A great Wednesday!

What a fun filled day we had. After a much enjoyed Meeting for Worship gathering, we headed for the Music room for our scheduled music class with Aedín. We sang .... and we danced .... and we played some percussion instruments. 

  

To help us practice the skill of turn-taking, Aedín created a Cardinal tree. Once a Cardinal student takes a turn, he or she places their cardinal bird on the tree. What a fantastic way to assure that each person has a chance at participating in some way or another. Great idea, Aedín!

After our Music experience, we went to our classroom to enjoy a delicious snack brought in by Katy and Tori. In honor of their 5^th birthday, Katy and Tori brought cupcakes to share with us all.  Mmm, mmm, good! Delicious! Thank you Katy and Tori! ¡Feliz cumpleaños!

 

 

Following the Jackson girls’ celebration, we headed outdoors to enjoy a cool wintery day.

We ended our morning with Math Workshops. Last week we got the chance to work on sorting and this week we practiced the mathematical concept of patterning. Learning patterns goes hand in hand with learning how to sort. Both activities rely on seeing the characteristics and attributes a set of items has in common.

During our Math Workshops last week, three stations were presented with a sorting activity. One station included (plastic) American coinage. The Cardinals worked together to sort dimes, nickels and quarters.

In another station, the Cardinals were invited to sort fruit counters.

And, in the final station, the Cardinals were asked to sort foam letters.

Today, we re-visited the topic of Patterns and encouraged the Cardinals to create simple AB patterns.  We reminded them that what makes a pattern a pattern is that the sequence repeats in the same order. So, putting down a red square, a pink square and a red square is not yet a pattern. A red square needs to be put down to complete two sequences of the pattern to begin a pattern.

One workshop was set up with unifix cubes.

In another station, the Cardinals were encouraged to create their own simple pattern using cut out pieces of construction paper in a variety of colors.  Some friends challenged themselves and generated more complex patterns such as ABC, ABBA, and ABCDE.

In the last workshop, the Cardinals were asked to draw their own patterns. Using a printed pattern grid, the Cardinals used markers to shade in the boxes to create their own simple AB pattern or more complex.