The Biggest Best Snowman!

This week we did a mini-unit on Snowmen. I don't know who had more fun, me or the kiddos!! We started the week off by brainstorming materials needed to build a snowman. Here is the list that my kinders came up with:

 

The next day I read the book The Biggest Best Snowman by Margery Cuyler. I really do love this book...for several reasons. But if you haven't read it, be sure to pick it up and check it out.

 After reading the book, I asked students to tell me what steps we would take to build a snowman. As I called on the students, I wrote down each step in turn. They were pretty detailed in their directions.

 After building the list, I noticed that they had used the same words throughout their directions, so we went through and circled the reoccurring words that were new to us. These words then became our new sight words for the week and the directions became our new poem for the week. The best part about it, the kiddos WROTE this POEM!!! They were so proud to take ownership. They wanted to change the title though. Instead of "How to Build a Snowman"...they changed it to "I Made a Snowman".

On Wednesday, we did a following directions activity. I gave each student a white piece of paper and students drew a snowman based on the directions I gave. Step by step, just like the students had told me the day before, I gave them directions. I also talked about using all of the space that they are given, meaning, don't make a teensy tiny snowman when they have a whole sheet of paper. This is how some of their snowmen turned out:

Thursday, I had students work together with a partner to make a snowman on a large piece of poster board. Again, I stressed the importance of an artist using the whole canvas to make their masterpiece, not just a tiny corner. When assigning partners, I pulled names out of our pick-sticks and the two names that I pulled out at the same time were partners. This was probably my favorite activity of the whole week. I watched them work so well together to design very unique snowmen/snowwomen!

When they were finished, I had the pairs stand up and talk about the snowman/woman that they drew. The one on the left has Santa in his sleigh being pulled by two reindeer. Very creative and they must be missing Christmas ;)

 Then today, Friday, students worked by themselves to build their own snowman with construction paper. The only materials they could use were scissors, glue and construction paper.

 Then lastly, I typed up the poem that the students wrote, and we illustrated them to help us remember the words. We also highlighted the new sight words that were learned this week. Then students glued the poems in their PIG (Poetry Is Great) folders and took home to read to their family.

And to top it all off, we ended our week with snowfall and more in the forcast for tomorrow! So, hopefully students will be able to go out and build their own REAL snowman with the freshly fallen snow this long three day weekend!

 Carie is a kindergarten teacher from Illinois who writes on the 17th of each month. She shares her experiences and ideas from her classroom, reading, writing, math, Art, and several other fun and exciting things!

Carie also writes her own blog: 

Kindergarten Hugs

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IMPROVISATION GAMES for IMPROVED LITERACY

IMPROVISATION CAN CONNECT TO LEARNING 

Welcome back to my blog and Happy New Year!  If you're new to me, I'm Enrique and I work with children, teachers and parents all over the world through my F.A.M.E. Foundation and through Context Method/MyTown Music.  Using artistic approaches to elevate how anyone learns is what we do.

I have used improvisation games for many years.  At first I used them to simply let the young learners have a break in their day that was fun.  Then I realized how much learning was taking place naturally, especially related to language, both spoken and embodied.  One of my favorite improv games is called TAXI.

I had played this game with K - 5 students, where the students become a passenger and/or driver in a taxi cab.  Each student becomes an emotion and embodies that emotion with what they say and do.

I hadn't yet tried the game with middle and high school students, but once I did, I found it was huge hit with that age group!

Then, I thought I should try it with adults in our professional development sessions, and WOW, did they love it.  They were as engaged as actors were.  I found that many adults had an actor/actress inside them wanting to come out and play!

Then about 3 months ago, I tried this game with preschool children and the result was…. the children wanted to play the game over and over again.  Below is an image from Gregory Sidor's blog "Everybody's a Comedian: An Easy Improv Party Game.  I encourage you to check it out.  It's a great resource.  Below are the essential steps I take when I engage preschool children in this game that elevates learning in many ways.

STEP 1: With children sitting in a circle demonstrate emotions with your own face and body and have the children guess which emotion you are.  Encourage children to volunteer to be the one demonstrating the emotion.  This step can go on for days, if not weeks.  Let it happen.  You're building skill level for the actual Taxi Improv game.

STEP 2: Place 4 chairs in the middle of the rug with children sitting around them.  Demonstrate with your fellow teachers or some visiting parents.  The first person, the driver of the taxi cab, chooses an emotion but doesn't tell anyone what it is.  This individual becomes this emotion with what they say and how they use their body language as they enter the taxi and begin to drive.

