Art activity with Christy:

The children went to the forest to collect some leaves. They observed the lines (veins) of a leaf and followed the contour with their finger. Christy talked to them about the shape of their leaves and gave them 3 different choices. The children were able to paint the leaf and imprint it onto their pieces of paper, trace the contour of their leaf or to look at the leaf and try to draw its shape. Christy encouraged the children and opened conversation about their art – the children observed the lines(veins) that a leaf had, and talked about the  different shapes: heart, oval, round. 

Using sticks to build furniture

 The children were excited to explore another idea with their sticks. We used the sticks to build furniture. We observed Vincent Van Gogh’s bedroom and by being thinkers, the children decided that his bedroom was not decorated. By the train area, you will be able to observe his 3D bedroom, created by the children. Now that we have built his furniture, the next step, is to decorate his bedroom.

This week we will focus our attention on sewing some pillows, blankets and collecting materials to decorate the walls. The activity will be open to everyone. We will observe while someone is decorating the bedroom and we will take some pictures. 

At the end we will make a chart to see if we all have the same taste in decorating or if we have different ideas.

IB profile words – Open minded and Thinker

It all started with the book “Not a stick” by Antoinette Portis.

The children came up with different ideas of what a stick can be used for and not be called “a stick”.  All the children had a turn holding a stick in their hands.  Becky was saying that by being open minded, they could come up with different ideas about how they could use the stick. 

These are some of the ideas that the children came up with:  hammer, bottle, magic wand, pencil, etc..

After coming up with all the different ideas, we all went to the forest to collect some sticks. Because one of their ideas was that sticks could be used as decoration, the children received a piece of cardboard and by using their creativity they decorated it with sticks from the forest.

Different ways of communicating

The pictures show some of the different ways that the children came up with as a way of communicating. We had a fun time writing a letter and walking all the way to the mailbox with it. The children enjoyed dropping their letters in the mailbox. They are excited to get a reply.

This pictures show another way of communicating that the children liked. Painting and expressing something through drawings and then without using words, the children had to guess what the pictures where about. They are really good at understanding messages even without listening to words. They saw the picture with the children that were going to the bathroom and without asking they walked quietly to the bathroom to get ready for outside. 

IB profile word - COMMUNICATOR

I am a communicator! 

The profile word for last week and this week is COMMUNICATOR. 

We read the story Library Mouse by Daniel Kirk to get some ideas about the different ways of communicating. The children identified four different ways in the story: writing a note, talking - oral communication, writing a story and drawing. After we read the story we made a chart with all the different ways of communicating that we were able to come up with. Walkie talkies, phones, radios, talking, notes, pictures, card, stories, and our body were some of the ways that the children came up with. 

After we made the chart we came up with a plan. Every day we will use a different method to communicate with our parents/friends. The children sent an email home, they painted a picture and in the upcoming days we will use different ways to send a message. It was amazing to see them communicating without using their words. We used only our body to express what we want to say. When we painted the pictures, the children chose not to tell what they wanted to communicate through their pictures because they wanted their friends to guess. All the children came up with wonderful ideas and it was interesting that they all had different ideas about the meaning of each picture.

IB profile word - REFLECTIVE

Dear Families,

Every week we will have a different story in the afternoon for our IB profile word. The children will get to explore that story through math, art, science, music, movement and language while learning about the meaning of the profile word with their lives and the lives of the character.
Last week our story was called "Tops and Bottoms" by Janet Stevens The children enjoyed being reflective; thinking about what they have learned, what they are good at and how they can improve the next time. They also learned that being reflective means to take their time to think about their actions and effects. The children realized that at the end of the story the bear was being reflective. He realized that he is good at planting and working in the garden, but he chose the easy way, sleeping the whole time while someone else was working in his garden. At the end, he reflected on the situation and realized that he has to work hard for himself if he wants to have something. 

I hope the children had a chance to tell you about all the different vegetables they tasted and all the different activities that we did related to the story.

Have a great week,
Anamaria

Health Break

Dear Parents,

In the morning we will explore the forest and right before group time the children will have a Health break. They will read books, rest in the comfortable hammock or swinging chair, eat a healthy snack and/or hydrate their body with some water.