Inquiring About Music- The Introduction

This week we started our Sound Inquiry! Our driving question is, "How can we create an area for students at the ECC to explore sound?"  In order to prepare for this, we need to investigate different ways to make sounds.  They were all very excited to start exploring! I started out by showing them a video by the amazing group STOMP creating music using brooms.  The kids loved it! We have since been watching a video every day showing people making music with odd items including a group that played an impressive version of "Call Me Crazy" by blowing into bottles hanging around their necks!  

The videos have truly inspired them to try creating sound and rhythm with different objects in different ways which is a part of our science standards. Below, a friend brought in some random items from home to show how they create sound!  

I set out some random items and instruments on a table to see what would happen. They started exploring right away.

I then created seperate areas for the kids to explore sound and added questions for them to explore. Next week we will add clip boards for them to document what they notice.  

In the area below, the kids explore and create a song by painting the colors on a strip of paper and then following their music to play their song!

Our friend below created a list while we were outside of the different things he noticed that created sound on our playground!  He presented the list to the class. He also showed us how rubbing a row of magnets created sound, and he showed us how he could create rythym with the zipper on his bag.

These friends below organized a performance for us! They each showed how their instruments made sound, then played them together!  They were very proud!

So far they have noticed that sound can be made by striking, blowing, rubbing, strumming/plucking, and shaking. We also learned that sound is caused by vibrations. Next week we will continue to explore sound and the kids will pick an area to become an expert in!

Here are some other things going on during our exploration time! Music isn't the only thing going on!

Beautiful loose art creations were made as seen below.

Below is a water sculpture. She made it so that the beads would move like a water fountain. 

Habitat creations have been popping up EVERYWHERE!  Based on what I am observing, animal habitats will be our next inquiry!  They have created a reptile habitat, dinosaur habitat (they later added an ocean habitat to this) and an insect habitat.

Below they are painting rocks because they wanted ladybugs for their bug habitat. 

Dressmaking was also popular for a while! They came up with some beautiful designs!

Creating two and three dimentional shapes and words with our magnets is also very popular!

Creating rock sculptures.

And castle building is still very fun for them!

As you can see, we have a lot going on in our room!  I am continuing to love using play and life as teaching tools!  The benefits to these kids are amazing, especially in the areas of problem solving, planning and collaboration!  Stay tuned to see what else is happening in our room next week!

Castle Documentaion

I used our castle wall in the hallway to show what we have been learning about during our castle inquiry.  After the kids presented, they took their parents to show them the documentation of their journey, along with showing them around the great hall and castle kitchen in our room.

Stained Glass and 100 Day

Last week we made stained glass to hang in our windows to enjoy the sunlight and beautiful colors.  It was a good opportunity to strengthen their finger muscles! 

The kids loved the rainbows in our room that afternoon!

For 100 day, they strung 100 fruit loops to create necklaces and grouped them by 10's. 

They created plans for their display in our 100 Day Museum and followed their plans. The kids enjoyed walking through the museum and seeing everyone's creative displays!  

We had a very interesting conversation after our museum walk! Some kids thought that the collections that took up more space had more than the other collections!  It took a good bit of thinking and discussion for them to figure out that all of the displays had the same amount! It was the size of the items that made some collections take up more space, not the number of items!

We also predicted how far we would go if we took 100 steps out of our room!  Some ended up in the gym and some by the office.  We discussed that the size of the steps we took made a difference, but we all took 100 steps!  We did not get near as far as they predicted!  

It was a fun day studying how much 100 really is!

The kids are working very hard on their Castle Inquiry presentation! I will post all about it next week!

How we Presented Our Learning About Castles to an Audience

The kids worked really hard on creating projects to show what we learned during our castle inquiry to present to other classes in our school and to our families.  This is such a great way to hone our speaking and listening skills!  First they signed up to be in an expert group. 

One group worked on a castle model and a book to show parts of a castle. 

I love how the girls below are using a resource to make sure their representation is accurate! 

One group created a map to show what maps tell us and where castles are located.

The group working on how things were different in the past and the group showing who lived in castles both wanted to create big books to show what they learned.  They chose to paint their illustrations.

The group showing us about castle defense and weapons decided to create a poster. 

They created wonderful items with the purpose of teaching others about castles. 

The kids practiced persuasive writing by creating invitations to invite (persuade) their parents to our presentation and open house. 

We practiced as a group.  Many kids also practiced on their own during exploration time. I loved the stuffed animal audiences they created!

After practicing, we discussed how each time we practiced our presentation we improved!  3 kindergarten classes came to our room to see our presentation. At the end of our day, our families joined us! I was so excited over the turnout! Around 35 family members came to see our presentation!  I don't think I have ever seen the kids more excited than they were about presenting for their families!   

Each expert group presented. After they presented we had an open house where our guests could walk around and see all that we had done about castles. We closed by sharing our kids favorite video showing a squire helping a knight put his armor on. 

I wish I had more pictures of the presentation itself, but it was such a busy time focussing on the students, it was hard to get pictures!

Every single one of them did a beautiful job of speaking as they presented...even our most shy students!  You could see the pride on their faces and when I pointed out that they had taught almost 125 people about castles they positively glowed!  Parents let me know how excited their children were about presenting.  They talked about it at home!  Now that I have done a large scale class presentation, I see the benefits! It was a great way for the kids to show their learning.  It was a beautiful celebration of their learning with our families.  It also brought closure to our inquiry so that we are ready to start fresh on Monday with a new investigation.  This was truly a wonderful experience for all and I can't wait to do it again!