Our Last Splash Day!

 I can't believe it is the last week of school! We enjoyed all of the sunshine we could this week, including our final splash day of the year.  We filled a swimming pool up with water from the sprinkler.  Friends enjoyed putting things in the pool to see if they would sink or float.  We also brought out some flower petals in ice and worked together to figure out how to get the flowers out.  Our favorite method was to smash the ice on the bike track cement.  

Indiana Early Learning Foundations:

SE1.1 Demonstrate self awareness and confidence
SE4.1 Demonstrate relationship skills
APL1.1 Demonstrate initiative and self-direction
APL1.2 Demonstrate interest and curiosity as a learner
APL2.1 Demonstrate development of flexible thinking skills during play
APL3.1 Demonstrate development of sustained attention and persistence
APL4.1 Demonstrate development of social interactions during play
SC1.2 Demonstrate awareness of the physical properties of objects
SC4.1 Demonstrate engineering design skills
SC5.1 Demonstrate scientific curiosity
PHG3.1 Demonstrate development of fine and gross motor coordination

Dinosaurs!

 We continue to enjoy our exploration of dinosaurs.  We discussed that a dinosaur had scales and most likely feathers.  Using that knowledge, we painted bubble wrap and added feathers to make it look like a dinosaur's skin.  Some friends used the bubble wrap like a stamp, and pressed paper down on to the paintings.

Despite rainy days, we have enjoyed lots of outdoor time.  Playing in bubbles, drawing with chalk and feeding our dinosaurs some of the plants on our playground.  We took this time to talk about the different diets of dinosaurs.  Our class favorite, the T-Rex, was a carnivore, but still enjoyed munching on some leaves on our playground.

Friends worked together to make dinosaur slime.  Once mixed together, we added dinosaur figurines to make footprints and used rollers and knives to make the slime look like scales!

A favorite non-dinosaur activity the last couple days has been "racing" vehicles off the side of our box fan.  A couple friends discovered that the fan wiggles while it is on.  They wondered what would happen to different toys if they placed them on tip of the fan.  Discovering that things with wheels would roll right off the top, they began racing different vehicles off the fan.  We also discovered that our voices make funny sounds when we sing "We Don't Talk About Bruno" into the moving fan blades.

Indiana Early Learning Foundations:

ELA3.1 Demonstrate mechanics of writing
M3.1 Demonstrate understanding of classifying
APL2.1 Demonstrate development of flexible thinking skills during play
APL4.1 Demonstrate development of social interactions during play
SC4.1 Demonstrate engineering design skills
CA3.2 Demonstrate creative expression through visual art production
CA4.1 Demonstrate creative expression through dramatic play

Dinosaurs and Outdoor Classroom Day

 This week Maon has been busy getting into our new exploration: dinosaurs!  Monday morning, a friend found some dinosaur figurines in our closet, and everyone was entranced!  Over the last few days we have been all about playing with the dinosaurs and learning all about them.  We've used magnifying glasses to look at their scales, created fossils using kinetic sand and built prehistoric structures using blocks and leaves.

Feeding the carnivore another dinosaur

Digging for dino eggs (navy beans)

An epic battle!

Making fossils

Dinosaurs have scales!

Making dinosaur footprints in the sand.

All of the sunshine has allowed us to enjoy our outdoor play spaces each day.  We've even taken some of our dinosaurs outside to join in the fun! Tuesday we played on the bike track with sprinklers and chalk.  Anything makes a canvas for a true artist, even our friends feet!

Trying to catch the water from the sprinkler!

Started with coloring the chairs.

Quickly moved on to coloring on eachother.

Blue feet!

Today we celebrated Log b'Omer with our EC outdoor classroom day.  We enjoyed playing on the bike track and green space with our friends in Katon.  There were sprinklers, frozen pom poms, bubbles, chalk, a giant water wall and even a car wash!

We found the water rushing down the drain very interesting, it made a waterfall!

Indiana Early Learning Foundations:
M4.1 Understanding of spatial relationships
APL1.1 Demonstrate initiative and self-direction
APL1.2 Demonstrate interest and curiosity as a learner
APL4.1 Demonstrate development of social interactions during play
SC4.1 Demonstrate engineering design skills
SC5.1 Demonstrate scientific curiosity
CA4.1 Demonstrate creative expression through dramatic play
PHG2.1 Demonstrate how the five senses support processing awareness
PHG2.2 Demonstrate development of body awareness
PHG3.1 Demonstrate development of fine and gross motor coordination