Apples

~Picking Apples~

~Drying Apples~

~Juicing Apples~ 

Nests: Clay, Paper Plates, and Collective Work

After finding a birds’ nests in the play yard and all of the recent hubbub about eggs (post-Easter dialogues), we wanted to study birds and their habitats. So last week we introduced our bird theme. The theme certainly caught the interest of these children at the clay table.

 Last time we used clay, we used tools like hammers, rolling pins, and presses.  This time, the children’s only tool was their hands. They molded, smoothed, created texture, rolled it into balls, pushed with their thumbs and fingers. They used fine and gross motor movements, small and large muscles.  The best part was that after they made the eggs inside the nest, they broke the eggs open and described the imaginary baby birds that emerged from their carefully crafted eggs.

Now that the discussion about birds’ nests had begun, the children had enough base knowledge about nests to create their first one. Each child used a plate with an adhesive coating to stick natural items to their “nest”. We talked about how we were using adhesive but that birds used mud as their adhesive. Many children hurried to find mud for their nest.

The next day, we asked the children what they know about birds’ nests.

• “They use sticks and leaves and all of that stuff.”
• “They put dirt inside to make it stick.”
• “Birds put dirt and mud and they wait until the sun comes and it’s dry and yellow.”
• “Birds use paper, cotton, mud, sticks. Water goes with mud.”
• “Birds pinch sticks with their beaks and put them in their nests.”
•  “Birds make nests so eggs don’t crack.”
• “And so other birds don’t crack them.”

On Friday, after analyzing the nest we found in the yard, we worked together to make a big bird nest together. Some children added a few things, and others spent lots of time finding sticks and leaves and mud to add to the nest. A few "issues" came up that the children had to work out among each other. Was it okay to add huge sticks to the nest? Would it be okay to break them into smaller sticks? What will happen if we let one of our friends dump a bucket of water into the nest? Will real birds lay eggs in our nest if we put it into a tree?

The team work was significant and fruitful.

 They were careful to make it soft and cozy for mama birds and their babies.

Don't you just want to jump in and cuddle up???

Next, we will…

• discuss different types of bird nests and how they are made.
• continue to discuss eggs
• begin to talk about different species of birds by finding out what the children know and what they want to learn about birds

A visit from the Lion Dancers

We were very excited to have Chinese Lion Dancers visit our school on Friday!!!  The children have been talking about it and it finally happened! (Now they believe me that it wouldn't be a real lion coming to our school!).

We prepared by making our own Lion Dancing masks, inspired by photos of real lion dancers:

Then we used our masks and our play silks to make a Lion Dance parade! 

Since real Lion Dancers have more than one person in each costume, we tried to do the same! The children did great in this activity. I was surprised--but not.  These children can execute group activities in a harmonious manner like no other group I've seen before. 

We prepared some thank you notes and put them in red envelopes so that we could feed them to the Lion! 

And the big moment! The real Lion Dancing!!! 

They were amazing! They played music and did some very acrobatic moves. They explained traditional elements of the Lion and the performance in the context of Chinese New Year.  The whole event exceeded our wildest imagination!

We were so grateful to have this beautiful performance at our school!  

*Stephanie*

Ghosts of Halloweens Past

Hey! We passed our 150th post! Since I tend to make a bigger deal than necessary about our blog milestones, I'll celebrate with a little reminiscing about past Halloween seasons...

Halloween 2010

 The Indoor Pumpkin Patch

Black sparkle paints on black bats

 Humongous coffee filter jack-o-lanterns

 Golf tees and pumpkins

 Discussions, in this case, what we're going to be for Halloween

 Ghosts and sequins

 A huge cardboard bat that hovered over our lunch tables in the patio for weeks!

 The maze (they've been asking for a maze since they heard the word Halloween)

 Halloween hats and simple props

 Pumpkin guts

 Decor

 Orange playdough

 Orange paint

And, well, great facial expressions!

Halloween 2009
(notice how we like our traditions!)

 The day Br fell asleep with a pumpkin!
Part of our Halloween tradition has been just to have pumpkins laying around everywhere.


Halloween 2008 (Beansprouts' First Halloween!)

 Orange playdough

 Five Little Pumpkins felt set

 Pumpkin Potato Head

Our first maze!