A great sunny start to term four.

Wow! take a look at some of the activities we have been up to this week.... With the sunny weather we have been able to get outside and make the most of the days.  

Experimenting with Clay

Clay is a fantastic medium for children to explore!

It invites children to physically manipulate by squeezing, pinching, patting, poking holes, breaking pieces off, rubbing, as well as stacking up on top of each other. 

Clay is another medium for children to creatively express themselves and communicate their ideas with others.

Most children approach the clay tentatively at first before becoming engrossed in the sensory experience. Often the clay is a little dry at first and then the children begin to bring a little water to the clay. 

  

The children begin to notice changes in the clay, in both the way it feels and the way it looks.  As they work with the clay children communicate with each other, collaborate together, sharing ideas, skills and knowledge with one another.

Box Construction and using the hot glue gun

This week at Kindergarten we have been learning to use the hot glue gun for creating box robots and many other different creations that the children have wanted to make.  

Box construction provides opportunities for children to explore scientific and mathematical concepts as they combine boxes and other materials together into three dimensional structures. As children construct they develop skills for problem solving, investigating, applying and reflecting on learning. What could I do differently next time?  What worked and what didn't?

Look what we did at Kindergarten today.  

Children were given a provocation where paint was set up in trailers.  Two pictures were provided one of a truck and the other of a tractor.  This was to encourage different types of children to interact with this type of medium - painting.  Lots of children interacted and lots of children noticed the details and the colours of the pictures provided.  

Well done tamariki on your mahi.

Pulley system...fostering curiosity

Cordahl was playing with the window blind.  Watching the roller end as he pulled on the cord to make the blind roll up.  Then pulling on the opposite cord to watch the blind roll down.  Over and over, up and down, again and again.

I could tell by the look on Cordahl's face, the way his eyes lit up, that this was fascinating stuff for him.  The way that he repeated the action spoke of his need to work it all out.  

Cordahl is such a joy to watch in action...he is a real tutu fingers...he wants to know, he wants to understand and he's hands on and in there.  We describe this as a disposition of curiosity and this is important in terms of learning.

Carr describes dispositions as patterns of learning: patterns of behaviour, thinking and interaction.  Dispositions describe the child as a learner and supports children's own thinking to see themselves as "someone who...tries new things...keeps going when it gets hard...knows when to stop and ask...learns from making mistakes" etc. 

Introducing pulley systems as a provocation to foster curiosity...

            The allure of buckets hanging on pulley's from the rafters within the kindergarten were a temptation too irresistible for the children to pass by.                                                                                

Max is in a state of awe! 

 

This play and learning experience both excited and challenged children's thinking.  With encouragement they

showed persistence with a difficult task as they trialled ways to be successful with the challenge at hand.  They gained considerable satisfaction from their efforts too! 

Trying alternative strategies and pushing the boundaries of thinking...it is possible to overcome obstacles, work it out and achieve goals.

A look of wonder on the girls face as they work out how to raise the buckets using the ropes and pulley system.

Te Whariki states the importance of providing children opportunities to experience an environment where they learn strategies for active exploration, thinking and reasoning.  That children develop confidence in using a variety of strategies for exploring and making sense of the world...the confidence to choose and experiment with materials, to play around with ideas, and to explore actively with all the senses (Ministry of Education, 1996). 

Cordahl and Olivia are just loving the challenge of working it all out.

"The fundamental purpose of education for the 21st Century, it is argued, is not so much the transmission of particular bodies of knowledge, skill and understanding as facilitating the development of the capacity and the confidence to engage in  lifelong learning.  Central to this enterprise is the development of positive learning dispositions, such as resilience, playfulness, and reciprocity" (Claxton and Carr, 2002) and of course curiosity!