Yves Klein loved BLUE! He even created his own blue and used it to paint blue works of art. The children were introduced to monochrome artwork through an introduction to Yves Klein and the stories Green by Laura Vaccaro Seeger and Bob’s Blue Period by Marion Deuchars. They then created monochrome paintings using a pallet of varied shades of the same color. Children continued to create monochrome art throughout the week to take home or display in our gallery.
We had our first sign language group with Rose on Tuesday. Rose first introduced herself and taught the children how to sign “my name is” . . . then each child introduced themselves. She taught us signs for different types of birds, which we will be learning about this month, and the signs for yes and no. She read us a story and played a game asking us questions, to which we would reply in sign with YES (making a fist and nodding it, like you nod your head for yes) or NO (putting down the ring and pinky finger and holding the pointer and middle finger straight and touching them to the thumb like a beak).
Henrietta and Wolfgang made their first appearance of the year with a problem they had in the sandbox the other night. Wolfgang was sad because Henrietta had grabbed the shovel from him. They helped us read through the first steps in problem solving, and the children brainstormed some ways to solve such a problem so next time Wolfgang and Henrietta would have some ideas for how to work it out.
Our study of birds began when some students found a dead bird on the front lawn, so we went to check it out. We kept our distance to avoid touching it and getting any mites or diseases while we observed it. We notice that it had two feet with claws, a beak, feathers, two wings, and a tail. We collected the bird and placed it in the freezer to examine later with a couple other songbirds who met their end, courtesy of Lyn’s cats. When we examine and compare them we will be careful to keep our distance to avoid any germs they may carry.
Children chose one or two colors of of their very own clay to put in a jar to use whenever they want. They each have a clay work mat with their name on one side and the alphabet on the other. They had fun using their fingers to pinch, squeeze, mold, form, and roll it, and tools to cut and mark it.
We read Hand, Hand, Fingers, Thumb by Al Perkins & Eric Gurney, Here Are My Hands by Bill Martin Jr. & John Archambault, and A Germ’s Journey by Thom Rooke & Anthony Trimmer. We saw a picture of a man sneezing and talked about how germs spread from one person to another, or from a person to objects to other people, and how important it is to wash hands. Lyn “sneezed” some glow germs into her hands then passed them to the children, then we turned off the lights and looked at the “germs” under a black light. We tried to rinse them off with water but it didn’t work, so we scrubbed with soap for 20 seconds then rinsed and voila! No more germs!
Kindergarten students did some number work. They began number scrolls, writing sets of 10 numbers at a time, starting with 0-9, then 10-19, 20-29, etc. They will continue through the year and see how high they can go, working on number formation, identification, patterning, place value, and multiples of 10. They played some sight word games to become familiar with some early common words. So far they have been introduced to the, a, and, of, to, it, that, in, you, & is. Students also continued to work on their Pete the Cat stories, adding more things he stepped in and the colors that it changed his shoes.
Friday students had a reverse day. We spent the first half of the morning outside, then came in for snack and work time. While outside we created a compost jar by adding leaves, both green and brown, some grass, a few sticks, some apples, a bit of soil, and some water. We took the jar inside and will watch as it decomposes through the year and transforms into nice rich soil for growing new plants.
