We Are Scientists: Simple Machines

Every little one likes to move things - it’s part of being a “little scientist”! One of the first science topics that we always work (play) with in early childhood (and up through the grades) is force and motion. 

Simple machines make great playthings for experimenting with movement and force. You can find them everywhere in your home, classroom, or schoolyard. The six simple machines are the wheel and axle, the lever, the inclined plane, the pulley, the screw, and the wedge, although the latter three are actually just extensions or combinations of the first three.

For this post, we'll focus on the first three :)

The Wheel and Axle 

Experiment with moving carts or wheelbarrows to get some idea of moving objects with and without the benefit of wheels. 

An easy thing to find might be some old or new luggage pieces. Luggage with wheels is very common these days, but also find a suitcase with no wheels for some experimentation. With your child, load each with some blocks or something with some weight (same in each) and try to pull/push them. Look for play cars or trucks that have removable wheels in your collection. Try to move them on a flat surface or even on an inclined one, without wheels and then with - your little scientist will be able to make all their own predictions and conclusions on this one! There are many LEGO wheel and rod pieces - again, try to move with and without wheels, for fun. 

The Lever

We see examples of levers every day - a seesaw in the playground is a lever. Kitchen tongs are levers. 

Your scientist(s) can make their own simple lever with objects in your home or classroom. Look for a glue stick or other cylindrical object and a popsicle stick, and make a simple seesaw. Take it a step further and design a catapult lever - the easiest way is to tape on a plastic spoon and use it to hold a lightweight object. Push down on the opposing end and your object will be airborne!

The Inclined Plane 

Children will see inclined planes in ramps, slides, and rollercoasters - all things that start high and go down on an incline. They are also part of working scissors, knives, and doorstops - they are designed to have a wedge shape to start with a slim side and get wider, like an inclined plane. 

To experiment, start with moving a toy car on a flat surface and see how far it can go. Have other elements laying around nearby and ask - How can we make it go faster?  Your child may decide to make a toy car move faster or farther by elevating one end of the road/block by propping it higher and making their very own inclined plane. By making a hypothesis and proposing a test, they are using the Scientific Method!!

Have fun!!

Book Choice: Expanding Equity

There are so many great, diverse books for children that can be introduced into your home or classroom library, enhancing your selection, making it more multi-cultural and more equitable. By showing characters of all races, creeds, and family and home situations, you are including all in your home or classroom, and making sure that your children are seeing that the world is full of wonderful diversity. Showing characters with physical challenges, or including characters who might have unseen differences, opens up great conversations and normalizes varied situations.

A short list of favorites doesn't even begin to touch on some fabulous new and old titles. Use this as a jumping off point, but keep adding to your own list - it's so important! 

Some books to look for ....

 

The Day You Begin by Jacqueline Woodson (2018)

This book doesn’t leave you at how people are different but rather reminds us that when we reach out and take the first steps, people meet us half way.

 

This Is How We Do It by Matt Lamothe (2017)  

One day in the lives of seven kids from Iran, Russia, Peru, India, Japan, Uganda, and Italy. Highlights differences and sameness about their schools, homes, dress, food, play, etc.

 

La Princesa and the Pea by Susan Middleton Elya (2017) 

This is a great retelling of the familiar fairy tale, with up to date illustrations by Juana Martinez-Neal. Check out the glossary of Spanish terms up front before reading.  So great for native Spanish speakers to celebrate their native tongue. Look for other books of this type - familiar stories with different languages and cultures featured.

 

Jabari Jumps by Gaia Cornwall (2017)  

This beautiful, simple book is very relatable for all children – the main character is working up courage to jump off the diving board.  Looking for books that show characters of all colors helps students see themselves in books.

 

The Bad Seed by Jory John (2017)  

The cool, graphic illustrations show the Bad Seed (the "bad" kid) and how it got to be bad … you will start to feel sorry for the bad one and root for it to go good.  Shows a kid version of trauma, and trying to find good in what can sometimes be a tough world … the right book for a certain situation.  Great for helping students develop empathy.  

 

The Diwali Gift  by Shweta Chopra and Shuchi Mehta (2015) 

The characters get a gift from one’s grandmother, Dadima, to celebrate the Hindu Festival of Lights, Diwali. Explains some traditions of a Diwali celebration – may help some students make connections to their holiday, which may not be a holiday all know about. Definitely read the glossary in the back for definitions first. 

 

All Are Welcome by Alexandra Penfold and Suzanne Kaufman (2018)  

This story is told in its pictures and has to be looked at closer than just the words on the page. Pictures depict children of all races, religions, etc. working and playing together in a school environment. 

