The Little School Community Blog

Who's in charge around here anyway? Our goal at TLS is to make the children active partners in their own learning. This is child-led learning at it's best! From sea creatures to rainbows, our teachers have been riding right along your child, letting them develop a lesson plan that moves and inspires them. Take a look at what your little ones have been diving into this week!

In The Curious Caterpillars, the kids have been interested in animals. In particular, the teachers noticed they were gravitating towards dolphins and whales. Launching from this interest, the class began a study about the sea. They created an ocean painting that the kids really *ahem* got into. The curious ones used every part of themselves to put paint to paper. Some skipped the paper altogether and preferred themselves. These blueman group wannabe's then headed straight to water-play where they could further investigate water while hopefully de-bluing themselves.

The Diving Dolphins have been more interested in alligators and crocodiles then dolphins. The kids  have been fascinated by these scaly critters, so the team has been finding ways to explore them further. They created a large cardboard and canvas alligator that the kids named "Star Wars". Deciding that Star Wars needed a home, they investigated his habitat and made him a swamp. The kids hiked down to the retention pond and collected cat-tails to attach to his swamp. The kids are reading books and creating their own facts about Star Wars: "My name is Star Wars. I live in a swamp. I eat fish and snakes. I make chomp chomp sounds. My family is all of us (classroom friends). I like to play volleyball with my family". One student has decided that if there is going to be another classroom alligator, his name will be named "Vol-tron". Obviously.

The Grizzly bears have been looking to the sky for inspiration. Their interest in the sky led them to rainbows where they conducted several science experiments. The class decided to paint their own unique rainbow. As such, they were very clear they did not want to use brushes. They went to the art studio to explore their options. The class lit up when they saw the corks, and proceeded to use them to paint their mural. They took one one color of the rainbow at a time... including indigo. Is that purple you see? Umm, no, it's VIOLET, thank you very much!

The Mighty Mes are a group of movers and shakers. Their love of construction led them into a study of builders. They discussed all they know about builders ("They have tape measures" Parker informs the class. "I have tape measures too, just like buildings" adds Sebastian"). The class even created raucous and action packed art by painting with hammers!

And lastly, one that made me laugh each time I saw it last week: A parent in in the Space Invaders Class has a broken ankle. This is of course an amazing thing for a kid to wrap their brain around. It is fascinating yes, but did you know it was also a Space Invader fashion phenomenon? Kids have begun requesting a paper cast for THEIR broken ankles. The trend is spreading (as trends do) and this is suddenly a group of very accident prone kids. Get well soon guys, or don't and keep learning all you can about broken bones!