Friday, March 31, 2017

We Are Marine Biologist!

Hello family and friends!

We've had such a fun week in the Tzemach class! As you remember from my last post, we are marine biologist! As scientists, we've been spending a lot of time in research. Last week we introduced the kids to a large number of sea creatures. We vaguely explored each creature together as a whole class. This week we wanted to make it more individualized. We wanted the kids to feel that they were real experts. We wanted them to go to their friends with questions about a sea creature and be able to get answers. We started by asking them which creature was their favorite. Which one did they want to research? Which one were they most curious about? Which one did they want to become an expert in? After selecting their creature of choice, we dove into our research.

To start our research we spent a lot of time in books. We had the books spread out and encouraged the kids to look through them and find pictures of their creature. Once they found a book that held information, we sat down one on one and read through the books. We asked questions and tried to find answers. If we couldn't find answers in our books, we turned to the internet. We sat down with the kids and put our questions into Google. We pulled up articles to read and explored pictures. We also wanted the kids to look at a short video of their creature to see it in action. After learning their picks, we found short 2-3 minute videos that gave a general explanation of the creature. Most of our research included: their living environment, what they ate, their behaviors, what parts of the world they lived in, and any other questions that the kids could think of. Between the books, articles, and videos, we discovered that we had learned a lot about our creatures! We were able to tell friends facts about our sea creatures! We were becoming experts!

As experts, we decided that we should share that information with others. We talked about the fact that marine biologist do research and when they make discoveries they share that knowledge with others. That's why we know so much about the world...someone discovered it and they shared it with us! To share our facts we thought it'd be best to write a book about our sea creature. We've written some fiction books throughout the year but never a non fiction. We started by talking through non fiction books with each child. We discussed the different parts of a book and their function. We discussed the difference between fiction and non fiction and why each was important. We gave the kids complete liberty of what facts they chose and how long they wanted their book to be. We became the author and illustrator for each page. We were careful to fill the pages with correct information. If we couldn't remember something we learned, we dove back into our books and searched for answers. Our pages consisted of things such as: the name of our creature, where they live, what they eat, interesting facts we discovered, and some of our favorite characteristic about our creature. I am in.love.with.these.books. Seriously. They really got excited about being experts and they took it seriously. They carefully drew their pictures to match their facts. They spent a lot of time working on their books. We didn't expect them to take up the majority of the week but they did. And that's ok! We were glad they got so involved. These are hanging up in the hallway so make sure you check them out.

After the fun mural we made last week, some of the kids wanted to do some more painting. This time they worked on individual artwork and painted creatures of their choosing. You can find these in the hallway along with their statements about their piece. Next week we will be jumping head first into our 3D creatures. If you have any recycled items at home, please bring them in. We want to give the kids tons of materials so they can get creative. Right now, the kids are saying they'd like to hang their 3D artwork from the ceiling to make the room look like the ocean. I think it's a great idea! I'm sure it will take us most of next week, but soon our classroom with come to life with sea creatures! We are also working to get a guest speaker next week. We're hoping he can come by and teach us all about the ocean and answer some more of our questions.

We're looking forward to another great week!

Love,
Rachael


Approaches to Learning:
  • Demonstrate growing ability to predict possible outcomes based on prior experiences and knowledge.
  • Demonstrate increasing ability to use prior knowledge to understand new experiences.
  • Represent prior events and personal experiences in one or more ways.
  • Try to solve problems encountered in play.
  • Demonstrate an increasing ability to follow through with tasks and activities.
Social & Emotional:
  • Interact easily with familiar adults by engaging in conversations, responding to questions and following direction.
  • Participate in group life of class.
  • Demonstrate strategies to join play group with adult support.
  • Recognize effect on others of own behavior most of the time.
  • Manage transitions positively when told what to expect.
Language & Literacy:
  • Show interest in informational texts about familiar objects.
  • Retell one or town events from a story read aloud.
  • Begin to identify significant words from text read aloud.
  • Explore books independently.
  • Incorporate information from informational texts into play activities.
  • Begin to understand the relationship between oral language and written language.
  • use drawings, letters, or words to create narratives about people and things in their environment.
Mathematics:
  • Investigate solutions to simple problems.
  • Classify objects in their environment by color, shape, size, or function.
  • Begin to show an awareness of numbers in the environment.
  • Sort and classify objects by one attribute.
  • Represent simple two-dimensional geometric shapes.


Exploring oceans through play during center time...



We are researchers! Learning all about our favorite sea creatures...







We are writers! Check out our non fiction books in the hallway...





Friday, March 24, 2017

We Are Scientist!

Hello family and friends!

I'm going to use this week's post to give you a brief update on what we've been doing the past 2 weeks since I was out of town for most of last week with family. First of all, I want to thank you so much for all the sweet words of encouragement and emails. They meant more to me than you know!  I was so happy to be on Monday and get back to a normal schedule. I'm so thankful for a wonderful community of parents like you!

