The Beginning

I am sitting in our classroom...already getting completely excited about the new school year. There are several changes that I want to make this year, inspired by the many Reggio books and blogs I've read over the summer and from visiting a Reggio private school over the summer. I hope you and your child are getting excited as well, it will be a wonderful year.

I was just writing the supply list for the year when I got stuck on how to describe beautiful junk. I decided it was worthy of a full blog post, since we will will be using beautiful found objects and "junk" throughout the year for sculpture, collage, and art projects. We often throw away items that can be transformed by the creative hands of a four year old. Some of the things you may want to bring in from home are listed below, but feel free to bring in anything throughout the year that you think can become part of a work of art!

- buttons
- yarn
- fabric scraps
- scarves
- egg cartons
- shoe boxes
- packing peanuts
- CDs
- boxes with lids (all sizes)
- empty plastic containers
- plastic containers with lids(transparent and opaque)
- plastic screw-top container lids (peanut butter, spice bottles,
coffee jars)
- unpainted metal jar lids,

Here are two pre-k blog posts all about beautiful junk. For some reason the link function isn't working but you can copy and past them into your URL...Enjoy!

http://www.playbasedlearning.com.au/2010/08/junk-art/

http://simpleorganic.net/the-three-rs-go-back-to-school/

I'm very much looking forward to meeting parents and children in just a few more weeks! If you happen upon the blog before school starts and you want to come by the school to meet me and see the classroom just email or comment on here and we can set something up!