Dear parents,
We started the week by writing a list of what we know about dinosaurs. The children knew quite a lot. They knew why dinosaurs had sharp or flat teeth, what extinct means, and theories about what happened to the dinosaurs. Someone noticed all the names end in -saurus.
While outside, some children had to be reminded when acting like dinosaurs to not really grab friends. We wondered if even ferocious dinosaurs acted that way ALL the time. Some children said maybe only when hunting for food.
Kelly came in and read a book about a scuba diving cat. The class identified many sea creatures in the book and after snacks each got a page to color underwater ocean animals.
We looked for pictures of dinosaur bones in our books and found many. We went to work creating our own dinosaur bones using clay. It was already the same color as the bones in the book. Children made the spine, leg bones, feet, eyes, teeth, head bones, and land for the dinosaurs to live on. A couple of people made sculptures of their human mamas too.
F. called from London on FaceTime. The children asked her about the weather, if it snowed there or was raining? She told us it was cold and raining, the same weather we were having that day. She showed us the shops out of her apartment window. We sang the goodbye song when it was time to hang up. It was great to see her smiling face!!
We have been reading about dinosaurs everyday. We wrote down how many feet long a Triceratops, an Iguanodon, a Tyrannosaurus Rex, and a Brontosaurus are, and went in the big room to measure. We discovered the Brontosaurus was longer than the big room. We also saw a picture of a 2 foot long dinosaur and measured each child and noticed they are all bigger than him. We didn't know there was such a small dinosaur. We also measured the yard to see if they would fit in our yard. Barely.
We wrote a dinosaur story. This story had some meat-eating dinosaurs and a sparkly dinosaur with sparkly nails and a sequined dress, who unfortunately, was eaten by a magic turtle. The acting was award-winning.
Next week we continue with dinosaurs.
Have a warm weekend,
Therese
The Big Bad Pig
Hi everyone,
We began Wednesday with the children retelling the story of The Big Bad Pig and the Three Little Wolves. Then we acted it out. The children chose characters, huffed and puffed, and in the end, made friends with the big bad pig.
While in the yard we discovered our tree had new leaves, our bulbs planted in the fall had bloomed, and several sleeping snails that were woken.
Alex came from the Brooklyn Conservatory, and drums were heard emanating from the big room. She said the children did great! While some children were making music, the others were beginning storytelling. We talked about how stories usually begin and how we could use animals as characters. We identified who the characters are in several books we've read. One group created a tale involving a dragon whose head was chopped off and given a shark head. The story ended with cupcakes and cake for dinner. The other children told a story about a turtle that surfed in California, narrowly escaping a cheetah that tried to eat him because he thought the turtle was a rock. This story ended with the turtle going to his mom and dad's house.
We wrote a story with the whole class too. They titled it The Legend of the Lost Treasure. The children were excited to act it out. There was lots of (pretend) fighting, and a newborn baby dragon who found a toy.
While story-writing, we are exercising listening and language skills, analytical thinking, and pre-writing skills. It is empowering for the children to create the stories and take charge of the characters who regularly die but have miraculous recoveries and magical powers transforming them into other beings or turning them invisible. When acting, they get to chose to be a character or an audience member, or practice pretend fighting, running in place, or how to die, among other things. It's a struggle to hear the narrator sometimes because the actors have a hard time listening while in character.
Next week: more writing and dinosaurs.
See you Monday,
Therese