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? 

Title Undecided (But a GREAT book!)

I wanted to share another story made by a group of children. The authors of this story are three 3 year olds and a 4 year old. One of the 3 year olds insisted that the story begin with "hello" and end not with "the end", but "goodbye". I thought that was really beautiful because in telling the story, we are communicating with one another, having a conversation - I love it. The students came up with the words of the story during a small group meeting recently, and today we reread it and the children made illustrations to go with the story. I won't say anymore yet, I'll just share the story and illustrations: 

Hello. A huge dinosaur eats a little dinosaur. 

The little monkey plays with the Incredible Hulk hermit crab.

And the huge dinosaur loves the Incredible Hulk. 

The monkey went away. They don't know what to do.

The Incredible Hulk saves the big, huge dinosaur from the museum. 

The Incredible Hulk was still alive and he got all his Incredible Hulk family. Goodbye.

FYI, Incredible Hulk is our pet hermit crab - he's rather large and is famous in our classroom for pinching me - he latched on to me, it was pretty painful! 

It was really wonderful to break this project into different days, rereading the story today with the children and revisiting the experience with them before making illustrations. The students were so excited, remembering what they had said, reciting it with me and exclaiming "Oooh! I said that!" Each child remembered exactly which parts of the story they had contributed - it was just a great day! 

The Pond

We LOVE books. My students are always asking to be read to, in large group and as a cozy, individual activity during center time. We talk about books always, making connections to our own lives and other books that we have read. We are still working loosely on our Eric Carle author study; the children love cuddling up with the stuffed animals and reading to themselves, each other, and me.

About a month ago, we made a book for a loved volunteer and put a copy in our library center. I'm excited to share that we have recently begun meeting in small groups to be authors and illustrators of stories to add to our collection!

The children came up with the words to the story and then I typed them up. Today, I read the story back to the children and they made the illustrations. I really love their story - they included characters, setting, plot, AND predictive text.

"The Pond" 

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. 

Light Discovery and Literacy!

I recently posted about our new light table - a world of possibility opened up, although once it was plugged in, I had no idea what to do with it. Thanks to some really great comments here and collaboration at my school, we have many ideas about how to discover and explore using this wonderful material! 

Here, the children are using their fine motor skills poking holes in black paper (placed on top of styrofoam)  with thumb tacks to make pictures - the holes allow the light to peek through, they turn out to be really beautiful!

Today, we received a new light-giving material in our classroom: an overhead projector. It was really exciting to introduce it to the children; we did it right after morning meeting. Each child wanted to put their hand over the projector to see it on the wall, and we did that, but after a couple of children had gotten the chance, others discovered that if they just stood in front of the wall, they could make shadows of their bodies. It was quite the experience! 

Of course, this would be the center that every child would want to go to at center time, and I worried about how we could organize it without fighting and tantrums. 


I had just been reading about ways to meaningfully incorporate writing into the classroom (as in, not having the students writing their letters for the sole sake of learning how to write their letters, but rather, fostering the love of the writing process and development). So, I took some advice and we made a sign up sheet. 

For the first couple minutes, some of the students either didn't understand the concept of the sign up or didn't care - there was still an overcrowded group around the projector. After a couple of breaths, reminding about the sign up sheet ( showing the students the list and where their names appeared on the list in relation to the students currently at the projector), and redirection to another appealing center while they waited, pretty much everyone was content with our new system. 

There were some students who could NOT wait to get involved in light and shadow play, and  spent their waiting time on the carpet playing with some of the objects for the projector and/or making shadows on the wall. 

This friend was using a star, putting it closer and farther away, watching how the image changes on the wall.

All in all, we made huge strides in our class today: we discovered more about light and shadow, we learned more about sharing, AND we incorporated literacy in a developmentally appropriate, play-based, child directed way (which is something that I continue to work on as I learn about Reggio Emilia and play-based learning. Can't wait to see where this brings us! 

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! 

Adventures in Bookmaking

Right before leaving for Christmas break, we engaged in a pretty small project (it only took a couple of small group sessions) but it was a great achievement in our class, and it turned out beautifully. We were making gifts for the teachers in our school who are special to us, and one of the gift receivers was to be Farmer John. We had so many pictures of him working with the children, so the children made him a book. 

First, we talked about HOW we could make a book. 

“You supposed to write in it, then fold it up”           “You fold it up and write it”

We also decided what should go into our book: 

“Put pictures on it”           “Grass”            “Cooking”             “Letters”            “Make he farm” 

                                                            “Can we draw worms?” 

The students cut out the pictures for our book. They did a WONDERFUL job cutting, and really worked on those fine motor skills! 

When the photos were cut, students chose about three for a page that they wanted to make, and then they glued them onto the paper. 

Looking over the photos and choosing where they would appear in our book was a beautiful way of revisiting our past experiences with Farmer John (and we have had a lot of them!) 

This is one of my favorite pictures!! 

In addition to the students choosing photographs to go into our book, they also made their own illustrations and wrote their own notes for Farmer John. 

There was also collaboration among the students, as they shared what they were making and showed real interest in what their friends were doing. 

After the pages were made, I typed up all of the lovely things that the children said and onto the pages they went. 

The last step was for the students to sign the book! 

Here is our book as the final project. We get to keep a copy in our library center too... I can’t wait to add to our collection!