Outside play

“Teaching children about the natural world should be seen as one of the most important events in their lives.”

~ Thomas Berry, The Dream of Earth

As is it getting warmer -- we will be playing outside much more. We'll move a lot of our centre activities outside -- we'll have bins of animals, dinosaurs, cars, musical instruments, paints, as well as chalk, bubbles, balls and pylons (maybe not all at once :). If anyone has any old sheets that they could donate, we'd love to have them (for fort building -- rips are fine -- I'll sew them up)

We'll also be trying to learn about the natural world as much as possible. (Does anyone have an old pair of binoculars that they would like to donate? I'd say lend, but, although we will try to be careful, accidents do happen......)

We might go out very briefly on rainy days to observe what happens in the rain....

Please also realize that I am not allowed to put sunscreen on your child! If you wish them to wear sunscreen, please apply it before they come to school (but not on pool days). Please send a hat EVERY DAY!

"Sunshine is delicious, rain is refreshing, wind braces us up, and snow is exhilarating; there is no such thing as bad weather, only different kinds of good weather."
John Ruskin

Transportation

We have learned about the many different ways we can move from place to place (this is our list of brainstorming).


Our deeper question is "WHY do we need cars?" (or trains, planes, boats, etc).
The children came up with some good answers -- we're still working on them. We will also talk about "At what cost?" (to the environment).


If you can't read the answers -- some are:
- to go to school
- to go far
- to go to Ottawa
- to get groceries
- so get stuff we can't carry
- to visit my cousins

We have had some fun with wheels too -- we ran cars through some paint and drove them on paper.

(one student was trying to copy what another student did with his car -- the hand to the left is from the student who made the lower painting -- he is trying to explain how he made the yellow curves -- isn't it wonderful to see this kind of teaching and learning?)


We are also experimenting with ramps and different surfaces so see if the texture of a surface affects how far a car can roll.

I love how this all tied in with our visit with Officer John!

Scientists in Schools

We had so much fun when Scientist Tammy came to visit.

First she talked about What a Scientist is and does.


Then we went to be scientists!

We learned how to be Meteorologists (studying the weather -- we learned about wind, clouds rain, and rainbows)

(making a thermometer)

We learned how to be Astronomers (inside the very warm tent was the night sky)


We learned how to be Archeologists and did some digging for bones


And we were chemists and did some experimenting with solutions


Thank you to all of the parents who helped -- Scientist Jody, Scientist Sheila, Scientist Cindy Scientist Tina, and Scientist Albert. And thank you also to Teacher Candidate Ms. B!

Japan Relief

As you may (or may not) know, one of the students in the morning class is Japanese. Her family, luckily, was not directly affected by the earthquake and tsunami. They are working to help raise money to aid the people who were affected in Japan.


There are some events happening in Toronto in the upcoming weeks. On Sunday April 10th (10:00 am - 2:00 pm)there will be a fundraising flea market & bake sale at Ikebata Nursery School (6 Garamond court, Donmills) You can park for free at the Japanese Cultural Centre. There will be balloon art, origami and Japanese baked snacks.

On April 9th and 10 there will be bake sales in many locations in Toronto. The event is called Toronto Bakes for Japan!

On Saturday there will be a bake sale at the Farmers Market at the Evergreen Brickworks (9am-1pm)

On Sunday from 11 am-3pm there will be bake sales in the west end at Liberty Noodle, The Rivoli, Cafe Diplomatico, and Amaranto Cafe. Please see tiffintales for more details.

If you would like to help, but cannot come to the bake sale, you can donate money to the Red Cross. The Canadian Red Cross site is here.

We will also be making origami cranes (am and pm class). Osh Kosh has a "Cranes for Kids" Program. For every crane that we make (and send to them) , Osh Kosh will donate one article of clothing to children in Japan. (We are making the "easy origami cranes" from the website :). Osh Kosh also allows you to take a picture of each crane and upload it to facebook. One per email though.

As a class, the morning class will be writing a letter (or some letters) to some children in Japan to tell them that we are thinking about them. If anyone from the morning or the afternoon class would like to put a personal note in our envelope you are very welcome to. We will be mailing it on April 15 .

Officer John

Officer John Tierney came to visit us. He taught us a lot about street, bike and car safety. Do you remember Elmer the Safety Elephant? He's the mascot for Street Safety.


