We Need More Flowers

 As we have engaged with the children in this inquiry centering around flowers and bees,  we have been mindful of capturing their wonder and the development of their curiosity.

Te Whāriki; the early childhood curriculum, states that;

“... children learn through play (and being actively involved) – by doing, by asking questions, by interacting with others, by setting up theories or ideas about how things work and trying them out, and by the purposeful use of resources”. Te Whāriki also says that “exploration will be guided, supported and challenged by adults and other children”.
(pg 82 Te Whāriki)

After our questions around ‘Why Are The Bees Dying?’, we were keen for the girls to
be active in making a difference to the environment. We reminded ourselves of our ‘Central Idea’  and in particular the ‘Lines of Inquiry’ that we had begun our inquiry with, that talks about ‘preserving and protecting the world’. 

We turned to the girls for direction and their solution was simple...
“We need to plant more flowers” so a trip to the garden centre was planned.

Why are the Bees Dying?

The girls have been watching the lovely spring flowers that are arriving in the gardens around the school and on our walks to Mt St John.

Our beautiful daffodil pictures got us talking about the stamens in the
middle and the bees that come to visit flowers to collect pollen and nectar.The girls drew daffodil pictures and we added our bee pictures to get a group picture that will be used
for the calendars this year.

We viewed a video of bees collecting pollen and nectar from the flowers and the commentator talked about how the bees were dying all around the world.

This immediately attracted the girls attention and they became very animated.

Why are the Bees dying they asked?

The girls came up with many ideas and I suggested they ask their families
for some ideas too. A little booklet was made and they families did a great job of
writing their ideas down and sending them back for us to read.

Here are some of the most popular reasons why people think the bees are dying;

Poisons and insecticides are killing them
Not enough flowers
The bees are getting a disease
People kill bees  

I asked the girls 
'What could we do to save the bees?'

The girls decided that we could grow some flowers.
Our next adventure is to go to the Garden Centre to choose
flowers and vegetables for our gardens. 

Our friend Melissa has provided us with some wild flower seeds and
we need to find a home for those too!

French in the Foundation Class

  Today we spent time with Madame Alpe. She brought her lovely doll Emilé and her puppets. 

At the end of the day, 
the girls enjoyed making a cover for their French book.

Here are some of the pictures of Emilé

French phrases that we are learning 

with Madame Alpe                                                                  

Bonjour                                      Hello                                    
Comment t'appelles tu?              What is your name?
Je m'appelle...                             My name is ....                                       
Tres bien                                    Very good                                         Merci                                           Thank you

Bon appetite                                Good eating

De rien                                         You’re welcome

Numbers

Un; 1. Deux; 2. Trois; 3. Quatre; 4. Cinq; 5.

An Interest in Bees Grows

We presented the girls with several pictures of bees and encouraged them to take a
closer look with the magnifying glasses.

Their first attempts at drawing the bees was quite different from their later drawings. Many girls began by saying “I can’t draw a bee”. We noticed that they were drawing faces on the bees; eyes, a nose and a mouth. The bees legs were straight lines. We asked them to take a closer look at the bees in the photos and we talked about the ways that the bees face differed from their faces.
This led to quite a change in their drawings.

After the first drawing, we took time to look at different parts of the bees, separately. We invited the girls to look at their own legs and to take a close look at how their knees and ankles
allowed their legs to bend.

When we looked through the magnifying glass at the bees legs, we pointed out that bees legs have different parts like their legs, and each part is shaped quite differently.

 

The girls then drew the legs of the bees several times to get a better idea of their shape. We noticed that the legs of the next bees they drew, were a lot more detailed.  

Once we had taken the time to look at all the body parts of the bee,

it was time to start drawing.

Here are the girls deep in concentration. 

Drawing bees isn't easy!

 

Introducing French

The girls have been enjoying their time with Mrs Alpe, the French teacher. 

On Tuesday the girls were introducing themselves;

'Comment t'appelles tu?'

'Je m'appelle ..........'

I have a feeling that the girls are going to catch on a lot faster than I am!!!

Constable Gordon Returns!

The girls achieved a perfect score in answering all Constable Gordon's questions this morning.

They really enjoyed it when Téa pretended to be in the back seat of the car with her brother (Constable Gordon played an excellent 'brother'). He began teasing and pushing her and she played along by pushing back (a bit of experience there perhaps?). 

When Constable Gordon asked why children shouldn't fight in the car, Kate surprised Constable Gordon by replying "because it will distract the driver". That was very impressive Scott and Kathryn!

The highlight was taking a drive in his car.

First they dressed up as police officers, which they loved, then walked up to the driveway.

They buckled themselves in and off they went with lights blazing. The girls didn't even get phased when he put the siren on!

A Glorious Day on Mt St John

On our walk up to the mountain, the girls noticed that one of the trees that just had a few buds on it last week, was covered in flowers. They were also delighted to spot a bee collecting pollen from one of the buds. Then they spotted another one, and another, until they realised that the tree was covered with bees. When they listened very carefully they called hear the buzzing of the bees too!

There was also a lot of discussion about the Lichen the girls spotted on the 

trunk and branches of the tree.

But the highlight of the walk was the cat that accompanied us from his home, up the steps, down the hill and came paddling in the pond!!!

Can you spot the cat?

And home again...

One of the girls asked me whether his mother knows that he goes up to Mt St John without her.

I seriously doubt it!!!

An encounter with a friendly cat on our lovely mountain really was just fabulous.