A interesting game of pretend emerged this week outside. Kyla, Tessa and Amelia began a game where they were yelling at each other. While their faces, half smiling, gave away that this was not really voices of anger, they nonetheless informed us they were playing “being mad” through their game of “yelling.”
Joining in, we wondered with them Do people yell when they are mad at you? By this point, this game caught the attention of other friends who jumped into the conversation.
“Yeah!” -Kyla
“No. Their face gets angry!” -Eva
We wondered again with the children about how we know when someone is angry. How do we behave when we are angry? How can we tell when we are angry?
“When I get angry I do a scary face.” -Eva
“I yell!” -Kyla
“I walk away and then I yell.” -Amelia
“I yell and walk away.” -Kyla
Wendy experienced a person who seemed angry one morning driving behind her in a car. She shared with the children that she noticed this person seemed angry by the look on her face and she wondered aloud with them about why and what she could have done to know. We wondered with them what they do when they are mad.
“Maybe you could yell back.” -Kyla
“No, you could get out of your car and ask what’s wrong.” -Amelia
“I walk away and have some time alone.” -Victoria
“Yeah, I walk away and when I’m better I come back.” -Emma
This moment spoke to us about sharing our ideas about feelings together. In our work to discover more about what makes “me”, feelings are an essential part of us. Reading the story In My Heart: A Book of Feelings by Jo Witek, the children are introduced to how our hearts can feel so many feelings. Some making us feel “light as a balloon or as heavy as an elephant.” From the book’s cover showing a series of colorful hearts growing smaller with each feeling depiction we note,
“If we dig all the way down to the red heart, we’ll be at the end.” -Jack
Labels of feelings and descriptions to illustrate bubble up some of the children’s understandings of feelings.
“Well he’s brave. I’m even braver.” -Charlie Kelly
“That goes like that then boom!” -Amelia (noting anger)
“Henry is hopeful in class.” -Sam highlights his knowing of this word
“Shy…” Tessa reacts to hearing, “some feelings have me tucking away.”
What feeling do you have in your heart right now?
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
REAL SHARE
We’ve heard that many of the children have been buzzing about Real Share at home. So far, we’ve only had 4 shares, so there are still many to go. As we are beginning to see, Real Share will look different for everyone, and we want to encourage this. We also want to make sure that we are setting everyone up for success. In order to get the most from our audience, shares should be short. Here are a few thoughts to consider…
-Help your child think of something that is meaningful to them. It can be a short story about something in their life, a drawing they made, or a special something from home. It can have sentimental value or it can just be something that is meaningful right now.
-Shares should be limited to 1 or 2 things.
-If the share is a book, pick a few pages to share and mark these pages ahead of time.
On Monday, we checked in with Kyla and Alex during meeting to see how they felt about last week’s Real Shares.
“I felt really good. Everybody was watching and listening and it made me feel good about it.” KYLA
“Everybody was responding.” ALEX
“I’m scared about it.” AMELIA
Eva quickly added, “I’m okay with it.”
“Why are you scared?” KYLA
“Cause.” AMELIA
This week’s Real Shares were brought to us by Tessa and Mika
What special place in Tessa’s house “just got a new color”?
What types of dinosaurs did Mika show us in his book?
Stay tuned…This week’s Real Shares will be brought to us by Charlie Kelly and Amelia.
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Recently, the children have been arranging an assortment of loose parts on the overhead projector and then tracing the projected image. After completing this, they bring their tracing to the easel to paint. This work has captivated them…
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
While enjoying some time in the park this week, a sad discovery was made. A beautiful Blue Jay was found laying dead among some leaves. Having spent a good deal of time observing birds at our feeder, drawing them and searching for their sounds and names in bird books, it was very clear that the children felt deeply for this discovery.
“It’s claw is up.” -Kyla
“I can see its head and its beak.” -Amelia
“It’s a Blue Jay.” -Kyla
“Let’s tell everyone in the class.” -Tessa
“I have something really sad! A birdie died!” -Kyla
“What do you think happened to it? -Charlie Kelly
“Hey! it’s a Blue Jay! That’s my bird! That’s my dead Blue Jay! I know who ate it! A Hawk!” -Jack
“I can’t believe everyone came over here! -Amelia
“Look! It’s dead!” -Victoria
“It doesn’t look blue.” -Sam