The past 2 weeks have been a little crazy as we've been trying to pin down what the kids want to learn about. To start last week, we were learning about plants because the kids had started bringing them in from their yards. We thought maybe they'd enjoy learning some more about these flowers. However, on Tuesday, the kids got to spend a little bit of time with Ms. Kelly while I was surprised with a sweet baby shower at school. While I was gone, they were talking to Ms. Kelly about things that are fast and she communicated with me that they seemed really excited about it! We thought this was something we should transition to. However, I found out that afternoon that my grandmother had passed away and I was leaving town. Michelle decided she'd keep up the plant study for those days and we'd meet with the kids on Monday about what they wanted to learn about. During this time the kids got to explore bulbs, seeds, plants, and leaves. They did some bulb dissecting and got to get their hands dirty as they explored different types of soil and plants. Michelle did some write ups on the bulletin board in the hallway that explains the rest of the week. I encourage you to go check it out when you get time.

When I came back on Monday we sat down with them to discuss our new exploration direction. They were all about things that go fast. However, during that talk someone mentioned that sharks go fast. This got everyone talking and before I knew it, most of them had jumped on the sea creature train! At this point, we had things go in so many directions that we figured it was time to do a vote. We asked them individually what they wanted to learn about and the verdict was sea creatures! At this point I was thankful that I hadn't spent all weekend at the library gathering "fast" books like I had originally planned. HA! This is the beauty of working with 4 year olds...they keep you on your toes!

All of that to say, we're officially on the topic of sea creatures! The kids are excited about it and have been bringing in TONS of books. I've been amazed at the facts we've been learning. Our plan for this exploration is to expose the kids to as many different types of sea creatures as we can and then allow each child to become an expert on a creature of their choosing in later weeks. To start the study, we made a web chart of ocean creatures we knew about and some questions we had. We then learned about the 3 main zones of the ocean: sunlight zone, twilight zone, and midnight zone. As we talked about these, we discussed their different characteristics as well as the types of creatures that live in each zone. We were able to learn how many of these animals have odd characteristics that allow them to better live in their zone. For example, many creatures in the twilight zone have large eyes because there is much less light in this zone. Many creatures in the midnight zone have body parts that actually make their own light since this zone is void of light all together. To further demonstrate these concepts, we made a jar of ocean zones. For the bottom, midnight zone, we dyed corn syrup a very dark purple/black. This shows no light entering that zone. For the next zone, the twilight zone, we used dark blue dish soap. This layer sits on top of the bottom layer and shows us how very little light can enter it. For the final zone, the sunlight zone, we dyed some vegetable oil a light green/blue color. This shows us that light can easily enter this zone, and therefore has the most abundant plant and animal life. I've noticed the kids talking about these zones during their play, so I hope you've been hearing about it at home as well.

After spending the week soaking up as many facts about new sea creatures as we could, we thought it'd be fun to let the kids paint an ocean mural of some of their favorite creatures we've studied this week. As we painted, we discussed facts about each creature, such as where it lives, what it eats, it's defenses against predators, and our favorite things about the creature. Some students chose to work alone during this time, while others worked together and merged their mural section. A few of them even created a beautiful coral reef full of colors and life! We did 2 of these murals and will be hanging them up on the walls as soon as they dry.

Next week, we plan on beginning to narrow down the interest of each individual child. We want them to learn, in detail, about the sea creature that they're most curious about. I'm excited to learn what each of them pick and see what direction they take us in next! If you have any books or ocean artifacts, please bring them in! Also, if you or someone you know is a diver or expert in oceans, we'd love to have a speaker! We're looking forward to another great week!

Love,
Ms. Rachael


Approaches to Learning:
  • Demonstrate increasing ability to identify and take appropriate risks in order to learn and demonstrate new skills.
  • Show curiosity in an increasing variety of activities, tasks, and learning centers.
  • Demonstrate eagerness and interest as a learner by questions and adding ideas.
  • Demonstrate delight or satisfaction when completing a task, solving a problem, or making a discovery.
  • Demonstrate growing initiative in selecting and carrying out activities.
Social & Emotional:
  • Demonstrate self direction by making choices among peers, activities and materials.
  • Demonstrate confidence by participating in most classroom activities.
  • Respond respectfully to positive and negative feedback from adults most of the time.
  • Follow classroom rules and procedures with reminders.
  • Manage transitions positively when told what to expect.
Language & Literacy:
  • Make relevant comments or appropriate responses to story events or characters.
  • Begin to identify significant words from text real aloud.
  • Begin to ask questions about eh causes of events they observe or hear about in books.
  • Explore books independently.
  • Show interest in informational texts about familiar objects.
  • Incorporate information from informational texts into play activities.
  • Begin to ask questions about the causes of events they observe or hear about in books.
Mathematics:
  • Use emergent mathematical knowledge as a problem-solving tool.
  • Generate conjectures abased on personal experiences and simple reasoning.
  • Investigate solutions to simple problems.
  • Classify objects in their environment by color, shape, size or function.
  • Use appropriate vocabulary to communicate mathematical ideas.
  • Begin to show an awareness of numbers in the environment.


Enjoying our Purim carnival with the other classes!















We had a blast on our blow up course!









Our short (but fun!) plant exploration...



















Learning about the ocean zones...




Creating our mural full of ocean plants and sea creatures...