Whoever You Are by Mem Fox (1997) 

This is a sweet, classic book which celebrates the similarities among people, instead of differences. 

 

The Sneetches by Dr. Seuss (1961) 

This book has an important message for any/all marginalized groups. 

 

The Family Book by Todd Parr (2003)  

All kinds of family groups are shown in this inclusive book. This books shows us that no matter what size or shape your family is, it is a great family for you. 

 

The Paperbag Princess by Robert Munsch (1992)  

The Princess saves the prince and then figures out she’s better alone - flips the gender stereotype.

Do this important work to celebrate diversity! 

And, as always, have fun doing it!

Spreading Joy, not Germs, in Your Early Childhood Classroom

A peek into any early childhood classroom should give you a snapshot of joy and exploration. These days, with precautions against infection in the time of Covid-19, things are surely different ... but the joy and exploration can continue, with a lot of creativity and flexibility :)

Circle time looks different - we can't be sitting close together in a circle on the rug and giving high fives and cuddles .... but we can have the same community feeling and fun with some small adjustments! 

If you are in-person -

• Incorporate alternate seating in the form of a wipe-off seat cushion or individual beach towel. Spread your friends out in a larger circle or other formation.
• Start your day outdoors, if weather permits, with the same seating options.
• Continue to get your littles up and moving, wherever they are, with motion-based activities to keep them on task.

Whether you're in-person or remote, greet each other using some innovation - “throw” a pretend ball (complete with some great sound effects) from one to another, calling their name, to greet around the circle. Give long distance high fives as air-fives or, in-person, use yard sticks with foam hands on the ends to pass around. (Follow with a squirt!)

Sharing is sometimes easier when your friends aren't "on the spot" - let them choose (or make) a full-sized or finger puppet to be their sharing tool, and then they can keep that puppet for the week in a cubby or other secure spot. Trade them in on the weekend for "puppet quarantine." Watch the joy as they start to open up!

In person, share the pen during circle or message time by just tweaking the procedure - a quick wipe down by the teacher between uses lets friends all participate and collaborate. Keep some disposable gloves and wipes available at your easel station and you won't end up with sore hands. 

Authentic interactions can still take place, even through plexiglass partitions or screens when all are playing/working with separate toys/materials. Encourage students to display what they are working on and have a "question wand" to get it going. Glue a BIG, bright question mark on a dowel/stick and use it to tap someone on the shoulder. They will look around and ask a friend a question (or two) about what they are working on. Once this gets to be a regular thing, you can fade the wand or use for special occasions. (Adapt for remote screen use.)

Remember, these young friends don't have pre-conceived ideas of what school is - so make it joyful, interactive, and full of exploration - just like every other year!

Good luck :) and have fun!!

Learning to Read and Write with Rocket

The Rocket books by Tad Hills are great tools to help kiddos gear up to learn about letters, sounds, and words to read on their own.

Rolling them out, book by book, over a course of weeks or months, with the continuing characters of Rocket and his “teacher,” helps the children see how the steps fall into place with the basic building blocks of reading and writing!! Use them as anchor texts to refer back to, keeping Rocket, the character, in their minds as a new reader and writer :) 

Start out with R is for Rocket to introduce the letters, one by one, and get excited about attaching importance to letters and sounds. Each page shows a few words, with pictures, to go with each letter, in ABC order, with Rocket and his friends as characters. Discussion and games can go on to extend the book, by looking around for other words that also begin with each letter, and matching them to the written words on each page :) 

Next up, when you’re ready, is How Rocket Learned to Read!! This follows a story format, as our buddy Rocket is approached by a little yellow bird who wants to be his teacher and to get him interested in reading. Rocket is resistant at first but eventually gets SO excited about learning words that it’s contagious!! Your kiddos will get excited too!! They may want to start labeling things around the house or classroom ... so let them! Grab some index cards, sticky notes, or cut up some paper and have some fun stretching words out to hear all the sounds!

 

When the time comes to launch some simple writing, Rocket Writes a Story is the third in the series and revisits the character of Rocket again. This book shows your kiddos how to put the words they know together, to get their thoughts down on paper. Rocket goes through all the same dilemmas as beginning writers do ... coming up with an idea, getting started, figuring out how to put words together in a sentence. He gets encouragement from his “teacher” who has great ideas, helps him get started, and cheers him on throughout! Your kiddos may see their own struggles reflected here and will cheer for Rocket when he gets going with writing! Use the word cards from the previous exercise and add in some basic sight words to help your children arrange word card sentences. Then, copy onto paper ... pretty soon, with practice,  they’ll be taking charge and putting it all together themselves. 

