AFC PINE AM

Did you know there are more kids that attend the in our afternoon session? It's true! Unfortunately, our AM kids do not have a chance to meet these awesome PM kids, but that still doesn't mean we cannot make an attempt to bridge the two communities! Today, we are attempting to do just that.  Community building is such an important part of our larger community of Ambrose and our even bigger Webster community! So how can we do it? How can we start with our little Pine class? The forest is one place that both classes thoroughly enjoy so we figured this would be a great place to try.  Our start to our community building is through a simple game of hide and find. N & L worked on painting rocks bright  beautiful colors that they then hid around the forest!  N took the lead and showed L how to spread the paint all over the rocks and making sure to cover every square inch. Once they were covered, the boys ran off to play while they sat and dried.  Before we left, ho...

As we continue to build our little community, the boys have been learning how to work together, use gentle hands when playing, and making friends with the boys over in Dogwood. Over the last few weeks we have seen so many amazing interactions between all of them. Today, I was finally able to catch it on camera! Although the video was originally capturing another moment, I am much happier with what we did see!  As you see below, N was crawling across the log with grace, but there was a bit of an obstacle. B from the other room had a small part of his body in the way. You just have to watch to see what happens next!    This sweet moment was just too good. Although these two boys see each other daily, we haven't seen this kind of play yet! Such a great way to end our time outside today. Way to go, N! 

Welcome to a new week!  Today, the boys' curiosity really drove a lot of what we did this morning. Our morning began like any other, but there was something new one one of the tables... floam!  N sat with a big pile of floam and explored the strange bubbly texture. He would roll it on the table and watch the small sticky balls stick to his hands and table. N giggled as he tried to peel each one off. He made several attempts to try and "break" the floam, but didn't find much success. That didn't stop him from trying out different ways to play with it: hiding animals, dropping it off the table, and finally pressing hard onto the table to make it flat.  Across the table, however, L sat with his floam and furrowed brow. In the video below you can see how L examines the floam with such curiosity! For about the next 10 minutes, L sat with his floam really studying it and moving it around to explore it in its entirety. Just look at those eyebrows!  The curiosity didn...

  Happy Thursday! We wrapped up our week with a lot of time outside today. Luckily it is absolutely beautiful out and we were able to capitalize on that 😊 This is also the last day we focused on the core words in, out, open, and eat! We headed outside to the cave area to play and engage with some activities that would really drive the use of the words in, out, and open.  To start, the boys made their way to a giant connect four game! This was such a great way to incorporate the words in and out. While the boys dropped both the red and blue pucks into the holes, we modeled some self talk on what they were doing. Once the whole board was filled, Ms. Jenn pulled the bottom off and all of them came tumbling out! The noise of the game pieces hitting the ground made both boys watch and pay attention to where they landed. As they came out, N picked them up to get ready to put them back in.  While L continued to work on putting the pieces in and out N saw a tub full of froz...

Good morning! The boys started their morning off with a great start! After a meeting with Ms. Kari, we got ourselves ready to go play at the forest. Once we arrived N immediately went down the first path he saw to get into the forest, L on the other hand stuck around on the outskirts to get a better look at things.  L wandered around the open space looking at the trees and then at the ground. Something caught his eye! He quickly bent down and grabbed a big ole stick. In the past few weeks L would normally just pick up one and walk around with it, but today he continued to pick up sticks as he walked. This gave us an idea- start a nature collection!  L walked around the outside of the forest grabbing different sticks and leaves to put into our collection bag. He would first examine what he found and then gently place it into the bag. Once he was satisfied with what he found outside the forest, he headed down the path into the forest.  As he walked through the dense greener...

We had quite the noisy morning this beautiful Tuesday! Today the boys got to practice their musical skills at meeting time and while playing outside! Ms. Julie joins our class every Tuesday and incorporates a lot of movement and music into our day. This morning the boys tried using 5 gallon buckets as drums! This inspired some more music once we got outside.  N is definitely our percussionist! He picked up a rhythm stick and began testing out different surfaces on the playscape to see if they made noises. He headed to the chimes with stick in hand. He furiously swiped the stick across the pipes. They rung out like an alarm across the playscape! Success!  Next, N headed over to some vertical pipes and gave them a whack with his rhythm stick. It let out a low hum. He continued to circle it until he successfully made each pipe sing different tones. He continued to walk around the area testing out sounds from solid wood structures, rocks, open ended tubes, and even the ground. N s...

Welcome back to a new week of school! This morning we spent our time with the Dogwood class playing up by the swings. It took some time for all of the boys to find something of interest to settle in, but once they found the swing it was good times all around. M & H were sitting on the swing when N walked up. He looked and saw that there weren't any spots open for him to sit. N walked around to the back of the swing and started to push the boys instead of trying to squeeze on. The boys all giggled as N pushed the swing back and forth.    M & H noticed immediately when N stopped pushing. "Hey, it stopped!"  N looked at the two of them and said "my turn."  The boys scooted over to make some room for their friend.  "Who is going to push?" Uh oh, now that all three boys were sitting on the swing there was nobody to push! The swing hung motionless as the three boys looked around. After about a minute, H popped up.  "Oh! I'll push!" From...

To end our third week of school, the boys spent most of the morning out on the hillside. During our first week of school N found the big plastic spools and has really enjoyed being able to roll them down the hill. As soon as we hit the hillside today, N ran straight to the spools. He began to play his normal game of giving them a slight push so they start to roll, but makes sure he is running ahead of them. He did this a few times and finally caught L's attention.  In the video below you can see how N rolls the spools down the hill and L watching him. Unfortunately I wasn't quick enough to catch what happened next. L walked over to the basket and picked up a playground ball. He gave it a big throw to watch it tumble down the hill. It was so great to watch him imitate N! As the play went on, I noticed that N was beginning to run ahead of the spools and would stop where he thought they might end up. He was trying to predict where they would eventually crash! Although his many att...

Every Wednesday, depending on the weather, we will continue to go to the forest and explore. That's exactly what we did today! N and L had the chance to run around the many paths, looking at the different leaves, trees, and fallen logs. Going to the forest is always exciting, but we are always looking for ways to make our visits more purposeful. Since today was our first day there, it was full of exploring, digging, and climbing. It wasn't until the very end of our time N started interacting with the nature loom we created.  L spent a lot of time plopping down in the dirt and picking up the leaves and sticks around him. He used some sticks to dig a little bit, picked up large leaves, and looked around with a curious eye. He was making conversation while he pointed at everything that intrigued him. I can't wait to see what he finds to put into the loom next week! In order to make our next few visits to the forest more purposeful we created a loom in which the kids can weave ...