This past week we started our provocations into the new unit of inquiry. With this art-focused unit, Ms. Dana (Art Teacher) and Ms. Leigh (Music and Drama Teacher) will be collaborating with us.
The enduring understanding that we aim to reach through this inquiry is that Art is a medium that allows people to share what they know, learn and believe.
To begin the inquiry the EY2 children were taken into the bedrooms of children around the world through a series of photographs by James Mollison. http://jamesmollison.com/books/where-children-sleep/ As a grade level, all the children gathered in the music room for the viewing.
Here are some of the images they discussed.
Guiding questions were used to prompt the student's thinking and the teachers scribed their responses. Some interesting examples were:
"the bed is missing."
"There's no couch."
"It's really really messy."
"I don't see that next to my house."
"I've seen it before; it's close to the mall."
"It's not clean, but my house is super super clean"
Viewing these photos was a first step towards helping the children see how images communicate, and we can read pictures to learn.
These particular photos are also lending themselves well for classroom discussions about things we think we need and things we want.
In the classroom, we used the first image to begin looking at perspective using the compass points strategy as a visible thinking tool.
N = Needs, E = Excitement, S = Suggestions, and W = Worries
Here are some of the childrens' responses:
Needs:
He needs a telephone (Shayaan) and a bed (Sohyun).
He needs a table. (I prompted. why?)- To put the telephone on. Antoine
He needs an iPad (Valerie)
Worries:
He might worry about the couch, (Antoine)
... about the bedroom, (Gabe)
... about the broken roof (Ivy)
He doesn't have a bed. (Chinsiv)
If it rains.... get wet (Anna), he might cough (Lang Lang), and the water will go in the house (Ken) and everything will get wet (Ivy).
Excited:
He would be excited about a door, a roof, a clock and a wall (Ivy).
...and an iPad (Valerie)
Needless to say, images communicate and are a great basis for conversations that lead us to think and learn. As teachers, however, we are mindful that learning is not a race and we all do it differently. As as a result, we must be respectful of difference and very careful to plan differentiated activities and reflections.
Since returning to school after the break, we have had lots of learning happening parallel, as it often does in an early childhood classroom. It is great to see learning outcomes being met through our inquiries into literacy and transportation. We continued to follow up on our inquiry into Who we are and our Loi: Inquiry processes. We have been exploring the process as a class through a mini inquiry into transportation. For our inquiry into literacy, Sohyun shared some images with us that she had brought from home as a response to the literacies post requesting your help. Among other images of environmental print, she shared images in hard copy similar to these:
Viewing these sparked a conversation among the children about what these were? Where might we find them? And what might the messages be telling or instructing? It didn't take long for the children to come to the conclusion that these were indeed signs. We see them on the road, in school, and in the Aeon Shopping Mall :)
I challenged the children to think about why we might need the signs and armed with some resources they went off to find out.
Back on the mat and prompted by guiding questions based on teacher observations, we talked about our outdoor experiences with the signs. We finally all agreed that...
We trust you all had a great Pchum Ben break, and we hope the children were able to share a little about what they learned on the last day of school, before the break. Our wonderful Teacher Assistants' used the teachable moment to share the meaning of Pchum Ben with the children to help them learn a snippet about our hosts culture.
New Buddies
Another exciting and reoccurring event commenced just before the holiday. We have new friends from Grade 3 that will be visiting us every Thursday afternoon.
The following excerpt from the Victoria State Government education website explains the purpose well.
"...Buddy systems help to promote friendship and support between older and younger peers through regular collaboration between their classes, fostering a sense of whole-school community. They also create friendships that enable both older and younger ‘buddies’ to bond more closely with their school, increasing the likelihood of more positive school behaviour for all students."
We met again last Thursday. The idea at the moment is for the children to establish trust and learn about each other through play. We are looking forward to new interactions next Thursday.
It's been busy in Early Years 2 since our last post. The children have been embracing the language of inquiry as thinkers and doers.
Reflection for learning
We continued our inquiry into our interests - transportation and imagination. Each child was given the opportunity to reflect on their experience about making and playing with the boat.
To guide the conversations, we used a four of the six D'Bono's thinking hats:
Yellow (positive) - What did you like about the experience?
Red (feelings) - How did you feel about it?
Black/purple (negative) - Was there anything you did not like or found difficult?
Green (creative) - Is there anything you would change? And if yes how?
Here is an old (2008), but informative video about DeBono's hats.
The children selected a smiley face to colour based on how they felt they participated in the project.
Here are a few examples of their feedback:
Imagination - Not-A-Box
Our ideas around the topic of imagination continued as we were able to review the work we did connecting to the story Not a Box, by Antoinette Portis. After reading the story, the children were challenged to use their imagination and illustrate their thinking. Please feel free to view their work hanging in the classroom.
