Term 2 Week 6    

metaproject...

Many MZa children continue their fascination with space. We have added stars to our solar system table and children have been busy designing and creating vehicles to travel to the stars and planets. But what are stars, actually...?

"They are the moon's President."

"You cannot go to stars...they have fire inside."

"Stars are really like planets and they move around the moon."

"They give bright light at night."

"The sun is a big star."

The question remains..."Are giants real or imaginary?" We have challenged our thinking by watching a short animation of the legend of Finn McCool, followed by an excerpt of a documentary about the geological feature The Giant's Causeway in Ireland. Children have re-created the story in play, incorporating shape recognition and an introduction to tessellation!

Our trip to Chinatown...

We had a wonderful trip to Chinatown on Thursday 5 February. The children did a great job of locating items important to Chinese New Year and practising their Chinese vocabulary to purchase decorations for our classroom and their homes.
Thank you so much to all our parents who helped the children on this day - this trip would not have been possible without you!

Gong Xi Fa Cai!

Term 2 Week 4

The last two weeks have been a hive of activity in MZa! The children's interest in the world of the imagination is continuing, alongside a long-standing fascination with what surrounds Earth; namely space and rainbows!

A giant question...

The children and I have been exploring the existence or otherwise of giants. Are they real or imaginary? Last week we all completed a survey, and analysed the data ,which showed that the majority of us believed giants to be imaginary. Over the next few days we read some books such as Jack and the Beanstalk and Gulliver's Travels, and viewed a short video about the world's tallest man.

A few days later, a revisit of the survey showed that us that, in many cases, our thinking had changed. So now, many children think that giants are real, some insist they are imaginary, and a few are as yet still pondering. It has been so exciting to listen to the children articulate how their thinking is changing as they process new information...

"Giants are imaginary because we've never seen a beanstalk before."

"Giants are real because they can walk by themselves. Giants are the same as persons, so it's real."

"In the book they were bad and eat people, but I'm not scared...only in stories."

"China is a real country, so giants are real."

The video we watched also led to some measurement fun. We wanted to know what 2.46m (the height of the world's tallest man) looked like, so we used a metre ruler to mark this length on the carpet. Some children then used a combination of unifix cubes, the metre ruler and their own feet to count how many units long. This then sparked the idea to measure each other!

Space...

Many of the children have been designing and building vehicles which could travel in space. A lot of thought has gone into the pieces of equipment used and what purpose each one will serve.

Over the rainbow? Not yet...

Many children remain enthralled by rainbows. What are rainbows? According to MZa...

"A rainbow is colours."
"A rainbow has treasure on the end of the side."
"The rain stop, the rainbow come."

Some children have enjoyed discovering how to make their own rainbows with mirrors and have been noticing rainbow colours in bubbles.

 
"Just look down, you can see a rainbow!"

Welcome to Term 2.

Happy New Year! It was lovely to welcome the children back and we are looking forward to a busy and exciting new term.

Many children have maintained their interest in our metaproject and shared information about the world from their holidays, such as countries that they visited and what they saw and did. I showed photos of my trip to the Glasshouse Mountains in Australia, and asked the children to share any thoughts...

"It looks like a volcano."

"But no lava is there."

"It is extinct...that means the lava is gone."

The sea has been of interest to the children lately. We have been using our prior knowledge as well as non-fiction books and the internet to share information and begin our inquiry. Some children have made a sea collage and created creatures to add.

I posed to the children the following question...

"Why does Earth have seas?"
"If not...all the people couldn't have water and they will die."
"The fish need water."
"The sea's got treasure in it and there's water and sharks and whales."
"Even the sea has fishes; like an aquarium."

Something that I have noticed in my observations of, and chats with, the class is their interest in the realm of fantasy and magic within the world. The imagination is a powerful meaning-making tool for young children who may not yet have the experience or language to construct and convey understandings in a "rational" way. Fostering the ability to "think outside the box" is invaluable to children's (and adults!) problem solving. Recently we have seen drawings about Lord of The Rings, songs from and discussions about  Frozen, scenarios created with fairies and wizards and play based around the idea of zombies!  They children have enjoyed sharing their knowledge of imaginary characters in the world.

