Wonder and Word Boxes

This week, the children have been building skills in new areas, exploring different sensory experiences, and observing nature. 

In the three/four classroom, dramatic play continues to be the favorite way to express ideas and create stories. Whether it was dressing up, making up a phone conversation, or creating a world under a table, they used their imagination to play with roles.

There were plenty of moments of wonder as the children came face to face with nature. By studying an ant trail, pondering an orange tree, or delighting in an insect's unexpected visit, they learned a little more about their habitat.

The twos, threes and fours danced outside to African drums and techno beats, and twirled their ribbon sticks to the sounds of the ocean and a rainforest full of birds.

The older boys continued with their sound project. They drew pictures of the inner ear, and talked about where sound goes in the body. That led to drawings of the vocal cords, brain, heart, and stomach. 

The boys created word boxes, decorating them with photos they cut out of magazines. Tom worked with them to sound out and write words on cards, and then create drawings to explain each word. They are excited about collecting words in their boxes!

Meanwhile, the younger children continued with their discussions and drawings of dogs, and marveled at light, colors and textures in their sensory exploration activities. 

We were thrilled to kick off our series of guest readers for story time, beginning with Karina (Ana Sofia's mom) and Gabi (Jose's mom). They read wonderful stories, and the children were very attentive. It was really fun to have parents share their favorite stories with us. Thank you, Karina and Gabi! 

Enjoy the long weekend, everyone! We look forward to seeing you on Tuesday.

Rhythm and Hues

This week, we continued with our sound project, built some dogs, added more rhythm, got busy writing, and had more fun with mud and water.

In my 3/4 class, we had color-themed arrangements of loose parts to promote color awareness and focus on texture. 

We went outside and moved to music using ribbon sticks. Each week, we will be playing with new rhythms in our songs and chants during assembly as well as our outdoor sessions on the piazza.

There was dress-up dramatic play and plenty of shared conversations with friends.

We've been using our easel every day for our welcome chalk drawings (focusing on pre-writing skills) on the blackboard and creative drawings on the white board.

Our dog project continued, with a chance to build a 3-D dog using styrofoam pieces.

In Tom's class, the boys completed their ABC display, which we use each morning as a prop for our alphabet song during assembly, and created their own word boxes. Norma and Paloma guided them in their continued study of sound. Their new "office" has been a big hit, with the boys getting busy creating "invitations" using the letter stamps and stencils.

They've been learning how to play "Go Fish" (in English), and have enjoyed an exciting shape game donated by Norma that her boys played when they were young.

All of the children are improving their balance skills in the movement class with Lionel on Wednesday and Friday mornings.

And Jess is delighting all the parents by teaching the children some serious knife skills in the kitchen atelier sessions.

Just like last week, we finished on Friday with a great afternoon of mud and water play! This gave the children many opportunities to cooperate with each other, learn about water flow and gravity, but also to have fun together.

In fact, these muddy afternoons have been so rich in learning that we are thinking of making Fridays an all-outdoor experience, with Lionel in the morning, then outdoor art (painting, clay, chalk) and mud and water time. It's a wonderful community-building opportunity for the children, and a fantastic day of creating happy childhood memories.

ONE MORE THING: We are very proud of the work that Paloma, our atelierista, is doing with the children. Today, we had another reason to celebrate Paloma's artistic talent: she had a booth at the AFSG Art Fest featuring her bronze sculptures and paintings! 

Congrats, Paloma, and many thanks for your outstanding work at HLC. We are lucky to have you!

Mud and More

It's been an unusual week at HLC due to many families going on vacation during the Day of the Dead holiday, but the children who came to school had a wonderful time!

Tom has been helping the older boys (ages 5 and 6) with their writing and creative storytelling skills. The boys are using more and more English in their conversations.

Some of the children wore costumes on Halloween. We did our normal activities, but they looked a little different than usual.  ;-)

There were fun new props and walks in Lionel's outdoor movement class.

The children did some inspired drawing in the atelier.

The outdoor work on the sprinkler system was fun to observe.

The kitchen atelier has become a favorite activity for the children. They are getting very good at helping Jess with the food preparation.

But the most memorable day was probably Friday, when we decided to spend the afternoon outdoors. The weather was warm, the group was small, and the mud was very, very squishy.

The boys had fun feeding our friendly goat neighbors.

There will be a lot more muddy outdoor play in the days ahead, so please be sure your child comes to school wearing clothes that can get dirty. Also, please be sure that your child has a full set of clean clothes (pants, shirt, underwear) in their plastic bag at school.

If, for any reason, you do *not* want your child to get dirty on a particular day (for example, you are going to another activity right after school), please let us know so that we can plan alternative play options.

We have missed the children who have been traveling, and look forward to seeing everyone back at school next week.