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
