Lights and…Action!

Our puppet shows just got a lot more interesting!  One morning I noticed the children making what I thought were holiday lights.  How wrong I was! No, these lovely lights were designed for our puppet show.  I was informed that you can’t have a show without special lights.  

Once our set was adorned, another group of children insisted that we needed some spot lights.  Luckily we had some people powered Ikea flashlights ready to shine.

https://youtu.be/KuxzG2R4qzE

Best Friends

P1260906One of the hottest (and most toxic) topics in Pre-K and K is Best Friends.  Most of the children do not enter the year with a preconceived notion that a Bestie is expected.  However, once one child says, “You’re not my best friend anymore,” it pops up all over the place both in the classroom and out.

Friendships in early childhood change on a minute by minute basis.  A Pre-Kindergartner’s event horizon can usually be confined to 15 minutes before and after right now.  At this age, you are my friend if you want to play what I want to play.  The minute you want to play something different, you are either no longer my friend, or simply no longer existing beyond my sphere of awareness.  Pre-K children are not trying to be mean in this behavior.  Rather their ability to understand the perspective of others is simply not developed enough to see beyond their own interests.

For this reason, “Best Friend” is not an appropriate term for the 4 to 6 set.  We encourage the children to realize that all of us are friends in our class.  Sometimes, we want to play with one child or group and sometimes we chose another.  It has less to do with how much we “like” another person and more with whether or not what we are doing is related.

How’s your bucket?

HowFull

This week we read, “How Full is Your Bucket? For kids.”  In this story, we learned that each of us has an invisible bucket we cart along with us everywhere.  With each negative interaction or event drops of “water” drip out.  When your bucket is empty, it can be hard to be kind or helpful.  It can also make you feel sad or irritated.  On the other hand, with every positive interaction or event, our bucket fills up.  We also found out that when we are kind or helpful to others, not only do we refill their bucket, but add new drops to our own, too.

Some days, your bucket seems to be leaking like a sieve.  Your alarm clock didn’t go off.  You burnt the toast.  Your dog stepped in the mud and then jumped on your pants as you walked out the door.  All of these tiny little things take from your bucket.  Children and adults are more quick to anger, irritate, judge,  and outright react without thought when their bucket is empty.

We’ve been noticing when our buckets are losing water and when we can help fill another person’s bucket.  Today on the playground, I saw children filling buckets by sharing binoculars, taking turns on the swing, helping others build once a building had collapsed, and by inviting friends to join them in play. If you notice your bucket is a bit low, try a small act of kindness.  You’d be surprised how quickly it will fill back up.

 

Why do we have bones?

P1260794Finding this bone in the woods has led to much wonder and curiosity.  Whose bone is it?  Why was it in our woods?  This week, we wanted to know why we even have bones.

HuM: Because when you don’t stand up, you don’t have any more bones.

SR: They’re a part of your body.

BW: Because we don’t wanna fall down.

KH: They help us not die and keep us standing.

IP: Help us not be broken.

EH:  If we don’t have bones, it’s going to be tough to move.

MB: We’re humans.  We need bones to be alive and maybe we’ll be a little bit alive.

MH: Bones are just a decoration.

GK: If we don’t have bones, we would not live anymore.  They help us cook our dinner and help us get our lunchbox.

XZ: They help us be strong.

HeM: Not breaking.

MS: Make us feel hard.

AZ: They make us strong.

AH: To be strong and healthy. To grow!

We’ll have to take a closer look to find out more!

Corn Experiment #1

One of the children asked us many times if we might try cooking the corn.  We asked them how we should cook it.  After a bit of thinking, they decided that their mom makes corn in the oven.  We weren’t sure where this experiment might lead, but we thought it was certainly an interesting prospect.

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The temperature and baking time were suggested by the experimenting student.

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These cooked quietly in the science lab while we finished our choice time in the classroom.  The children helped us set a timer so we wouldn’t forget to pull them out of the oven.  Two students watched the timer carefully for the last 9 minutes.

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When Miss. Davis brought them in, the pan was still hot.  We noticed they didn’t look too different.  We did, however, decide that we should keep them separate from the other corn so we could compare them.  One child suggested making a label and another wrote it out for us.P1270188

Once we looked a bit closer, we could see some differences between the cooked and uncooked corn.  What do you notice?

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Forest Fours

Yesterday was our first official Forest Four Day.  Kindergarten and Pre-Kindergarten spent about two hours exploring our Northbound Trail.  The undergrowth sprouted up beyond our knees over the summer, leading to a lovely, wild excursion.

