Monday, September 29, 2014

Letter L, leaves, fish tanks, and pre-k

Hello Purple Room Families,

Last week was the first week of fall...and with fall we see the leaves changing colors! It was a perfect week to begin introducing the letter L to our young friends, and at the same time, interesting to see how the older group facilitated this learning.

When we were brainstorming all the letter L words, 'leaves' was the word most commonly repeated. So we thought about moving outside to collect them and use them for our letter L collages.

We also spoke about how plants are living and so no plucking leaves out of them. We used the example of someone pulling their hair. They said, "Owww, that would hurt!" So keeping this analogy of not plucking leaves in mind, we set our with our personalized ziplock bags to collect leaves. As soon as friends saw a leaf, they exclaimed, "Come here, come here!" Here you see the entire team spread out on a mission. They even helped each other add leaves to their bags if they found two of the same kind. Wow, its amazing to see this kind of sharing and helping a friend finish his project without even being told.



Now this was interesting, after remembering not to pluck, our smart friends shook the branches. When asked why they did so, they replied, "so that dried leaves might fall down and then we will collect them!" Well, I could never think of that. Got to say, these were great and creative minds on the expedition.



Then we set out around our premises to look for any different kinds of leaves. They had said that leaves have different colors, shapes, and patterns. So we definitely were looking for some more to compare.



Outside on the side walk, there were many more. But again remembering not to pluck them, our eyes were always on the ground looking for dried fallen leaves. Here we found some yellow, green, and brown fan shaped leaves and collected those. We also saw long poky leaves as in the picture below and gently felt them.



All our friends were excited to see different shapes and colors. D found a curled brown fan leaf that looked like a tulip flower and she even smelled it. L found a twin green fan shaped leaf and couldn't wait to put it in her bag. While other friends scanned every corner of the bushes...



Soon we spotted a tree that looked different in color. This was where we captured the learning moment and spoke about fall, and trees changing color. When we asked them why they thought the top part of that tree was brownish orange, they said that it was because of the sun shining brightly on it :) These are some aha moments that can never be forgotten!



We came back in, and friends made a 'person L' and other friends checked if they made it correctly :)



Later we worked with our letter L collages and were so proud to use the materials we found on our leaf hunt to make them!






Other activities and projects...

MAKING FISHP FOR OUR TANKS...

Rolling fabrics to made body, and adding the tail, fins, and eyes...






Our very unique fish...



Gluing our handmade fish into our tanks and making up our ocean stories...



Adding the blue water effect to our tanks...



Adding the glitter and glimmer that we see when the sun shines down on the ocean water...



MAKING A HABITAT FOR OUR DRIFTWOOD FISH...
friends cut shiny blue paper to add water and used blue packaging material as water too...slowly by slowly they kept adding all the habitat elements...



Adding the more blue to the habitat they created...



While other friends were adding rocks and pebbles....



Adding shells and sea weeds...



Now you will be astonished at their observation...accidentally some transparent pebbles dropped on their write up stories. Friends right away noticed that the letters got magnified and were bigger as compared to the letters around them. Well, even a teacher's eye did not capture this., and we spoke about a similar concept of a magnifying glass.



WORKING OUR FINE MOTOR SKILLS WITH SYRINGES...
Learning how to suck the water with two hands and how to squirt it with one...



Friends got bottle caps, and were so told to not let the water from the syringe overflow the caps...Well, lots ofp all muscle skills at work, eye hand coordination and many other actions going on. I love such open ended explorations where they are thoroughly enjoying and living each moment of it!

L even noticed that how the syringes had numbers 1, 2, and 3 on them and on holding the syringe upright after sucking in the water, one could actually say how many ml of water it had :) You bet, we have some future doctors here ;)



MAKING LEMONADE...
squeezing the juice out, tasting the sourness, and transforming it into a delightful drink that quenches every throat :)



PRE-K

Friends in pre-K wanted something outstanding to recognize their work that we collect and display on the wall...so we thought of self art pictures. Here you see D working on the other half of her face. We spoke about the symmetrical construction of our bodies and how to connect and extend the lines and curves. It was a very interesting and new project to encounter...



A, P, and L working on their face portraits...friends even added the part of their t-shirts that they saw on their shoulders!



Tracing and learning to write letter L...



Making a collage of our fish tanks by remembering the things we put in them...



Drawing the materials in the tank now in a bowl...



Another interesting achievement...

We had collected a lot of their pre-K work and since it was the end of September, we thought to compile those in books. So with Teacher Richa's idea, we moved our book binder from the office to our classroom and friends made their own books!!!

First we spoke about the steps that we need to follow while using a machine. We discussed that we need to connect it first and then press the start button. So with the main switch of the extension cord off, we learned to plug in the machine. We also spoke about safety and how important it is to have an adult around you observing you all the time when such activities are done.

In this picture you see P figuring out how to connect the three prong plug. He was connecting it the opposite way and soon he problem solved and figured out the match. We thought it was like a puzzle piece to match together. A was working with him too, giving him her best tips :)



Then we stacked our work...



And slid the stack in the right section and hit the button to make the holes...



Then we carefully matched the sections and put on the black spine that would hold the book together...



We moved the lever towards ourselves and that opened up the spine spokes...we then locked the spokes of the spine to our papers.



