Week in Review September 22-26th

Week in Review 

September 22-26th 

Exploring the sand 

Over the past two weeks, the children have shown a great interest in the sand. The children have developed several different ideas about how they can manipulate the sand. Diego, Ivan, Victor, Rayan and Lauren started to develop strategies about how they can build with the sand. While Lilly, Jenna and Ibrahim were interested in creating pathways in the sand. 

Ms. Mehl provoked the children's thinking with clear plastic cups. As the children explored the plastic cups in the white sand many of them were focused on filling and dumping their cups. While in the wet outdoor sand the children enjoyed filling the cups up and turning them upside down. When they pulled their cups upwards they noticed a tall structure in the sand that resembled the shape of their cup. 

                       

We wanted to build on this idea of pathways so we placed a small amount of white sand on the blue art trays and offered the children combs, toothbrushes and paintbrushes. The children observed as the paintbrush and/or comb created positive and negative spaces on the blue trays. They noticed how the paint brush created large spaces, while the comb created small lines. 

Week in Review

September 15-19

Exploring Pathways

     Through our observations last week, we have noticed that the children are developing an interest in pathways.  We implemented two different experiences that incorporated this idea. In the first exploration, the children observed and discussed how the hermit crabs moved through the sand. They noticed that each hermit crab made a unique path that could  be followed through the sandbox. Vanessa noticed that "one crab moves kind of sideways." Paisley recognized that "the shell on that one leaves a mark, too."

As the children continued to watch the hermit crabs, they began to make their own paths in the sand with their fingers. "Look! I made my own marks." In the coming weeks, we will explore other ways that the children can create their own pathways.

The second exploration that we implemented this week used clear tubes and marbles. We were curious to see how the children would use the tubes as pathways for the marbles. Rayan, Diego and Ivan realized that they could connect the tubes by placing the end of one inside of another tube. This worked well to create a long path for the marbles; however, some of the larger marbles became stuck at the junction of the two tubes. The boys solved this problem by asking a teacher to hold the tubes for them. 

 We will continue to explore how to successfully connect the tubes together without "getting the marble stuck."