June 30th, 2017

I cannot believe summer is here! What a year it has been! Everyone has grown; creatively, socially, emotionally, academically, and intellectually. 

Personal identities have begun to form.

Deep friendships have grown.

This next school year is something to look forward to as we all continue to grow alongside each other for the 2017/2018 school year.

June 16th, 2017

Happy Father’s Day to all the dads out there!

Everyone has been working so hard on their Father’s Day gifts for their dads!

Some of the gifts they made focused on their writing. They are getting really good at recognizing and copying letters. Among the writing practice, they practiced their fine motor skills by adding buttons and pasta pieces, and expressed why they love their dads. We talked about all our dads do for us and why we love them so.

I hope all dads have a great weekend with their little ones!

June 8th, 2017

What is a fairytale? Without me asking, they proceeded to tell me all the types of stories they now know of; nursery rhymes, poems, “normal stories”, and now fairytales. Information books (non-fiction) made its way onto the list because they knew it was also in a book. I like how this question turned into a conversation about different ways of storytelling, and the difference between fiction and non-fiction writing.
All fairytales we learned about this week were told orally. Their close listening skills have improved greatly. A big part of us learning about fairytales this week was to practice remembering the important parts of a story and in what order they happened, retelling a story and recalling the characters within the story.
“I’ll Huff and I’ll Puff and I’ll Blow Your House In!” The Three Little Pigs was our first fairytale. Which house is stronger? How come? We made 3 visual versions of the 3 pigs houses; straw, sticks and bricks. Some drew the Big Bag wolf and what they thought his home would look like, as well. We also made toilet paper tube pigs!
“Bibbiti Bobbidi Boo” Cinderella was our next fairytale. With a pretend wand, we said “Bibbiti Bobbidi Boo” and turned each other into different animals. It was too cute! The kids were cute running around with their newly bedazzled paper, feather and jewelled crown too!
“Fe-Fi-Fo-Fum” For Jack and the Beanstalk, we made bean art and everyone practiced cutting on a long curve to make a spiral beanstalk. 
“Granny, What Big Teeth You Have! All the Better to Eat You With My Dear!” Said the Wolf from Little Red Riding Hood. We made paper bag wolf puppets, and used picnic baskets and red towels to pretend play this fairytale.
Some other things we did this week include learning about the letters N and V, journals, baking and adventuring down to the creek.

June 2nd, 2017

We learned all about tornadoes this week! How timely, considering there was just a tornado not too far from Calgary!

Spin, Spin, Spin…went the kids! We learned that tornadoes move in a circular motion and they form when hot air and cold air come together. We used two hands, in a circular motion to draw our very own colourful tornadoes. So much fun! Although tornadoes happen on land, we did an experiment where we made a tornado in a glass jar with water and dish soap. Everyone took turns holding and spinning the jar in a circular motion, to see a mini water tornado.
We learned that tornadoes are so powerful that they can lift up large objects like cars, so we tried to figure out what objects would move when we blew through a straw. The kids did a great job trying it out and placing the object on the correct side of the board (will blow and will not blow). Everyone also made a 2 part art project where they drew an image of a place where they think a tornado would be (i.e.: a farm, as many images we looked at were in the countryside) and then used shaving cream, a few drops of black paint and their hands to mix up a tornado within a stencil. The results were quite neat. We had a bunch of fun using straws to blow paint around a larger paper to make a neat tornado painting as well.

It was fun learning about the job Storm Chasers do too. It was cute seeing them run around pretending to follow the tornadoes!

This weeks letters were A and M. How many different ways can you build A. It’s neat to see how differently each child’s mind works. They are do things just a bit differently from each other. I saw some write with the buttons in the play dough, some build with small sticks, some use their finger as a pencil to write in the play dough and some use buttons to outline the letter. Good thinking everyone!

We revisited Mat Man this week as well. Mat Man is a great tool that helps to improve body awareness, and in turn helps children to draw people. It also opens the floor to discussing other details like, colour of eyes, eyebrows, clothing, jewellery, etc.

Some other things we did this week include journals, a couple outdoor adventures, and a picnic lunch.