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Thanks to everyone who joined us for the End-of-Year Celebration this afternoon! We had such a great time remembering the wonderful year with you!!
Here's the video we shared during the celebration to enjoy again or in case you missed it: https://vimeo.com/423870428/a33fc7d8da We wish you an incredible Summer!!
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Our Growing Community!
We had a lot of participation in our Zoom experiences this week! It was fantastic to see everyone and to observe the work you were doing. Some special friends also made appearances! On Tuesday, we meet Caroline David, who is already comfortable with the Zoom experience (or so it seems)! Although Alexandra is not new to our community, it was great to see her and Elena participate, all the way from Germany, both last week and this week! Who could forget Sally's per hamster, Nibbles, who is extra cute even if he fell and hurt his ear. Of course, we are all eagerly anticipating the arrival of Jessica's baby, an up coming event that was celebrated at today's Sing-along! Many thanks to all who contributed to and participated in this wonderful gathering! Silhouettes and Shadow Puppets
WeavingThursday's Zoom was all about weaving. As we got started, we noticed there were more ideas, object, and materials related to rainbows. Joslin had rainbow strips for her box weaving. This led Sam to share that we was working with a rainbow loom (a new technique for us!) and Evelyn brought out her rainbow piggy bank. When Ellie showed us her work, she told us it was a rainbow, and then added to it to make it a "real rainbow." Gigi also worked on a series of stripes that looked like it might be a rainbow. Throughout the weaving process, children demonstrated their individuality and creativity. Almost everyone had uniques strips to weave with. Leigh and Prater cut theirs from old magazine pages. Alexandra showed her paper saying "I made it from my paintings from last week." Evelyn had worked created marble paper with food coloring, dish soap, and milk. She cut the resulting papers into strips for weaving. While her friends worked, Lane added tape decorations to a troll house she was making. Just creating while being together is very satisfying, or in the words of one parent, "almost therapeutic."
We hope you all enjoy your long weekend! We also hope that everyone can join us for next Friday's Zoom Call. This call will be our end-of-year celebration, featuring a slide show of many favorite memories!
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     | We had a wonderful and full week in KW last week connecting to one another through Zoom, Seesaw, and messages. We started off with a Zoom dedicated to making messages for new children coming to school in the Fall. Having time together to share about the existing and coming relationships was meaningful as children shared about those they know, know of, and haven't yet become familiar with. Through the Zoom conversation and continued dialogue on Seesaw through the week, we saw children and families giving of themselves for these relationships. We observed the dedication to this important value and tradition of our school community: preparing for and welcoming new families into the school. Here's some of what the children shared while working on messages and showing photos of the new children: Grace M and Louise talked about Frances and Luke coming to Brown room next year. Grace M: "I'm making a picture of Lukie...of me and him...going to Grandma's." Louise: "Me and Grace we want Frances and Luke to get married so we can be sisters." Grace nods in agreement and smiles. Louise: "So about Frances is..." Louise tells about the games Frances and the family like to play at home. She even demonstrates one game enlisting Ali in the process! Grace M: "Lukie likes phones. So Lukie might like to bring a toy phone to school, maybe." Louise: "Frances likes to play with kitchen stuff and doctor stuff." Grace D: "I'm starting one part all blue and this part all purple (because those are Lily's favorite colors.) When I show Lily pink and purple, Lily says, 'I want blue!' So I'm going to keep on going with the color blue because she really likes blue." (Talking about Dakota coming to Tucker Room next year...) Grace D: "I think I know who Dakota is already...Oliver's cousin. My mommy told me. But first I'm going to do Lily's card, then I think I might do her card." (Continuing to look at and talk about the photos of the other children coming to school next year...) Grace D: "I know Wilder! ...What's his doggy's name?" Grace shares that she has seen Wilder around the neighborhood walking his dog. Grace M folds a piece of paper in half: "I'm cutting out a heart." Grace D decides to also incorporate a heart: "I'm doing it dark red so Lily can see it, because she can't normally see yellow." |
Through the dialogue and reflection of children on their work for incoming children, we see children not only making connections to new relationships but also to one another and their community. They take into consideration what they know about individuals and incorporate these ideas in their work and in the continuation of building connections within the group.
On Seesaw we saw families sharing in the delight of this tradition, creating colorful cards and messages and including personal notes about what they like at St. John's. We observe the ways individuals consider how to ease the transition to a new school and experience. For the children moving on from St. John's, it also helps them reflect on their experience and ease toward their own transition by passing on memories and meaning to others in the community.