STEP 3: The 2nd person chooses their own emotion without telling anyone and enters the taxi embodying that emotion.  THE TAXI CAB DRIVER, the first person, does their best to become the emotion of the 2nd person.  

STEP 4: The 3rd and 4th individuals do the same as the 2nd person.  In the end, 4 emotions will have been experienced.

NOTE: It is a very good idea to write down a list of emotions the children know on a board of some type to help them have a visual of what the word looks like and to help them have a selection to choose from.  Grow this list of words over time.

With young children, you'll most likely be starting with words like "Happy", "Sad", "Mad", and "Funny."  Remember to not underestimate the children's abilities.  Start with those kinds of words and take the risk to extend on those words.  For example, once they know "Happy", you can introduce "Excited", which they probably know, and go on to words like "Exuberant."

Have fun and remember that fun IS NOT fluff!  Fun is where it's at.  Fun is an INVITATION to the learner to create and discover! To read more about improvisation, check out my book/e-book Living Like a Child!
Enrique
Founder, F.A.M.E. Foundation
Co-Founder, Context Method
Film Composer

Quick and easy gifts and a FREEBIE

Christmas is quickly approaching! Do you have all of your parent gifts done? Do you have them wrapped? Do you have student gifts ready?? So much to do with the time quickly passing! Only EIGHT, I repeat, EIGHT days until Christmas! Can you believe it?? But that means only 3 more days until break for me…how about you? Are you already on your Christmas break?

If you are panicking about what to do for parent gifts this year here are a couple quick and easy ideas. 

Handprint Mittens:

Materials:

·       mitten cutout or pattern

·       Small heart pattern or cut out

·       White paint

·       Paintbrush

·       Cold hands, warm heart print out

·       Hole punch

·       Pipe cleaners

·       Student pictures

·       Markers

Directions:

·       Students cut out the mittens

·       Students Write: Love, Student 2013 on the back of the mitten

·       Teacher paints their hands and students place them in the mitten.

·       While paint is drying, cut out hearts and cold hands, warm heart sayings.

·       Glue heart in center of hand and saying down by the fingers.

·       Glue the child’s photo in center of the heart.

·       Laminate (optional)

·       Paper punch to of mitten and ring a pipe cleaner through the hole.

Easy as 1 – 2 – 3~

Tissue Paper Wreaths:

Materials:

·       Student pictures

·       Small white paper plate (or white circle cut outs)

·       Small red circle cut outs (for center of the wreath)

·       Red and green tissue paper cut in small squares/rectangles

·       Glue

·       Pencils

·       Paper Punch

·       Pipe cleaners

·       Scratch paper

Directions:

·       Students glue the little red circle in the center of the white paper plate/circle

·       Students take scratch paper and put a big glob of glue on it.

·       They take their pencils, wrap a piece of tissue paper around the eraser end of the pencil and dip it in the glue and glue it around the edge of the white circle. Repeat this step until all of the white is filled in with tissue paper interspersing a few red pieces of tissue paper (holly berries)

·       Glue student picture in the center

   Easy as 1 -2 -3

What do you get your students for Christmas?? I used to spend money on books and all kinds of goodies but a few years ago I realized that a pad of paper and a pen was a HUGE HIT! So, that is what I do, I head to the dollar store and find cute pads of paper and fun gel pens. The kids get so excited because they now have their OWN pad of paper to keep notes on. 

Also, do you have your students do anything over break?? For those of you who didn't know, I like to have my students continue to practice certain skills so I send home a Holiday Challenge packet. It is filled with simple activities for them to do at home, to keep their brains busy. The students who return it after break get a special prize...usually a trip to my treasure box.

Click here for a copy of the packet!

Enjoy and I hope you have a VERY MERRY CHRISTMAS!! And a HAPPY and SAFE NEW YEAR!

Teaching Kindness and Acceptance

I just adore Chrysanthemum...How can you not fall in love with this sweet, cute, precious little mouse?? Even my students love her!

  

This year, we kicked off the year using the book Chrysanthemum by Kevin Henkes, to teach our unit on names. After reading the book to students and completing the activites, I had to ask myself, "Why have I never used this book to teach names, acceptance, kindness and respect for ourselves and others? WHY WHY WHY??"

 On the first day I just read the story to students and let them discuss what we read.

One the second day, before I read the story, I had a large red heart that I showed the children. We talked about how nice and pretty the heart was without any crinkles or markings on it. Then I told the children that each time they heard hurtful words, to crumple up the heart. I got this idea from Nancy over at First Grade W.O.W! Click on the link to take you directly to her post on this particular Chrysanthemum mini unit and to get other ideas! (She has some really great ideas for teaching social skills, I love her blog!)

