who doesn't love a robot?

Inspired by a digital story created by second graders at our school, we now have our first pre-k digital storyteller. Who can resist robots and bad guys. Take a look...

a culture of storytelling

I just registered for this year's Wonderplay conference and am already looking forward to the day, especially having the opportunity to hear Vivian Paley speak.  They shared a wonderful excerpt of Paley's talk from the 2008 conference.

Her work regarding play and storytelling has inspired a culture of storytelling in our classroom. Here are a few stories that have already been written and performed in our classroom. To add a bit of context - each day two storytellers tell me a story, which I write down word for word. After they tell their story to me, we look at the number of characters in the story and I invite the storyteller to choose who they wish to be during the performance. They make their choice and then we ask other children in the audience to act the parts of other necessary characters. The performances are an end of the day ritual that we all really enjoy. *I wish I could share images of daily perfomances but it is impossible to do so without showing the faces of the children*

 

I Was Scared 

A wolf was there and it scared me! And they attack me and able to put me in the net. So they put me in the box and they put me in the web. Then I bounce, bounce, bounce on the spider web. And we play together. Then we play painting. And me and wolf, we played painting game and eat orange. Then we eat vegetables and noodles and we share together. Then we eat together. And we look each other and we jump on the trampoline. And we eat watermelon. Then we smiled and we enjoy!  

Ugly Monster Run 

One day three ugly monster and there was a ghost behind her the ugly monster. And he ran away! The ugly monster run away. Then the ghost say “boooo.” And he say “why the ghost scare me? I run away!” The she never see the three ugly monster again.  

All About In Pre-k 

I was too shy and my friend and I went with him and I wasn’t shy. I go with my friend at home and eat and with my mom. I was resting with a mat in the floor for a sleepover with my brother because there’s no space so that’s why I need a mat. When I sleep with my mat I play with my toys over here. And you use it for the swimming pool – it floats.  

My First Fairy Tale 

One day the three little bears went out to go for a walk. Then a naughty girl named Goldilocks that she was very hungry so she look for a bowl to eat some porridge. Then she use the small medium size but it was too cold. Then she tries the baby size one and it was just right. Then when the three little bears came back she wake up and then she ran away to the jungle.

taking a chance

If you'll remember, I mentioned here that we have begun an exploration of dinosaurs. I also mentioned I was very hesitant to do so, as the concept of the dinosaur is really very abstract...since they're extinct and all. But weighing the pros and cons, I couldn't get over the fact that the loudest voices I heard speaking about dinosaurs were several of the children learning English. The chance that they could be fully engaged in a project overwhelmed my list of cons.

Below is a book, written by J. This is J's first story told in English and I attribute that all to dinosaurs. He had the motivation to make sure I understood his story because he was so excited about the story. You will see the idea of eggs and babies come across in his illustrations and words. This seems to be the area of interest for many of the children. This week many of the play scenarios and conversations all came back to this idea..how are dinosaurs born.

This, of course, makes me happy because it seems like a perfect way to segue into animals alive today who lay eggs. This will be more appropriate for project work as we will be able to have first hand experiences with the living animals. In fact we will have a live reptile in our class for two weeks, for observation and even handling! *A note for any parents in our classroom, please don't tell your children about this connection yet or that we will have a reptile in the classroom. We want them to make their hypothesis first and see what ideas are brewing. We haven't yet made the connection to today's reptiles and dinosaurs and I want that connection to unfold naturally*

Enjoy J's book...

silly billy stories

Aside from two mornings where I completely forgot our new storytelling routine, the stories have been flowing. Silly stories seem to be a favorite, and the children seem very aware of their audience when telling their stories.

Take T for example in his tale Silly Duck...
A duck was sleeping in a bed with a kid. It was sleeping and snoring like a lobster. And he opened his eyes and go to the zoo and see all the snowy animals. And it was snowing everywhere and the neighborhood was empty. The duck was so silly making a silly dance. The End.

D seems influenced by the Dick and Jane book she has been reading at home in her story Big Family Work...
One day there was Dick, Dick said "look father Jim plays and plays." Then the Sallie says "look, he make a oqn club house." Then Dick and the father were telling her to never play. Then he and his mother - mother said "Dick is a boy and whole family work together." The family works and works. The family eat food every single day. And the Sallie says "oh my ball is not here. Who can found my ball? My ball is yellow and pretty." Then Sallie found her ball. The End.

The Three Crayon and the Box by J
He just dancing. He dancing all by himself. And the big girl. And he color on the crayon, and he just draw it. And draw the sun and the sky. And the chicken live and the egg, his nest. Like the color. He not coming now, he just color his head. The End.

This one is amazing when I think about X, she entered the pre-k with no English as many of the children did and when she was telling this story I had to ask her to shorten the story because it was so long. Truly amazing.
Three Little Butterflies by X
The three little butterflies three color is one yellow color, one is the red color, and one is white color. The three little butterflies in the garden play. The rain is down. The three little butterflies is fly. One red butterfly said red flower "I want to go to the leaf dance there." The red flower said "come here." The red butterfly "me too." Then the white butterfly and yellow butterfly come fly. The three little butterfly said "no is friend." The three little butterflies fly to yellow flower say "yellow flower I want to fly to leaf there." The yellow flower say "yellow butterfly, me too come there.' And yellow, white, red butterfly fly. The three little butterfly fly to white flower said "white flower, I want to go to that leaf there." White flower said butterfly, butterfly me too."

A Silly One by Annie
Mrs. Chin and Ms. Merril come from Xin Yue. And Ms. Merril drink cow milk, Ms. Chin too. The End

Silly Goose by Brian
Butterfly drink the flower. Ms. Merril and me see the butterfly. K see the fish. D see the bird. F see the fish. X see the eye. Mrs. Chin see the cow. Me see the playground, see T. Me see the big mommy house. My see Ms. Merril house. Oink! The End.

A horse with Wings, Oh my!

Ever inspired by early childhood educators blogging about their classroom endeavors, I ran across Teacher Tom and his use of storytelling in the classroom. This year, we have a class full of natural storytellers so we gave it a try this morning. During morning arrival activities, I sat with J and S (the first two people to sign up yesterday on our storytelling sign up sheet). I asked them to tell me a story and this is what they had to say...

"One day a horse was flying in the sky and was raining using some books and raining down on people's houses. And people said "what a nice music," so they dance in the sun and run on their houses ceiling. The End." -J

S seemed inspired by J's flying horse as you'll see...

"I'm gonna make a silly one. The horse was jumping off the house and the horse talked. And the horse had wings. And the horse turned into a people. And the horse turned into a shoe. And then the horse turned into a hen. And then the horse turned into a Miss Merril and then turned into a Mrs. Chin. And then it sits and rests. The End." -S

Each child sat beside me while I read their story during our morning meeting. Actually, J is an avid reader already so he took the story right out of my hands and read it to the class. The audience loved the pure silliness of both stories. I asked the class if they thought we should make storytelling a part of our morning routine and we took a vote. We had 16 votes for YES and 2 votes for NO so it looks like it's going to be a part of our morning ritual. I'm curious to see how children respond to writing for an audience. This is something that Teacher Tom talks about in his entry and I'm curious to see how it plays out in our classroom. I'll update with more stories soon!