Classroom

We started April off by talking about the seven continents: Asia, Africa, North America, South America, Antarctica, Europe and Australia. We learned that Africa, is where the elephants, giraffes and lions live. South America has tropical forests and one of the longest rivers in the world the Amazon River. North America is where we live. Europe and Asia are together on the map, but Australia is an island where the kangaroo and koala bear live. Last but not least Antarctica is way down below frozen and home to the penguins.

The last week of April we learned about the three R’s Recycle, Reuse and Reduce. Which are three great ways we can eliminate waste and protect our environment! We learned all about waste and how we choose to handle it affects our world’s environment and everything around us like the air, water, land, plants and even man-made things.

Kindergarten

In kindergarten lesson we learned more parts of speech. We learned that a pronoun (I, me, he, she, herself, you, it, that, they, each, few, many, who, whoever, whose, someone, everybody, etc.) is a word that takes the place of a noun. That an adjective describes a noun. Adverbs describe verbs. That prepositions are ‘where’ words not a ‘where’ wolf.

Science

The first week of April we made a salt volcano. We filled a jar with water and oil then we added a drop of food coloring. Since salt is heavier than water we sprinkled salt on the oil and it sank to the bottom of the mixture, carrying a blob of oil and food coloring with it. In the water, the salt started to dissolve. As it dissolved, the salt released the oil, which floats back up to the top of the water.

The second week we did a water color transfer experiment. We filled one glass of water with a few drops of yellow food coloring and another glass of water with blue food coloring. We left the third glass empty. Next, we tore off some paper towel, rolled it up, and stuck one end in the blue water, and the other end in the empty glass. Then we did the same thing using the yellow glass of water and the empty glass. The blue and yellow colors started traveling up the paper towels. Once they became saturated, they dispensed the colored water into the middle glass and created a completely new color green! We also noticed that the middle glass, which was once empty, now had the same amount of colored water as the other two glasses.

 

The third week we made rain clouds in a jar. We filled a jar up with water, squeezed shaving cream on top, and then put a few drops of food coloring on top of the shaving cream. Just like real clouds, the shaving cream cloud became saturated because there was too much water for it to hold so some leaked out just like rain falling from a cloud.

  

The last week we did a gummy bear experiment and put a gummy bear in plain water, sugar water, salt water, vinegar, milk and baking soda water.  We let them sit for about 6 hours and then checked on them in the afternoon to see what had happened. The results were really surprising. Instead of dissolving, the gummies grew, some to almost triple their original size!

 

Music

By: Ms. Faith

To start of the month of April, Ms. Lisa shared about her missions trip to El Salvador from spring break. She showed the students pictures of kids from the country and even sang songs she sang with them. Ms. Lisa discussed how the kids looked different from what the students look like, but they still enjoy games and music just like them. We reviewed the notes and how many counts each note receives, and the musical terms forte and piano. Forte is Italian for loud and piano for quiet. To reinforce these terms, the children marched in a circle around me singing “John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt” as I pretended to be asleep. They sang piano at first and then when it got to the part where they had to sing the la, la, la’s, they had to sing forte to try to wake me up. They got a kick out of trying to wake the teacher up! Along with reviewing the musical terms, Ms. Lisa had students use some instruments such as: tambourines, castanets, rhythm sticks, and egg shakers. Thank you Ms. Lisa for another great month of music class!

 

Art

By: Ms. Faith

In celebration of the International Festival, Ms. Michele took the students on a couple journeys to different countries. The first trip she took us on was to Japan. The class learned about the celebration of Child’s Day and looked at pictures of decorations they use in the celebration. These decorations were, paper lanterns, dragons, and coy fish streamers. So, Ms. Michele had the students make the coy fish streamers out of construction paper. We decorated them with crepe paper, sequence, and different types of paper for scales. While the class was learning about the country, they listened to Japanese music to inspire their artwork. The next journey landed us in Australia where the class got to hear an instrument native to the country called the Didgeridoo, and watched a clip from Steve Irwin to hear his accent and see some of Australia’s animals. Ms. Michele showed pictures of the Aborigines that live there and their artwork. The students then got to use materials from the earth to paint a picture to look like an Aborigine painting. The class used turmeric, clay, charcoal, dirt, and terracotta mixed with water as their paint and Q-tips to make dots to fill in their drawing.

 

To finish up the month, the class went back to the focus on a specific artist, Vincent Van Gogh. Ms. Michele showed a picture of his painting called “The Bedroom”. This inspired the project for the students to make a 3-D model of their “dream” bedroom. They got to use felt, markers, wooden pieces, and foam shapes to decorate their room. It was amazing to see the detail the students used to create their own bedroom. Thank you Ms. Michele for the adventure through art class!