Wednesday, September 25, 2013

120 bilingual first grade- I continued working in small groups on portraits.  The rest of the class worked at different stations, creating signs about their classroom and school rules and working on team building exercises.

116 bilingual second grade- I brought a small group to the studio to watch Austin's Butterfly and receive intensive assistance with their portraits. The struggling group is getting smaller and smaller in 116 as more students build their confidence and abilities.

Preschool, 103- I followed the preschoolers outside to photograph a lesson they were working on.  They are learning number recognition, starting with the number one.  They found sticks and twigs and composed their own number ones to display.  One student created a two and was busy looking for more sticks to create a three.

I was walking around the building when I noticed the preschool students had used their numbers to decorate our courtyard.  I love that other classes will get to see what they created. 

112- Three students in the first grade self-contained classroom were pretty far ahead of their classmates. Since they had all painted a beach scene, I set up an inquiry area using seashells my daughters and I had collected on our summer vacation. I added paper, colored pencils, fine tip pens and pencils to the area. The rest of the class would work on their background scenes and the only instruction given to the inquiry students will be where the children sit. I want to see if the kids can figure out a way to play and learn using the shells without instruction. There is a fear of doing the "wrong" thing, so we want examples, we want to copy the teacher and each other and I thought this exercise would help them get over that.

I recorded as much dialogue as I could.  Some of it had to be translated, as the students fluctuate between English and Spanish (sometimes without realizing it.)
S1- Wow! So beautiful!
S2-Can I touch? What do we do?
S1- Look! These are the same! 
S2- Did you make these?
T- No...
S2- I know- you got them at the beach! They are all the same, but different! 
T- What makes them the same?
S3- The shape is the same!  The colors are different!  These have holes.
T- I  wonder how the holes are formed.
S4, eavesdropping- I think animals in the water bit the holes in the shells!
S2- And some are broken! 
S2- Where did you get them?
T shows them a picture of the beach.
S1- This is you! You went there! 
S2- I'm making a pile of all the same ones.
S3- When did you get them?
T- Over the summer. 
S3- These ones have holes
S2- Look! This has purple!
S1- Look! It's beautiful!

A few more excited exclamations of how beautiful some of the shells are.
S3 noticed a shell on our beach blanket in the photo. He is determined to find that shell, so he searches until he finds one that resembles it.  He places it on the photo and compares the two. Student Two notices.
S2- Whoa! You found the same one! Wow!
S3 hides a tiny shell under one of three big shells, then shuffles the shells and has the kids guess which shell hides the baby shell. 
S2- Why are some so soft and some are hard?
T- I think you mean smooth and rough. The ones in the ocean a long time get smoother, like stones. 

We touch different ones and guess which were in the ocean a long time. 
S2 starts collecting a pile of smooth shells.
T- Do we want to learn more about these?  [Lots of nodding heads respond.] What should we learn?
S3- I want to know what the animals look like. I want to know more about where they come from. I want to know how they catch it.
S2- I want to see the water. I want to go there. 
S1- I want to learn about the animals, too.
T- I still want to know what makes the holes.
We look at photographs of shells and beaches. A drawing of a shell comes up.
S2- We can draw them! 

The bell rings and we agree that our next step is to draw our favorite shells.

103, preschool- I think we are finished with the letters and drawings for our alphabet book.  I have to check to make sure there aren't any letters that might have eluded us, but we're definitely in a good place. 

Our completed alphabet word list.

104, bilingual kindergarten.  We spent the period brainstorming pictures for our letter book.  We used Spanish words.  The students were really passionate about which words were included. I can't wait to see their drawings next class!