Santa Letters

The children wrote the sweetest letters to Santa a few weeks ago. Since then, they've been anxiously awaiting letters back and they arrived this week! Yay!

Here's a peek at a few of their letters...

The children were overflowing with excitement this morning as they read their special messages from Santa. He had such kind and thoughtful responses to each of their letters. So pleased to see how were personal they were. Santa didn't forget me either, what a pleasant surprise. Definitely a magical morning!

Christmas is coming...

The children have been busy practicing and preparing for the winter concert coming up this week. They've also been busy making a special handmade gift for a loved one. Here's a sneak peek!

Trimming the Tree

At our exploration table this week we have felt trees begging for creative hands to embellish them with colourful shapes and patterns. Here's a peek at some of the trimmed trees...

Pattern Block Designs

Creating patterns, symmetry, beautiful designs and art with the pattern blocks has quickly become a favourite math tubs activity. Very proud of their creations, photographs are often requested as a means to document and preserve their work. Here are some examples of their pattern block designs. 

Magnet Madness

The past few weeks have involved much reading, playing and experimenting with magnets. 

The big ideas being that magnets can create a push or a pull. Essentially, attraction and repulsion. We like big scientific words! Opposite poles attract and the same poles repel. 

The children tested the strengths of magnets and their ability to pass through various materials such as glass, plastic, wood and sand. 

They also magnetized scissors by carefully rubbing a bar magnet along the length of the metal ends. They tested their made magnets by picking up paper clips with them!

We also did a pretty cool compass experiment and learned about how the earth is like a giant magnet. We made our own compass by magnetizing a paper clip and floating it in water with foam ends. We marked the end pointing north with a marker and tested it again. Sure enough, no matter which direction we placed the 'needle', it would rotate and point north. 

The favourite experiment had to be the floating magnets. Two donut magnets placed on a pencil with the same poles facing each other was a great visual to show the invisible force created. The children could physically feel the two magents pushing away from each other. 

Making 4 and 5

In math, one of the many things we've been working on is breaking numbers into two or more parts and finding all the possible ways to put them back together. We've been using cubes and jewels and even paper chains! 

Charlie Harper Cardinals

Our first winter inspired art project of the season comes from American artist, Charlie Harper. His use of shape and simple lines was the perfect springboard for a paper collage creation. The children completed these wintry scenes in one art class. 

Torn white paper created an instant horizon line, while the birds were layered together with various bits of cut paper. We used the hole punch for eyes and snow. Pom poms never disappoint and added the finishing touch - berries are a delicious street for our feathered friends after all. Some tucked a shredded paper best in a crook of their tree. 

The big news is that these beautiful pieces are off to the Children's Department at the VPL's main branch in downtown Vancouver. Pretty cool!

Since our work was going to be displayed in a gallery like setting we worked on adding artist statements to tell people a little more about us. 

We've already received very positive and encouraging feedback from the Library. Such an exciting opportunity.

Here are a handful of the completed pieces. Click on an image to enlarge it. Please note, the art will be safely returned to the artists and this lovely collection will be displayed at school in the new year!

Perspective

In our latest winterscapes we practiced using perspective by playing with the size of the trees and footprints. The taller, bigger trees look much closer than the shorter, smaller trees in the distance. The larger footprints look closer to us and then fade into the distant sunset and over the snowy hills as they get smaller.