Relationships are always at the heart of what, why, and how we approach our work but they really stood out as a theme throughout all our synchronous and asynchronous interactions this week. Children looked for one another on Zoom calls and recalled memories of time spent in-person together, they made cognitive connections as they linked concepts and built off of one another's ideas, they told about their families and other relationships which are meaningful to them, and made suggestions for ideas based on their knowledge of one another.
One of the bonuses of the online platforms we continue to see are the ways we are able to connect to one another's families and home-lives in a way that wasn't previously as accessible. For instance, this week we were able to see and interact with many siblings including all of Leigh's sisters, Sam's sister Claire read to us on Seesaw, we had a surprise peek into the metal-work Jen's sons were working on at home, and we got to meet Ellie's friend, Matthias.
One of the bonuses of the online platforms we continue to see are the ways we are able to connect to one another's families and home-lives in a way that wasn't previously as accessible. For instance, this week we were able to see and interact with many siblings including all of Leigh's sisters, Sam's sister Claire read to us on Seesaw, we had a surprise peek into the metal-work Jen's sons were working on at home, and we got to meet Ellie's friend, Matthias.
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Jokes continued to be shared this week, bringing a certain playfulness and joy as a bridge and connection between us. We also spent a lot of time thinking about our connection to the earth and the similarities in observations of Spring signs and the nature around us. From these reflections, and others (like "Updating the KW Photo") as we near the end of the school year, growth arose as a theme leaving us thinking about what Jossie said on Seesaw:
"Nothing is better than having to grow." -Jossie
We look forward to continuing our reflections on the growth and learning shared this year in our time together this coming week as well as the joy of shared-explorations and simply being together.
And...just a little more from our week: some images from the materials work we did together on Zoom and continue to share on Seesaw related to printing cross-sections and sculpting tinfoil. We're loving seeing all your images and "tours" of the work you continue offline!
Seems Like Old Times!
In some ways, this week resembled the KW we knew when we were back at school. Perhaps most significantly, the conversations flowed quite naturally, even though we were "together" on line. This was especially true during our Thursday Fancy Feast zoom. Just like the way we start lunch at school, we included a virtual moment of silence which was perfectly delivered by Lane and Louise.
Thursday's conversations were similar to the way we chat when we are around a lunch table together. The topics included: pets, dreams, family rituals, activities, use of materials, and jokes. The jokes were a fun way to end our time together.... and inspired Leigh to post a great joke on Seesaw today. Here's a look at our fancy group:
Thursday's conversations were similar to the way we chat when we are around a lunch table together. The topics included: pets, dreams, family rituals, activities, use of materials, and jokes. The jokes were a fun way to end our time together.... and inspired Leigh to post a great joke on Seesaw today. Here's a look at our fancy group:
  | Likewise, when we are at school, conversations naturally flow while we work with materials. This was true on Tuesday when we used photos as inspiration for mark-making. Tuesday we talked about strategies we were using, materials, our sources of inspiration, and references to our chapter book. Jen was on the Zoom call had was working on the challenge of drawing a reflection of a dinosaur. When she had drawn the reflection, she asked the children for suggestions to make it look more like a reflection. Here's their great suggestions: Lane - Get a blue pencil and draw under it. (To represent the water) Joslin - You could get the clearer marker in your house and draw over it. After completing several journal pages, Lane brought up the subject of fatigue, saying " I did one hundred arts. I feel like I'm tired of doing arts." |
Tuesday's Journal Work
Different Strokes for Different Folks
Another way of being together that was reminiscent of being in the classroom was the choices made by children. Although our Zoom calls usually have a big idea or specified materials experience, children were not limited to those experiences. During last Friday's dance party, Ellie was still focused on making messages. While classmates boogied, she kept up her work on them. During our mark-making zoom on Tuesday, Evelyn was engrossed in a detailed building.... one that she kept working on during our building zoom today. It reminded us that we would work in this fashion during our KW afternoons. some children would be working with materials, while others were building, or making messages, or exploring shadows or doing a puzzle. Sometimes just being together, having conversations, and sharing ideas is more important than doing the same experience as everyone else. We look forward to more connections and conversations in the coming weeks.
Today's Builders
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Thank you so much for all the ways you reached out to us for Teacher Appreciation Week and for all you do to support our work during this unusual time. Happy weekend, Happy Mother's Day!
