After the rains came down yesterday, enthusiasm from discovery went up! The Bright-Eyed Bears took a walk and discovered tadpole eggs floating along peacefully in the massive puddles that formed near the ECC building. We found our classroom tadpoles under a campus bridge early in their life and have been watching them grow since the beginning of the school year. The children have enjoyed books, videos, and cd stories about the metamorphosis from tadpoles to frogs. Yet, we have missed seeing the eggs in real life during our study. It was a special treat on Tuesday to see those jelly-filled little eggs containing a teeny tiny little tadpole, no bigger than a dot. We very gently scooped some up to bring back to our Exploratorium to raise in a group aquarium along with Mrs. Jotch's and Miss Bowen's classes. Here is a picture of our new little friends. Enjoy!
The children will use their Science Journals to record information thru drawings and dictation as they watch their tadpoles grow. Science in motion!
The children are learning to play and playing to learn every day!
As part of our All About Me & My Five Senses unit of study, the children are learning each week about one of their five important senses. This week, the focus is on the sense of touch. We read a book from Scholastic by Dana Meachen Rau, that taught the children that their skin is an organ just like their heart, lungs, and other organs inside. Skin is the only organ that's on the outside! They also learned that their skin receives messages from the world through touch and sends them to their brains. That's how they know what is cold, wet, bumpy, soft, etc. The children tested this theory out with some fun partner games. In the photo above, one friend pulled a picture card from a deck, "read" it to the other friend who then put their hand into the "feely box" in search of the item on the card. The feeler friend was blindfolded and had to simply use their sense of touch to find the item. Fingertipping fun!
Below is a photo of Bright-Eyed bears enjoying a mystery bag game. The children had to reach into a numbered bag, feel around, then guess what was in the bag based upon their sense of touch. There were three bags. One bag was filled with flour. Another was filled with sea shells. The last was filled with bubble wrap. Each child drew pictures and dictated to the teacher about what they guessed was in each bag. I can't wait for you to see the results! Science journals will come home once a month for you to enjoy.
Our first focus letter of the school year is letter L. The children learned the song about "Luscious Lollipops", read a book about a little lamb who laughed too much, chose which Handwriting Without Tears wood shapes should make the letter L, and practiced many ways of learning the shape, sound and print of L. A favorite new activity was yesterday's "punching" lesson. The children practiced the proper writing grip by gripping a large push pin. They used the push pin to punch holes down the big line of L, then the little line over. This is a fabulous and fun fine motor muscle builder!
There is so much more to tell about all of the fun and learning we are having in The Bright-Eyed Bear classroom. Stay tuned! In the meantime, enjoy the picture gallery! Have a great day!
