Tuesday, May 17, 2016

Continued creativity and exploration...

Hello Purple Room Families,

Teacher Richa had brought to our class a great branch from a wine grape plant. Our friends were eager to turn it into something exciting! When asked about what they want to do, the majority replied saying that to them it looked like a chandelier and they wanted to make a chandelier for the classroom. So preschool friends together decided to turn this into a community project where each one's creativity would reflect their unique personalities.

Friends first scraped the tiny bark off to give it a smooth texture. They enjoyed ripping, scraping, and even brushing the bark off the branch.







At circle time, it was fun to see how each one perceived the branch in their own way. Some of the answers that came up were that it looks like a chandelier, an antler, a spooky tree, an owl's home, a laid down ladder, a hurdle jump, and letter Y. Interesting perceptions!






Continuing the community project, friends came over one by one to pick their choice of string with a pretty bell chime tied to the end.






Next they chose their choice of beads. We had a lot of varieties like glass beads to reflect the sun, rainbow beads, wooden beads, golden and silver accent beads, regular plastic beads, different shaped beads, and custom beads that our friends made a week prior out of clay which were then baked to harden!






They worked together in their own trays creating patterns or just randomly choosing beautiful beads to go together.






They we so engrossed in casting their string of chime...






Finally, friends decopauged their photos onto little tiles that were hung on the other end. They also created some clay figures to go on the back of the tile, so one side of the tile had their picture and the other side had their clay figure.






Next, we added lights and tada! Our chandelier was the most mesmerizing thing to admire. It was so magical that friends hit on it gently just to hear the soft chime. Blue Room went through the same process so that our chandelier is really a preschool community project. What fun work!







From caterpillars to butterfly...
Our friends continued to keep a track of the caterpillars' life cycle by doing weekly observations. Soon, the caterpillars went into their chrysallises. For our friends, it was such a sight to behold!







We transferred them from the jar to their net habitat. They were still under the keen observation of our friends who waited each day to see them hatch. Friends already started collecting flowers and deciding what fruits to put in when the butterflies would be out! Caring is such a big part of their lives!

Exploring gak made from clear glue is an adventure in itself! Friends got involved in discussing the science behind mixing different ingredients and seeing how glue when combined with borax and hot water can transform into such an exiting mixture - SLIME!





Stay tuned for more fun stuff as we look forward to the end of the year and graduation!

Hugs,
Rashida


In our classroom...

Hello Purple Room Families,

It was a big achievement last week when we finished our last letter of the week and are now in the process of reviewing them. Friends enjoy playing challenging games related to numbers and letters. Every correct answer confirmed how much they've learned this year! While pre-k was running on one side, our other 3- to 4-year-olds worked on basic letter recognition and penmanship.

Along with all the basic pre-k curriculum, everyone has been enjoying doing art and talking about it. Friends also got involved in learning about the butterfly life cycle when the caterpillars arrived. The older kids remembered about the process from last year and were helping the younger kids by passing on their knowledge :) Facilitating each other's learning like this in a mixed-age preschool gives the older kids a sense of leadership and helps build community across the age groups. It's wonderful to see their relationships and communication grow together!

Friends kept a close eye on the butterfly life cycle and...



...Drew observations weekly to trace their growth...



Friends also got to see hundreds of lady bugs that hatched out...






Letters...























Working with sculpting clay...



Clay models/figures created by friends....









Friends did geometrical art drawing lines using a ruler and coloring different sections in chalk and oil pastels....









Birch trees...

Friends first painted the barks...



Then chose their background oil colors...



Stroked and painted it...



Tada...a new gallery display of their hard work!



To cook during letter Q week, we made quesadillas...




Then later on, pancakes and waffles...















Gluten-free cake was a different experience in baking chemistry...



Discussing all about GLUTEN...













And Cat in the Hat "hats" (fruit kabobs) for Dr. Suess's birthday with strawberry and banana stripes...






The children always bring so much excitement to each project or activity, making it more fun both for themselves as well as the teachers!

Keep seeing y'all around,

Hugs,
Teacher Rashida,