SMILES EVERYWHERE

Snow doubt about it...playing in the snow is a blast!

Snow Much Fun

Isn't it interesting how icebergs look blue? 

We think so. We added a bit of blue food colouring to the 

snow in the sensory bin. 

We made some arctic animals available.

The children, as they always do, came up with their own ideas.

Measuring and shape making and scooping was they way to go!

Jackson braved the cold cold snow and made a frozen alphabet. After making his letters, he set them outside. With the arctic cold temperatures, we'll have frozen letters in no time.

Hmmmm....what would frozen alphabet soup taste like?

Snow Tracks, Sleds and Sun

Today was the day! 

Cold as cold could be, but that just couldn't keep us away from our first sledding day at the hill.

The tracks of a sled being dragged behind sets small footprints marked the journey up our Suzuki Hill.

The smiles and laughter told the story of the journey down.

Even Ms. Lecoq joined in the fun!

Finally giving in to the cold cold morning, we followed the long shadows back to a warm classroom.

Rosy cheeks, joyful chatter, satisfied thrill-seekers...

a great start to a wintry day!

Finally! We Get Oustside!

We never know how much we miss things until we can't have them! That's been true for our wonderful outside space. Mother Nature has delivered a wallop of a winter and we've been watching it through our windows. We've been watching blizzards and been in a deep freeze! An Arctic freeze! A polar vortex freeze! But this day... this very wonderful day... this perfect play-outside-in-the-snow day... we got to go outside after lunch and that's where we stayed all afternoon!

We are pretty sure that the trees missed us as much as we missed them. 

This was a perfect day to make a birthday-snow-cake for Mrs. Pizzuto!

Buckets were filled. Castles and mountains were made.

A chair fit for a king! Oh what fun! Oh how joyful!

Rosy cheeks gave way to soggy mittens and soaked snow pants... and OH how good it felt!

Ice Scientists

Two boys, a bin of snow, plastic containers ... and all the wonder in the world. These are the perfect elements necessary to conduct a scientific experiment! How can snow turn into ice?

Day 1 - Making Ice - Brody and Keegan visited the sensory bin filled with snow. They helped choose some containers to add to the bin. Brody noticed the "small, medium and large" containers and together. The boys began to make 'snowmen and castles'. What they ended up with was a 'Diamond Museum' and a small bin of snow. They wanted the bin of snow in the freezer "so it can turn to ice". It was going to take "to the afternoon" to become ice. 

When the boys checked the bin of snow in the afternoon, it had turned to ice. They made a book to record their scientific experiment!

Day 2 - Sticky Ice - Keegan and Brody were anxious to continue their work on the ice they had created. This day, they began to add 'brick walls'. 

Brody discovered that ice can 'stick' to a glove.

Keegan discovered that ice can stick to other ice.

This kind of news had to be shared!

Day 3 - Salt Tunnels - Still excited to experiment with ice, 'salty paint' was introduced. The boys mixed salt, paint and water together. The salt dissolved when it was stirred into the paint. Each colour needed "3 spoonfuls of salt". Red, yellow and blue 'salty paint' and eye droppers were added to the activity.

             Prediction 1: Nothing will happen to the ice.  It will just get coloured.

         Prediction 2: The ice will get coloured and melt.

"Look, it's cracking. There's a hole."

"My blue ices stuck together."

"Feel this Keegan. My whole arm is cold. Whoa!"

"You wanna taste the salt?"

"All the colours mixed. It's a rainbow castle."

Results - Snow can turn into ice.

                Making ice is really fun.

                Playing is learning.

Look At Those Tracks In The Snow

~ True solitude is a din of birdsong, seething leaves, whirling colours, or a clamor of tracks in the snow.~ Edward Hoagland

Children often gather at the window gazing and wondering about the world beyond it. Looking closely... ever-so-closely... some children noticed teeny tiny tracks in the freshly fallen snow.

"Look! Look! Right there! At the bottom... by the bush."

"Yeah. I see 'em. The birds were eating the feeders. They ate mine."

When the children notice and become interested in their world, we wonder with them. We enter into the magic of wondering and discovering like the children do.

We wondered with the children about the type of birds that visited the feeders.

Taking pictures of the many tracks will help us to compare them to some of the ones in the books we are looking at. 

Children like evidence! Some of the tracks were from birds.

 Others were not!

There were questions to be answered.

First thing in the morning, with interest of tracks in the snow sparked, children noticed tracks just beyond our playground. Of course, further investigation was in order.

These, they decided, were definitely NOT bird tracks! "Maybe it's from a bunny? My mommy saw a bunny one day."  "I saw a bunny in my back yard."

                 

"Let's follow them. There's a trail."  

"Where do you think it will lead to?  Will it lead us to the bushes?"

                                                  

The trail led us to a tree. There was talk of bunnies, holes in the tree, hibernation and squirrels! And it didn't stop there. One set of tracks led to the discovery of another type of tracks. The children compared the size of their hands to this new set. They immediately decided that these tracks were from a dog... a very big dog!

     

 In the wonderful world of kindergarten, once discovery starts... and we wonder together... the world grows bigger and bigger and... we discover more evidence of one kind or another.

And we make our own tracks.