SHELL EXPLORATION

During the first week of April, I went on vacation in Florida and was able to bring back an abundance of exotic seashells.  I had decided to focus on Nature Materials during April and this fit in beautifully.  I laid out shells on trays with magnifying glasses and also included a book about shells.  The conversation that was inspired was amazing.  The children started their observations and immediately started commenting on the different types of shells, the different colors and sizes of the shells, and of course, how they could hear the ocean in the shells.    

Some of their words..."Some are prickly".  "Some are smooth".  "I noticed something, this one has stripes, and this one has stripes"!!  "Look, it has purple inside this one".  "Some have holes in them".  "Some are bumpy".  "Hey, I think I see water inside this".  "Oh it must be the sea you are listening to".  "No, I 'm looking, I see puddles".  

More words..."Something big would've had to live inside"!  "You can see these little dirt spots from the ocean".  "You might see a little rainbow if you do this" (put magnifying glass close to your face).

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Here is a child trying to match the shells on his tray to shells in the book.

I continued to support the children by offering paper and pencils so they could trace shells, write about shells, and document what they saw.  

PRIMARY AND SECONDARY COLOR EXPERIMENTS

We continue on our journey of mixing colors and start to learn the difference between primary colors and secondary colors; the name of the colors you get when mixing primary colors together in different combinations.  This was a game we played at circle.  Each child was given a heart and had to figure out if the color they had was primary or secondary and then they put it in the appropriate basket.  As you can see, they mastered this game very well! 

Here, we started with plain colored playdough and used markers to color the playdough with primary colors.  Next, we mixed the colors together, two at a time to get our secondary colors.  

The children had to work with the playdough for a bit to mix the colors properly.

It was hard work and a little tricky to color our playdough.

Next color experiment...shaving cream!  The colors didn't come out as colorful as I was hoping, but it still showed how mixing primary colors together yields new colors. 

This experiment was as bright and colorful as I had hoped.  The children were given coffee filters and pipettes.  As we have been doing, they had the 3 primary colors to start, and mix together to make their secondary colors.  This child really got engaged in this project.  Observe his concentration as he carefully drips colors together to make new ones.

This child kept the primary colors separated at first, and then started experimenting by adding drops of color to the primary colors to create secondary colors.  

PRIMARY COLORS

We spent the month of March mixing colors.  We started by learning about the three primary colors, or first colors.  We learned that you can't mix anything to get red, blue, or yellow.  But, what happens when you mix combinations of primary colors together?  First, we made a chart of equations and tested out the different combinations.  I wrote the different colors down to help them with spelling, but they were able to figure out which color was which by sounding out and figuring out first letters.  Beginning reading!!

This child is writing down the first two primary colors she is going to mix together.

Here she is mixing red and blue together.  Once she figures out what color that makes, she will add that to the first equation she started to write out.  Math, literacy, and science in this project!

Mixing...

Writing...you can really see the equations in this picture.

Lots of mixing and writing! 

STAINED GLASS ORNAMENTS

For this activity, we sorted jolly rancher candies by color, then each child chose a color to unwrap and smash with a hammer or mallet.  Then we put the smashed pieces into cookie cutters that were on a piece of parchment paper on cookie sheets.  We popped them into the oven for 5 minutes and they melted!  

We put them in plastic bags so the pieces wouldn't fly all over.

First we used rubber mallets...

Then we tried smashing with mini hammers.

Unwrapping candy.

Smashing candy with a hammer.

Placing the smashed candy into the cookie cutters

Smashing candy with a rubber mallet.

I may have left them in the oven a little too long...oops!  The children absolutely loved smashing the candy and seeing what it looked like after melting it.  

RADIO VISIT!!

One early morning in November, I heard on a local radio station that they were asking local businesses to help collect food for the Food Bank.  I called right away to request a box because this fit in perfectly with our Community unit.  In October, we focused on working together and helping each other in the classroom, and in November, we focused on our Community outside of our classroom.  We worked all month on how our Community helps us and how we can help our Community.  We collected food for a week and then arranged to go on a field trip to the radio station to bring our food box and participate in the festivities.

We are waiting sooo patiently....

We had a special snack....

And we got to go into a real radio recording booth!! 

We sang our turkey song...5 Fat Juicy Turkeys and it got recorded.

Then we got to listen to ourselves singing; first how it sounded...

Then, we got to hear our voices sound like chipmunks; low; slow...

And backwards!!

Here we are posing for a picture before going on the air live in a different booth.  We were so excited to be able to visit our local radio station, have a tour, and be able to have our voices recorded and be on air live!!!  Radio stations help us learn about news and weather, local events, and play music for our listening pleasure!  

STONE SOUP

As a culmination of our community unit, we read the story Stone Soup.  There are many variations of this story, but I have found one that I prefer that stars a town with animals who are visited by two pigs.  In the beginning of the story, the townspeople are super grumpy and locking their town up from the visitors.  They aren't willing to share.  Then, as the story unfolds, the pigs come up with a plan and show the villagers how to share.  It is amazing to see how the animals faces go from grumpy, mean, and angry to smiling and happy once they learn how to work together and help each other to make stone soup together.  Everyone ends up contributing as part of the community and the story ends with a great feast and party with the villagers and visitors.  Once the children hear the story, they love to help with retelling as the week goes on.  We do book-related activities throughout the week and at the end of the week, we get to work together and help each other make our own stone soup!  

The children made a list of what ingredients they wanted in their stone soup and they went "shopping" for the ingredients!  Preschoolers really are imagination experts!!  They took turns shopping and checking their friends out of the market.

Of course, the highlight of the week was actually preparing the stone soup!  Here, a child is using a butter knife to chop some pears to put into the soup.

The children also chopped some apples.

And some potatoes...

They scraped their chopped fruit and vegetables into the pot and also added some frozen mixed veggies and elbow noodles.

We couldn't forget to stir it all up before putting it onto the stove to simmer!

It was sooo yummy, we all ate bowls and bowls of it!