Week fifteen 2008

Here are some highlights from week fifteen! Theme: 7 Continents & 4 Oceans

Focus: Asia, Australia, and Africa Number: 19 and teens review

Classical composer: Gioachino Rossini (1792-1868) was an Italian composer who created 39 operas as well as sacred and chamber music. His best known operas are Il barbiere di Siviglia (The Barber of Seville) and Guillaume Tell (William Tell). As you can see from the video, the children had a great time reenacting the finale to the William Tell Overture as the cavalry comes to free the oppressed! Hi, Ho!! . Table Activities: The children worked their fine motor muscles stretching rubber bands onto various cans, working on wooden puzzles, making long chains with plastic links, and stringing beads to make bracelets, necklaces, and head bands. . Music: In addition to listening to William Tell, the children also heard a child’s brief version of the opera and had great fun pretending to be William shooting an apple off his own son’s head and riding horses with the cavalry to save the day. We also talked briefly about Figaro, the main character from The Barber of Seville. We listed to Figaro’s not-so-humble opening song in English… “...Everyone loves me, everyone wants me, everyone calls me…Fi-ga-ro…Fi-ga-ro…Figaro, Figaro, Figaro…..” The children also had fun keeping the beat with rhythm sticks to “Epo I Tai Tai E”, a traditional Maori song, which translated means “We will not be sad, we will be happy!” The song also features a cool instrument called a didgeridoo. The children learned how this instrument was originally made by termites! . Art: Miss Cristina worked with the children on drawing skills, using many of the skills built upon from previous weeks. The children worked with pencil and paper to draw shapes and make the shapes into objects, such as boats, people, and suns. Each child had an opportunity to show their drawing in front of the class and talk about what they drew. . Theme: Miss Cameron shared her beautiful silk fan from China and the children created their own version using liquid water colors, filter paper, cardstock and craft sticks.

They listened to lullabies from China and Tibet while creating dances to the peaceful music. We also listened to a fun song about saying hello in China called “Ni Hao” and “Do the Monkey” which talks about monkeys, elephants, and tigers. As we shifted focused down under, the children learned about the Great Barrier Reef and how amazing it is. We looked at different shapes of coral such as fan, elkhorn, brain and rod corals. They created a reef with construction paper, sand, pipe cleaner coral, and shimmery craft paper creatures. As you can see from the photos, they are all wonderfully unique. See if you can pick out the example from the photos!

We listened to and "Waltzing Matilda" and "Kookaburra", two favorite Australian songs. For Africa, we learned a song called “Jambo, Bwana” from Kenya. The song helped the kids learn some Swahili words and was a fun way to dance and sing. We also listened to Raffi’s “Anansi” about the African spider legend. . Storybooks: Yoon and the Christmas Mitten, Neptune’s Nursery, What Do You Do With a Kangaroo?, Anansi the Spider, Anansi Goes Fishing

. Math: We made #19s by pasting the nine over the zero. Then we reviewed the teens by playing a game. The kids had all the numbers 1-9 and teacher called out the name of a number (i.e. “13”). The kids took the correct number and pasted it over the zero. It is amazing how well they understood and completed the task. Their understanding, correct identification and awareness of these numbers 11-19 have progressed significantly over these several weeks…it’s exciting to see! . Free-Play Fun: The children love to pretend play with each other and we have relaxed our rules for the reading loft to include some quiet play up there as well as reading. The kids also had great fun this week playing with tunnels and pop-up toys and using the light-up globe to pretend to travel to different lands. The HWT wood pieces also continue to be a big hit!