Tuesday 26 November 2013

Creating A Christmas Tree…

Stage 1

10

My Little Learners have had so much fun this past week making mini Christmas trees.

Helping each other

6  7  9

They decorate our room perfectly even when unpainted and not yet decorated. 
I am thrilled with the results. 
Take a look…

5

First each child selected a substantially thick magazine. 
ie Australian Women's Weekly, Top Gear, which incidentally the boys loved!

Steps to Success

To begin simply fold the top right corner of a single page in towards the centre to form a triangle and make a firm crease as below.

photo 3

Next take the newly formed right corner and bring it across to the middle of the magazine ensuring the hypotenuse is now straight along the magazines centre.  The page should still be completely attached yet hanging off at the bottom due to the folding as in picture below. 
The Little Learners call this move “making a Dads tie”.

photo 4

Lastly, fold upward the small section that is hanging off the bottom of the ‘tie’ as shown below. 
Ensure the crease is firm and strong then turn the newly shaped page and start again. 
Continue with all pages including the covers. 
This took my Little Learners approximately 2hours to complete.

photo 5

Once completed, stand upright and tape covers together. 
This makes the folded pages fan out slightly and form a Christmas tree shape.

photo  photo 2

Now the trees are ready to spray paint with green paint. 

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Pop back tomorrow to see the spray painted trees,
the star and decorations that really finish the activity beautifully.

I hope you are inspired to have a go.

Happy Tuesday!
Mrs Stowe Smile

Friday 15 November 2013

Moving On With Daily Five

Loving implementing Daily Five

After launching Read To Self, it was time to move on into

2. Read to Someone

Again we started with the suggested anchor chart for Read to Someone
and
practised the behaviours that would ensure this was a successful station. 

In my mind it was risky practising the anti behaviours as ‘the sisters’ suggested but…they were right. 

My little rascal was doing his usual thing so I selected him to demonstrate the behaviour that would not be good to have during this Read to Someone time.
 
Needless to say…

He excelled in his demonstration of rolling around the floor, taking the ‘shared book’, being noisy and making ridiculous faces.  The Little Learners laughed hysterically and I immediately ventured ( as suggested) into having him then demonstrate helpful behaviour for Read to Someone. 

SHOCK , HORROR…

He did this perfectly so naturally we all applauded and praised his demonstration.  HE beamed with this attention.  Now for the best news ever,  he AMAZINGLY employed the correct behaviour for the whole session of Read to Someone.  Yes I was astounded.

My Little Learners are proudly now achieving 20minutes of Read to Self perfectly and 12 minutes of Read to Someone brilliantly too.  Have a look at the following photo’s.  They echo my ramblings.  By the way the Little Learners even get up and change their books without being disruptive.

photo 1photo 2photo 3photo 4photo 5photo

And now…

I'm gathering ideas for Work on Writing so please
share anything you do that’s great and help us out.  Much appreciation for anything!

Happy Saturday!
Mrs StoweSmile