We went on a field trip to the Montana Natural History Museum. We went first thing this morning. After the bus ride downtown we went on a nature walk along the Kim Williams Trail. We saw so many cool things: nests, frozen leaves and sticks that looked like someone had sprinkled glitter on them, squirrels, ice forming on the stream, a spider web and so much more. It was a wee bit chilly but oh so beautiful! After our walk, we headed into the Natural History Museum. We went on a hibernator hunt with our clipboards, did a little movement as the different types of animals that either hibernate, migrate, or tolerate winter, and then had a little free exploration time. It was a fantastic experience all around!
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It is important for our kiddos to be given ample opportunities to explore, play, and create with wooden blocks. Children learn many concepts through block play. It provides an excellent opportunity for social and physical development and enhances creativity. There is a long list of specific concepts and traits that children learn through block play. Here are just a few: coordination, visual perception, motor development, spatial orientation, fine motor coordination, cooperation, negotiation, compromise, problem solving, finding multiple solutions to problems, classification, comparisons, directionality, logical reasoning, classifications, etc. the list goes on. The kiddos discovered a small spider in the block area. As a result, one of our friends began building a structure she felt safe enough to play in (it was a small, harmless spider by the way). During one of our debriefing sessions she shared with us what she was doing. A few of our friends joined in and together they came up with the challenge of seeing if they could build a space big enough to play in where they would be safe from this spider. (I did mention the spider was small and harmless, right?) These kiddos worked together on this mission they came up with on their own. Their collaborative efforts were very productive. The pictures above show our friends and their structure. What you can't really see is that the structure has four walls and two of our friends are, in fact, hanging out inside the structure. AND... they used every single wood block. Their mission was accomplished. Amazing! Another great day in kindergarten. We focused on writing narratives during Writer's Workshop this morning. Many of us wrote about hunting stories since our explorations of our set of Montana Outdoors Magazine brought up a few questions about hunting. One of our friends wrote about a time he went hunting with his family and saw a mountain lion. After recess we had a math lesson where we used our bodies to represent a number, i.e. Three kiddos in a row to show the number three. Then we compared two groups to see which was more, less, or equal. Then the biggy... We compared two numbers and figured out how many more one group had than the other. This is a complicated concept in kindergarten. We had fun becoming part of the problem. I wish I had taken pictures but we were knee deep in learning and it slipped my mind. After lunch we taught one of our friends, that was out sick the pass couple of days, how our new Learning Center time works. They were so excited to share the big changes. They are loving the new system. Today we had Mrs. Lochridge, our school's Occupational Therapist (and one of our friend's mom), come and work on letter formation. Here are a couple more pictures of our afternoon! We began our day exploring my family's subscription to Montana Outdoors. The kiddos were so excited. They found some amazing pictures, had lots of questions, and made many discoveries. Then we moved into Writer's Workshop. We wrote personal narratives today. We shared many stories today. Many of which focused on telling a story about an injury. Our friend with a broken leg inspired our story telling of a time we got hurt. After recess we explored a new math manipulative, Base Ten Blocks. Their discoveries were amazing. They discovered they could build with them (one trio group created a Subnivean Zone), make shapes with them, that they were 3D shapes (a rectangular prism and a cube), that the stick was equal to ten cubes, and much more. In the afternoon we continued our work with our new Learning Centers. Today we launched our new system for Learning Centers. We have extended our time at Learning Centers to include Inquiry Play Based centers. This new system allows the kiddos more time to explore, create, question, problem solve, socialize, and so much more. It also allows them the freedom to move from center to center at their own pace. Another benefit of this transformation is it allows the teacher to pull reading groups during Learning Centers and allows the groups to be flexible. It was a successful first day!
After reading The Greedy Triangle, by Marilyn Burnes, we explored all the different types of shapes we have in our classroom. We discovered that different shapes have different numbers of sides and angles. We also noticed the different shapes and designs you can make with the different shapes. We investigated the shapes, made some creations, and then took a "gallery walk" to see everyones' masterpieces. Then we discussed what we noticed. Some of our noticings include:
What a productive, engaging math lesson today experienced through play. :-) After reading Todd Parr's, The Peace Book, we meet with our big buddies and worked together to come up with our wishes for the world. We painted a world after studying images of earth from space, had our big buddies write all the wishes, and then added a self portrait. This collaborate piece reflected both the big buddies' and little buddies' ideas and self portraits. We will be hanging these in the hall and they will be displayed for a few weeks before coming home.
Fish, Wildlife, and Parks has a wonderful trunk focusing on Owls. Today we explored all the amazing owl artifacts. Check out our little investigators. Did you know there is a secret creature world under the snow? Where the ground and the snow meet is called the Subnivean Zone. One animal that seeks shelter in this zone is the Meadow Vole. The warmth in this zone helps keep the vole safe from the elements and the vole finds plenty to eat in this zone. Although semi safe in this zone, the vole still has many predators to watch out for. Ask your kiddos about the fox and how the fox hunts it's prey. After learning about the Subnivean Zone your kiddos were asked to create this zone with the wood blocks. Then they were given a few animals to act out what happens in this zone. The results were amazing. Your kiddos are so creative. I love to see them experience rich learning through play! Check out the Wild Kratts episode about the Subnivean Zone. |
by Mrs. WinterKindergarten is truly the BEST and that is why I want to share our world with you! Archives
September 2017
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