We made collections:

 

Tried some problem solving and teamwork:

 

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Repaired forts:

 

Took on some challenges:

 

 

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And searched for wildlife:

 

One Little Pigeon and the Big, Bad Spider: The Final Draft

Last night we shared our movie with family and friends.  We rolled out the red carpet, enjoyed pizza and salad, and smiled for the paparazzi.  This project couldn’t have been possible without the children’s creative ideas and the help of Mrs. Haluszczak.  Filming in the past, we discovered that attempting to film the story straight through was a painfully long process.  This year, we tried arranging filming day a bit differently.  While Weird Eric and I worked with current scene actors, Mrs. Haluszczak took the remainder outside.  They spent the morning exploring Spring as it presented itself that day.

For those that are intersted, our final draft follows.  I’ve also attached some of our shot notes and the storyboard if you are curious to see how we organized ourselves for this process.

2018 Pre-K Movie_Final

Scene I: Pigeons’ House, exterior

Narrator:  Once upon a time there was a little pigeon playing basketball.  A Big Bad Spider came along.

BBS: “What are you doing?”  

Pigeon: “I’m playing basketball”

Narrator:  Then the pigeon ran into his house.  The BBS was very hungry and now he was grumpy and lonely.  He knocked on the door.

BBS Knocks

BBS: Pretty please, can I come in and get some food?

Pigeon:  Not by the feathers of our feathers, feathers, feathers!

Narrator: The BBS tries to wrap the house in a web.

BBS tries to throw a web on the house

Narrator:  The police officers came.  

Four police officers and two police dogs enter the scene.

Officer X: Halt in the name of the stars!

Officer R: Halt in the name of the star loft!

Officer N:  You’re going to prison.

Officer F:  I’m going to capture the Big Bad Spider

The BBS is hiding from the police.

Officer N: The police dogs can sniff out the Big Bad Spider.

PD V:  We’ll find him, sir.

Police dogs run back and forth sniffing for the spider.  Eventually, they find him and go get the police officers.

PD Kate: Woof Woof! We found him!

PD Victor:  We found him! Can we have lunch now?

Officer R:  Yes, you may.

Officer X:  Good job, doggies!

Officers F & N:  Good job today!

Police give the PDs dog bones.

PD K:  Woof, woof! Thank you!

Narrator:  They captured the BBS and took him to the police car.  

Police take BBS to car and drive away.


Scene II: Pigeons’ house, interior

Narrator:  The pigeon decides to watch tv.  

Pigeon W: (turning on the tv using remote) I’m going to watch, “The Unicorn Drives the Bus” show.  


Scene III:  On the TV, Unicorn driving a bus

Narrator:  The Sparkly Unicorn decides to drive somewhere.

Sparkly Unicorn:  I’m going to have some mac and cheese and some Brussels sprouts.

Narrator:  Then the Sparkly Unicorn gets dressed in pink stuff.  Then she puts on some make-up. She begins to drive.

Sparkly Unicorn: I have to pick up White Cat on the way.  

Pick up White Cat on the bus.

Sparkly Unicorn:  Come on, let’s go to our meeting.

White Cat: I hope we have fun at our meeting.

Sparkly Unicorn:  Sparkle Butterfly and Rainbow Butterfly are going to be there.

White Cat:  Ok. Well, that sounds fun.

Narrator:  They drive to the meeting.


Scene IV:  An office or meeting place

Narrator:  Rainbow Butterfly and Sparkle Butterfly are at the meeting.  They are all talking about work.

Improv “work talk”, Sparkly Unicorn, White Cat, Rainbow B, and Sparkle B.

Narrator:  Rainbow Butterfly and Sparkle Butterfly accidentally end the meeting by being too silly.  

Rainbow Butterfly and Strawberry leave scene.

Sparkly Unicorn & White Cat: What in the world!!!!


Scene V: The bus

Narrator:  White Cat and Sparkly Unicorn get back on the bus and leave.  After they drive for a while, they stop and go to sleep.


Scene VI:  Pigeons’ House, exterior

Narrator:  The pigeon goes back out to play basketball again.  

Everyone that isn’t BBS or police slowly comes over and says, “Can we play, too?”  All play basketball for a bit.

Order:  Rainbow G, Sparkly B, Sparkly Unicorn, White Cat

Narrator:  Then they all get tired and fall asleep in a heap.


Scene VII:  Police Headquarters, interior

Narrator:  The police officers drive the BBS to jail.  

Police taking BBS through the headquarters.

