Dear parents,
We read Baby Bird's First Nest. We talked a tiny bit about animals that fly. Most people shouted "birds fly" with one person adding butterflies and telling us about her grandmother who loved butterflies.
Tuesday Kim came for a family share. She read Feathers For Lunch and the children acted out the story. One person got to be the cat and everyone else was birds. The cat just got feathers. We split the class in two groups. While some acted with Kim, we reread a book about a bird's nest and asked the children if there was anything we could use in the big room to make a nest. They used the square, rectangle, and triangle blocks to make a circular nest. One group wanted to make sure it was big enough for six baby birds while the other group was more
concerned with flying the coop.
In the yard we collected sticks to build our own bird nest. The children helped weave the sticks, mud, vines, grass, and leaves into a nest. While we were working on it someone noticed a bird fly into a small area on the church wall. When we looked for closer inspection we saw that there were two birds building a real nest! The children wanted to put our nest in a tree. We did. They wondered whether birds would use it or maybe borrow sticks for their own nests.
We used the Cheerios Kim left us to make bird feeders. The children honed their excellent fine motor skills to weave the cereal onto pipe cleaners. We took them out to the yard and placed them in a bird's eye view. Later when we returned a few missing Cheerios excited the children. And the teachers.
Friday we read Pepito the Brave Bird and searched for shapes in his body. The children saw circles, triangles, and half circles. We traced them on the carpet and in the air. We worked to trace these shapes using cardboard shapes, and scissors to cut them out. The children glued them onto paper to make new shapes.
Next week, another family share--book yours today-- more acting out books, and story writing.
Have a flightless weekend,
Therese