The second week of school went flying by! The children were busy exploring all the things around the classroom that they did not have the chance to in the first week. They played with the water beads at the sensory table, built houses in the block center, and painted collaboratively on an easel.
One thing our 3A children noticed as they were playing was a mysterious sound that could be heard underneath our classroom! Once they heard it, they asked "What is that sound?" As educators and grown-ups, we have the tendency to give away the answers quickly. However, if we leave things open-ended or challenge the children find out those answers themselves, we believe that the learning can be more meaningful.
We wanted to take the children's inquiry further, so we decided to take a walk around our school and find out if there were other sounds. The children first thought about what things we would hear outside. They shared that they thought they would hear 'scary monster' 'flowers' 'eagles' 'cars' etc. When we walked around outside, what we actually heard were 'digger' 'dump truck' 'baby crying' 'car horns' 'people talking' and 'train' sounds. The children were listening in to all the sounds around us!
Afterwards, we wanted to explore another one of our senses: smell. We smelled two mysterious jars (one had vinegar soaked tissues, and the other had soap water soaked tissues) and asked the children what they smelled. This took us into a whole another imaginary world where the children began to smell 'elephant' 'horse' 'giraffe' etc. It was truly fascinating to get to know what and how the children thought and processed their senses.
Our last exploration in Senses was taste! We observed two similar but different fruit; a lemon and a lime. The children noticed that they were yellow and green, then wondered how they would taste! We first tasted the lemon. The facial expressions of our children were priceless! Then we tasted the lime and thought about which fruit tasted better. Three friends chose lemon, and the other three chose lime!
As we continue our explorations of senses, we want to welcome any ideas, questions, and theories from our children to deepen our understanding of the world together!