After pushing the lever back to its starting place, we picked up our book and saw it bound and ready to go home...



Overall, we had a fun week and look forward to many such more!

Keep seeing you around,

Hugs,
Teacher Rashida

Wednesday, September 24, 2014

Letter F, Fish, Friendship Fruit Salad, and Rain!

Hello Purple Room Families,

I am so excited to write about our new school year starting this September as we resume our the letter of the week. Friends were looking forward to this too. They love their letters and are so passionate to learn about them, checking them around the environment (print knowledge), brainstorming words that begin with that letter, and getting super excited when there is a friend in class whose name begins with the letter of the week. Letter F week was fabulous and fantastic.

We read some fictional stories and talked about the fiction vs non fiction during lunch time almost everyday.

We made our own frog game where the frog has to reach the lily pad. After we made the game, we soon realized that we did not have dice to play and so made our own...

Making the game and talking about how horizontal and vertical lines together make blocks and how to divide the paper in four equal halves...



Rolling the dice to count the numbers and move the frog that many steps...



Moving ahead counting one to one without missing a beat...well there were other friends around to check if somebody skipped a number ;) and they were just too good with keeping track ;)



Reaching the lily pad...and we played it over and over again...



Counting the dice dots to know how many steps they need to move on the game...



Just fun, fun, and fun...



We later got involved in making our own fish out of driftwood. We spoke about the driftwood and it was interesting that they thought it was either a log or a rock. We also spoke about the different parts of the fish and the use of those parts as well...
P got a fun book from the library which gave us a better insight on the topic of fish!

S choosing her fishy colors and painting her driftwood...



P choosing his driftwood and coloring his soon 'to be' fish :)



After adding all the eyes and gills and fins and tails....tada! Pretty, pretty, pretty!



During the week we also worked with our letter F collages and chose feathers to go on them...

We brushed glue...



We dripped glue...



And we collaged feathers!



While some friends really thought out of the box and used the materials in a very open ended way to create their masterpieces...

D making a feather fan using feathers and popsicle stick. She also made a collage using the materials at the table...



P making a fan with popsicle sticks as spokes...



FRIENDSHIP FRUIT SALAD...

Sharing about all the different fruit we bought to make our salad and talking about how hard would it be for one person to carry all the fruit - the reasons why we called it the friendship fruit salad, because we each contributed our share!
We also compared and contrasted all the fruit in regard to shape, color, fruit that have seeds inside and outside, fruit that can be eaten with peels, fruit that does not need to be cut and can be eaten right away after washing and much more.






A talking about her blueberries.


Friends had no idea if a cantaloupe had seeds in it or not. So we decided to go abra ka dabra and check it out...



Whoooo...a moment where we truly appreciated nature and its beauty! They all screamed, "Wow!" Some friends said that it looks like a pair of eyes. How neat!



Exploring a peach...



Working to put the salad together...



Slicing strawberries...



Tossing all the fruit into a big bowl...



The last touches with D adding raisins and cranberries...



Later during lunch we thoroughly enjoyed this desert and some friends decided to make it even smaller by recutting the big chunks with their personal knives and placemats. A great skill in action, where they held the fruit with one hand and used the other to saw through the fruit :)



MAKING FISH TANKS/AQUARIUMS...

Brushing the base of the prospective ocean with glue...



Adding colored sand to the ocean floor...



Adding other things that we had discussed at circle time- shells, seaweed, shiny pebbles, rocks, glitter, coral, and sea plants...


We will continue to work on this project and add more elements as the children come up with their creative ideas!

TEAM WORK CONTINUES WITH PUZZLES!!!



It was exciting to try the ocean puzzle since it was a new one...so there you see the team in action...



That last piece and the honor of placing it to finish the project...these friends decided to stay in class while the rest went outdoors during outside time, just because they were so dedicated to finishing it!



RAIN, RAIN COME AGAIN!
The sudden rain last week was a moment to cherish and no soul could sit still when they saw rain out the windows. They all requested "Can we pleeeeease go outside?" which was out of our regular schedule. And there we are with our feet set out to feel the nature showers!

Friends did everything they could in the 10 minutes that we decided to stay out.

Tasting rain...



We pretended to squeeze shampoo and bathed...



We cupped our ears and got pin drop silent to hear the musical rain...



L walked on a puddle and saw her shoe prints behind, and said that they looked like a fish with scales!



Checking out more shoe prints...



L making footprints to measure how long they were...



A finding a dry spot to make her footprints to measure...she said she wanted to make a twin footprint :)






We ended our 10 minutes expedition ;) by pretending to be pirates looking for a rainbow treasure and hit our sand ship..."Ahoy!" everyone exclaimed.



What a perfect way to end the week!

A GLANCE AT PRE-K
Pre-k friends helped me cut out pictures to finish the library cards to use next week for letter L



Making our chart of the fruit salad we made a day prior...and adding their favorite salad fruit to the bowl...






A dedicated to finish her worksheet page...



Friends in Purple Room are busy and working hard toward the auction that will begin either the first or second week of October. We as a preschool unit are looking forward to this event. Please get your pockets filled with pennies and quarters and nickels and dimes. Your auctioneers will soon get involved in marketing and working to empty your pockets ;)

Will keep seeing you'll around,

Hugs,
Teacher Rashida