of our classroom is our classroom community space. This is an interactive area with each child's picture, name, and a collage they created. The children have enjoyed finding themselves, looking at their name, and seeing their classmates' as well. 

We play a variety of letter games each day! Children learn letters, starting with those in their name, through exposure. This means playing, drawing, singing, feeling, and moving with letters!

Developing an understanding of details through self-portraits

Some of our project work this semester has focused on creating self portraits through an exploration of the smaller details.

 At the beginning of the year we always have the children draw a self portrait for their portfolio. As the children drew their faces, we noticed a disconnect between what they were  observing in the mirror and what they were representing on  paper.  Our first step to help the children notice details was to provide them with the outline of a face and have them add the facial features.  As a result, some children were placing facial features in the general location where they are found on the faces while others were drawing random shapes without regard to the location of facial features. 

   

The children began this investigation by drawing self portraits. We provided the children with an outline of a face and they added the details.

Abi uses the recycled materials to create an eye.

Khalil used the small black stones to outline the shape of the eye.

Ali E. is placing one of the beads up against his eye as a way to connect the image to his own body.

Yousef is looking at the picture of the eyes. He pointed to the image of the eyes and then pointed to his own eyes.

Throughout these experiences, the children were developing their fine motor skills, becoming observers of details and strengthening their language skills as they described what they were seeing and doing.