Weekly Activities

The Earth Group has shown commitment as they enthusiastically worked to complete this project. Once the rooms were painted, the furniture was made. Creativity was needed as they chose recycled materials to make furniture. When looking at the rooms, one can see that each room is a reflection of the child who created it. It is such a wonderful feeling to see the pride in the children’s faces when they showed their room to others.Equally wonderful was the appreciation that the other children had for one another’s work.

We expanded our horizons and became bakers!  The children were extremely excited to learn how to make sugar cookies.  Patience and turn taking was tested as we measured and mixed the ingredients.  Choosing a cookie cutter and colour of sprinkles was no easy task. Careful thought when into each choice. The children were very proud with the finished cookies and  took great delight in sharing them with the rest of the class. The recipe is posted at the end of the blog.





Ingredients                           Directions
1 cup unsalted butter                         Pre-heat oven to 400 degrees
1 cup sugar
1 egg                                                  Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy.
2 tsp. vanilla                                      Beat in egg and vanilla.
2 tsp. baking powder                         Combine flour, baking powder and salt in a separate bowl.
1 tsp. salt                                           Add to butter mixture, 1 cup at a time.
2 3/4 cups flour …

We started this unit with a walk outside.The children had varying points of view as to what a decoration is.When we looked inside the classroom for decorations, the children also had different ideas. Some felt a plant was a decoration while others felt a plant was only a decoration if ornaments were on it. 
We began with the empty doll house to help children appreciate each others' perspectives.  They worked together to decorate and furnish the house.  Colour was a large part of the discussion as they felt it was an important aspect of decoration.   

We Decorate Our World.
Transdisciplinary Theme: Who We Are
Central Idea : People use decoration and this helps us learn about each other. 
The lines of inquiry that will guide the inquiry into the central idea are: - exploring a variety of decorations from various cultures - decorations tell human stories and help us know one another - similarities and differences in 
ideas about what a decoration is.

To gather the children's ideas on what they know about decorations, the Earth Group and Water Group went on a decoration walk together. The children had varying opinions as to what a decoration is:

Charlie: a decoration is something you put up and take down. It is not something we see everyday.
Sasha: Decorations are shiny. Olivia: Decorations make things beautiful.
Eva: some decorations are colourful and some are not. The ones that are not colourful are not pretty. Eric: Rocks are not decorations because they don't go up and down (put up and take down). Hyra: Paintings are decorations.

When we were listening to various music pieces last week, the music evoked more than just feelings in the children. The music triggered their imaginations and they began to tell stories. When listening to Vivaldi, Sasha was very animated and told a story of flowers growing in the sun with princesses in the garden. The music of Bach’s Toccata and Fugue inspired Olivia to tell a story of a “bad guy coming” prompting the children to add their ideas: Kamy – It is dark outside. Andy – Lots of bad guys coming. Aston - I think trains are coming.
Connecting to the children’s idea of music and stories, we added sound to the fairytale, Three Billy Goats Gruff.Each child had a set of rhythm sticks to create the sound effects of the goats trip trapping across the bridge. The children instinctively knew that the smallest goat would have a softer trip trap than the largest goat.
Sasha suggested putting on a show. The children enthusiastically went to each group inviting them to watch. On Friday, we cont…

Line of Inquiry: How music and sounds are used to express feelings. What do we know about our feelings? To find out what we know about our own emotions, we played a card game . The cards portray people expressing a range of emotions such as fear, excitement, happiness and sadness.   The children took turns drawing a card from the pile, identifying the emotion, and talking about a time when they experienced that emotion.  We expressed ourselves in front of a mirror so we could see how our expressions and actions look to others.


After the game we listened to portions of four pieces of music:
- Vivaldi - Four Seasons (Spring)
- Beethoven 7th Symphony
- Mozart - Figaro
- Bach - Toccato and Fugue

The children chose to paint to the music of Vivaldi and Bach.  When we were listening to Vivaldi, Andy exclaimed "this is happy!" Olivia and Kamy agreed. Sasha added that the music was making her feel excited.

The Bach piece evoked different feelings. Aston "loved" the music. …