On Tuesday morning the children played hangman with whiteboards and whiteboard markers. They used a variety of key themes to guide their learning, and effectively proved their learning by associating words with each of the key themes. The recognising, spelling, and application of specific words was guided by the educators to maximise the effectiveness of the language skills utilised in this activity. The children and educators benefited from this activity in a variety of ways. The children were able to develop relationships with each other as well as the educators, whilst also developing their literacy skills by exploring the correct spelling of certain words within specific themes.
On Tuesday afternoon we explored what happens when we add dish washing liquid to pepper in water. Initially we discussed our hypotheses - what we expected to happen. Lilly and Tommy thought that the pepper might explode and jump in the air, Lilly thought that the water would start bubbling, and Eden thought that the water would turn green like the dish washing liquid. Charlie also considered our safety and suggested that we move out of the way in case it explodes. Once we had taken turns to set up the experiment, we observed what happened. We noticed that when we dipped the tooth pick in the dish washing liquid and put it in the water, the pepper moved away from the tooth pick, very quickly. Charlie suggested that we try the experiment again without putting dish washing liquid on the tooth pick. When we tried this experiment, we observed that the pepper didn't move. This showed us that it was the dish washing liquid that the pepper was moving away from.
Throughout the experiment the children were able to practice their communications skills, team work and patience as they took turns to follow, understand and complete the steps of the experiment. The children also followed the procedure of an experiment to deepen their understanding, creating a hypothesis, recording observations, and attempting to communicate an explanation of why it all happened.
