We had another amazing week at school filled with so many fun activities and centers. Here is a look back on some of my posts from this past week (I try to post everyday, so if you want to see everything, make sure you follow me!)

Our students were finding potato bugs (as they call them, but they are also called roly-poly or pill bugs) and were asking lots of questions about them. So we made a habitat for the bugs in our classroom, and set up an inquiry center (the “I See, I think,  I wonder” page  can be found here). We watched videos, read books and looked up more information on them. They’ve also had to feed them (they take leftover vegetables from their lunch and cut them into small pieces to add to the container). It has been awesome seeing how much they learned about these little crustaceans!

We introduced watercolor paints to students, and encouraged them to try and paint different lines. I put up some Van Gogh paintings to inspire them to create something  with lines. Students did really well with this, and loved creating colorful paintings!

At the end of the week, we watched a video about Van Gogh (this one) and read The Artist and Me by Shane Peacock. Then students had the opportunity to paint their own masterpieces inspired by Vincent Van Gogh. Before they began, we discussed being mindful of what we are painting and to have a plan of what we wanted to create. Then we discussed the tools we were going to use. They had paint (red, blue, purple, yellow and white- note there was no green, this student created it herself!), a paintbrush and a plastic fork. They had to paint their picture first, then use the fork to create lines and movement in their paintings. They had so much fun with this activity, and it was great to see their thinking and the process they used to create their art pieces.

Our letter loose parts center from this week. This month we are focusing on the letters S, A, I, T. Students could pick the letter and how they wanted to create it with loose parts. I love the book Alphabet Under Construction by Denise Fleming. It goes through each letter of the alphabet and constructs it in different ways to match the letter (for example, Buttons the B).

Come back next week to see what we get up to. We have lots of 10 Black Dots activities happening and we are going to start looking at 2D shapes so I will have lots to share!