Overview of Our Week
9/21-9/25
We hope you have been enjoying this week as much as we have! It has been so fun to see the children all making friends and finding their interests in the classroom. We have started seeing more purposeful investigations as the children are exploring their environment. Check out some of the children's work!
Last week, we introduced watercolor painting to the class. The children learned the process of painting and explored how to add color to their pictures. As they have gotten more comfortable with the process, we’ve seen then become interested in representing something specific in their paintings. This week showed them a vase of sunflowers to paint. We talked about the colors we saw on the stem, petals, and center of the flower. The children have been observing the shapes of the flowers as well. We talked about how we can move the paintbrush “up and down” to make the shape of the stem. When they looked at the center of the flower, they saw its circle shape. They learned how to move their brush “around and around” to represent this part of the flower on their paper. The yellow petals of the sunflowers were an interest of the children. Some of them focused on the way they come out from the center of the flower while other children noticed they way they go around the center of the flower instead. Their paintings have become more focused and detailed as they explore the painting process further.
Last week, we gave them the opportunity to explore large ramps outside. They focused on how the balls rolled down the ramps quickly. We watched as some of the children experimented with out to manipulate the ramps in different ways. some children moved the ramps up and down to change the speed of their ball. Other children moved large blocks to the bottom of their ramps to stop the ball when it rolled down. Some of them were interested in racing their balls and seeing if the speeds were different. They shouted “Ready, Set, Go!” before they all let their balls roll down. We plan to continue this investigation and allow the children to explore new ways of manipulating the ramps and the way their ball moves. 
We saw lots of smiling faces when we brought in the large screen and projector. The projector cast light onto the screen and allowed the children to see their shadows. They were excited to explore how they could move their shadows and manipulate the light. Some of them noticed how the size of their shadows could change when they moved closer or farther away from the light source. Many explored how their shadow looked when they jumped up and down . We plan to continue this investigation and see how they expand on their discoveries.
Many children in our class have shown an interest in how different substances move. They have been trying new ways to make sand and water move with cups, scoops, and funnels. We have explored how substances move through different sized containers. The children experimented how moving the container closer or further away from the substances affects how quickly the substance exits the container. We went to on to explore how substances travel through funnels. The children observed how the sand was gravitating to the center of the funnel.