Connections: Gaining Momentum and Depth
 | As we've settled into a rhythm in this new season, we're seeing increased connections between concepts and areas of focus in our learning. Families have reported the range of engagement children experience with the different modalities of "online" and "offline" learning, but also that some children are starting to shift into a deeper connection with the experiences being offered. We are seeing this too and, while it still varies and that is completely understandable given the circumstances, we also are noting many connections weaving throughout the various concept threads we are following. |
Some Current Concepts and Threads of Learning:
| Art Journaling Mark-Making Pattern Texture Color (and the Rainbow) Emotions Light and Shadow Sound Connections to nature Building Paper sculpture Relationships between each other, families, and materials These also include some use of other languages such as photography, literature, and tools as we are always looking for ways to diversify our offerings and allow for new insights through multiple languages. |  Leigh responds to Mark-Making to Music  Austin's response to the Weekend Walk Scavenger Hunt |
Children demonstrate connections forming across learning concepts:
During our Zoom interactions and on Seesaw this week we observed multiple links children have and are making between concepts. These concepts interweave across the variety of experiences offered showing the cognitive connections children are making and the ways they continue to think about the concepts in various contexts.
Here are some examples from the week, categorized by our three offerings over Zoom.
(Note: Scroll through the slideshows to see and read about Color-Mixing & Rolling Beads.)
Here are some examples from the week, categorized by our three offerings over Zoom.
(Note: Scroll through the slideshows to see and read about Color-Mixing & Rolling Beads.)
Making Connections Through Color-Mixing | Connecting Concepts to Rolling Paper Beads |
Concepts Observed Through Movement
During our Dance Party, today, we listened to the tracks used for our Mark-Making to Sound activity on Seesaw. This time we made "marks" or motions using our bodies. This created a different opportunity for children to interpret the feeling of sound and music using body motions. We observed children respond by choosing between these kinds of movements:
- large and small
- fast and slow
- circular or linear (horizontal or vertical)
- distinct or subtle
How We're Working to Extend Learning
A BIG THANK YOU for your feedback during conferences and on Seesaw this week...it all has contributed greatly to our ability to see not only see what is engaging children, but gain insight into the children's learning processes and their connections. We also learned more about the different ways families are utilizing experiences and the range of needs and desires around how to deepen the connection to the work.
As we plan each week with the children, we think about activities which weave concepts together and extend into a "next step" or different perspective or language. One of the ways we do this is to deliberately offer a diversity of experiences. We consider what ideas arose during the week, what threads we have been following, and how can we plan a next experience to deepen our and the children's understanding of those ideas. We consider all of the teachers including families, teachers, children and the environment (in this case, home, our online platforms, the materials, and experiences offered.)
In doing so, this week we implemented a new series of activities that we hope brings all of this together and especially brings us back to the children's voices: Inspired Connections. You may have seen the first two activities on Seesaw inspired by Lou Lou's response to gathering and arranging rainbows with materials and Jack's response to nature which reminded us of some current threads.
In doing so, this week we implemented a new series of activities that we hope brings all of this together and especially brings us back to the children's voices: Inspired Connections. You may have seen the first two activities on Seesaw inspired by Lou Lou's response to gathering and arranging rainbows with materials and Jack's response to nature which reminded us of some current threads.
Our hope is that we can remember an important aspect of the Reggio Philosophy, in that we value an intentional revisiting of concepts and experiences as a way to deepen our understandings. We invite you to use Seesaw and the documentation shared by families and ourselves as a way to revisit, deepen, and extend the learning. We aim in this season to provide new content and new ways of approaching the learning each week, but we highly encourage you to go at the pace that is right for your child...slow it down and really immerse yourself and the children in the experiences when possible.
As much as we can, we will offer a variety of ways to connect to and extend these experiences at home both in our Zoom interactions, but especially within the Seesaw activities where we often suggest a variety of questions to consider and languages to explore the activity through. Feel free to use as much or as little or to add your own twists to these ideas. We want each of you, and the children, to feel free to access the right amount of content and depth that works for you in this time.
As much as we can, we will offer a variety of ways to connect to and extend these experiences at home both in our Zoom interactions, but especially within the Seesaw activities where we often suggest a variety of questions to consider and languages to explore the activity through. Feel free to use as much or as little or to add your own twists to these ideas. We want each of you, and the children, to feel free to access the right amount of content and depth that works for you in this time.
An InvitationDuring conferences we received a variety of feedback on how much each family and child is able to engage during this time. Many are really trying to juggle many roles and needs under one roof and we again hope to support you in the best way we can. Thank you for the feedback and always feel free to reach out with more! We received one request for more ideas to extend the learning, possibly into a long-term project to be explored at home. If you are wanting the same, we'd like to offer an *optional* invitation: to hold a team meeting with you (Jill, Jessica, and parent(s)) where we discuss ideas and plan a possible project to follow at home. Please reach out if you are interested in this! | Thanks so much for reading and reflecting with us! |
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