Friday afternoons are quickly becoming one of my favourite times of the week. As our kindergarten class continues to work on our learning goal of building a school community we have begun to meet weekly with our grade 3 big buddy class to create nature crafts together. I have been working on building a predictable framework for these weekly visits. One buddy (sometimes the Kindergarten, sometimes the third grader) teaches the other buddy the activity. Then through discussion they make a plan, divide up the work and together create the artifact. When done, the kindergarten students get their personal book tub to have the older buddy read to them in a quiet corner of the classroom. This week as the children were working in two classrooms with their big buddy they each had a leaf to paint and decorate. As they worked together they were getting to know each other, talking about sports, play and family. It was such an honour to observe the students obviously enjoying each other...

Float and Sink in the forest :) As we grew our community of learners this fall the kindergarten students worked on their first inquiry. We go outdoors every day either to the forest or onsite to the field. Students spend some time in circle conversations then a teacher led activity followed by self directed play.  During Thursday forest mornings we are fortunate to include Morgan from NS3 who facilitates science activities such as sound mapping, exploring the forest with our senses, a quadrate exercise with hula hoops and a nature scavenger hunt. In the classroom we deepened our understanding through participation in knowledge building circle conversations, books, videos, nature art and special visitors.  M ...

Professional Learning Partnerships Last year my good friend Margie and I decided to work together to pilot the Daily Five. We did it on our own time and thoroughly enjoyed the growth together. We visited each other's classrooms, shared stories and made changes to our approach after lots of professional conversations (while walking a local trail of course). This year our hardworking and innovative Professional Development Committee created an opportunity for teachers who are ready to make a shift in their practice. They provide two full release days for each partner which can be taken in half day blocks. A colleague asked if I would be interested and of course I agreed!! She would like to move from whole group to small group teaching and is also interested in taking her kindergarten class outdoors once weekly. With these two learning goals in mind we planned two observational visits to my room so that she could observe small group during exploration time and Kinde...

Play nourishes every aspect of a child's development. I believe that it forms the foundation for physical, social, emotional and intellectual skills which are important for their happiness. One of my goals as a primary teacher is to create a rich play environment which will support the whole child This year in nature kindergarten I have been planning invitations for play using natural materials. Here are a few that have been fun to plan and enjoyed by the children over the past few months.  SAND PLAY  I added some natural materials like tree blocks, beach stones, sticks which are similar lengths, pinecones and sand. Then since it is spring I added some insects from our math bin. I was curious to see how this provocation inspired the children to explore the sand table in new ways using loose parts.  RAVENS NEST  My daughter loaned me a raven's nest for the classroom. I was curious to see if this little centre would intrigue my student...

We've moved to the seashore!  Beginning this week we will be going to the seashore on Wednesday mornings and to the forest on Monday mornings. We have been doing math at the forest this month so w hile we at the seashore some of the students were gathering loose parts along the beach and building number sets. I just have to share David's beautiful fleet of five ships! ...