Little Cloud

As an extension of our Eric Carle author study and an opportunity for discovery, exploration, and imagination, we took a trip to the art museum! A wonderful employee at the museum read "Little Cloud" and then she and the children worked together to interpret paintings with clouds.  They were really engaged and did a great job determining what kind of day it was, where the sun might be, what it felt like in the painting, just by examining the paintings! Then, they used cotton balls and crayons to make their own cloud pictures. 

After our trip, we revisited "Little Cloud" with our new copy of the book. Then we went outside to make some observations of real clouds! The children had a great time looking at the clouds and discussing what shapes and images they saw. Clouds are so cool, aren't they? They "change" into so many things! We talked about making our very own book about a little cloud.

Making observations is fun!

When we went back into the classroom, each child received a blue piece of paper with the words "The little cloud changed into a ________". I offered the children the option of using paint or glue and white streamer paper for making their clouds. They all had great ideas (unicorn, hermit crabs, me!!) and followed through, taking their time. When they finished making their clouds, they wrote whatever they made their clouds look like and also wrote their names. There was invented spelling and letter strings - what's not to love about emergent literacy?? 

The only problem with the paint/paintbrushes and the streamer paper was that it went on so quickly, and it was so much so quickly! They will still make beautiful pages in our book, but it made me rethink the materials that we used. 


I did the same activity with a different group today - some things were better and some things were not - but this is what's interesting and wonderful about school.... the teachers and students are ALL learning. Today, of course, was a completely clear, blue sky kind of day, so we couldn't really observe clouds. We still revisited the book though and talked about what clouds look like. So it could have been better if we had clouds, but it still worked out. What definitely seemed to work better than the first time around was that I still provided paint, but instead of using paintbrushes, the children used Q-tips. It made for much more detailed illustrating and because it took longer for the paint to get onto the paper, we had more time to hold conversation during our work. 

There are one or two small groups who haven't met with me for this observation/bookmaking, so we will see what changes, works, doesn't work... it's always an experiment isn't it? 

Eric Carle Part Two

Over the break, I picked up some $5.00 hardcover Eric Carle books and stuffed animals (from Kohls - GREAT buy!) They were a big hit with the kids, who cuddled with them while their friends read the Eric Carle books they took home to read over Christmas. 

It was really interesting and lovely having our friends share the books they read over and over while at home for two weeks. 

It was great - each student shared in their own way. Some students looked at the pictures for clues about the story and told it in their own words, while other children had the book mostly memorized and read the books all of the way through. Others combined what they remembered being read to them and added dialogue and details as they used the pictures and general plot to help them generate their own versions. Everyone had a wonderful time sharing and listening. 

Today, we went further in our study of Eric Carle. We recalled what an author is - "it's someone that writes their book" .... "and the characters too". Then we started to focus on the job of the illustrator. We watched the videos available on Eric Carle's Website that showed HOW he makes illustrations. The children (and I) were fascinated, and it generated a lot of questions and conversation. We talked about the many ways that one could illustrate. 


One of the children asked if we could illustrate (which was the PERFECT segue into our next activity). We came together as a small group to come up with a story. We were able to get the words together, so in the coming days (and let's be realistic, week or two), we are going to be working on a title, title page, and our very own illustrations! 


Here is our story, can't wait to share our book!: 


The animals are walking and they see a big pond. There was a bridge so they can walk across it. Then they walked on the playground. They slide down the sliding board. They went on the swings. Then the lion said, "can I get a cookie?" And his mom said, "no". The tortoise said, can I get ice cream?" And his mom said, "no". The rabbit said, "can I have a sandwich?". And his mom said, "yes". They ride the bike and the scooter, taking turns. The End. 

Eric Carle Part One

In the beginning, I did not plan on having my students engage in an author study; there were just Eric Carle books that fit with the things we were doing in the classroom! It started with "The Tiny Seed" - we have a large garden/small farm at our school, and as we explored it, we read every book we could about growing things. Then came "The Very Hungry Caterpillar", which went along with our very own caterpillars in our classroom. It was fun to read about this caterpillar's journey as we watched our caterpillars make their chrysalises and transform into butterflies. 

When we got our classroom pets (hermit crabs), it just made sense to read "A House for Hermit Crab". We talked about the homes of our hermit crabs as we made observations. 

When our school volunteer, Farmer John, began cooking with us, he suggested that we start with pancakes. Realizing that I also owned "Pancakes, Pancakes" (yep, by Eric Carle!), I knew that not only did I have to read it for the obvious classroom connections, but it was time to talk about Eric Carle as an author and his work. 

I was fortunate enough to meet the wonderful author when I was younger and I have several of his books, a couple of which are signed. It started very simply, and without much of a plan - we kind of just went with the flow. But I'm happy to say, my students love Eric Carle and are really excited to learn about his work. We discussed an author's job, and as the students began to recognize Carle's work without my prompting, we dove into some real research. We visited Carle's website and watched him read "The Very Hungry Caterpillar" to us. We also looked at his pictures, and the children loved guessing who the people in the photographs were and what they meant to Carle. They really love that he "looks like a grandpa" and have very interesting and insightful theories about his life and work. 

They discussed amongst themselves how he came to make his books - 
M: "When he was small, he didn’t know how to do it" 
S: "When he got big, he thinked and thinked until he stopped thinkin’ and then wrote it. "


It's really amazing how quickly and thoroughly they absorb the information - they compare and contrast pictures of him when he was young and recent pictures, they can tell which books he illustrated, and have been asking a lot of questions and have been talking about him on their own. Even my students who never went to our library center before started heading that way, picking out his books. And they asked to go to his museum... I wish I could take them :-(

Anyway, this is a really long post, sorry - but I wanted to kind of summarize everything that we have done so that future posts will make sense, as we continue to explore Carle. One of my students already said he wished he could make pictures like Carle, little does he know we are going to be discovering illustrations and becoming illustrators as we continue or study! 


I'm also really excited to get back to school and our study tomorrow, because thanks to Teach Preschool I found out that Kohls was selling Carle books and stuffed animals for 5 dollars each! What a great addition to our library center and wonderful way to get the kids reengaged after a long break!