floppy and floppy take flushing

Joy has been on my mind lately. Learning should be joyful. Life should be joyful. This is actually the provocation that I posed for myself - to think of my own joyful learning memories. I remembered my first grade teacher, Mrs. Norman, leaving green tracks in the classroom for St. Patricks Day. I remember the joy of finding such a fun mystery in OUR classroom (which I think led to a pot of gold). This is what led me to leave the joyfully mysterious tracks I wrote about in my last post.

Through our provocations, as educators and parents, we can spark joy and curiosity. In our fully present and meaningful interactions we can allow space for joy. And in honoring children as thinkers, idea-makers, and doers we nurture the culture of joy within the classroom (or home).

Today joy came from finding two rabbits in our classroom, from petting them, and from restraining or shreaks of joy - opting for gentle oohs and ahhhs for the rabbits sake. Joy came from having the bright idea to build a bunny playhouse for our new friends. And the joy will continue tomorrow as we trouble-shoot making the playhouse safe from bunny escapes.

                    Can you feel the joy?

Floppy and Floppy have escaped! Time to think about changes to the playhouse.

Can you think of your own joyful learning memory? Does it give you an idea for your own classroom or home?

orange feet in the night

Our week...in pictures and (some) rhyme.

Tracks in the snow, tracks in the snow

Where do they go...

and whose tracks are they?

Each child finds their own way to share - through talking, writing, drawing, and more.

Animals visited our room during the night...

leaving footprints: red, purple, brown, and blue.

Tracking guides and books provide many clues.

So excited some run straight for the books -
before hanging their coats on hooks!

A big idea, a great idea...

to leave food for our animal friends in hopes of their return.

But balancing bowls from the ceiling is tough.
It requires some practice and perseverance to not give up.

Soon bowls of food began going up on the ceiling.

Come on crows, giraffes, and elephants...come to eat food in our room,
there's more than enough.

a camera in small hands

We rarely have the opportunity to take on the perspective of another. This is the magic of art, the invitation to see, for a moment, the shadows and light and beauty that another sees. I invited one of the children in class today to photograph her light table creation. I handed her the camera and off she went. When the camera returned to my hands, I could only smile at the many photographs taken. She 'saw' the objects I overlook each day. It's a reminder that there is beauty in simplicity...perhaps even in a garbage can.

I tried to dig for a bit more and engage in a conversation - but this was her language - the language of photos and images. I have been revisiting the idea of '100 languages' this week and have to admit I often look for the language of spoken word but today I am content to simply enjoy one child's perspective.

Enjoy the simplicity and beauty.

the dance

Several months ago I read a research article examining the differences between Norway and Finland's education systems. Finland surpasses Norway on the PISA and Norway funded this bit of research, hoping to better understand why their Nordic neighbor surpasses them educationally (at least in regard to the PISA). I apologize that I can not find this article now and the title is escaping me. Much was discovered through the research but what has stayed with me is the value teachers in Finland place on teacher child interaction. The researcher found that teachers provide more immediate, consistent, and meaningful feedback in Finland. This has powerful implications, especially for struggling students. If a student or students are struggling and teacher feedback is limited then the chance for success diminishes.

The topic of interaction and my role as a teacher has been on my mind in recent weeks, especially surrounding the puppet project. This study began months ago as we noticed children radiating pure joy when interacting with finger puppets. As time passed and we all gained experience with storytelling, retelling, and puppet exploration I invited my father to visit the class to help children build a puppet theater of our own.

Children created a blueprint for the theater and luckily my father's design bared a striking resemblance to their plan.

The immediate response was strong, with children wanting to visit the puppet theater often. As we observed children during play we noticed the inherent difficulty in delving deeper into puppetry. Children need to listen to one another, collaborate, and negotiate ideas. These are skills difficult for us all but especially difficult for young children. Ms. Anny and I responded when it seemed children needed assistance before becoming frustrated and we modeled several puppet shows. Then the unimaginable happened. Children were done with puppets, the interest disappeared.

What happened?

Frustration happened.

When working through project-based learning teacher interaction is so vital. Providing a foundation, a reservoir of skills children can tap into later is the goal but in this situation I didn't step in enough to stave off the Great Wall of Frustration.

We could give up.

Sometimes throwing in the towel is the responsive thing to do - however in this situation I feel strongly that the responsive action is to persevere. I chose a small group of 5 children who have shown great interest in puppetry over the last several months. We revisited some of our favorite stories together, talking about the characters and their traits. Then I invited children to create their own character. They drew a small sketch of their character and told a story about their character. Later I enlarged the sketches and surprised the group with larger versions of their characters to paint in creating a final puppet.

We now have five monster characters, some are grumpy and some are nice. In fact one eats dinosaur food. Our next step will be to write a shared story using these characters, perform and record the puppet show. I'm not sure what will come of it. The class may be beyond excited to watch the "movie" on the Smart Board...or the puppet craze may just be finished after this.

It's such a dance - knowing when to stand back and when to guide more directly. Luckily we can always take a step back

on perspective

Upon our return from the holiday vacation we stepped right back into all things puppets. The trip to the Shadow Box Puppet Theatre had been on everyone's mind last week and Friday was the day. As always, in reflecting on the video and photos from the experience I was struck by the observational drawings children created. With all children sitting in the audience - with similar perspectives - it is a beautiful reminder of how we each see so uniquely. Amid a loud theater, filled with elementary schools from every borough, our children were able to put pencil to paper and quietly observe. They saw bits and pieces with such clarity that even I had to take another look around the room.

This auditorium, like almost every other in New York City, became a mosaic of details. Heating grates, ornamental lights, numbered seats...

One child sees a stage - another a sea of chairs - and yet others
see vividly the details of the ceiling and wall.

Lights captured the attention of all children.

The proportions and symmetry of her sketch reflect her
precise style also seen when building in block center

He sees it all, everything in front of him, high and low.

The perspective used to draw the 3-D aspect of the seats stand out.

The wheel-like spindles represent beautiful light fixtures that were hanging above. 

So much time and paper space devoted to the main event.