At the end of the book, our heart was crumpled and it actually even tore a little bit. This brought us to the discussion of how words that we use can be hurtful and when we use hurtful words, they make a mark on someones heart that can't be fixed. I showed that students that once a heart is broken...or crinkled, it may never be the same...we can't smooth out the heart after those words are said...we can't take back hurtful words. I let that soak in for a little bit and let the students discuss their feelings and if someone has ever hurt them.

Day 3, I read the story yet again and this time we talk about ways to help heal someones heart or keep it from getting hurt. Some of the ideas my students came up with were: Saying I am sorry, not using those words at all, being kind to everyone, not  making fun of others and helping others.
After that discussion, we took our band-aides and helped to heal Chrysanthemum's heart and attached a poem to the center that reads: Before you speak, think and be smart. It's hard to fix a wrinkled heart!

Day 4 - Students made their own Chrysanthemum! The kiddos were so proud of them and I must say, they turned out adorable! We also made speech bubbles, from Chrysanthemum that say "I think the name _________ is perfect! Love, Chrysanthemum" I made this into our bulletin board for the quarter, to remind my students to always think before they speak.

Day 5: I let the kiddos act out the story as I narrated. Since this was our first acting of the school year, of course many of the students were shy and not sure what to do, but they tried their best and NO ONE made fun of each other...and that is all that mattered because that meant, the lesson taught them exactly what it was supposed to :)

And I must say after doing this mini unit, I hear my students complimenting each other all day long, every day! It is such a wonderful sound...music to my ears.

 Carie is a kindergarten teacher from Illinois who writes on the 17th of each month. She shares her experiences and ideas from her classroom, writing about reading, writing, math, Art, and several other fun and exciting things!

Carie also writes her own blog: 

Kindergarten Hugs

Kindergarten Hugs

Celebrating Dr. Seuss

Hi! I am Carie from Kindergarten Hugs! I hope you are having a wonderful weekend!


We will be celebrating the work of Dr. Seuss during the last week of February to take us right into READ Across America Day on Friday, March 1!  It all starts with teachers reading Seuss books and doing Seuss inspired activities all week long. We also have special dress days throughout the week! Click here to see the list! Our READ Across America committee puts together a letter that goes out to our staff to prepare them for the whole week! See that letter here. Then for the grand finale on Friday evening, our school hosts a "Dr. Seuss Family Night".

 Friday is the day of Seuss week that the students LOVE the most so, I wanted to share what we do on that Friday, with you today!

We usually begin the day with an assembly where a local judge comes in, has the children raise their right hand and recite the "Readers Oath".  Then teachers put on their own production of "Green Eggs and Ham" and "The Grinch" and sometimes classes will perform skits or poems as well. Then the students sing a Seuss chant to end the assembly. We also have guest readers from the community come in throughout the day and read a Dr. Seuss book to our classes! Community members include (but are not limited to): Police officers, firemen, local radio personalities, local business owners and doctors. Our guest readers then remind our students to come and join us in the evening for a fun filled night of laughter, togetherness, reading and games! Throughout the day, classes are making and eating special Seuss treats; whether they be cupcakes, cookies or any other treat! This year, my class will be making Seuss Hat treats! Made with Ritz crackers and gummy lifesavers stuck together with vanilla frosting! YUM!

Then comes....

DR. SEUSS FAMILY NIGHT! 
which includes...

Free- Family- Fun

Students and their FAMILIES are encouraged to come and enjoy a FREE evening at the school filled with lots of FUN!

The doors open at 6p and as families are walking in the door they are able to sign up for door prizes (usually brand new hard cover Seuss books or stuffed Seuss characters). Then they are free to choose where to go and what to do next! Families enjoy the night of games and craft projects that are based on a variety of Dr. Seuss books. Some of the activities include: 

• Seuss Treat Making
• Guess How Many Fish? (we have a fishbowl full of goldfish crackers)
• Family Read (families can bring their own blankets or use ones provided to read books together on the gym floor. They also get to choose a free book to take home with them).
• The School Book Fair (this is usually the busiest place the whole night and the first year we will not be having it the same week as Seuss :(  )
• Seuss Bingo
• Oobleck 
• Crafts
• Cake Walk
• Bucket toss
• Bulls-eye toss 
• Pictures with a Seuss Character (Some of our staff and their family members dress up as Suess Characters such as Who-ville characters, Horton, Cat-in-the-hat, Sam I Am etc... 

Here are some pictures of our staff dressing up!

Characters from Who-ville!

Another Who-ville character! 

