Play dough is fun

Almost all children enjoy playing with play dough. With this in mind I set up a play dough activity to entice our children who like to cook in the sand pit.  I wanted to see if the same cooking interest could be extended through play dough.

Boston showed the first interest. He makes great cup cakes in the sand pit however was a bit hesitant to participate with the play dough at first. When he warmed up he made wonderful cup cakes and then went onto make lolly pops and carried them through the kindergarten to see you who would like one. The play dough provided a great boost of confidence and he returned to the play dough a couple of days later to make more lolly pops.

"Who wants a cup cake or a lolly pop"? said Boston

Play dough is a great activity for all children as it requires no special skills and is an open ended activity where the imagination can run wild.

What would children create given the opportunity to use natural resources from the environment?

I will make a fish snail" said Shing

"I can make a caterpillar" - said Taupaki

A few days later, we changed the colour and provided different materials...now what would children create?

I make a crocodile" - said Quin

 "I made an entire family of insects" - Ella

 "I made a snow man and look his head comes off" - said Zoey

"Its a dinosaur, but I make a bear cause bears go in caves and a bad bear eats them " said Jai

 "I make a spider.  Eight legs, I count to eight legs. Spiders have a lot of mouths, more than me they have 3" - said Abbie

"It's a man" said Natalie

 "I make ice-cream cause I like ice-cream vanilla and chocolate" - said Belle

 "I making a giant" - said Lucas

"I make people", I like this play dough and I didn't know I like play dough"  said Jackson

The benefits of play dough include... 

• fine motor skill development, 
• it encourages creativity and imagination, 
• it is often a calming activity, 
• it is a social activity that can support the development of friendships, 
• play dough also supports literacy and numeracy,
• and most of all it is fun!

Purple Heart

Purple Heart

Spotlighting kindness.

He taonga rongonui te aroha ki te tangata

Goodwill towards others is a precious treasure.

Developing our kindness curriculum

As some of you may be aware, we developed our kindness curriculum as a way to show our support and aroha to the Holtz family who lost their son Eli earlier in the year through violence. 

As a team we were moved by their strength as a whanau and by their love and compassion for others who have been touched by violence, and like them we thought there must be something we can do.

For us it was about looking at how we could bring an anti violence message into the kindergarten day in proactive and positive ways. We shared conversations with our kindergarten whanau and came up with a range of things that we thought valuable and have been steadily working on these ideas. The astounding thing is that...

When we focus on kindness, 

kindness grows!

Creating our

Purple Heart

Stamp

We were very fortunate to have Hamilton artist Te Ahuora, come on board to help achieve our vision to grow kindness and aroha within our kindergarten day. 

He interpreted our ideas beautifully. It’s one thing to be able to draw, but to articulate someone’s whakaaro into art is really something else.

Te Ahuora really thought about what we were trying to achieve here and produced this wonderful art piece that speaks to children of kindness and reminds them of the aroha that is in their hearts to share.

Receiving a 

Purple Heart 

stamp

Love, compassion, empathy, generosity and joy for others are dispositions we want to nurture and are the attributes we look for when awarding children a 'Purple Heart' at kindergarten.

Tamariki receive a Purple Heart in recognition of their kindness and it's a special moment, a proud moment.

Of course we have a beautiful ritual surrounding this to honour kind efforts…

The stamp is placed on the wrist where children are able to feel their heart beating. Every time their heart beats, kindness is pushed out into the world to settle on the shoulders of others…in this way kindness grows.

Here the girls 'blow' on their Purple Heart stamp to push kindness out into the universe.

"I was folding the towels and I get a stamp. My friends were happy cause I made them get happy by folding the towels for them" said Taupaki.

What does kindness look like?

There are all sorts of ways that you can get a kindness stamp...

By caring for animals

Giving someone flowers

Doing a job for someone

Pushing a friend on the swing

Playing nicely together...being thoughtful, kind and caring.

Or showing a friend how to do something to help them achieve their goals.

"You have to be kind to people" said Sophia.

"When I give stuff to people I get a purple heart" said Darroll.

"Be nice and friendly and you get a purple heart" said Nat.

Taking responsibility to care for the environment...that's kind!

Helping a mate to put on his shoes...now that's an extremely friendly and a very kind thing to do!

"When you be someone's friend, you say please can you play with me and that's kindness, when you be nice" said Jacob.

"You help your friend get something or help them put their mihi outfit on" said Belle.

"You be very kind all day, sharing, showing people around and being helpful" said Kanin.


Or simply folding the laundry...that's helpful and kind. 

"There's lots of different ways to be kind"
 said Asjah.


While kindness might seem pretty straight forward to learn, it's a bit more complex than meets the eye.  We don't make children happy when we simply enable them to be receivers of kindness.  We escalate their feelings of happiness, improve their well being, reduce bullying, enrich their friendships, and build peace by teaching them to be 
givers of kindness." 
(Price-Mitchell, 2013)

 #Share your heart
In memory of Eli Holtz

It's almost here! Are you ready for Grandparents Day?

With Grandparents Day fast approaching children have been busy writing invitations, drawing portraits, and sharing stories about their beloved Grandparents.

They say a picture is worth a thousand words and drawing portraits of Grandparents has been a catalyst for some children to share their memories and thoughts about what makes their Grandparents special to them. 

Granny

“Her lives on a farm but I don’t. I help her feed the calves, I help feed the big calves up on the hill. I sometimes stay a night at Grannys… I like the farm cause there’s lots of things I can do”said Luca.

     

 

     

 

     

     

“Drawing is the easiest medium for children to master, and it quickly enables them to explain things with precision and detail. Children can make their thinking visible through drawing, and use it to make plans, theorise and tell stories" (Wright, 2012).

     

        

   

“Drawing is a powerful means for appreciating being… When children draw from memory, they can be transported back to a favourite place, person or event” (Wright, 2012)

And remember, Grandparents Day will be held at Bream Bay Kindergarten on Friday 14th September. Keep an eye on your mailbox (or your inbox) for your   invitation and further details.

Hope to see you there!