Spud Celebrations 2013

This year we had two spud harvests, one at school and one with our grand friends at the senior's lodge.  Which meant we had two celebrations.
 
            
After the fun part of digging, counting (20) and sharing the harvest with
our grand friends we went to the “Spud Sundae Bar”.

Mmm choices of green onions, bacon, shredded carrots, cheese and sour cream.
 
                           Delicious!

Today at school we celebrated with the kindergarten/grade 1 class. 
Their spud tubs produced 70 potatoes.  As the potatoes and toppings
were being prepared I told the story of the Enormous Potato.
  
                         
                          Time to eat.
                              
        
Learning to serve themselves from communal bowls is a first
experience for some children.  It’s a practice we incorporate
everyday at the snack table.
       
The toppings were the same as at our grand friends except we substituted
the grated carrots for dirt (chocolate sprinkles).
    
The discussions included comparisons of the toppings each chose. 
The kindergarten teacher created a sheet for her class to do, after
we left, to further the discussion of what they preferred.
   
But if I had to guess (by the amount of empty bowls) I would say the
majority enjoyed the mashed potatoes and their toppings.

Thanks to BC Agriculture for the opportunity to participate in this great program.

Baby Shark

Have you heard the camp song Baby Shark?  It’s catchy.  There are many versions, gruesome versus non-dismemberment so I modified it slightly, took out grandma and grandpa and we are rowing a boat instead of swimming. 

We’ve been singing it for over a week so today at the craft table we made clothespin sharks.
 
Paper shark cut outs, clothespins and ric rac for the teeth was all it took.
    
Well and a bit of investigation to learn about different types of sharks
and how many teeth do they really have.
Then colour 
cut       
and glue      
Then sing the song 
 
Baby shark, do do do do do da doo baby shark! 3X
Momma shark, do do do do da doo mamma shark! 3X
Daddy shark, do do do do da doo daddy shark! 3X
Let's row our boat, do do do do da doo let's row our boat! 3X
Hungry sharks, do do do do da doo hungry sharks! 3X
Let's row faster do do do do da doo let's row faster! 3X
Safe at last, do do do da doo safe at last! 3X

Art from the Beach

 
On the weekend my daughter and I spent some time at the beach collecting rocks, shells and driftwood.  I set them out on the art table today with plastercine, markers and I plugged in the glue gun too.
 
   
The children were busy colouring the rocks and shells.  Busy attaching the shells to rocks and rocks to driftwood using the plastercine or hot glue.
         
               
    
           
  And just exploring each item for it’s feel and taste.
               

Story – The Oyster and the Mermaid

Not long ago I was able to attend a storytelling workshop by Susan Munzer.  She creates “story in a box” kits that are fabulous.  She also sells the kits which you finish, such as the painting, at home.

Susan has authored a book called Learn to Play – Play to Learn and has a website that tells you more about the book.

I bought several of her kits and the one I’m sharing today she calls The Sea Treasure. 
 

I prefer to call it The Oyster and the Mermaid.

Sorry about the beginning of the story with the interruption but we were making cookies.  Hope you enjoyed it.

We All Play in a Yellow Submarine

With just a couple of weeks left of school we weren’t quite ready to
put our bus away.  So instead we changed it to a submarine to fit into
our ocean theme.
 
We wrapped the whole bus with white paper and started to paint.
 
I took one pool noodle and cut it in half lengthwise and secured it
under the paper. 
 
    
It holds the blue fabric that represents the water.

We hung blue and green streamers for seaweed and water. 
The children like to run around the submarine feeling the
streamers with their hands pretending to swim.

So we brought out goggles and a diving mask.
 
The submarine is decorated with fish that we made at the art table.
  
A parent brought in an asian pear wrapper and we hung it on
one of the windows.  It looks like bubbles.

Each day the children explore, expand and exchange ideas for the submarine.