Santa's little helpers

Thank you so much for all your donations of wrapping supplies! Look what the children were up to....

"Look I made a Christmas dress. Do you like it?"
(Using art materials in different ways, thinking outside the box if you will)

"I'm wrapping a present for under the tree."
(using her small motor skills to wrap, also social / emotional  expectations of being kind and generous)

"I need some tape. You have to cut the paper."
(fine motor development with cutting and tearing tape)

"This is for my mom and dad."
(notice the name tag she is printing on)

"I need to cut this paper to wrap a book."
(using his fine motor skills, sharing the supplies, figuring out how to make that paper fit)

Her finished product!!!
(those are mermaids swimming in the background)

"Can I wrap this box? I need to cut the paper."
(very focused using those scissors. Spacial awareness, knows to spread out on the floor.)

"I'm making a card to wrap for my parents."
(taking our wrapping one step farther, extending her ideas into creating a gift)

"How do I use these?"
(Using stickers to decorate and as tape to secure her wrapping paper.)

"I want to build this snowman. I'm done now, can I make something else?"
(fine motor skills, tidy up his area, ready to do more)

"How do I hang these bows? Can I put all these things on the tree? We can use this for all the presents."
(creativity in her design, problem solving, extending play to include her friends)

"I need help here, how do I get these bows on?"
(social skills-sharing, helping, asking for help, cooperating)

May I just add, this inquiry play block was so quiet, the children were so engaged in many activities set up on the tables. Their minds were challenged today!!! It was a beautiful thing!

(If you can't comment here because you don't have an account you can contact me regarding the blog at my school email  karalong@mytools2go.ca)

Mixing Colours

We wanted to make coloured ice cubes.
The children decided that food colouring would work to make the ice cubes.
We predicated what we would do with them.

Some children thought if they melted they would turn into new colours.
Some children thought we could eat the coloured ice cubes.
And some children were excited to have coloured ice cubes for there bumps and bruises.

The next day, this is what happened.
"Can I have green and yellow?"
"The light makes me see the colour."

"If you squish it around in the bag, the water follows the ice cube."

"I'm melting mine to see what colour I get."

"Mine is making green."

"Red and Green kinda makes brown."

M and S are creating the same colour on their paper as in the bag of liquid.

R and E are creating a colour together.
"Put more blue on your finger."
"It's Purple."
The 2 of them added more blue then more red and continued making new shades.

"From here, (twists neck) it looks like 6's"
"Mine is getting a darker green. It gets lighter if you push on it hard. See?

"It's pink, then purple."

Listen to the children's voice-some awesome things are said. Sometimes saying nothing says a lot too. They are focused, and they are commenting on each others work, expressing their observations, working sensory and fine motor. Observing that mixing colours creates new colours, using different mediums to create art. The list goes on. This inquiry from beginning to end was enriched in so much learning, learning that they will remember because it was their interest that provoked the inquiry, it was meaningful and purposeful play!!!