Cockatoos - Celabrating Chinese New Year

The Cockatoos group took part in Chinese New Year celebrated in the whole preschool.
We ate noodles and learned how to mix different ingredients inside the dish; we admired chinese
costumes and different items, we received a coin as a present to bring us luck for the whole year and
they practiced also yoga using traditional chinese music.

Children's interest: All the children really enjoyed the celebration so much so they continued dancing by themselves on chinese traditional music.

Purpose: To learn about traditions and internationality through chinese New Year celebration.

Lpfö:  With a mother tongue other than swedish, develop their cultural identity and the ability to communicate in both Swedish and their mother tongue.

Ducklings- Science- Sowing seeds in the eggshell

Science-  Sowing seeds in the eggshell

We had a science activity where we reviewed the plant cycle and sowed some seeds (white kidney beans) in the empty eggshells.The children learned to plant seeds.They had a lot of fun during the activity.
Purpose: To develop their early science skills

Lpfö 98( revised 2010):

-Develop their understanding of science and relationships of nature,
as well as knowledge of plants, animals, and also simple chemical processes and physical phenomena.

-Acquire and be able to differentiate shades of meaning in concepts,
see interconnections and discover new ways of understanding the surrounding world

How Old Is This Tree?

Counting Rings

Measuring the Circumference

Making Tree Rings

Activity:

The children learned ways to estimate the age of a tree: counting the rings inside the tree and measuring the circumference of a tree's trunk. During the ring counting activity, we brought logs into the school from the playground. Needless to say, bugs came in with them. The children were really excited about the little visitors. It was a great opportunity to work on language and communication skills. We talked about how they bugs got into the school, made projections on how the spider may have felt being in the school and explored beyond the here and now, discussing where it may be going.

Teacher: Oh wow, wonder how that got in here!

Child 1: the log

(The children start to chase the spider all around)

Teacher: How do you think the spider feels when you chase it around?

Child 2: Scared

Teacher: Why do you think it might be scared?

Child 1: because it is small.

We went out into the forest and measured the tree trunks of various trees, recording our findings. We later used string to demonstrate the different trunks and use comparative language such as big/bigger/biggest, short/shorter/shortest, fat/fatter/fattest to compare and contrast the trunks. They then created their own colorful tree trunks practicing their fine motor skills (cutting, drawing circles and coloring within the lines).

Purpose:

• sensory exploration: tactile, visual, olfactory
• language skill development: superlatives and comparative (big/bigger/biggest, etc), taking on the point of view of others, making predictions/talking beyond the hear and now 
• Math skills: ability to compare and contrast, make inferences based on known knowledge, use of measuring tools

Connection to the Lpfö-98 Revised 2016:

"Children search for knowledge and development through play, social interaction, exploration and creativity, as well as through observation, discussion and reflection.  A theme based approach can broaden and enrich the child's learning"

Kiwis- Lilla Vasaloppet

Lilla Vasaloppet- 2018

One of our international traditions is celebrating Lilla Vasaloppet. Every year we spent
the whole morning outside and participate in different outdoors activities. For this year,
we had to go through different stations with different tasks. We started our 1st station in
the forest (kids had to collect pine cones). The 2nd station was to make a circle and
choose their favorite song. The 3rd station was to jump 10 times. The 4th station was to
run towards the swimming pool. The 5th station was to play hot potato. The last station
was tug the war. After we finished all the stations, we had blueberry soup and bananas
for snack. The next day we rewarded our children with diplomas for completing the race.
Kids enjoyed a lot.

Purpose:

• To celebrate the preschool´s  traditions and ceremonies.
• To work as a big team and achieve the goal.
• To know about Lilla vasaloppet and get basic knowledge of winter sport in Sweden.

Lpfö 98 rev 2016:

“ Feel a sense of participation in their own culture and develop a feeling and respect for other cultures”

Ducklings - Art Craft

Art Craft- Creativity

We did art craft activity in the gym room. The children colored the flower template using okra (lady finger) as the brush. They dipped the okra in the paint and colored into the flower template. This activity helped them learn colors ,develop their fine motor skills and creativity . They were very focused , interested and had so much fun during the activity.

Purpose:

Develop their fine motor skills.

Develop their creativity.


Lpfö 98( revised 2010):

"Develop their creativity abilities and the ability to convey impressions, thoughts and experiences in many different forms,such as play,pictures,song and music,dance and drama."

Cockatoos - Jolly Phonics Orally cvc blending

Children started to learn about orally blending. They helped the teacher to recognize c, a, t sounds and actions.Then they put all these letters together to make a word CAT. then they played with toy cats and at the end of the session all the cats went to sleep.
Children's interest: all the children were so happy to help in recognizing the sounds and especially to ppretend play with cats.They tried to read the word with their help too.
Purpose: To be aware of orally cvc blending and use of words that we learn about.
LPFÖ: Develop an interest in the written language and an understanding of symbols, and communicative function.

     Kiwis - Exploring the seesaw and balancing

We found some pieces of wood and the children tried building with them but the tower fell down so we had a think about what to do with the blocks instead. One child started standing on one block testing the weight on toes and heels. We all wanted to see how it was standing on them so we built a path, two blocks ended up on eachother creating a seesaw!

Purpose:

• Letting children's own interest stand in focus when developing ideas into activities.
• Practising balancing, and gross motorskills.
• Judging space between steps.
• Testing the effect of weight on the seesaw.  
• Using social skills like taking turns, helping and encouraging each other.

Lpfö 98, rev 2016:

Develop their curiosity and enjoyment, as well as their ability to play and learn.

Develop their motor skills.