This week, we began to introduce the CLARA (Crick Learning for Resilient Agency) learning powers to the children. The CLARA learning powers describe the qualities, skills and dispositions of a lifelong learner. These learning powers are not fixed or static and like a muscle, we can grow and develop them with practice.
The learning powers also give children a language to describe and discuss their learning and themselves as learners.
We had a new friend join us at ELC this week – Tamoo. Tamoo’s super learning power is belonging. We all have this power too and Tamoo is here to teach and guide us on how to grow our belonging learning power individually and as a group.
We loved meeting Tamoo!
We discussed the people that love and help us and during our play investigations, some children chose to draw the people that support them most in their lives.
BELONGING AND THE EARLY YEARS LEARNING FRAMEWORK
BELONGING
Experiencing belonging – knowing where and with whom you belong – is integral to human existence. Children belong first to a family, a cultural group, a neighbourhood and a wider community. Belonging acknowledges children’s interdependence with others and the basis of relationships in defining identities. In early childhood, and throughout life, relationships are crucial to a sense of belonging. Belonging is central to being and becoming in that it shapes who children are and who they can become.
We have been exploring colours and the colours of the rainbow. We conducted an experiment using different coloured water to see what colours could be made when mixed together. Paper towel is placed in the coloured water which then transfers into the adjacent cup.
Aicha: There’s yellow and blue and red.
Frankie: It’s (the colour) is going up and down.
Liam: You put yellow and blue make green
Will: Yellow and red make orange.
Ambrose: Red.
Arielle: Orange with yellow and red.
Tesi: Purple is blue and red.
COLOUR MIXING
Children have also been mixing primary colours to make secondary colours of orange, green and purple.
BIRDS AND NESTS
We watched the following video about the life cycle of birds. We had a discussion about this story.
Ellara: I found a bird with one eye with Uncle Mark and Lucy. I put it in my new shoe box Will: birds to lay their eggs to keep them warm.
who would live in it? Ellara: Birds when they want to get food they fly and get food Tesi: they eat worms Shruti: Birds are fly, in the sky. Aicha : I had a bird at my old house.
Tesi: They eat worms. Will: There were 6 eggs. Joel: Then they hatched.
Tavae: The red bird is the daddy. Liam: Why do birds lay eggs? How do they make eggs? Will: Why do they have wings?
Some children have been using clay as a language to express their knowledge, understanding and experience of birds and their lifecycle.
Aicha: I make a worm because I need to feed the bird. I making the bird house. I squish, squish.
Olivia: Mine is really squishy. I’m a little bird. Birds eats the worms and they actually lay eggs and they fly and play like that stuff and one I’m a little bird, I like being with the other bird’s.
Aicha: And now I’m going to squish and make a house. The nest. Im going to make a lot of eggs inside and then they crash, I look after them. Nicole, you know at my old house I had a bird but it died.
Olivia: I making a cloud because the birds flies to the cloud.
Aicha: Nicole, this (nest) is like this, a circle.
We watched another video, of a bird hatching. We recorded the children’s comments as they watched the bird.
Tavae: It’s making a door to come out Krisha: It’s a bird Will: When it’s in its egg it doesn’t have its feathers yet Frankie: The eggs wobbles Aicha: The bird is wobbing the egg to go out Frankie: It’s getting out Omelia: A crack Kanal: Crack Frankie: It’s hatching Aicha: It’s getting out. Xavier: It’s getting out. Ambrose: A egg. Olivia: It looks like chicken trying to get out the egg
Tavae: The bird is coming out. Frankie: It’s a girl. Aicha: The head has come out. Liam: It try to crack and it used its beak so it can get out the egg. Frankie: It stuck Tavae: It like a monster. The bird got a foot. Will: The bottom still stck Aicha: It don’t fly Frankie: And the feathers make it fly.
NAMES
Some children have been working in small groups with Nicole in Home 2 on identifying and writing their names.
PLAY BASED LEARNING
Using their skills of creativity, curiosity and imagination, our children have engaged with different materials and resources in their play.
