“Play is the work of the child.” – Maria Montessori

Each day, students have centres time after they complete a work activity.  This centres or play time is a valuable opportunity for students to learn how to share, take turns and interact with others.  During this unstructured time is when I see the greatest creativity.

Neil arranged food at the house centre.

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Emma made a beautiful painting.

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Bonjour mes amis!

On Thursday afternoons just before home time, you can hear sounds of a different language coming from Room 101. Anne-Marie, Reyel’s grandma, has been giving us lessons in French.

Here are the videos that we’ve been using:

This French greeting song is my favourite video. I can say all of the words in this song.

I love cars too, but I am still practicing to sing at high speed along with this video. And I love how the little fish swim just as well as the big fish.

We are bucket fillers!

“I can be kind and help others.” -Daphne

“I can hug somebody.” -Reyel

“I can be nice to other people. I can play with them.” -An

Our kindergarten students have a good idea about what it means to fill a bucket. It’s fast. It’s easy. And the best part of this is- when you fill someone else’s bucket, you fill your own at the same time. Making others feel good, will make yourself feel great too!

Bannock with Grandma Sadie!

Today Division 9 made bannock with Grandma Sadie. We mixed warm water with sugar and yeast together, and then prepared a flour mixture with flour, baking powder, salt, sugar and a couple spoonfuls of the dissolved yeast.  We added water to get a play dough-like consistency. Next week, I will post the recipe if you want to make this at home.

Grandma Sadie’s family is Wet’suwet’en, and they come from Central B.C., near Smithers.image image image

Each student took home a piece of dough that could be baked at 350 degrees for 5 to 10 minutes.  You could also deep-fry it, and then it would be called fry bread.

What does it mean to fill a bucket?

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Steve Harmer, a magician-educator, visited Thunderbird School on November 24, 2015 to talk about invisible buckets. Every person in the world carries a bucket with them every day. These buckets hold good feelings. Kind words and actions fill buckets, and our kindergarten class learned about being bucket fillers. We were amazed with magic tricks involving a rabbit named Stu and a dove, but more importantly, we learned about how easy it is to bring peace, happiness and joy to our world. Immediately after the show, students in Division 9 all had kind words to share with Mr. Harmer. We wrote them on a piece of paper so he would be able to take the compliments home.