Mandy's School News

Reading: The Dragonflies Enjoy Our New Library

“I have a Halloween book. I picked it because I like monsters.” 
 “I have a book about the community. It’s about all the people who help other people when they write stuff for them.” 
 “I picked this book because I thought I would like it. This ghost takes the scarf and then the guy takes the ghost and puts it on like a scarf. ” 

“My book is about Clifford. It’s about when he goes to school with his mom. I saw it in the white part. See? It has a white sticker.” 

“This book is about a little girl who has a baby. I like babies. The cover had lots of babies on it.” 
“I got an animal book because I wanted to see how animals look. Here is a snake. Do Toads give you spots when you touch them?” 
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Mandy's School News

Inquiry: The Bumblebees Balloon Study Timeline

The Bumblebee Pre-K kids have embarked on another adventure: they have decided that they are really interested in learning more about balloons – how the float, why some float and some don’t, how they deflate, what happens if you fill them with sand… 
So they are off!

Here is the timeline their teachers posted in the hallway to document their study and findings: 

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Mandy's School News

The Imagination Playground is Here!!!

Phase one: Exploration
We got our new Imagination Playground blocks this week and, as you can see, the kids are just a little bit excited…

Dragonflies:

 “I was building a home for these little round things.  I was pretending that they were babies. We were playing with them and we builded a house for them.”

 “I really love them!  I think that we can make cool things with them.”  

  “They were fun. We made furniture. It wasn’t just me.  [Other people] made the furniture, too.”

“I like these long ones. They make things taller!”

Spiders:

“Build a city we can play in!”
“I’m just helping moving things back and forth.”
“It’s enjoying to work together cause if you work together it can help.”

 Bumblebees:




 “I’m building a castle!”



 “There’s enough blocks for everyone!”


 “I am making a slide for the balls.”


 “We can work together to make a castle.”



Beetles:

 “They’re big!”


 “I’m building a house.


 “Let’s use these as hoses.”  

” This is a train track.”


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Inquiry: The Bumblebees’ Community Helper Movie!

The 4-year old Bumblebees made a movie for the culminating project of their Community Helper study. Throughout this 2-month long inquiry study, they studied various community helpers; such as firemen, policemen and EMT workers. They tried to think of a way to share what they learned with their families and the community. They came up with the idea of making a movie, wrote the story, narrated and helped with production. We present to you “The Cat That Got Stuck In A Tree.” We hope you enjoy!



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Cooking: Crickets Make Ravioli!

After talking about Italy the 3 year-old Cricket class decided to make their own ravioli from scratch! First they worked together to make the dough and then they stuffed the ravioli with ricotta cheese and spinach. Bon Appetit!


Mixing the ingredients

Exploring the flour

“This is fun, but a bit messy!”

 Time to try them!
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Mandy's School News

Play: Ladybugs Make Play Structures with Boxes

Check out our 2-year old ladybugs figuring out how to recycle refrigerator boxes and turn them into indoor play structures! Sometimes they are houses, castles, tunnels, and forts. They have been using them non-stop during dramatic play. Fun!

“I’m in the fire house!” 


 “Find me, find me!!” 

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Inquiry: Researching and Building a Fire Truck Out of Blocks!

The Dragonfly pre-k kids are doing an inquiry study on firefighters. They decided to make a fire truck with blocks. They first carefully drew their plans on the easel prior to block construction. 

(R)“We had an idea to draw a fire truck, so we copied it different. Then we started making it. I made something to get inside the fire truck.” 

(L)“I gave her the idea to put the siren on there. (Points to blocks) This is the siren we drew in our plans.”

Next they used a book about Fire Fighters to research fire trucks in order to help them build their own fire truck in the block area!
“We used the book because we didn’t know if we wanted to use sirens, so we decided to use a book to find a picture of a siren.”
“We didn’t know how we were going to make it [the fire truck] so the book showed us pictures to use.”
Ta da! Presenting the Dragonfly’s very own fire truck. 
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Mandy's School News

Reading: A New Class Job!

The Bumblebees have a new class job that they have come up with on their own: Acorn Reader! Every day, one child reads a book to their pet fish Acorn. And the crazy thing is that Acorn moves over to look at the book every time!!

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Science: Spiders’ Chocolate Taste Test

The Spiders K/1 class had a talk during lunch one day about chocolate: “What is white chocolate?” one student inquired. A long conversation ensued about chocolate with the teachers and children. “How can it be white if all other chocolate is brown?” After multiple conversations, a further investigation and taste test was carried out. 

“This one feels softer than the darker one. It’s more moist!”

“They get blacker!” 
“This white one tastes more like milk.”

“That dark one tastes sour and a little bitter.”


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