In July, our class was interested in explosions (inspired by 4th of July fireworks) and volcanoes and lava. That interest has continued, but also sparked a parallel project when someone noticed that the volcano/mountain shape reminded them of a teepee.
We brought a big historical book about Native American life and culture to share with the children. It had great pictures of how they dress, about their families, crops, places where they lived, their civilization, houses, use of hand-made and natural materials and tools, and their overall lifestyle. We talked about most of the pictures and the children had so many questions as well as facts to share that they already knew. They were so amazed to see the teepees and suggested that they wanted to make their own teepee village!
Getting inspired by the following two pictures our project started...
Together we found some materials in the classroom that we were able to put together in the form of tent/ teepee and created a teepee community..
We also created a huge teepee with the sheet that our friends had painted the week prior...
Friends made their own smaller teepees using sticks/ skewers and scrap fabric...
Friends also colored the teepees that we shaped out of tortillas...
...and created a village /community similar to the picture they had seen in the book.
We discussed that there are still Native American communities today, but they don't usually live in teepees anymore, so this was more of a historical pioneer-era look at Native American life.
Friends mentioned flashlights and knew that back in those days there was no electricity. So they suggested we switch off the lights in the classroom and use flashlights instead. This led to a lot of exploration with shadows, and how to work with minimal light. Soon our discussion introduced us to fire which was the only form of light back then. So friends decided to add that element as well. We gathered some logs from our outdoors and friends put together a fireplace...
With fire, comes camp, and with camp comes marshmallows...so we made marshmallows where friends added their color of chocolate and ...
...we enjoyed roasting and eating the marshmallows. We even fed it to our pet horse, Flower!
Friends pretended warming their hands with the heat of the fire...
FARM WEEK...
During the farm week (the week of the 2nd petting zoo visit), we engaged in discussion about animals. It was fun to connect it with our ongoing teepee project. We learned which animals were used back then for transport and in the farm or many other reasons. Horses were very popular. Also how fire helped protect people from wild animals led to discussions about wolves. (The wolf scene from Beauty and the Beast made some of the children aware of this phenomenon already.)
During this week we had the petting zoo where friends enjoyed petting their favorite animals...
Well this was truly an adventure that was not a part of the plan. One of the chickens flew over the cage and ran all around the grass area. Friends were jumping with excitement watching the chicken flutter all over the place. Our two brave rescuers -- the person from the petting zoo and our own Teacher Rosemary -- worked together to catch it. The chicken was adamant to give a tough chase. Finally we had to bring a sheet to blindfold the chicken and it was put away in a locked cage :)
Later during the week we had fun making DIRT CUPS!
We spoke about what dirt is made of. Children were trying hard to recollect what things they have seen in the dirt. They gave a list of almost everything that you could think of. Rocks, sand, clay, dead plants, fruits, insect, and other living bugs eat the dead things, organic compost, and finally all this combines together to make a rich healthy soil. We also spoke about the different kinds and colors of soil around the world. I talked to them about the red and yellow soil in India. We also read and saw pictures of the orange soil in Arizona. This all tied back into our volcano conversations about the layers of the Earth and what our planet is made of. With the blackish brown soil being the most common that our children see as dirt, we went ahead to make our dirt cups...
We first prepared instant chocolate pudding, measuring and counting in doubles to double the recipe...
Next friends got to crush the Oreo cookies in their own Ziploc bags. Using their own unique styles - crushing with palms, using elbows, using the pincer grip, stomping with fist etc, friends crushed them to the tiniest crumbs!
Next we talked about patterns and layered out dirt cups with pudding-Oreo-pudding-Oreo...on the topmost layer friends emptied their entire crushed Oreos bag :)
L talking about his pattern!
The last and the most fun part was to dig the worms. Again friends used their unique ways to think. Some dug them deep down with only a tiny part of head sticking out, some dug them with head in and tail out, some crawled them over the cups, some put them in half way down while some lay them on the topmost dirt layer.
We enjoyed our dirt cups around our teepee community fire! And at the same time got fired up to run laps and burn it off outdoors.
L got a sunflower part and all the seeds were out...friends tried to find matching pockets for the seeds and placed them in the best match.
We worked with farm puzzles and farm toy animals...
Our pony Flower was also the highlight of the week. She got some grooming by friends and they enjoyed being around her as well...
We talked and distinguished between wild and domestic animals and friends use animals for many activities like painting, pretend riding, and with play-dough !
With these projects there is so much learning going on that it's sometimes hard to capture and convey it all. I can only say that the big picture can be seen only when the little elements are put together by the children. From small things to begin, like the color of fire with the blue sparks being the hottest, to building the teepee village, the knowledge that our children are soaking in is priceless! Thank you for sharing such creative, positive, and enthusiastic children with us who are so excited to learn, have fun, as well as share their visions and thoughts!
Keep seeing you all around,
Hugs,
Teacher Rashida.
