Nina Marni beautiful learners and their amazing families. Welcome to our weekly blog.
| Learning Intention: 1 |
To challenge children’s construction skills by providing loose parts and STEM experiences.
| Why: . STEM education in early childhood allows children to begin to learn and retain a knowledge base that they can build on as they get older.Loose Parts play encourages children to make, create, problem solve and hypothesize. Loose parts have no instructions and no predetermined rules. The concept of ‘loose parts’ supports children to become critical thinkers as they use these open- ended materials to plan their work and create whatever they want to without an adult telling them what should be done. It helps children to be imaginative.Loose parts give children the freedom to arrange and rearrange, essentially using the parts to create their own rules and designs, which allows the focus of the experience to be on the process rather than the product. Fine motor skills are developed and strengthened when children grasp and pick up small objects. |
Constructive play formerly know as construction play in the early years is the use of a variety of objects and materials to intentionally create and build. Blocks , sand , play dough , wooden blocks and recycled boxes are some resources that children use to create and construct using their creativity and imagination. Children blossom with a multitude of learning skills through these constructive and creative building and designing mechanisms . STEM , physical development, and social skills are some important learning skills that children begin to gather, through such collaborations.
Masking tape, sticky tape, and glue sticks were some resources that were used to construct a recycled box tower. Play dough has also been in use this week for constructive play throughout the learning space where children have been learning about different ingredients which are included to construct a beautiful Bach of play dough.
Community visits around the school and the log park have seen children construct with the logs using creativity, design and precision.
A camera was crafted with a recycled box to take on our community visits around the school to capture some wonderful moments of exploration.
STEM included into our constructive invitation. Counting has been an interesting learning station this week, where we have observed little learners revisit during the day.
Play dough has been a favourite resource for constructing this week, natural resources were sourced to create some beautiful masterpieces.
We used some mud , water and some colourful blocks with lots of collaborative support to create some amazing constructive learning this week.
| Learning Intention 2: To encourage children’s expression of ideas through collaborative arts-making experiences in Visual Arts and paints. Why Helps a child’s development enhancing creativity, fine motor coordination, self-expression, creates and builds on imagination, cognitive development, sensory and many more skills of social interactive and collaborative engagement and verbal communication. Explorations of a variety of colours and textures helps children develop their confidence, self-esteem and problem-solving skills. This learning intention will be a collaboration with learning intention 1 of mark making. |
Helping children explore and create new exciting and collaborative art making experiences provides children with exploration and investigation into colour. Artistic techniques and styles are perfected where creativity and design begin. Children begin to unleash their creative potential through collaboration and team work.
This week we celebrate the festival of holi. This festival is know as the festival of colours in the hindu culture enhancing positivity. Children experienced this festivity through the exploration of many colours, and paints. This festive nature is collaborated with our learning intention of visual art and paint experiences.
Our constructive recycled tower has been brought out for a bit of colour. Children had their paint and paint brushed ready to add the colours of the rainbow to this amazing piece of art.
We caught a glimpse of a rain bow in our bubble water this week , and this was through the reflection of the sun light.
| Learning Intention 3: 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 blessingsSacred symbols are used in my school/ELC and in church celebrations, prayer and liturgy. (CCC1145)Other faith traditions also have sacred symbols The Sign of the Cross is a prayer to God.Doctrinal and Content Elaborations: Doctrinal Insights from the Catholic Tradition that support this Enduring Understanding include:The Sign of the Cross is a prayer with actions and words.The words remind us that God is called Father, Son and Holy Spirit.The actions represent the symbol of the Cross, and that prayer involves our head, heart and body. |
As we are currently in the liturgical season of lent , the children have been entering into prayer through out the day. Using flowers and the sacred cross to talk to Jesus and thank him for their families and their loved ones. Fasting and prayer throughout the season of lent has been spoken about to children through stories and described to help them understand the true meaning of lent. The prayer table and its sacred symbols have changed its colour to purple to signify penance, repentance and renewal. At the beginning and at the end of prayer it has been a very sacred moment where each child gets an opportunity to begin prayer with lighting the candle and blowing it out at the end of prayer
Children developing an identity for making marks and making books that represent their ideas. This week children engaged in some reading and book making with their teacher. Picture books have been a favourite and a collaborative learning experience when joined in with their peers. Some amazing pencil strokes and a beautiful story about the writing was related through this learning experience.
Community walks around the school, what precious moments to share with children interacting having conversations and enjoying the bliss of nature. We ventured on a picnic this morning , had a play on the oval, the log park , visited the Turtles and the fish , and picked some beautiful vegetables to be shared and consumed at our meal times.
Easter is fast approaching and our little learners have been very busy preparing some amazing easter gifts for their families.
Specks of gold for sharing this week.
Hope you all have a relaxing weekend.