school update: colors and 3 little pigs

 

 

late December
"We spent the rest of the week discussing colors. This was something that had been coming up in the children's conversations as they worked on art projects. We noticed lots of questions like, "what color will red and pink make" and so this week we experimented with using the primary colors to create the secondary colors. Various paint media were used as well as a polymer gel, which brought up some interesting questions about matter and led to a science experiment. We look forward to exploring the results of our experiment on Monday." -- Hannah and Emily

 

 

 

Ming Ming the piggy buying bricks from Alvin

 

Ming Ming inviting the two little pigs to the safety of her brick house.

 

Anya building a house

 

The 3 Little Pigs
01/08/2012
Well our return from break was fantastically smooth! Everyone came in Tuesday morning ready to resume the routine as if we'd only been away for the weekend, though a bit more excited to see their friends.
The children were very excited to discover that we were going to be exploring the story of the 3 Little Pigs and got right down to beginning to make their own pig puppets. Throughout the week we continued making the characters in the story out of various media and you can see some of our handiwork on the big board outside of the classroom. We also used a wide variety of materials to try to build the pigs' houses. Using pipe cleaners and small wooden pieces the children experimented with building houses and then trying to blow them down. They discovered that there was a way to interlock the materials which made it harder to blow them down, even when they formed a wolf pack and together tried to blow the houses down.
However, the highlight of the week was our play of the story. The children took turns either being in the play or an audience member. Before beginning to plan the actual plays we discussed with the children the parameters of class plays, namely that there were 2 very important things to keep in mind. 1) Everybody would have a turn but it might be on different days. 2) Teachers would assign the roles and all roles were important. The children were immediately comfortable with this and throughout the process we heard not one "But I want to be the wolf", etc. We were so impressed with this demonstration of the children's team spirit.
We're sure you're not surprised to hear that all of the children were terrific actors! They really thought about what actions to use to act out the words of the story and each added their own touch to their characters, from very convincing wolf voices to the protective way they ushered their piggy siblings into the safety of the brick house. You can check out some pictures of the action on our photo page.
Next week we'll be exploring the story of Goldilocks and the 3 Bears. We can't wait to invite other classrooms for our shows and enjoy a porridge feast. If you have a version of this classic story that you think we might enjoy, please feel free to bring it in to share with the class.
This week we also felt very fortunate to be able to spend lots of time outside. Although the weather is unseasonably warm, it's still important for all of the children to have a hat and mittens everyday.
--Hannah and Emily