What's that on the air? The scent of winter baking, and all the seasonally-favored spices, was part of our Morning Gathering on Tuesday. Tubes of scent: vanilla, cinnamon, clove and pepper, were all passed around the group to be sniffed and examined. T recognized the pepper, as he likes it on his popcorn during our picnics, and the children asked a few questions about the chunky cinnamon stick sitting in the tube with a little ground cinnamon as well. From there, we moved over to the school table to make clove and cinnamon stick sachets. B liked wrapping the rubber bands around the top; V worked hard to tie the knots with the rick-rack ribbon and T's mom was visiting for the morning, so she and T made his together. Soon everyone had a nice-smelling sachet to take home.
On Thursday morning, we gathered around a plate of shelled nuts, and each child was given 4 whole nuts: walnuts, hazelnuts, almonds and brazil nuts. Then we went around and tried to match the shelled nut on the plate to the whole ones; each child held up the nut they thought was the match, and after Gathering, we sat down and began the best part: cracking and eating nuts. V loved this activity so much from last session, I knew we'd have to do it again, and there was no less enthusiasm this time around. The lighter-colored walnuts, the almonds and the hazelnuts were most popular, and it was fun to watch and see if there was actually a nut in some of them; a few hazelnuts were 'duds' and so we began shaking the whole nuts first to discover if there was a nut inside before bothering to open them.
We played a lot of games too: our "Animal Mothers and their Babies" matching game was offered on the table, and it was lovely to hear the children remembering how to ask for pieces from their friends to match up the pairs. At Wednesday Gathering, we played our New Name Game, where the children continued to select the letters of their name from a pool, match and orient them onto their name card. We did a little tricky thing by asking the children to raise their hands if the card/letter was not in their name, and encouraged each child to spell their name aloud. On Thursday, we played our "What's Missing Lotto"; the children remembered the names of some of the 'missing' parts that we learned from last week, "handle" being the most useful and easily remembered. Game playing reminds the children to take turns (and keep track of them) and during our What's Missing game, when a child couldn't find the picture on their own card, I asked if anyone else could see where the picture was, which gave the children a chance to help each other.
You might have noticed an envelope of cut-out snowflakes come home last week-- or not. B embraced the activity of cutting, and her snowflake ended up looking like a pile of tiny flakes indeed. T and V were interested in cutting out the colored origami and decorative papers I had offered for this activity and took their snowflakes home. T made a snowflake which he declared "looks like a windmill". Perhaps they are taped up to window, or are being sent off enclosed in holiday greeting cards. I never do know what sort of life the children's artwork has once it is taken home...
Speaking of art, we had our usual Wednesday easel time this week, and with a new twist: the children are now going in one-by-one to use the easel and work. While we have had the group hanging out and watching in the past, I've noticed that this can be distracting for the artist, and a bit crowded to boot. Something to share, too: when we are talking with our children about their artwork, asking questions and telling your child what you see can be helpful in encouraging them to continue expressing themselves creatively. While our kids like to hear "oh, that's beautiful" and other kind things, when we focus more of our attention toward what's on the paper ("I really like blue, and I see you made five blue circles, all in this corner. Tell me about that...."), this lets them know both that their work is worth notice, and tells them what you personally found interesting. "I see you used some bright colors, right next to each other. So many bright colors makes me feel like...." Children are much like adult artists; they like discovering how you, their beloved parent, relates to their work. When we give our children this sort of feedback, they are more encouraged to take chances in their artwork and to express themselves more authentically.
Outside in our sandbox, T and V were digging trenches for water to flow through. We talked about how a part that circled around looked like an island, and recalled one part of the story "The Little Island", where a kitten asks the island, and later, a fish, how it is that the island is surrounded by water and is still connected to the land. Then, we dug our trench deeper, and filled it with water for a live demonstration of this very concept. Their eyes grew wide as the lone island in the water appeared. (These are the moments teachers live for!) Amazing what one can learn in a sandbox!
Our playdough story this week started with a yellow flat circle of playdough, which one child dubbed a "magic golden meadow". A popsicle stick was laid across and then, B added green balls to the playdough to become "tigers". V and T were busy creating replicas of the original work, figuring out how to hollow out small pieces of dough and stick them upside down to look like 'big rocks'. V discovered that when the dough sticks to the bottom of the red-handled rolling pins, that you can make it go back and forth on the bottom like a pendulum. B gave me a playdough cake with a candle in it, for my birthday, and T told me "I'm working on a wormhole. Here's a worm to go in the wormhole. See, the worm have protection in here and then the worm can stay in there." Even worms need shelter too.
On Thursday, we celebrated V's 4th birthday together. Her mother and little brother brought delicious fruit skewers and a book to share, and the children were very, very happy to have a birthday time at school! We sang a song about the Earth going round the sun; B was the sun V traveled around, and we honored each year with a verse of its own. Thanks for the yummy nibbles!
Some other moments:
Wild weather drove us indoors on Wednesday, so we gathered to read William Steig's "C-D-B" ,a book made up of phonetic little sayings that the children chimed in to help me read when they could. Fun!
V and B like two peas in a pod, sitting close together on the rug to look at the "Dinosaur Bones" book, and then wrapping up babies and carrying them around. V told me that "both the babies are girls", and their little girls were wrapped snug in scarves and blankets.
The rubber-band pegboard was out again. We talked about the different shapes they made: triangles, squares, parallelograms and trapezoids (these big words made them giggle), and T made an "H" out of rubber bands, which was 'an H for Hazel. See?"
V working methodically with the magnetic crane truck and shape blocks, using the crane to neatly unload, and then reload, that set of blocks back into their 'trailer'.
T and B worked with the other set of magnetic blocks to make cars and skateboards; V joins in too.
Sandbox treasure hunts outside were a blast, along with playing "Find the Shoe" and shooting baskets with the balls.
I wish all of your families a peaceful and fun winter break. We'll see you in the new year!
