Alongside the ongoing volcano projects in our classroom, this week we also worked on practicing recognition and writing our names. Some friends brought books from the library about volcanoes and even shared many facts about volcanoes that they learned at home. Thank you, parents, for supporting the children's learning both at school and at home!
Friends showing the books to each other that they got from the library...
Friends looking at the nonfiction pictures and enjoying discussing what they see...they also had so many questions to ask about the different things in the book...
L is creating a huge volcano island and using baby oil as pretend lava oozing out...
N making a volcanic mountain...
So we did another active volcano in our class. This time we first did the experiment using a see-through bottle for them to see what was actually going on inside when the baking soda and vinegar got mixed. They were surprised to see how it actually fuzzes out from the bottom and travels all the way to the top in the form of an explosion...
We then performed the same experiment in our classroom-made volcano...
The eruption lasted for about a minute but the height was reducing slowly slowly and then it stopped. We used the same idea to describe how volcanoes erupt and then calm down...
Working with our NAMES!
We did many name songs and introduced each other talking about how our name is special to us and how we all would love to be called by our names. Friends shared about their first letter and some even spelled their names. Friends even guess what was the first letter of their other friends' names.
We worked on learning how to trace our names...
Friends wrote their names on the sensory table ( we had watercolor and baby oil spread out for them to finger write and practice their names)
Later, friends worked to form their name letters using foam letters that got stuck to the sensory table...
For the names week we baked letter cookies where friends carved their initials on the cookie with a toothpick. We spoke to them about what initials mean...
Other activities we did during the week...
Painting with a special brush :)
Some friends first dapped the paint on the paper and ran the brush over it.
Some other friends first painted on their brush and then rubbed that on the paper.
A is adding glitter to make her painting sparkly...
We also did see-through painting. We attached sunflowers on a transparent plexiglass frame and K painted what she saw on the other side...
A masterpiece created by our growing artist...
They loved this so much that we opened up a similar activity with them where we placed their pictures on one side of plastic and they drew why they saw...
E taking a close look, drawing his outlines, and choosing the closet color match to his face...
A totally engrossed in tracing his self...
Similarly, we worked to create our birthday wall pictures by mirroring half a photo...
Here we worked on symmetry, discussing how if we drew a line in the middle of our face, the other half would look exactly the same. We gave them one half of their picture and they had to finish the other half for a complete face...
One day last week, friends heard thunder and remembered our discussions of the drought, which got them thinking about the Native American rain dance we had done earlier in the month. Knowing this dance was sacred to their culture, our friends respectfully got engaged in a rain dance, expecting and raising their hands up, asking for more rain to eradicate the drought...
Soon some got engaged in playing a soft musical band whereas the rest still performed the rain dance on the beat of the music played by our children band...
That week we enjoyed face painting and friends chose different characters to pretend play..
We also made paneer, which is fresh cheese, from scratch. Just two ingredients - milk and vinegar and the cheese was ready in 15 minutes. We tasted it outdoors and everyone said that it tastes very close to tofu!
Felt board stories...
This week we celebrated our friend R's 5th birthday as well as his last day...we love you R. Thank you for your pizza and cupcake treat. Wish you love and luck in everything you do. Please visit us wherever you get a chance!
Keep seeing you'll around,
Hugs,
Teacher Rashida