One of our classmates lost his first tooth a couple of weeks ago, and I overheard the following conversation...

"When your teeth fall out and then you put it under your pillow and then the Tooth Fairy will come."

"But you know...when your tooth fall out you throw it in the window and when you sleep you can see it's in the outside place."

"The Tooth Fairy is special. Some fairies are different and some are the same. They are very special and they can come anywhere."

"They don't come if you are awake."

"Yes, yes...and fairies can make magic with her magic wand."

Our Student Led Conferences on Tuesday 13th were a great success! The children did a fantastic job of  sharing with their parents how they learn in K1. I was very proud of the independence and confidence shown by MZa children.

During the K1 Arts Exhibition, many children in our class contributed to the making of this wonderful sea / ocean.            

The last two weeks of Term 1  ( already?!)

Metaproject

Some children have been choosing over the last fortnight to make art pieces about volcanoes. This is exciting as it means that they are processing their understandings, then later expressing them in a way which feels comfortable and natural. We have seen modelling clay volcanoes with red paper spilling out to represent lava, drawings accompanied by verbal explanations describing how volcanoes work, as well as paintings and a K1 papier-mache collaboration.

Our class also really enjoyed making 'volcano sandwiches' by cutting bread slices into quarters, pinching the edges together to make a pyramid shape and then squeezing over honey to represent lava. During this activity there was much discussion about how a crater was needed at the volcano's top and how best to make one. Cutting the crusts into small pieces to place around the volcano's base  led to some children sharing their understanding of lava forming rocks as it cools. It was great to see the children's enjoyment of this activity, which not only consolidated their knowledge of volcanoes, but incorporated mathematical concepts and fine motor skill practise.

We have also continued our exploration of what surrounds Earth, and have been inquiring into the solar system, with children sharing their prior knowledge to create a back-drop to planets...

End of term celebrations

The children have early this week been making placemats and party hats and yesterday had a fantastic time using them during the festivities. They enjoyed a performance of Purple Paw Prints, not to mention a visit from a "special guest!" Thank you for providing party food for our class to share - they had a wonderful morning.

Thank you also from Ms Aspa and myself for the lovely gifts. We will really enjoy going shopping during the break!

Wishing you all a happy holiday period... we hope your family has a restful, enjoyable break together. See you in 2015!

K1 meta-project

It has all been about volcanoes in MZa over the last fortnight! Many children are fascinated by volcanoes and have been making them from clay. After drying and painting, they made them  erupt by filling the craters with bicarb, vinegar and red food colouring. There was a lot of pleasure to be had in seeing the children's awareness of how volcanoes work take a hands-on perspective!

I showed the children a short video after which I asked them if they had any questions about volcanoes. The responses below will provide many directions in which to expand our inquiry in coming weeks…

"How did the earth get Lava?"
"I don't know why volcanoes make fire."
"Why does lava come from volcano?"
"Why do volcano blast go straight up?"
"How do people go near volcanoes?"

In addition, many children continue to have firm ideas about how planet Earth was formed...
                                                           

It's wonderful to see the children so engaged, making connections and becoming so knowledgeable about the world through our meta-project!

K1 Service

Thank you for sending in the shopping money for our children to purchase items to fill the Project Get Ready For School bags which the class have been busy decorating. They are now full and ready to be presented to the recipients. We made the first presentations on Thursday afternoon...to two local school friends who have spent a couple of days with us over the last fortnight. Our new friends were very excited to receive the bags!

UN Celebrations

We have had an exciting time during the last week, with our UN Day and Food Festival. The children loved completing the craft activities and filling their 'passports' with their parents, then went on to sing beautifully on stage. I was very proud of them...as, I know, were you! Everyone looked fabulous in their national costumes...

Thank you to those parents who were able to help during today's Food Festival. We enjoyed having you with us to enjoy the delicious fun!