Insects and Clouds!

We have been talking a lot about insects and learning about the many different types of insects. We read about bees, ants, mosquitos and flies! The students collected natural materials when we were out on our bug hunt and they used these to create bug pictures. We read the following Eric Carle books, to inspire the students' creations.

They worked hard and made many different types!

D.S's cricket  

A.A's caterpillar

K.T. made a mosquito biting a caterpillar

E.K made a bee and caterpillar

H.W's creation

M.A's ant has 6 legs

P.D made a stick bug

M.W. made a caterpillar

M.P. made a butterfly

B.G made a cricket

Can you see the spider in it's web?

G.O. made a firefly

A.R's creations!

A.C's caterpillar

R.H's creation

I.S's butterfly

What always amazes me about children is their creativity! They each had the same materials and yet their creations were each so unique. This is a great activity for you to do over the summer. Go for a nature walk, collect and gather materials, then bring them in and create with them! 

We also spent time this week looking at the clouds. They were many different shapes! Some days they were moving very fast and others it didn't look like they were moving at all! 

This summer see if you can find different shapes in the clouds. You might be surprised by what you see, if you take the time to lie down and look!

Happy Father's Day!

"Walk alongside me daddy and hold my little hand. 

I have so many things to learn that I don't understand yet. 

Teach me things to keep me safe from dangers every day. 

Show me how to do my best at home, at school, at play. 

Every child needs a gentle hand to guide them as they grow. 

So walk alongside me, daddy we have a long way to go."

We hope all the father's enjoyed the tiles the students worked so hard to create!

We're Going On a Bug Hunt!

We have been observing the students during recess time. Everyday a group of students find buckets from the sand pit and set out on a quest to find bugs in the yard. They have been quite successful finding many ants and some potato bugs. We set up a provocation to encourage the students to continue their thinking about bugs.

The students began creating with the materials at this table.

E.K in the process of building his habitat

"The ants are on the mushroom. They are holding apples!"

M.W's habitat

"the ant is carrying the apple."

"The bugs are sharing food"

N.M- "This is a bug school. The rocks keep them safe. They all have food on their backs"

We also suggested going on a bug hunt, this was met with a loud cheer and burst of excitement. The students geared up for a bug hunt with clipboards and pencils. We changed our shoes and headed out to the trail.

Here are just a few of the bugs we were able to find.

A bumble bee

Heading back to school because a storm was coming

We wrote a list of all the different bugs we found on our walk, it was quite long!

We read some books about insects and learned that insects have 3 body parts (head, thorax, abdomen), 6 legs and can have wings. We looked back at the bugs we found and realized some of our bugs weren't insects! Worms, spiders and centipedes are not insects! So we headed out for another bug and insect hunt in a different location, hoping we could find different ones.

They found something!

"Ms. Tompkins, take a picture of the dragon fly!"

Such a beautiful day! We are so fortunate to have such fabulous green space around our school. 

Can you see the bug?

The excitement of this simple activity can barely be put into words, but one SK student summed it up like this, "This is the BEST thing I have EVER done!"

Here is what the students recorded on their bug hunt:

"Where do insects live?"

E.K found 9 different types of bugs

P.D. sorted what she found by 'insects' or 'not insects'

I.S. identified whether what he was an insect ("yee") or not ("no")

A.P put a checkmark before each type of insect he found