Jack's creative artwork

One morning last week, Jack took a real interest in the painting that I set up in the art room. He liked the look of the bright primary colours and began on his painting straight away. Jack used red, green and orange. Once he had finished, I could tell straight away what he had painted, and began asking him about it. "It's traffic lights!" he told me. I asked him where he had seen them, and he told me that he sees them on the roads all the time.

I asked Jack if he knew what the colours represented. "Red is stop", he said. "And green is...?", I said. "Go!", he replied. He was a little unsure with what orange was, and I told him that it meant to slow down and try and stop safely.

Jack then began telling me that ambulance and police can go straight through any of the lights because they are always in a hurry and it is an emergency.

Jack then moved on to painting a rainbow. carefully choosing the colours he wanted, and taking extra care in painting it in an arch shape.

I enjoyed having these conversations with Jack, and loved that he was able to share his knowledge from the wider community, with me, and express it through his art work. Fantastic work Jack!

Ainslee

Making shapes to sound

Today I wanted to explore children's interest to establish sound-sense-shape relationship. I could see many of them (generally those above 3 1/2 years) interested in shaping their names in developing letters. When I thought about writing I remembered physical differences in their hands holding a pencil. I discussed the matter with Irene and suggested Tarquin holding the pencil making a three point grip (which is good). The angle of pencil to the paper is also 45 degrees. Most of the children in the centre are developing this skill through encouragement to write their names. Charlie is developing his skill by holding a crayon in the proper method. I think it would be a good start to transform meaningful sounds into shapes (letters) beginning from children's names. If it prospers well, numeracy will also be shaped on paper. Irene has tested Tarquin, Donnagh and Charlie and shared their interest with us.

Mohanan

Paige Writes

Paige has a very strong interest in writing and has done so for some time now. Every day at KIDSPACE , she can be seen at some stage, pen in hand, practicing forming symbols that represent letters.

Recently I noticed her at the literacy table, very focused on what she was doing, and it was clearly obvious that she was attempting to put her thoughts down on paper. She would gaze off into the distance momentarily, before proceeding to write, telling a story as she did so. Later on in the day, I observed her doing the same in the playdough area writing a shopping list. I knew it was a shopping list, as I could hear her naming the items as she wrote.

Paige is developing an understanding that symbols can be "read" by others and that thoughts, experiences, and ideas can be represented through words, pictures, print, numbers, sounds, shapes, models, and photographs. She is also developing a familiarity with print and its uses, by exploring and observing the use of print in activities that have meaning and purpose for children. Monica.

Baking pikelets for an Art Deco morning tea

Noah, Ataahua and Paige wanted to help me make pikelets for morning tea. We were aiming for a more 'traditional' morning tea rather than sandwiches. Pikelets with cream and jam are an olden day treat, but still a favourite today. The children helped me to take the ingredients and bowl to the art room table. We got started with our recipe, and I had three wonderful helpers. Paige stirred the eggs and sugar. Ataahua wanted to help put the heaped table spoons of flour in to the bowl, and Noah was keen to mix it really fast once all the ingredients were in. After all the measuring and mixing, I baked them in the electric frying pan. Just before morning tea, we spread with margarine, jam and whipped cream. The children thought it was a very tasty treat for morning tea.

Ainslee

Early Literacy

Ruby, Eneri and Taneesha display their "understanding that symbols can be 'read' by others and that thoughts, experiences and ideas can be representing through words, print, and shapes", Communication, Te Whaariki.

Look at the marks, letters and shapes these children are making to represent themselves, Eneri and Ruby- their names, and Taneesha is mark making shapes. They are making their own language and developing writing the English language too.

Ko te re tuakiri Language is my identity

Ko te reo tooku ahurei Language is my uniqueness

Ko te rea te ora. Language is life.

(Whakatauki taken from "The New Zealand Curriculum, for English-medium teaching and learning in years 1-13").

Jessie

Reading stories together

Ben wanted me to read 'The Little Yellow Digger', Taylah and Max joined in. Max liked to point at lots of the pictures on the pages particularly the dog and all the different diggers that got stuck, he talked lots as he pointed to the pictures. Ben asked lots of questions about what the diggers were doing and actively inquiring. Taylah just enjoyed watching and listening to Max, Ben and the story. Throughout this time as a group we all ended up listening to about three or four stories. It was a great time to share together and discover and be engaged in literacy.

In Te Whaariki it says "Children develop an expectation that words and books can amuse, delight, comfort, illuminate, inform, and excite;". Through the use of stories children can get used to different voices that teachers can make for different characters and really be engaged in the story and use their imagination.

Tamara