Nina Marni beautiful Little learners and their lovely families. Welcome to our weekly blog
Learning Intention 1: To continue to develop children’s cutting and pasting skills using a range of natural and manmade materials.
Why
- Cutting and pasting activities for children in Early Learning have many benefits. For example, cutting and pasting can help the development of fine motor skills. They can cut images, shapes and drawings and paste them into various shapes
- Cutting and pasting activities can also be used as creative channels for children’s
self-expression.
- Cutting and pasting is an important first skill to master for children to then be able to design, ideate and successfully create artwork and objects.
- Cutting and pasting is a necessary skill for many school-based activities and will support school preparedness for children.
An intentional cutting and pasting table set up in the room everyday so support consistency, predictability and development of this skill
- Use of different types of scissors to support inclusion of all children
- Use of various types of joining materials such as; glue sticks, (with appropriate supervision), sticky tape, masking tape etc
- Use of collected natural materials from community walks
- Use of collected recyclable materials provided by staff and families
- Pattern making with shapes and different materials
- Discussion about aspects of visual art such as line, texture, shape and pattern
This week children have been exploring their fine motor co-ordination through the use of scissors. Nature based learning resources as well as man made resources have been some learning tools which children had the opportunity to trial with scissors. Opening and shutting the jaws of the scissors and being persistent and patient with their cutting have been some amazing experiences that were captured throughout this learning.
Learning Intention 2
Sacred symbols
Sacred symbols are special and important.
Why :
Doctrinal Insights from the Catholic Tradition that support this Enduring Understanding include:
- Sacred symbols remind us that God is close to us, and with us.
- In my Catholic learning environment, I can see many sacred symbols.
- Candle flames remind us that God is with us.
- The Bible reminds us of God’s love for us through special stories.
- The Cross reminds us of Jesus.
- Water is used for special blessings
- Sacred symbols are used in my school/ELC and in church celebrations, prayer and liturgy. (CCC1145)
- Other faith traditions also have sacred symbols.
Doctrinal Insights from the Catholic Tradition that support this Enduring Understanding include:
- Sacred symbols remind us that God is close to us, and with us.
- In my Catholic learning environment, I can see many sacred symbols.
- Candle flames remind us that God is with us.
- The Bible reminds us of God’s love for us through special stories.
- The Cross reminds us of Jesus.
- Water is used for special blessings
- Sacred symbols are used in my school/ELC and in church celebrations, prayer and liturgy. (CCC1145)
- Other faith traditions also have sacred symbols.
Morning prayer time this week has been very consistent with our little learners as they have begun to sit in a circle eagerly awaiting their turn to vrbalise their thanks to Jesus for the week. Children have had the opportunity to hold a symbol of their choice. This week children used a Pink rose that they picked from our own school garden.
Book Making – Literacy Intentions (Our hopes for their learning)
- Reading picture books regularly.
- Children will enjoy a joyful connection to picture books.
- Continue using mark-making tools, such as crayons, texter’s, pencils, paint, chalk, sand (as they create texts during this process).
- Children will build symbolic functioning, sharing something about the marks they have created.
- Bookmaking ongoing throughout the term
This week children have been vey engaged in their writer’s workshop. Teacher’s reading picture books to children throughout the day with open-ended verbal communication and children using special moments throughout the day to work on their unfinished books. These moments have either been a collaborated effort or as individuals have helped children to be valued participants taking charge of their own learning. This week we had a visit from Bentley from preschool who joined in our writer’s workshop creating and designing his own book and reading it out loud to our little learners.
Our community visits throughout the school have been consistent this week where children have had lots of opportunities to visit our common spaces. This week children visited the MUDLA where they spotted lots of fish ,turtles , a bearded dragon , a green frog and some hopping mice. Children had the opportunity to create their own pictures of the animals showing them off at their tanks.
Sustainability throughout our learning spaces have begun to continue and flourish. This week children were provided with opportunities to design the clay pots within their own learning spaces. Teacher’s brought in succulents for their special pots.
Some specs of gold for this week.
Hope you all have a relaxing weekend.