Hi Everyone,
Took me a few tries to get on BUT I'm here and I've got it! Just spend the last little while looking through all the posts and before I say anything can I just say WE ROCK! I'm so excited to be apart of this team learning journey. After reading the posts I've become inspired with so many ideas. Jen - I love how you've labeled Wednesday as 'Walk Wednesday'. What a great way to have structure and routine mixed with flexible learning (learning that happens organically during 'Walk Wednesday'). I welcome the idea to have some of your students share their journals entries with my SK S.
Since our large meeting my teaching partner and I have added different strategies into our program. One of the things we are working hard on is "not working harder than our students" After listening to Stan talk about this I stepped back and realized how capable young minds are. We have done this in simple ways - i.e. when there is a problem we simple support by saying, "I notice _ looks sad how are we going to problem solve this." I catch myself posing more questions and giving less information at the start.
We continue with our Forest Friday adventures - although the last two Friday have been cold we have still gone out. We have changed our loose parts station to objects collected in the forest by our students. This makes it personal and gives a sense of empowerment because they have chosen it.
Next, I'd like to focus on finding something that is a "problem" (real life problem within our community - learning locally) and determine as a whole how we can solve it.
We are continuing with our amaryllis investigation which will come to an end after March Break because its life cycle is over.. We've noticed a sense of "providing" with our student when they took care of, observed and researched our amaryllis. We've got some seeds from TomatoSphere (controlled seeds - from earth, and seeds that harvested on the international space station in July and August 2016). We plan to grow these inside and place them (the ones that survive) into the outside school garden. We also plan to place a birds nest (that I found) in the forest and have our students find it - our hope is that our students notice the garbage in the nest - the rest is up to our students.
Caitlyn
I love your idea about showing the bird's nest with garbage in it... I'm so curious to see what great thoughts and discussions come from it. Please share when your kindies have had a chance to see it!
ReplyDeleteCan't wait to share we plan to do the nest this coming Friday!
Deleteas for problems -well you can wait until one comes along or you can raise one -and it does not have to be complex
ReplyDelete-example mud in the hall after recess -we all walk out into the hall, look at the mud -ask why it might be a problem -maybe relate to a person like the custodian -go back in side and have a KBC on how we might help
-keep notes on the talk and if nothing arises that is okay -wait until tomorrow and one of them may bring in an idea
-could be as simple as making a sign for other students and/or going to other classes in small groups to present the problem and ask for other students to help -lots of learning here but i think the most important learning would be around having voice -having ability to help -the world need a lot of this right now
I like that way of approaching it thank you - it's allow the students to:
Delete1. wonder/think
2. asking "how can I fix/solve this problem"
3. my ideas are valued
Hey Caitlyn,
ReplyDeleteI loved reading about your journey thus far and how you are bringing nature in as well! To piggyback on Stan's post, I think the relevancy and authenticity of our work can be something as simple as the mud in the hall! So perfect. How can we all promote respect of our spaces? I am also thinking of the garbage that is in your nest and the impact garbage has on our animals. I know that our Grade 3s are quite upset and frequently comment on the dog poop outside. Excited to read more!