Simon was building 3D shapes with the magnetic shapes
Tarun building with blocks and wooden people
Who’s hiding?
It’s Shruti!
“It’s a magic show”
Imaginative play
Kanish lining up the diggers.
Xavier “I Superman with a mask”
Building a road
Tavae: Stacking the blocks “It’s a rainbow”
Playing hide and seek
Omelia found Frankie
Playing musical statues
PRAYER
SPECKS OF GOLD
EARLY YEARS LEARNING FRAMEWORK
OUTCOME 1: CHILDREN HAVE A STRONG SENSE OF IDENTITY
• Children feel safe, secure, and supported
• Children learn to interact in relation to others with care, empathy and respect
OUTCOME 1: CHILDREN HAVE A STRONG SENSE OF IDENTITY
• Children learn to interact in relation to others with care, empathy and respect
OUTCOME 2: CHILDREN ARE CONNECTED WITH AND CONTRIBUTE TO THEIR WORLD
• Children develop a sense of belonging to groups and communities and an understanding of the reciprocal rights and responsibilities necessary for active community participation
OUTCOME 2: CHILDREN ARE CONNECTED WITH AND CONTRIBUTE TO THEIR WORLD
• Children become aware of fairness
OUTCOME 2: CHILDREN ARE CONNECTED WITH AND CONTRIBUTE TO THEIR WORLD
• Children develop a sense of belonging to groups and communities and an understanding of the reciprocal rights and responsibilities necessary for active community participation
OUTCOME THREE: CHILDREN HAVE A STRONG SENSE OF WELLBEING
• Children take increasing responsibility for their own health and physical wellbeing
OUTCOME 4: CHILDREN ARE CONFIDENT AND INVOLVED LEARNERS
• Children develop dispositions for learning such as curiosity, cooperation, confidence, creativity, commitment, enthusiasm, persistence, imagination and reflexivity
OUTCOME 4: CHILDREN ARE CONFIDENT AND INVOLVED LEARNERS.
Children resource their own learning through connecting with people, place, technologies and natural and processed materials
OUTCOME 4: CHILDREN ARE CONFIDENT AND INVOLVED LEARNERS
• Children develop a range of skills and processes such as problem solving, inquiry, experimentation, hypothesising, researching and investigating
OUTCOME 5: CHILDREN ARE EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATORS
• Children express ideas and make meaning using a range of media
OUTCOME 5: CHILDREN ARE EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATORS
• Children interact verbally and non-verbally with others for a range of purposes
This morning we visited the MUDLA (multi-disciplinary learning area) in the school.
The children explored and viewed the many different animals such as hopping mice, green tree frog, long-necked turtle, yabbies and a variety of fish.
Some children documented their observations through drawings.
Arabella’s observation of a turtle
Xavier noticed animals in the water
Ambrose drew a fish
Aicha’s drawing
Frankie identified the different parts of a Yabby
Our friends in year 5/6 showed us Memphis, a bearded dragon. We had the opportunity to look closely at Memphis.
What can you see?
Aicha: I see his tail.
Omelia: and legs.
Will: It’s sticking to his body (the dragon was attached to Asher’s jumper)
Kanav: He’s stuck
Liam: His legs are moving.
Some of us then stroked and patted Memphis gently.
What does Memphis feel like?
Aicha: Spikey
Arabella: Bumpy
Hani: I don’t like lizards
Tavae: I didn’t touch it.
Kanav: Feeled good.
Olivia: I touched it on the back. It was spiked and rough at the back.
We love exploring our environments and learning more about animals.
EARLY YEARS LEARNING OUTCOMES:
Outcome 2: Children are connected with and contribute to their world.
Children become socially responsible and show respect for the environment
Outcome 4: Children are confident and involved learners.
Children develop dispositions for learning such as curiosity, cooperation, confidence, creativity, commitment, enthusiasm, persistence, imagination and reflexivity
Children develop a range of skills and processes such as problem solving, enquiry, experimentation, hypothesising, researching and investigating