 Our Seuss Night brings in approximately 400 people to help celebrate Dr. Suess' Birthday! We always have a blast as a staff! As do the kiddos and their family members! Where else can a whole family go for free these days? Not many places! AND they will come home with lots of prizes, treats and a free book or 2!

I would love to hear how you celebrate READ Across America!

Monday, Monday (freebie)

Here it is the Monday after a terrible tragedy took place just three days ago and my heart continues to ache for the families of those who lost their lives at Sandy Hook Elementary School. It also aches for those poor children who witnessed this tragedy. I will continue to send my love and prayers to the city of Newtown, CT and I ask that you do the same if you are someone who prays.

As you begin your Monday, many of your students may have questions, may be fearful or confused. If you are needing help in knowing how to assist them please visit Debbie Clement's post from yesterday that have several resources for you.

In light of the fast approaching holiday I have put together a Holiday Challenge checklist for those of you who want to keep your students brains busy while they are away from school during the winter break. I send the checklist home with students over the break but it is not mandatory. Students who complete the checklist can bring it back signed and completed get a starburst and a BEE buck (our 'caught doing something positive' tickets) And the best part...this checklist is a FREEBIE just for you! Just click on freebie above or the picture below and download it for your kiddos today!

Take care, God Bless and love your students unconditionally! Keep doing what your doing and make a difference in their lives!

Happy Holidays!

WHAT ELSE? Engaging Critical Thinking Skills. An INTERACTIVE BLOG!

REKINDLING DISCOVERY & WONDER!

"PLAY IS THE HIGHEST FORM OF RESEARCH."  Albert Einstein said that!  Really, he did. 

"FUN IS NOT FLUFF."  I said that... and I'm proud to say it every time I have the opportunity to work with teachers and parents across our country.  The words "What Else?" which come from my dear colleague, friend, and mentor, Mimi Chenfeld, speak to playing, discovering, wondering and doing so as we look for more depth in learning.

THE GOAL OF TODAY'S BLOG:
It's so wonderful to have you back and I'm so happy to be able to share with you some fantastic images which I hope will give you ideas on how to re-direct children's abundant energy in ways which elevates their critical thinking skills and so, so,  SO many other ways of learning.

There is something called the:

NEXT GENERATION SCIENCE STANDARDS.  They are so cool. They talk about things like big concepts that we want all young learners to start recognizing.  One of them is one we all know in the PreK and K world... Patterns!!!  Another I'd like you to think about with our first image is:

CAUSE AND EFFECT

Take a moment and really look at this next image.  Soak it in and then comment as to what kinds of things children would learn by placing objects inside the tubes.  I'm not going to give the answer away in the blog, but rather in my reply to your comments.  If you like, you can also email me directly at enriquehankfeldman@gmail.com.

CAUSE AND EFFECT

FOOD!!!  

I'm such a foodie.  I love to cook and I am the chef in my home.  I've even found ways to be much healthier and in doing so, I've lost 53 lbs over the past 4 years.  Below is an image related to food.  What can we learn from asking children about what their favorite food is?  Take a glance at this next image and read the comments from children when asked that question.  Feel free to comment and I'll be happy to reply.

A CHILD'S NAME

We all know a child's name is a powerful gateway to learning in multiple areas.  We usually think about it related to literacy and that's great!  What about math?  What about patterns?  Enjoy this next image and if you'd like to engage me with a comment, I'll be pleased to read your comment and reply back to you. 

SHAPES AND OUR WORLD

Children are so connected to life.  They are a great reminder to us adults that there is so much wonder and richness all around us.... all the time!  So, back to the concepts of the Next Generation Science Standards...this time think about "Stability and Change."  What is that?  Is it one or the other?  Do they co-exist?  Can we guide young children in playful ways so that they begin to understand this kind of a concept?  I used to think the answer was no, but over the last two years I've been asked to design play-based approaches that combine Arts Integration for PreK and K which connect to things like STEM, the Common Core, and these Next Generation Science Standards.... and yes, in playful, developmentally appropriate ways.  At first, about 20% of my brain said....ughhhhh, but the other 80% which is still like a child, said, "That could be fun!"  Guess what I noticed?  I was making decisions on what I thought would be good for children based on my own prejudging.  I'm no scientist, but I do know how to search for things on google.... I challenged myself and oh what fun!

Look at this next image and ask yourself:

• What is this child creating?
• How did they create it?
• What are they learning?
• Is it related to something this child has seen?
• What is stable about it?
• What could change about it?

ACTIVATING WHAT CHILDREN ALREADY KNOW

In my part of the country, you see lots of nature.  We can use things from nature to create different kinds of Art.  We can use these objects found in nature to classify, identify and compare!  Look at the image below.  