 

Get some inspiration going with Rocket and friends - and have fun!!

Playing Store: Consumers and Producers

Playing store can be a great play experience for your kiddos, but why not really make it meaningful?

With a little help, your children can participate in PBL (project based learning) by creating their own products, "pricing" them, and "selling" them.  It sounds complicated, but it truly is not :) 

As an example, one small crew made bead bracelets and duct tape bookmarks, as part of an open-ended craft activity. (Great fine motor work, BTW!) Some were very elaborate, therefore more "expensive." The artists and artisans were the "producers." When they had a bunch of “products” finished, they laid them out and examined them, counted up the sale items, and came up with a pricing system. They kept it simple with $1, $2, and $3 items, but this could be adjusted if you wanted to make change or work with harder numbers.

All items were then priced and the kiddos turned our dramatic play area into a store display area. They arranged their goods, and some friends made signs to show "consumers" where to shop. They all discussed how much each item should cost, and tagged items with sticky notes.

For the consumer side, children then took turns being shopkeepers and customers. This required a little adult intervention, to model being the paymaster, and to sort out roles. Shopkeepers could earn "Kid Cash" while working and then save it up to go shopping with later on. A few customers were given some cash on loan, to get the process started. Customers with no cash yet had to window shop, plan, and wait until they made some money to spend. All roles revolved, so all students got a chance to be producers, shopkeepers, and customers.

When it was time to be a customer (or consumer), each child had to budget their teacher-issued “Kid Cash” in order to purchase what they wanted. Decisions had to be made about items that were too pricey, or not within the budget, and the dollars had to be stretched to stay within budgets. 

On the sales side, adjustments were made to prices if items weren’t moving well and small groups of students spontaneously got together to make those judgements. It was awesome to watch them start to take ownership of the store :)

Throughout the process, lessons were learned, the children could tell about the process that we “studied” :) 

AND we had so much fun!

* This lesson was done pre-COVID-19. Adaptations could include quarantining supplies for a few days in between segments and setting up a store play center using precautions seen in actual stores (such as clear partitions and hand sanitizer stations), “normalizing” these scenes for students. This would allow for some play interchange, while maintaining distance and safety precautions. 

Exploring with Ezra Jack Keats

Ezra Jack Keats was a groundbreaking author/illustrator who left us a gorgeous collection of storybooks, with characters drawn from minority groups and what he called "outsiders.” When The Snowy Day (one of the first books that Keats authored) was published back in 1962, it broke the color barrier for depictions of characters in children's books. 

Keats had grown up poor during the Great Depression in a Jewish neighborhood of New York City, and said he knew what it felt like to feel "outside the group." Although he was white, he decided early on to make many of his characters reflect the varied groups of people that he saw every day, who were not seen in the books he read. His use of urban settings and characters representing all races, set him apart as an author and illustrator and won him awards, such as the Caldecott Medal, for his work.

As a teacher, I can recall reading The Snowy Day to a class, including children of color, and having children get excited about seeing "themselves" in the story book. It was a wake-up call for me to curate my classroom collection so that this wasn't an unusual occurrence, but rather one of many books depicting characters from all races, creeds, living and family situations, etc. As Ezra Jack Keats believed, "all children should be able to see themselves in a book they love."

Keats went on to write and illustrate many, many books. Some of his characters were featured in several books, such as Peter, first seen in The Snowy Day. Peter was featured in 5 or 6 books, and grew up to be an older child in Pet Show. Students get very excited when they make this connection!

Keats' style of illustration was also so engaging and is completely captivating all these years later! He used all different methods, incorporating some collage, gouache, pen and ink, etc. in order to keep his art interesting. Kids find his colorful work fun to look at!

There are so many Keats stories that you can build an extension activity from ... 

The Snowy Day - use a shaving cream/glue solution to layer on “snow“ and use urban building silhouettes to complete a landscape and then write about it.

Peter's Chair - remember a "special something" that was handed down in your family and draw it, cut it out and embed it in a picture with more collage elements.

Whistle for Willie - imagine hiding in a box or learning a new skill and who you would surprise with it ... now draw it or write about it!

You can use any book to try collage, embedding some newspaper scraps and even fabric in a picture and writing about a character or scene from the story.

For more information about Ezra Jack Keats, click below:

https://www.ezra-jack-keats.org/

Have fun!