The More We Get Together

Our first time leading the all school sing along!

It was easy to see that this was going to be a special morning when we turned on the projector and suddenly, we could see an audience looking back at us.
Before gathering for sing along, we asked the children who they thought might be joining us  (virtually). 
"Grace" - Lily
"Chris" - Finlay
Sam: Does anyone else have a sister at school who will be joining our sing along today?
"I have my sister. Olivia." - Daniel 

We were in fact SO EXCITED about participating in sing along for the first time that we forgot to take photos and/or videos of us actually singing! Whoops.

In preparation for today, we spent time using instruments and singing our selected songs yesterday during our morning meeting. Our song choices were "The More We Get Together, "The Itsy Bitsy Spider", "You Are My Sunshine", and "Two Little Blackbirds". Maybe you'll hear some of these being sung at home now that we have had some practice both learning and singing them. 

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After many experiences using the stampers for mark making and identifying the different images created, Jade and Lily have now chosen their personal symbols! 

Jade: "I'm choosing the goat. It looks like horns and teeth. Scary teeth."

Lily: "I know it."
(spoken while choosing her new symbol, a heart.)

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Message Making

"Oooh, that look good." - Finlay

The majority of us have chosen our personal symbols and have begun to recognize their use in different areas of our school environment. We have also started to identify our peers by their chosen symbols. When speaking about symbols yesterday, Hugh said, "Mine is a present. Forever!"
The children are now showing a sense of ownership over their chosen symbol and are becoming more interested in using them for identification purposes.
​This sense of identity connected to our symbols as well as great enthusiasm surrounding receiving and giving messages both to and from our families when utilizing our school post office proved that this week we needed to take a deeper look into message making. What does it mean to make a message for another person? How do we go about creating these messages? What materials can we use?

"For my mommy. It can say from Coon Coon and Finlay. Made by for Mom. I did all by myself.
Oooh that look good."
- Finlay
When initially creating his message, Finlay used a marker to write his words onto the paper. Then he later used his symbol to stamp his otter image over the words he had written. 
"And made by Finlay", he said as he used his otter symbol. 

Creating messages has also shown us that we are being introduced to new materials throughout our environment that take further investigation and practice using. 

In this series of images, Hugh shows interest in using tape and throughout this process discovers that some types of scissors work better at cutting tape than others!

When asking the children to share about the messages they were making - 

Hugh: I'm making one for all my family.
Jade: For Mama. 
Finlay: I'm making a map. This is a house. Another house. I'm making a house for Halloween. Look at all these houses!
Daniel: I'm making a dinosaur. 
Lily: Mommy.

In the Brown Room we prefer to introduce materials slowly and embrace the process of learning how to best use new materials to our skill and comfort level. The quantity and variety of materials may be introduced slowly, but opportunities to use these are encouraged consistently and frequently.
We learn how to work with these "new" materials through exposure, trial and error, problem solving, and using lots of critical thinking skills. Once a child becomes familiar with using a tool or material, then the ways in which they may be used for self-expression is endless!