Tuesday, October 29, 2019

10/29/2019

What is Light?

As we've explored shadow in our studies of body movement, we've also been experiencing aspects of light. We wondered, how much do the children connect light to shadow and so we decided to begin discussing light more directly. We opened dialogue on this today with the question of "What is light?" The children shared a couple beginning thoughts:
Joslin: "Light is electricity."
Lou Lou: "And you can see, remember that, you can see. You can see everything you are scared of."

Fall Watercolors and Spooky Building

Evelyn, Sam, Sally, and Jill were out today so we had a smaller group in KW. (HAPPY BIRTHDAY, EVELYN!) Children had a few choices including watercolor painting with Fall colors, "Spooky" building in construction, and cutting shapes in paper to prepare for an upcoming light exploration. While children were initially excited about the fold-and-cut activity during our meeting discussion, spooky building and watercolor painting captivated much of our time together this afternoon.

Problem-solving in Construction

Joslin and Lou Lou were the first to arrive for Spooky Building. Possibly inspired by the topic of light or our previous use of light and shadow in construction, Joslin immediately said, "We need light." The decision was made to add spooky twinkly lights. A problem arose quickly when the children attempted standing the long blocks vertically as they would not remain standing. Austin joined the children and worked with Joslin and Lou Lou to devise a plan: use double sticky tape on the blocks placed horizontally on the floor and then stand the long blocks vertically on top of the tape. This didn't seem to work, however. So Joslin and Lou Lou brought over masking tape. They decided to try taping the blocks together, first standing. This proved tricky so they decided to lie the blocks down on the floor while they thoroughly taped the blocks together. After taping the one side, they began to lift the blocks but Lou Lou noticed a problem; she showed Joslin how the individual blocks still wiggled from side to side a bit. She thought the other side would need to be taped, so the girls flipped the blocks over. another problem arose: the roll of tape ran out! Jessica suggested the children try what they had done so far and see if it worked. So Louise helped Lou Lou move the blocks and the blocks were stood up. The blocks were not as stable as the children wanted (in part because one block was not taped so the ends were lined up.) The children decided to lie the blocks down in the end and continue adding spooky details.

At this point Grace M., Austin, and Louise were also involved in the construction. Here's some of what was said while the children worked:
Grace M. (Stacking tree cookies in descending order): "Do you want me to put these on?"
Austin: "Yeah, that could be the fire place."
Joslin: "We need a fire."
Grace: "Oh, I have a idea." (She brings an orange bottle.)
The children work together to build a fire. Grace decides to use some of the black pipe cleaners in the fire.
Louise: "We could make these (black pipe cleaners) spiders. This (netting) could be a spider web."

Painting and Messages

Water color painting was a big hit today, especially for Grace and Grace who explained to our substitute, Brigitte, that their names have the same letters. Children were free to paint what they wish and some chose to make messages including for Jill who was out today.

Outdoor Classroom

We ended the day in the outdoor classroom. Children pretended to cook together and worked diligently at tricks on the bar. Grace D. asked Joslin and Lou Lou how to jump up and catch the bar from a standing position. When hearing Lou Lou had "focused" and practiced repeatedly until she figured it out, Grace tried the same, "I need to focusing...I need to practice before I go home because I want to show Brookie and Melanie. They have never seen this one." Focus was indeed a strategy by many of the children as they often began in a pose, looked up at the bar, took deep breaths and then jumped or did a trick. (See sequence of Joslin below for one example.)