The Rainbow Fish

One of my all time favourite book is, The Rainbow Fish, by Marcus Pfister. I remember listening to this book being read to me by my school's librarian when I was a little girl! So, I obviously had to share it with my class in the beginning of the school year. I also took this opportunity to dress-up as the Rainbow Fish! 

 

For art, we created a school of fish. We took bubble wrap and painted on fish scales. 

We also had a sensory station and explored the deep blue sea for exotic things! "I feel something prickly..."

At the end of the school day, I shared my scales with each student, just like in the book! They loved it!

The Perfect Square

We've been learning about shapes in class and read the book, Perfect Square, by Michael Hall. Afterwards, the children became creative cats in the making of their mathematical art masterpiece from a perfect square. Look at all of the shapes that they used!

Up, up & away!

At the end of last year, we read the Dr. Seuss book, Oh, the Places You'll Go!

Afterwards, we made our own papier-mâché hot air balloons. What a fun project for the kids!

Gigantic Sunflowers!

All week, we have been reading the big book, The Sunflower Tree by Elizabeth Pulford. 

This book is about Mr. Potter who grows a gigantic sunflower tree that grows, grows, GROWS!  

STEM:  The children were challenged to build the tallest sunflower tree out of play-doh, pipe cleaners and Fruit Loops!

Science:  We also fermented our own seeds and grew them in plastic baggies. The children could choose from bean seeds, pumpkin seeds or sunflower seeds. 

Art:  We studied Vincent van Gogh and created our own sunflowers that came to life! We even used actual seeds!

Goodbye Jitters!

A great way to make those first day jitters disappear, is to make and drink Jitter Juice with your class!

My kids loved the book, First Day Jitters by Julie Danneberg. BUT, they loved making Jitter Juice even more! We combined punch, Sprite and sorbet to help us to get rid of our first day jitters! The kids were buzzing all day and the following day about how there jitters were gone! 

A New Year!

I welcomed my brand new class today! Hello 2017! 

Shooting Stars...Meteors!

I WONDER how a meteor can change Earth?

After we inquired into how dinosaurs and super crocs have changed over time, the children naturally wanted to learn more about meteors and how they can change Earth. They already knew a lot about the meteor theory that killed the dinosaurs, but they were wondering what other changes could happen if it landed on Earth now. 

We first took ACTION into our new line of inquiry on meteors by reading articles in National Geographic for Kids. Luckily, we found a copy of an issue online about our topic! 

 

Then, we took our investigation further by watching a video online about meteors and asteroids.

Finally, to make CONNECTIONS between what we read and heard, we extended our thinking in an experiment. I WONDER if the size of the meteor that lands on Earth matters?

The calm before the storm!

The children chose three different sized spheres as our meteors. They threw them past Earth’s atmosphere and into it’s brown sugary-flour crust! The results WOWed the children! The biggest meteor caused the most amount of changes on our Earth. Once we removed each meteor, the children also noticed how craters were left in the ground. 

The DISCOVERY of craters left by the meteors led into another rich discussion! I also showed the kids my connection to seeing a crater at Meteor Crater in Arizona! They also realised how heavy the meteors can be!

Meteor Crater, Arizona

Making Butter!

When the children came to school, they saw a table with cream, a bowl, a whisk, plastic zip-block baggies with marbles inside of them, glass jars with plastic marbles and 2 loaves of fresh bread. Their curiosity boomed into overdrive!

I WONDER what we are making today? This was the common question throughout the class, but I didn’t spill the beans…yet! They had to execute the experiment first and watch the changes happen to the cream in order to DISCOVER the mystery treat. 

The kids EXPLORED and took turns with a partner in the shaking of the cream. A few whisked the cream in a bowl, a couple shook the cream violently inside of a jar and some shook the cream in a baggie with a marble. 

Shaking inside of a jar

Whisking the cream

Shaking in a baggie

After a while, they DISCOVERED some changes happening to the cream. They saw it change colour, from white to yellow. Some of them saw small lumps in the cream. Others noticed how it went from a liquid to fluffiness like with scrambled eggs. The excitement was roaring in class! 

But, what did we make?

After our muscles were aching from all of the shaking, we took a deep breathe and REFLECTED on our findings.

At first, the kids were fixated on the fact that the substance looked like eggs, so it must be just that. But, then they connected the bread on the table with the yellow, slimy mixture. WOW...we made butter! They also DISCOVERED which method of shaking worked the best in making butter. We decided making butter in the glass jar with the plastic marble worked the best!

Finally, it was time to taste our Science creation! 

Once we finished our mini-feast, we REFLECTED on whether we enjoyed the butter or not. We recorded our answers on a graph. Looks like the majority of us loved it! 

A Moon made out of Oreo's!

In the middle of our inquiry unit, I asked the children what kind of changes they wanted to learn about next. Once a kid in our class wondered about space and how the moon changes, it was game over with any other ideas because of the enthusiasm involved!

So, we WONDERED about how the moon changes. 

The children's prior knowledge about this line of inquiry was interesting! 

Next, we took ACTION and EXPLORED online about how the moon changes. 

"I'M CONFUSED!" To further investigate and DISCOVER into this phenomenon, we had to borrow globes and flashlights from the Science department of my husband's high school (where he also teaches Science!) We also had to add Oreo's into the mix!

The children's understanding of the changes that the moon experiences sky rocketed with the Oreo demonstration. They were able to conduct the Oreo experiment with a partner and talk (REFLECT) about the changes to others. Now, when you ask them about how the moon changes, they'll be able to shed light on this topic.

What can you do with milk & vinegar?

The children came to school with many wondering questions when they saw the front table with milk, vinegar, measuring tools and a bowl on it.

The children followed the very precise procedure in our Science experiment. 

Action/Explore:  Boil a cup of milk. Measure 4 teaspoons of vinegar into mug.

 

Pour milk into mug and stir ingredients together.

 

Use a strainer to drain excess liquid out.

 

Scoop the solid out.

After all of the liquid was drained from the solid, the kids formed the 'dough-like' substance into a shape of their choice by using a cookie cutter. They made tree ornaments.

When we completed the experiment, we talked about what we made. The children at this point, didn't know that they made plastic. Further exploration online was required to fill in the gaps. They also made the connection to our symmetry unit...the ornaments are 'equal shmequal!' 

Discover/Explore/Reflect:  So many changes happened during our experiment! We made plastic like in the olden days!!