Here's the traffic song! (Ask your child for the tune!)

Stop says the red light.
Go says the green light.
Wait says the yellow light,
Blinking in between.

Here is what they say and
Here is what they mean.
Stop says the red light!
Go says the green.


This couldn't have been better timing. We're in the middle of talking about transportation!

Math Monday - Data Management

In Kindergarten children sort, classify and compare objects and describe the attributes used. They collects objects or data and make representations of their observations, using concrete graphs. They answer and ask questions about their data and the graphs, and use mathematical language in their discussions.

Graphing activities for kindergarten include collecting data and organizing it in a variety of ways.

When children walk around the classroom and ask their friends which cereal they prefer, put a tally mark under the cereal picture, and count how many tally marks are in each column, they are not only graphing but also working with statistics or data analysis. There are lots of fun things to do in this area of math and the activities integrate well with science activities.

Graphs make counting and comparing meaningful and provide opportunities to bring numbers, letters, letter sounds and other literacy skills to the children's attention.

When children are making guesses about what might happen in different situations, they are learning about probability.

The children should have experiences:

• collecting information
• counting and making tallies
• surveying peers
• sorting objects
• making graphs with real things and making picture graphs
• reading graphs
• making observations from a graph
• working with tally marks and comparing their results with a friend's results
• asking questions about graph results
• using the terms "never, sometimes, always" (probability)
  

This graph is one of our "entry" activities. Each child has a name card and they pick it up upon entry and answer the question. We are currently talking about transportation and the ways that we come to school (we walk, ride bikes, come by car, ttc, in a van, etc.) We talked about how many people had said yes, they came in a van and how many people had not come in a van (it was up to them to decide if their car was a van or not). We talk about not having to count every name, we can just look to the side (the left hand numbers) and find the top person's number and that is the total. (Confused?-- this makes more sense when we do it)

Did more people come in a van? Or did more people not come in a van? (we talk about more, less or the same, or equal.). Then I asked the hard question: How many more people came in a van than didn't come in a van? (5 more). This is a tricky one, but we have done it lots of times, so most Sk students and some Jk students understand it.
One way of explaining it was taking off some of the names and having it be equal -- or a "tie" and then counting the 'extra' people. We also practice it by everyone standing up and then I say "The two people who are in row number 1 sit down, then the two people who are in row number 2 sit down", etc, until there are no more pairs to sit down -- the last people standing are how many more.

Some of the math words that we use:
more
less
equal (same)
column
row (this one is trick)
graph

Look for the helpers

We didn't get to talk about the Earthquake in Japan before the break. If it comes up in the discussions of the children, I will be focusing on all of the people who are helping -- and how we can help.

This is a partial post from Preschool-blogger Teacher Tom (see the whole post here) [ I've done the 'bolding']:

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We can’t keep the truth from our children: it would be a crime to try. Our first responsibility, it seems to me, is to be aware of the emotions, both ours and theirs, name them (“I’m disappointed,” “You seem angry,” “I think we’re both sad.”), accept them, and just feel them.

As parents of young children we may not fully control the channels of communication with the outside world, but we are their main source of interpretation. Whatever the subject matter, we owe our children our honest opinions, emotions, questions and understandings. It’s perfectly normal that my own deep sadness or anger or despair would be shared by my child. But it's my job to make sure it doesn't end there. I need to help her [his daughter], as I help myself, work through those feelings and find away to move forward in hope and joy: I don’t want live any other way.

One of the most concrete ways, I think, to find that hope is, as Mister Rogers says, is to "look for the helpers."

When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me. “Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.” To this day, especially in times of “disaster,” I remember my mother’s words, and I am always comforted by realizing that there are still so many helpers – so many caring people in this world.

Fortunately, for most of us the world is not so full of daily disaster. Your child is unlikely to experience much of it except on TV, and frankly I don’t think that’s such a bad place to get some initial exposure as long as you’re there with them. It doesn’t have to be television: passing the scene of a traffic accident or witnessing the business end of a fire department call to a neighbor’s house would serve just as well. Viewing disaster at a distance gives parents an opportunity to calmly lay down a little philosophical groundwork to prepare for when tragedy strikes closer to home.

Brilliantly, Mister Roger’s mom came up with looking for the helpers. It was a simple observation that comforted him throughout his life.
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