Tuesday News

April 30th, 2013

We started our morning with a short choice time today.   Short, but productive including an impressive new building style on the magnet tile rug, and beautiful pictures drawn in journals.

Our choice time was put on pause when our friend Alicia came to our door for Spanish. With their Spanish knowledge steadily growing, the children had no problems with the number game she brought with her which involved rolling a large cube with numbers on each side and then counting up to that number in Spanish.

The children then were treated to a story read by Alicia, all in Spanish about waiting for the bus, or Autobus. While the characters in the story waited, they observed many different vehicles driving by their bus stop and through their observations we learned several names of different types of vehicles in Spanish! Our Spanish lesson rolled along with a song we all knew, The Wheels on the Bus, but with the new challenge of singing the words we all knew in Spanish!

We thanked Alicia with our Kindness Song before she left and the Cardinals returned to their choice work. A new activity the Cardinal teachers introduced today was book making.

The Cardinals  have been so immersed in story dictations at journal time,  writing of signs for various block creations, and  sounding out of words around the classroom. The teachers suggested that the children begin writing themselves and suggested making own books.  Having the opportunity to create personal books of things that they area interested in facilitates writing and reading readiness skills. Some of the children are beginning to sound out words and are able to identify and write the initial consonant sound of words for  their drawings.  We refer to this as 'kid  writing' and we will be encouraging children to begin to explore this skill. One of the important parts of kid writing is that the children begin to auditorily   discriminate different letter sounds and make those connections with words.

The class took on this new endeavor with enthusiasm and we are thrilled to see the children begin to take even more ownership of their beginning literacy quest as they not only imagine the stories and illustrate their thoughts, but also do the physical writing of their own thoughts.

After stretching our minds in new and exciting ways, the Cardinals moved outdoors for some time in the magnificent sunshine. 

We started out having our snack around the stage outside. 

Soon everyone was off exploring the outdoor classroom and small groups of classmates were banding together...

Finding friends from other classes!

Creating additions to the climbing structure... 

Or forming families of Cardinal birds and acting out everyday events and problem solving together!

Thursday News

Throughout the Day on Thursday...

*We had Spanish with Alicia and experienced naming and recalling of body parts in Espanol. We also sang "Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes" using the Spanish terms we learned for head: cabeza, shoulder: hombro, knee: rodilla, toes: pies. 

Here are the full lyrics if you would like to practice and invite your child to sing with you:

Cabeza, hombros, rodillas
y dos pies
Cabeza, hombros, rodillas
y dos pies

Ojos, oidos, boca y una nariz
Cabeza, hombros, rodillas
y dos pies

*Shared sculptures and participated more in the creation process: The confidence and pride of the children in their artistic work is displayed as they often ask "Can I show this during Morning Meeting?". After Hannah walked around with her recycled sculpture today, the children were inspired to return to the studio to work. Children learning from children is an intrinsic form of motivation that sparks curiosity in a new way. This time, we introduced two new tools that Hannah used in her more complex sculpture including a stapler and exacto knife (with the aid of a teacher). This led to many children choosing to work in the studio during Choice Time.

*Journal Dictation and Drawing: In response to our prompt, "Draw a picture of something you like to do with your friends". The children enjoyed sharing daily activities and experiences with the Cardinal peers through their drawings and descriptions.

We spent the rest of the time connecting with each other and our surrounding environment in our outdoor space!

Thursday Spanish and Sculpture Walk!

February 7, 2013

This morning there was an active calm in the classroom. As Cardinals began to arrive they found places to busy themselves immediately. Two hot spots in the class were building with magnet tiles and reading on the front rug.


After settling into our activities, Alicia stopped by with Spanish fun to share. After our greeting routine, she brought out some pictures to help explain some of the Spanish words for colors. We sang along with Alicia to help stick the new words in our memories and then she brought out an exciting game to play with our new knowledge. She introduced this as one of the favorite games of the kindergartners and the Cardinals were excited to be trusted with this big kid activity! With fun fly swatters, each friend was given the opportunity to listen for the Spanish word for a color and then swat that color on the rug. We ended our time with our Spanish goodbye song and a squeeze of the "muuuuuchos gracias" vaca.

In morning meeting, we surprised the children and excited to learn of a special activity for the day. A sculpture walk all the way in Alverthorpe park was in store for today!  We discussed some of the things that we thought would be important to think about on our sculpture walk which helped us have a central focus. We talked about the kinds of materials that may be used by artists who want to have their art displayed outdoors.  What about rain....wind...snow....?  We connected with the concept that the materials needed would have to be sturdy and able to sustain the varied weather.We bundled up and headed outside to see what kind of artwork we could observe. We walked through the "Sculpture Garden" and ran up and down the hill to see the sculptures spaced around the park. We then took some time to enjoy the outside space before walking back to our classroom to have some choice time.

Sculptures back in the Classroom