Family Portraits

The artists: three- and four-year-olds

 front

 back

My plan was to have them narrate a story about their family to me and I would make a glorious display of the family portraits and their family story.

Being the self-assured, independent, self-aware group of children that we have here at Beansprouts, here was what actually resulted from the pieces:

So, I take it, this means they loved their pictures so much...they wanted to wear them???

Sand Tray (An Activity and A Process)

Inspired from this product that was pinned on Pinterest, I made a new activity tray (a.k.a. "work").  

On a tray, I offered the children:

1. a smaller tray with sand

2. cards with simple patterns or shapes

3. a writing tool (a little plastic stick)

4. a tongue depressor that would act as the eraser (later to be switched out for combs)

I wanted to see how well the children could copy the patterns on the pattern cards, and for the most part they could. It was a good assessment for some children.  

One of the children didn't even want to attempt the triangle pattern and I could tell it was because the child was afraid of making it "wrong". This is a student who has an older sibling who no doubt, with good intentions, tries to "teach" the younger sibling how to do things like draw shapes.  The great thing is, if it weren't for this activity and closely observing the child, I wouldn't even have picked up on the child's need for guidance in this area.  Now I know that this child needs extra support in taking risks as well as getting out of right-and-wrong models. 

In the photo above, Br and Ha showed me that combs (taken from another work basket) actually work better as erasers because the tongue depressor just pushes the sand right out of the tray.  Combs also make beautiful striped patterns in the sand. 

Since our only playsand options were blue and purple, I stole some more natural-colored sandbox sand, which needed a good sifting.  Look at all of the debris caught by the colander.  Our sandbox is full of treasures.

Until next time!

Stephanie

Mini Easles

After a friend Craig sent me this great idea of using desktop easels and q-tips for a painting activity, I really wanted to do the activity, too.  So I used these dry erase boards and taped some triangular blocks to the back to elevate.  It took a few tries and angles before I found the right construction, but here it is:

Oh, and oops! I was out of Q-tips. And since I am quite fond of little ceramic dishes to hold the paint, the longer paint brushes kept tipping out of the bowls...

so it was time to adapt again...

When it was all set up, something felt incomplete.

Just add flowers...

and children!

Getting organized

I spent one hour (just one!) making an organization system for our classroom.  I tend to have my own little notes (er, in my head) about things I want to do with the kids, and occasionally we have a weekly plan that corresponds to the curriculum theme.

And although I tend to thrive in an environment that allows for spontaneous inspiration, I do have those days when inspiration doesn't come and I need a plan.  And when I have a plan on a day when inspiration does come, I can use that inspiration for other things, like how to upgrade the environment, or what to add to the sensory table, or what new station to set up in the classroom.

We have a schedule of who is in charge of what and which days so I put that in the binder, plus some extra weekly planning sheets.  

I like to save stuff, so I made a place to save our old curriculum plans. Hey, why reinvent the wheel next time we do the theme? At least we have some skeletal components for the theme next year.

Since we've been doing printed daily logs of our activities, we can save those for reference, too. 

Now that the system is in place, it will be much easier to follow it.

(Fingers crossed!)

Seasonal Change

This week, we saw rainy weather for the first time this season. Last week, we were in the high 80's, and this week we were cold and wet.  Ironically, the first day that it rained, look where the kids wanted to be!

Where there are usually at least three or four children in the patio reading books on the couch and doing extensive self-guided art projects, on this cold and rainy day, they were ALL in the sandbox!  I decided to leave the shelter of the patio area to see what was happening.  But when I went over there, nothing big was going on, just some big ol' sand castles and the usual birthday cake play.  Okay, that is big in and of itself, but nothing unusually spectacular.

The fact that there was nothing totally exciting going on (beyond the usual excitement and learning in child-led dramatic play) tells me that the rain is simply a non-issue.  They didn't even seem to notice the sprinkles on their heads and backs.

And that is why we spend a little time outdoors every day, rain or shine.  On a typical day, we see 3 to 5 hours per day outdoors.  On the rainiest day this week, we saw about two.

More to read:

what to children learn when they play outdoors?

learning through play outdoors

tranquil scenes have a positive impact on the brain (ahem, getting out in nature)

tv is relaxing (ie. stop watching tv and go outside!)

Books

Bike Painting Revisited

Some activities are simply worth repeating.  

It became the largest art display in Beansprouts history!

The next day, the kids had a marvelous time washing the bikes and drying/polishing them up.  Could an activity with bubbles ever not be fun?

Linked up to Learning for Life!