Making Connections

A few weeks ago I took a course with two wonderful ladies, Roni Cahen and Bev Seperle at our local Early Years Centre. The course was all about lines. Lines, lines, lines. 

We were given the task between weeks of exploring lines with the children in a variety of capacities. We explored the lines over the course of the month on and off. The children didn't quite respond they way that I thought they would... most of that was my fault. I didn't facilitate in the ways that would have really captured their interest. That doesn't mean though that the children did not benefit in some ways from the exploration. In fact, I would say, we're just getting into it! 

We had a look at some different types of lines, and gave names to those lines. The children will often refer to lines with those names now. In addition to naming them, we gave them sounds. We've really taken to drawing lines in the air and giving them sounds. Fun sounds like 'whoop, whoop; vrrrr; zzzzzz; ck, ck; etc' This has really captured their interest, and you will often see us waving our arms around in the air and making funny sounds. In fact, it has increased the children's interest in their letters and numbers. They have given the letters and numbers some writing sounds (Future Kindergarten teachers I warn you that these children will provide a soundtrack to their writing). A three for example makes this sound...'whoop, whoop'. 

But our discovery of lines has not stopped there. The children have found lines in the room and linked them to the line names I mentioned earlier. 

One child discovered the 'squiggley wiggley' line in a shell on our science table (see the picture above for an example of a 'squiggly, wiggly line'). 

I asked him if he could draw that line for me somehow, and he said he could build it. I was curious to see how he could do that. I watched as he created this:

This is the explanation of how the squiggly wiggly looks like a drill and it can drill a tunnel. 

I thought that was a rather neat interpretation of a shell with a squiggly wiggly line.