Diving into Sharing the Planet

Exploring the Unit

Sharing Our Experiences 

In this Circle Time activity, the Dolphins had a chance to try out their presentation skills in front of all their classmates and teachers. Reflecting on and sharing their personal experiences outside of school, each child who had photos in the class album felt brave and comfortable enough to take their place at the front of the class when their photo popped up onto the screen. We had a variety of presentation styles from pointing out interesting elements, to nodding and shaking our heads to questions from the teacher, to taking the lead and introducing and explaining the situation  independently. This was also a great chance to practice our listening skills as we focused on being respectful of other people's turns, and showing kindness by paying attention to our peers and even ask them questions. We continue to reflect on our experiences in nature through the photo displays that are now up in the classroom. 

Planting

As we wanted to start doing some planting and growing in our classroom, we thought we better start off with sharing our prior knowledge of plants and fine tuning our understanding of how plants grow and what they need to make them successful. We were eager to share our plant facts with the class and the children were soon shouting out 'stem', 'seeds', and 'leaves', as we brainstormed what we needed to draw to make a flower diagram. We talked about how plants generally need sunlight, water and soil to develop, before starting our own class project: growing beans. Volunteers came up to the front to help shovel soil into our large planter, sprinkle beans into the soil, and spray water across the top. 

After some research, we learnt about how a bean plant grows, that it needs to develop roots to suck up the water in the ground, and that we needed to be patient as the beans could take several weeks to grow. We followed this up by working as a group to think of plants that we would like to try to grow in the classroom. We took a couple of suggestions and had a closer look at how they grow using a few sources including Google Images, Kiddle.co and Youtube.com

We acknowledged that these plants wouldn't grow without our help and that we would need to ensure that we helped them along by watering them daily, making sure they got enough sunlight, and didn't disturb the soil with our curious fingers. Across the classroom, we had our sensory tray set up as a mini garden where we were able to really explore the feeling of the soil and the act of planting and replanting using a mixture of faux plants and natural materials. 

Creating Flowers

A craft that we started yesterday involves a multi-step process and careful, gentle hands. Listening carefully to Amy, we had to cut down the lines on our paper (making sure we stopped at the end of each line), curl the cut bars and then wrap the paper around a paper straw to create our flower with a handy stem. This activity relies on a high level of patience and focus as we have to listen very carefully to the instructions and slowly carry them out without ripping the paper. We will continue creating our wonderful flowers for the remainder of this week. 

Building Up Our Learning Space

We continue to develop our ownership of our learning space and interest areas. Last week we built up our 'growth' wall display. The AM class collaborated on Project Sun. We first had to paint a large cardboard circle orange and yellow using roller sponges. Once this had dried, our next step was to stick orange and yellow tissue paper using white glue. Meanwhile, the PM class worked on the rain cloud. First step was to paint it blue to show how full of water it was. We added white gravel on top using white glue and painted the rain drops. Once hoisted up, we were happy to see our class flowers had enough sunlight and water to continue to grow. 

Following this, our next cooperative project was to decorate backdrops for our animal habitats. The AM class were assigned a painting task. The desert backdrop was to be orange, the nocturnal forest black, and the jungle green. The cardboard pieces dried over lunch, just in time for the PM class to complete them by sticking a variety of shapes and materials to give them more dimensions. We will be taking a closer look at habitats as we go forward. 

Music and Movement

Open Shut Them

A song we use during circle time a lot is our Open, Shut Them song. Although it is set to the tune of Open, Shut Them, the lyrics quickly change from the original version. If you would like to sing along with your dolphin at home, the lyrics below may help you out!

"Open, shut them, open, shut them,

Give a little clap, clap, clap,

Open, shut them, open, shut them,

Put them in your lap, lap, lap,

Creep them, creep them, 

Creep them, creep them,

Way up to your chin, chin, chin,

Open wide your little mouth,

But do not put them in.

Soaring, soaring, soaring, soaring,

Way up in the sky,

Flutter, flutter, flutter, flutter,

Like a butterfly.

Roll them, roll them, roll them, roll them,

Roll them round and round,

Shake them, shake them, shake them, shake them,

Shake them to the ground!

5 Little Fishies

A silly song we sometimes sing when waiting for our friends to finish in the toilet is 5 little fishies. This is another song we sing acoustically but if you would like to have a listen to the original version at home, you can check out the video below. We have great fun waiting to see if we will be eaten by the shark as we count down from 5 to 1. 

1-100 song

Although we don't have an expectation of counting anywhere near to 100 in K1, we have been enjoying singing along to this 1-100 song as a little brain warm up at the beginning of some of our Circle Times. Some of us are noticing patterns with the numbers and that even if we may not remember the words 'twenty', 'thirty', 'forty' and onwards, we have realised that once we get to 21 the unit sequencing repeats itself from 1-9 allowing us to confidently shout out numbers as high as 91, 92, 93, 94....

Sharing the Planet Songs

Below are some of the unit related songs we have been practicing over the last 2 weeks. Not only can we sing along to them, but we can dance along with actions and refresh our memories on some of the components of growing plants. 

Grow, Grow, Grow

The Farmer Plants the Seeds

Can You Plant a Bean?

Google Albums

We will continue to upload to our Sharing the Planet album for the rest of Term 1

AM Dolphins: Sharing the Planet

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PM Dolphins: Sharing the Planet