Spark returned focused and ready to learn this week! We kicked off our space-focused session. During our circle times, we focused on weather as a bridge to our space topics. We learned about Doppler radar and satellites, and how they help show us what’s going on with the weather. We also watched some videos of storm chasers and learned why and how they look for tornadoes.
In the afternoon, Spark spent a lot of time exploring the frozen version of a favorite outdoor spot, Nakoma Creek. We enjoyed boot-skating, looking for clear “windows” in the ice, and busting up areas of thin ice with hockey sticks. The third time we came out, the ice had done something magical: All of it had refrozen, but there was a thin, crunchy, crystal-filled layer on top of the stronger, solid ice. The heroes spent a long time crunching it up and sweeping the shards with their sticks. From Ms. Olivia’s perspective, several kids seemed to become less hesitant about playing outside and more confident and capable of moving over difficult terrain after their experiences this week. Children were also attentive to boundaries and guardrails as they had their fun on the ice.
Makerspace was a big hit this week, with heroes creating their own coin banks and mailboxes after discovering a pile of toy coins and bills. We saw many moments this week where the heroes created play worlds that involve the entire group.
The social-emotional focus of the week was courage. We explored what it means to be brave and aimed to try new things this week both during Spark Play afternoons and during the morning Montessori work cycle.
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