Sewing Project - Cloud (Part I)

Date: 22nd October 2015
Day: Thursday
Time: 4:00-5:00pm
Class: Pomegranate
Theme: Water is so FUN!
Teacher: Ms Yeong

Sewing Project - Cloud (Part I)

Today, we started with our sewing project. All of them will get two pieces of the cloud, a needle and the colour of thread that they had chosen last week.

I guided them one by one before letting them to finish their thread on their own.

Preparation for our Cloud Project

Date: 16th October 2015
Day: Friday
Time: 4:00-5:00pm
Class: Pomegranate
Theme: Water is so FUN!
Teacher: Ms Yeong

Preparation for our Cloud Project

I have told the children some time ago about this project. Since October is coming to an end soon, that also means that our water theme is going to end as well. We shall start a new theme in November when the 6 years old children joined us back in our thematic class.

Therefore, I showed the children some materials that we are going to use and we also discussed the colours of thread that they wanted to use.

I have cut the outline of the clouds for each of them. The children showed quite great interest to start soon. As we needed to sort out our phonic exercise and writing for the weekends, we shall start with the sewing session next week.

These are the materials that we needed for the sewing session.

Phonics Class

Date: 15th October 2015
Day: Thursday
Time: 4:00-5:00pm
Class: Pomegranate
Theme: Water is so FUN!
Teacher: Ms Yeong

Phonics Class

Today, we concentrated on our phonic class as we had been left it untouched for a day or two. Therefore, there's no theme activity for today.

Book Sharing & Blowing bubbles

Date: 13th October 2015
Day: Tuesday
Time: 4:00-5:00pm
Class: Pomegranate
Theme: Water is so FUN!
Teacher: Ms Yeong

Book Sharing & Blowing bubbles

Today, we started off by having a book sharing session with the children. I chose the book - Ted, Bo and Diz The First Adventure. This lovely book is about these 3 friends who went on an adventure in their dinghy and they encountered a group of polar bear sleeping on the iceberg. When the iceberg started to break off, they needed to find a way to send the polar bears home. Fortunately, there were a group of whales nearby which they could help to send the polar bears home. The moment they said goodbye to the polar bears, came a bigger piece of iceberg with lots of penguins on it.

From here, I have to explain the globe to the children. They gave me some answers with my guidance such as where they could find polar bears and penguins. With this lesson, I also brought up the issue of the changes of climate and temperature of the Earth that causes such an encounter. I'm not sure how much could the children understand. Yet, with such thoughts, hopefully they could explore it much further in the future.

We have another about 20 minutes left for the lesson today, I brought the children back to the garden again with the bubble solutions that we had mixed the other day. We tested with some of it and found out that the bubble solution still can be used. Therefore, I gave each of them a bowl and the hoop. After the first experience they had previously, it seems that the children could handle the bubble solution much better this time. They even enjoyed it much more compared to the other day. We had used up all the bubble solution this time.

Note: 14th October 2015, Wednesday will be a public holiday. It's Awal Muharram. The school will be closed. Therefore, there's no blog update for tomorrow. 

Worksheet - Poem "The Rain"

Date: 12th October 2015
Day: Monday
Time: 4:00-5:00pm
Class: Pomegranate
Theme: Water is so FUN!
Teacher: Ms Yeong

Worksheet - Poem "The Rain"

Today, I have prepared a worksheet for the children to work on it. It's about the poem that I found online which I think the children could understand it. - The Rain by anonymous.

The poem is as followed:
The Rain
Pitter-patter raindrops, 
Falling from the sky, 
Here is my umbrella, 
To keep me safe and dry!

When the rain is over, 
And the sun begins to glow, 
Little flowers start to bud, 
And grow and grow and grow!

I took out some words for the children to fill in the missing blanks. This is how the worksheet looked like:

After that, we added in some action for this poem so that the children could understand it much more. We all had a great time doing this activity!

Mixture of Activities

Date: 8th & 9th October 2015
Day: Thursday & Friday
Time: 4:00-5:00pm
Class: Pomegranate
Theme: Water is so FUN!
Teacher: Ms Yeong

Mixture of Activities

I used these two days to sort out some data and information that we had learnt so far with the children. Hopefully they could still remember the vocabulary that I have introduced during the beginning of the thematic class.

We had also did some discussion on our next activity that we could do before the thematic class ends at the end of October later. The children were quite interested with sewing as well. I found a very beautiful picture of clouds and raindrops that the children could work on it. Some materials will be needed for such activity, therefore, we shall arrange a time to start that sewing project.

Art Project - Paper Mache (Bowl) - Part VI

Date: 7th October 2015
Day: Wednesday
Time: 4:00-5:00pm
Class: Pomegranate
Theme: Water is so FUN!
Teacher: Ms Yeong

Art Project - Paper Mache (Bowl) - Part VI

The children were quite excited when I brought in some colourful markers. Once the children had completed their Phonics homework today, they could start to decorate their bowl. Some of them started to draw all sorts of pictures on their bowl. It looked very beautiful and creative. I love it.

The children will bring home the bowl today. Hopefully they could make use of it.

Art Project - Paper Mache (Bowl) - Part V

Date: 6th October 2015
Day: Tuesday
Time: 4:00-5:00pm
Class: Pomegranate
Theme: Water is so FUN!
Teacher: Ms Yeong

Art Project - Paper Mache (Bowl) - Part V

Some of the bowls were still dam with the water colour from last evening. We might have to postpone the decorating session to tomorrow. Therefore, we used today's time to have our writing session and Phonics class.