• What do you see?
• Can you make any comparisons?
• What could you and your children make from these things?

THE GREAT OUTDOORS!

When you think of a garden, what do you think of?  Some say food, some say plants, some say nature, other say the sun, others trees, some think of cycles and many other wonderful observations are in fact possible.  Have you ever taken your children through a project of sorts based on an outdoor space?

Related to this next image:

• What visual cues are obvious?
• What visual cues are not so obvious?
• What auditory cues might be obvious?
• What auditory cues might not be so obvious?
• What kinds of kinesthetic cues are obvious?
• What kinds of kinesthetic cues might not be so obvious?

LETTERS AND COLORS

This final image is so simple, but it's so powerful.  GIANT LETTERS hanging from the ceiling.  Think about the process that went into making these letters.

• What would children learn by co-creating these shapes?
• When would children see these letters?
• What might move these letters?
• How could you use this concept in other areas of learning?

I hope you're enjoyed today's journey.  It has been a pleasure being your guide.  If you like what you saw today and what you experienced, check out my newest book, "Living Like a Child" and check out my Foundation's newest partners, Arts Integration Solution!  Check out their "Ai Minutes!"

Cheers,
Enrique C. Feldman, Founder and Director of Education
Fostering Arts-Mind Education Foundation
Film Composer and Producer

SUNSHINE ART!

It's Enrique here and thanks for stopping by to check out my blog.  I have the most wonderful relationships with so many great preschool and kinder classrooms.  I'm so fortunate to have the opportunity to work with so many lovely teachers, children and parents and the thanks they show fuels in such an authentic way!

If you're been reading my blogs, you'll notice that I have been spending a lot of time with the Sunnyside Head Start preschool classrooms.  It's a truly magical place, as are many of the centers in Tucson, Arizona.  

Welcome to one of those classrooms... 

THE SUNSHINE CLASSROOM!

As you can read below, back during the 2005 - 2006 school year, the children of this room chose their inspiration, their interest, there POV, if you will.  Their perspective and how they saw things is what the teachers so cleverly allowed to be the motivational aspect for the entire year.  The children chose...

THE SUN! 

One of the really exciting things about this approach is that the:

• TEACHERS ENGAGED THE CHILDREN using QUESTIONS.
• TEACHERS VALIDATED ALL THE CHILD RESPONSES.
• TEACHERS POSTED THE CHILD RESPONSES.

This approach says to the child, "your ideas matter."  When we feel we matter, we all bring such wonderful energy to whatever situation we are involved with.  Below you can read some of those responses.  Enjoy!!!

Additionally, teachers engaged the children with the opportunity to

"represent what they knew about the sun" in artistic ways.  

The children's knowledge of the sun grew over time from their prior knowledge and then building on that through discovery and dialogue.  Below is one example of a child's perspective on:

• WHAT THE SUN LOOKS LIKE
• WHAT THE SUN FEELS LIKE
• WHAT THE SUN DOES
• HOW THE SUN MAKES THEM FEEL

Enjoy this lovely piece of process-based Art!

What could YOU do with YOUR CHILDREN?  Perhaps you could try some of the following ideas which all build on critical thinking skills in loving ways by engaging the interest of the children.

• TAKE THE CHILDREN OUTSIDE AND ASK THEM WHAT THEY SEE?
• ASK THE CHILDREN WHY CERTAIN THINGS GROW?
• ASK WHAT DO PLANTS NEED TO GROW?

Once you discover the interest of a group of children or an individual child, expand on that interest by:

• ASKING THE CHILD WHAT THEY KNOW ABOUT THEIR INTEREST
• ASK CHILDREN AND PARENTS TO SHARE WHAT THEY KNOW WITH EACH OTHER
• AFTER CHILDREN HAVE SHARED WITH PARENTS, REVISIT WHAT THEY KNOW
• FIND WAYS FOR CHILDREN TO REPRESENT WHAT THEY KNOW WITH ART

If you wanted to, you would carry a like this on over a period of time, which can lead to very meaningful learning.  This also builds community by creating a sense of "who the class is."  Here is a photo of the garden at Sunnyside Head Start.  What a fantastic place for discovery to begin and continue!

I hope you've enjoyed this quick blog and that it's inspired you to look around at all you see and look for opportunities to connect your young ones to learning in ways which interest them deeply.  When you see a young child entranced with something, remember that you have found their "magnet!"  Once you've found this connection, it's up to all of us to find ways to use that in numerous ways to make learning a joyful experience!  TEACH and GUIDE ON!!!  

Many of these concepts and techniques can be found in my book "Living Like a Child."

Enrique