Following on from that experience, we learned that our Grade 2 friends had also been learning about imagination using the same story. Grade 2 invited us to visit and view their work. We called this 'our first in-school field trip.'
Some of the children show themselves as great inquirers as they asked questions about the work they viewed. Later in class we reflected on what we had seen and how the Grade 2 3D Not-A-Box models differed from our imagination drawings.
Imagination continued...
As we continued our learning journey, we periodically brought the children's attention back to the inquiry cycle. To help them dig deeper (going further) into using their imagination they were challenged to complete the phrase:
If I could be anyone I wanted to be or do anything I could I would...
We have astronauts, princesses, police officers, doctors, teachers, pilots, builders and... Elsa's.
The teachers scribed each child's idea as they made their thinking visible using paint and at least one additional media. Their final work can be view in the classroom very soon.
Of course - parallel to illustrating imaginative ways of being, the children were keen to engage with friends from Ms. Karyn's class in dramatic play experiences and dress-up to bring their ideas to life.
Transportation
During the later part of the week, our attention was directed to inquiring into transportation. However, while doing so, the teachers focused on the students ability to work together - as a whole class, group, or pairs.
As a guide, we used the 'think-puzzle-explore' routine.
To begin the children organised themselves into groups using the feelings cards. Children with the same feeling sat together and brainstormed everything they thought they knew about transportation. Their ideas were documented on a poster.
Later they were presented with a variety of images relating to transportation or a transportation system. Armed with sticky notes and pencils, the teachers took notes of the children's conversations and possible questions that arose spontaneously. Some children select pictures they felt a connection to or saw something they wondered about.
The room filled with voices such as:
"is it on the water or on the land?", "is this a broken boat?" (Ken)
"I like it it like the same, it needs four!" (Valerie, while looking at a picture of a car and one of car tires).
"I see a motor!" (Chinsiv)
"Oh! a bicycle has big wheels and a motorbike has small ones." (Ivy)
"I like this hot air balloon because I want to fly with a balloon one day." (Bella)
Our 'Who we are' unit of inquiry exploring our interests will continue throughout the school year alongside the remaining three units.
Developing skills and understanding the attitudes and attributes of the learner profile
Every day the children are offered opportunities to play in ways to support their development in fine motor, language, social, and number skills.
Furthermore, we have been exploring print in our immediate environment, an inquiry that will continue for a longer period of time. We started by looking for print we could find in the classroom.
Later this week we plan to look for print on campus. In preparation for this the children were asked to think about choices. What choices should we make on our wonder walk to make it successful? What choices would make it difficult to do a wonder walk carefully?
One important aspect to consider as we explore visible and oral language (print), is to acknowledge the language we share in our homes. What does print look like and sound like in your mother tongue? In the literacies blog post from September 25th, we requested your assistance to support this inquiry.
Here an excerpt for your convenience:
'We would appreciate your support with our inquiry into the alphabet - its sounds and symbols.
Therefore, we are encouraging the students to bring copies of alphabets or other print code systems to share and discuss in class. The objective is to access the students prior knowledge about print. Also to observe how print is used in different contexts and languages.'
Attitudes and attributes of the IBPYP earner profile
Alongside these learning engagements, we have been working on increasing the children's awareness and understanding of the learner profile (LP). The children happily contribute to creating the poster for our display.
The children all know about the LP wall in the classroom and are excited about sticking on their well-earned LP tickets. Each time a child is observed displaying an attribute or attitude of the LP, he/she is given a ticket on which the teacher will write a brief note on what was observed. The tickets are written from the student's perspective in the 'I' form. For example, "I was a risk taker, because even though I am shy I talked about my interest during 'show and tell', or I was an inquirer and thinker when I was able to think of a good, different question to ask my friend about their interest." Attitudes are also acknowledged, such as when a child shows empathy towards a friend or a new level of confidence. It has been great to see that the children are beginning to understand what to look for and acknowledge what they see themselves.
Our First 'Mystery Reader'
We were delighted to have our first Mystery Reader visit us on the last Friday of the term. Thank you, Sophie! The story of Baby Gaston was very amusing :) and Silouan did a great job helping to paraphrase the French story.
Please consider being a Mystery Reader for the class. All the detail is in the letter from the last post here. However, to simplify the sign up I have created a google doc for your convenience. Please add your name and your child's name next to a date most convenient for you. Please be reminded not to tell your child that you are coming and send your clues in a few days before. Have a wonderful week
Notices:
Please note, this information is NOT in the October calendar on the blog so please mark your personal calendars.
School Photos October 20 & 22
During the first week back after the break, all students will have their photos taken.
