Thanks to parents who are embracing the children's interest by either writing letters and putting them in their child's mail box, or leaving a letter in the lunch box. Last week I had a parent who left different denominations of coins in his child's mailbox, and later during the day, those coins paved a way to open-ended discussions. There was a lot of math we did with those, as well as some tracing, reading about how the country's name and year is printed finely on each coin, etc. Such a teachable moment!
Our light/sand table was kept lively throughout the week by their imaginations and creativity! They are also using many different styles to draw. Some use one finger, some use two, some use their palms, while some use their full hand. We've even seen plastic bugs and paintbrushes used as drawing tools in the sand. Also a lot of peer modeling goes on here - a boon of a mixed age classroom!
K said, "Its a humungous Spider!"
G made her own face with two ponytails!
Our cardboard pipes use took a new turn this week. They used them as telephones, where one person placed it near the mouth while the other next to the ear, and took turns passing messages. Neat!
They also made a "hideout" using the same tubes.
Designing and building a drainage system and fixing it with tools was a topic of interest as well.
This week was the letter "H" week. One of the words that came out during circle time was 'H'ockey! Later we made our own hockey sticks and used our ping pong balls as pucks and enjoyed playing hockey everyday.
Indoors - Playing Ice Hockey..
Outdoors - Playing Field Hockey...
With the letter 'H', we made our collages using materials starting with the letter 'H' (letter H stamps, letter H stickers, Hockey stick, Heart, Horse, Hen, Happy face, Happy birthday, Halloween decorations, etc )
This week we worked in collaboration with each other and with the Blue Room to plan our two celebrations -- the Harvest Carnival and the Halloween Party. Brilliant ideas came from our childen and we tried our best to incorporate most of it. Some were...
Crazy Dance!
Pinning a tail on a soccer ball!
Well our soccer ball finally turned out to be a muddy ball...but we still loved it!
Free open-ended community art!
Decorations!
We choose to decorate our classroom with pennants (a carry-over from our sports discussions) and party streamers.
For Halloween, we made our own Trick-or-Treat bags and also made skeletons.
We enjoyed trick-or-treating and then having a pizza party for lunch. What an exciting day :-) !
The Cheeezeee Moment!
Phew!!! It was a very busy week with a lot to do, but together we cruised through it with ease and fun!
Thanks to all my wonderful kiddos who never take a step back when it comes to helping, both with hands and minds!
Have a great week ahead!
Warmly,
Rashida
