The children have been looking closely at the drawings in many of our First Nation stories. they have been interested in colour combinations as well as lines, dots, swirls and circles. I introduced this study with books and then moved to large paper with black sharpies and crayons playing My turn, Your turn with two children working in partnership.  Next we visited a grade four classroom to play the same game with us using those same lines, swirls, dashes and circles shaded with crayons. Last week the children began to plan their large mural by painting dots, concentric circles, mixing paint colours and deciding on different colour combinations. This week they filled in the white space with some of our preschool guests. Finally the children worked with our grade two and grade four buddies to add onto our murals with black and white paint using the lines, swirls and dots. This has been great fun and a wonderful way to build classroom and school commun...

We collected a small branch and some twigs to make our first nature craft for the new forest or as the children call it the Woodlands. The children worked in small groups with an adult to decorate the twigs with washi tape and then string them together with yarn or twine and then add a painted rock for weight to stabilize it. Then they chose out of the way branches and hung them in the forest. A few of the children make their own twirling twigs to leave in the forest. And just in case you're wondering yes it was hard to wrap the twine/yarn around the rock without it slipping off. There were quite a few attempts and lots of different strategies like choosing a bumpy shaped rock or an oval rock, using about 3 feet of wool/twine to wrap around the rock or tying especially tight knots. ...