Vegetables, Fruit, and Earth Day!

The Kindergarten Kids continued to learn about spring and explored fruits and vegetables this week.  They learned the scientific difference between fruits and vegetables, and they taste tested different vegetables.  It was fun to see if they liked cauliflower, beets, cucumbers, and peppers!  They used a t-chart to record their opinions of the different vegetables.  We also weaved Beatrix Potter's story, Peter Rabbit, into the unit.  The K-Kids listened to the story and then, as a class, wrote a letter to Mc. McGregor from Peter Rabbit.  The class decided that Peter Rabbit should apologize for playing in Mr. McGregor's garden, ask if he could help fix anything, and ask for his jacket and shoes back.  Then the K-Kids each wrote a letter back from Mr. McGregor and told Peter Rabbit he could have his shoes and jacket back and if he could have any vegetables.  It was really fun to read the responses, and many of the kids decided that Mr. McGregor would forgive Peter Rabbit and share his vegetables with him.  One of the kindergarteners decided that Peter needed a "carrot break" and then he could have his jacket back!

We also celebrated Earth Day on Thursday (since there was no school on Friday) and discussed as a class why we need to take care of our Earth.  The kids also thought of ideas they could do to help protect the world and keep it clean.  They learned about recycling, reusing, and reducing and also discussed littering.  Using magazines, the kids made a wonderful class collage of animals, green forests, and clean oceans and lakes.

Our fine art unit this week focused on Joan Miro.  Joan Miro was a Spanish artist born in Barcelona.  He mostly used primary colors, lines, shapes, and stars to create art.  The K-Kids learned about the different elements he used (closed shapes, open shapes, Miro stars, taking a dot for a walk, and use of balance and space).  They experimented with the different elements.  The final piece they created was a directed art experience.  Ms. S. gave verbal directions (ex. Draw a miro star in the top right corner, take a dot for a walk in the middle of the paper, etc.) and the K-kids followed the directions on their own pieces of paper.  Because the direction did not dictate size, color, or exact shapes, the drawings all look different but the same elements are within each one.  I am excited to share these drawings with you at the art show in June!

The kids were very busy mathematicians this week as well!  They practiced telling time to the hour and half hour and created a fun sunflower clock.  They practiced writing time using a digital format (6:00, 9:30, etc.) and drew pictures of what they may do during that hour.  Using pattern blocks and tangrams, the K-kids learned about angles and counted the number of angles and sides in different shapes.  Then they used the shapes to create pictures.  To celebrate Spring, the K-kids used jellybeans to practice sorting and creating a bar graph to show how many of each color they had.

We continued with our poetry unit this week as well.  They read two new poems and used the poems to identify word endings, adjectives, and rhyming words.  One poem was an acrostic poem, and they worked together to create their own acrostic poems using the words - Earth Day.  These poems will be kept in their poetry folder and shared with you in June.

Have a great long weekend, and I will see you all on Monday!