We only used about 15 minutes to get the children to share their idea of what they could do with their beautiful bowls. Some said they wanted to put their toys in it, some said they wanted to put their beautiful hair band in it. Leow Xun even asked if she could use the bowls for food. I told her that this bowl is made from paper and with those water colours, it's not suitable for food usage.

Even though it was raining outside, however, due to the haze weather lately, it's not advisable to go out to enjoy the rainy day. The children seem to be a little disappointed. Yet, they still could understand the condition of the weather recently and follow the lessons patiently.

Art Project - Paper Mache (Bowl)- Part IV

Date: 5th October 2015
Day: Monday
Time: 4:00-5:00pm
Class: Pomegranate
Theme: Water is so FUN!
Teacher: Ms Yeong

Art Project - Paper Mache (Bowl)- Part IV

Now, the children were thrill to see that their bowls were pretty hard. They wanted to take it off from the mold. I helped them one by one to remove it.

Today, I prepared some water colour for the children to colour their bowl. There were some primary colours. Then, some of them requested to have other colours such as purple, orange and green. Therefore, we used the primary colours to get the mix and the children happily coloured their bowl.

In order to guide the children and busy getting the colour mix, I didn't manage to take any photos for this activity.

Art Project - Paper Mache (Bowl) - Part III

Date: 2nd October 2015
Date: Friday
Time: 4:00-5:00pm
Class: Pomegranate
Theme: Water is so FUN!
Teacher: Ms Yeong

Art Project - Paper Mache (Bowl) - Part III

By looking at those bowls that the children made yesterday was kind of thin. I kept the homemade glue in the refrigerator yesterday. When I looked at it today, it seems like very diluted. I guess the temperature and the moist in the refrigerator had added on some effects to it. So I brought back the glue to class and at the same time, I have also cut out more stripes of paper for the children to add on the layers to their bowl.

First, we checked to see if the initial layers that the children did was firm. Then, after that, I distributed the brushes to them again with the glue. The children continued by making their bowl's layer thicker.

Hopefully the bowls will get dry over the weekend. Then the children could start to decorate it next week.

Art Project - Paper Mache (Bowl) - Part II

Date: 1st October 2015
Day: Thursday
Time: 4:00-5:00pm
Class: Pomegranate
Theme: Water is so FUN!
Teacher: Ms  Yeong

Art Project - Paper Mache (Bowl) - Part II

Today, we started off by getting the homemade glue done.  It was my first time doing this, I didn't realise that I have put in too much of cold water. No matter how much of hot water I put in, it didn't change its form. Finally, I have to ask the favour of our headmistress to demonstrate it. The children were amazed to see the changes of hot water in the tapioca flour.

Once, the homemade glue was ready, the children started their paper mache project. Some of them were quite patiently paste it for a few layers while some just pasted a few sheets and left the table. I have to help out to put in more layers for those which looked quite thin. We shall let the bowls get dry and see if we could paint it tomorrow.

Here were some pictures taken during the activity:

Art Project - Paper Mache (bowl)

Date: 30th September 2015
Day: Wednesday
Time: 4:00-5:00pm
Class: Pomegranate
Theme: Water is so FUN!
Teacher: Ms Yeong

Art Project - Paper Mache (bowl)

Only Leow Xun brought some old newspapers  to school. Then, I found some unwanted book catalogue that we could make some use of it. Therefore, I guided the children to cut it into the size and shapes that we needed. After that, I let them continue with it.

I only mixed the tapioca flour with water and started to paste some of the paper onto the mould (a plastic bowl) that I had prepared earlier. I wanted to see if it will stick. Basically, I only wanted to show the kids how the process of getting the paper onto the plastic bowl.

Once the paper is ready as well as the plastic bowl as the mould, we shall start our art project tomorrow.

Water Mixture

Date: 29th September 2015
Day: Tuesday
Time: 4:00-5:00pm
Class: Pomegranate
Theme: Water is so FUN!
Teacher: Ms Yeong

Water Mixture

By adding water to different ingredients, it will turn out differently. From the encyclopedia that we read, we know that water helps a lot in diluting sugar, salt etc. By mixing water into flour for example, will change it into a dough and we could work on it. The children were quite interested to find out other things that they could do with water.

I suggested that we could mix water with tapioca flour to make glue. We could use the glue to do an art work. The children couldn't imagine it. As a result, I shall bring in the tapioca flour again tomorrow.

The children needed to collect some old newspaper for this art project.

Bubble Solution Making

Date: 25th September 2015
Day: Friday
Time: 4:00-5:00pm
Class: Pomegranate
Theme: Water is so FUN!
Teacher: Ms Yeong

Bubble Solution Making

I got this bubble solution recipe online and I wanted so much to try out with the children when we first started the water theme. Yet, I couldn't find a chance to bring in this topic. As we were talking about the usage of water and how water could change the form of materials, I wanted the children to try to do the bubble solution.

I prepared the following materials for them:

1) an empty bottle of 1500ml
2) a bottle of dish washing soap (I chose this particular brand according to the recipe online)
3) some tapioca flour (we only needed 4 tablespoon)
4) 1500ml of water

Before we start, I delegated some task to each of them so that everyone could get involved.

I passed the empty bottle to Rachel for her to fill it with 1500ml of water. Then, Leow Xun helped to pour all the water into the empty pail that I had prepared. Suzanne and Lucas helped to put in the dish washing soap. Then the rest of the group, Yong Jun, Yi Ern, Eugene and Zi Yue helped to put in the tapioca flour. After mixing all the ingredients together, I gave each of them a bowl of solution to try it out.

At first, the children find the solution quite watery. Yet, after a while, they managed to blow a big bubbles. Once, they saw one of the friends could do it, they all wanted to try to blow a big bubble.

They had lots of fun today! We kept the extra bubble solutions for another day.