BBS:  “I just wanted some food!”  

Officer X:  We have some spider webs in the closet.

PD V:  They are really yummy.

PD K:  They are super good for spiders.

Officer N: They are very healthy!

Officer F:   “We have a web cage that can help you with that!”  

Officer R:  You have to keep eating it all day because we have lots.

Narrator:  The cage is made out of webs.

BBS: This cage is GREAT!

The BBS eats the web jail.  

Officer R:  “We’ll drive you back if you say please.”  

BBS:  “Please drive me back.  I want to make new friends.”  

Narrator:  The police drive everyone back to the pigeons’ home.  


Scene VIII:  Pigeons’ House, exterior

Narrator:  Everyone was inside when they arrived.  

Officer F:  Go knock on the door, spider.

The BBS knocks on the pigeons’ door.  

Pigeon:  “Who’s there?”

BBS:  “The Big Bad Spider, can I please have some webs to eat?”  

Pigeon:  “Sure! Here’s a web.”

Pigeon hands BBS some web.

Pigeon:   “You can have as much as you want.”

Rainbow B:  Let’s make a cake for the spider.

Officer X:  We’ll make it banana flavor

Sparkle B:  Let’s have a party.  

Narrator:  Everyone has a party at the pigeon house.

Dancing and partying ensues.


If you are curious about organizing an amateur shooting schedule here is how I did it:

Play2018_Storyboard

2018 Movie_Shots-character

Shooting_Order_2018 Movie_Shot List

“The Grinch is Real”

This conversation began at lunch yesterday.  I’m not quite sure how the topic began and it quickly spread across all tables in our classroom cafe.  The children were comparing notes on the proof they claim to have regarding the truth of the Grinch’s existence.  Some said he had climbed in their window and left a tuft of hair behind.  Others insisted that he had taken their very special bunny.  After many offers of supporting arguments, I decided we should probably get to the bottom of this quandary.  I asked the children how we could find out for sure if the Grinch was real.  They enthusiastically agreed that a trap was the best way to get proof.

grinch

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G:  We put lots of clips on him and take the clips on the door and we keep the clips open with scissors.  When he comes in the door, the clips close.

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V:  The Grinch can walk along and we make a button.  When he is coming, we push the button and the cage comes down.  Then Victory!

grinch (5)

R:  I want to put everywhere a net, so he can’t get anywhere and we can trap him in it.  We have to put them everywhere.  We’ve got to make a sign to say, “No Grinches Allowed!”

grinch (6)

W:  The Grinch will come into our school.  There’s a button that says, “Yummy Tasty Garbage for the Grinch to Eat,” but it tricks the Grinch.  It’s really a net that traps the Grinch.

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E:  When he steps on the pillow, the trap will fall down and pinch his hair, then he’ll walk in and be stuck.  I’ll put some garbage in the cage and when he gets it, the door will slam.

grinch (4)

X:  I made a net.  When he eats a hot dog, it will go down on his head.  …[G’s] clips will get his feet.

grinch (1)

B:  We can put traps all over the school and then take them out for people.

grinch (2)

K:  We need to see if he’s real.  If he’s laying in a rope, he’s real.  This is the escalator.  He’s pulling a rope.  It’s capturing him on the rope.

It seems the children have very definite ideas about how traps work.  They are also pretty confident that the “Grinch” is a bad-guy no matter whether they believe he exists or not.  I’m curious to see how they might build these traps.

The Question of a Hole

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Big discussion this morning in the forest: What made this hole?  The first discovers were sure it was a snake.  Laughing, screaming, and yelling warnings while running through the woods followed.  This brought the rest of us in for closer inspection.  Many assured us that it was definitely a snake hole.  That is until we were presented with another idea.

MF:  It is not a snake hole. It is a mole hole.

Mrs. F:  Oh, how can you tell?

MF:  Mole holes have the dirt pushed up around the edge like this.  Moles are bad. My grandpa has them all over his yard.  We put little yellow worms in that the moles don’t like and they go away.

VJ:  Snakes don’t dig holes.  They slither and there are no slithers here.

FD:  Moles aren’t bad.  They are cute.  I held one once and they are cute.

GS:  Yeah, moles are good for the world.  They help trees and plants grow.

AZ:  No, it’s definitely a snake hole. RUN!!!!

After this discussion, some of the children remained to contemplate the origins of the hole.  The rest ran off to run from the attacking moles and snakes.  It appears it doesn’t matter what is attacking, it’s just fun to run around hiding from the imaginary threat.