We began our morning with Ms Fanucchi teaching us a Halloween song.
Followed by work choices, everyone had to come over and write a Thank you card to Farmer Scott and Eric.
Even more Halloween fun. Our 8th grade buddies visited and helped us make masks and crowns.
TUESDAY
After Spanish we all did a still life drawing of a corn stalk, looking closely at the different parts of the stalk and what they are called. The children had to write at least one word to label their drawing.
We listed the tassel, corn, cob, kernel, leaves, stalk, and roots.
We will display these drawings in the stairwell this week. If you didn't notice we have also displayed the family drawings in the classroom.
We ended our morning with a discussion about rough housing. A large section of our PreK community enjoy rough housing and wrestling, it is not gender exclusive, boys and girls enjoy and benefit from playing.
We felt a discussion was needed to make sure everyone understood roughhousing. While it is good for our bodies and minds, we need to understand the rules.
Q: What does rough-housing mean?
Luca: It’s when people are pushing, and they’re fighting.
Q: Do you mean to really hurt someone or are you just playing?
Luca: Just playing.
Q: How do you play safely?
Evy: You need room.
Nolan: If you’re doing sword fighting, you need a paper sword.
Margot: You just fight with your swords (not bodies).
Luca: You can’t kick people.
Q: What happens if you do accidentally push someone over?
Margot: You say, “Are you ok?”
Evy: You say, “Do you want a hug?”
Grace: You could hug them.
Luca: What if you accidentally pushed them onto a wall?
Grace: Get an ice pack for them?
Q: What if you see someone hurt?
Margot: You could say, “Are you ok, do you need an ice pack?”
Luca: You could go get a teacher?
Nolan: You could say sorry.
Margot: Then you could just take a break from playing with them.
Austin: You could ask if they want a hug or an ice pack.
We talked about rules for sword-fighting and wrestling and did some demos, discussing how you
stop if you accidentally hit someone, or when you finish tackling someone you stop, and let them
get up. We will continue this discussion all week looking at ways we control our body and use
'safe words', to tell the other person to stop.
We also read 2 short stories, Sophie gets angry deals with a strategy that Sophie uses to help her calm down. The Bear who shared, makes two new friends by sharing.
In the weeks ahead we will also start to discuss emotions and feelings and take a closer look at ways we can control them. After reading the books we briefly discussed what you do when you feel angry.
Q: What do you do when you feel angry?
Margot: I play something else that doesn’t make me angry.
Evy: I go up to my room by myself.
Beatrix: I hug my stuffy.
Leonard: When I get mad, I eat.
Grace: I play music.
Beatrix: I listen to Hamilton.
Nolan was showing us child’s pose, another good strategy.
If you are looking for more information about roughhousing I would recommend a book by Anthony DeBenedet called The art of roughhousing.
QUESTIONS
What did you draw on your Thank you card?
What did you make with your 8th grade buddy?
What word or words did you add to your corn stalk drawing?
Can you explain what roughhousing means?
What did Sophie do to help her calm down when she got angry?
