recycled art

We have been saving our lunch packaging, especially lids, all year and we have lots. What could we use them for? The children discussed different possibilities – and then got to work. In the first week we offered only one item that had not been recycled – some narrow strips of corrugated card. they were an exciting stimulus to new ideas.

There has been a steady stream of constructions ever since.

“Hamish saw Tyrone’s roller coaster – he painted one, now he has made one of his own.”

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Alissa made a train on tracks:

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Boden had an idea for a train as well – his shows that he has seen electric trains  – maybe trams – because he had the power lines going over the top of the train – and the train was able to move along the tracks.

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There has been a real sense of excitement with the problem solving and creativity demonstrated.

(we would love to not have any waste to use – we are still working on that).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

the medical centre

Hospitals, health and their own bodies is a big interest with young children, and the medical centre has been going for a while at kinder – though lately, it hasn’t been very busy as the children have spent more of their time in mat play, construction and letter writing. But with a visit from Brian the ambulance officer recently and now a visit to the dentist coming up, interest seems to have been renewed.

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Now we are seeing more cooperative play with some children who previously may not have been involved. The same setting, the same resources, the same children – but new experiences and growing social confidence and skills, have made a difference to the play. The dynamics of a group at kinder are fascinating!

On Thursday we also witnessed a real AHA moment – a step in learning right in front of us. One child had chosen to be the ambulance officer – which means putting on the uniform – and then he noticed that the star in the badge on the uniform was the same star as on the front of one of our first aid books (hint – first aid books are regularly updated and the old ones are no longer able to be used as references – but they are fascinating sources of much information for kinder kids!).

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What a rich moment – he showed his interest in the book, and in the uniform, he showed visual discrimination skills, he was excited to be validated as a “real” ambulance man, and he was thrilled to share his learning with others – identity, community, well being, learning and communication – all aspects of this emergent learning moment.

Our daily report

At the end of each day, we ask the children to think about what they have done during the day and tell us something that we can write down on our little whiteboard. We put this up in the window, facing out, so that their parents or carers can read it.

Last term one of the children noticed that we were using the word “we” a lot. Sometimes it looked a bit different – but it was still the same word when we read it out. This became part of the daily routine to notice, and soon to count, the “we”s in

our report.

 

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This week,  the adults asked if they could find a different word – the word “a”. The children were quick to find “a”s in lots of words – but not often by itself.

This brought up the difference between a word and a letter. We have already noticed the difference between upper and lower case letters.

Now the children are counting the words. They listen and look and keep count on their fingers as we read the report out loud.  Then someone can come up and circle one of the words. There’s not enough jobs for eager learners! Today they wanted to write the number down.

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Different children have a go each day – it’s not about getting it correct, though we are working towards that – because we don’t have a curriculum to rush through. They share their knowledge and spark each other off into the next stage.

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(Sandy is thinking about what else to do to his number “2”.)

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Now we would never plan to start “teaching” sight words to children, or the most frequently used words, or whatever they might be called at present by school teachers – but it’s happening because of this group’s interest.

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