Dear Blossom Families,
We appreciate your support during our building study! With your efforts, we were able to build an entire city with all of the boxes, egg cartons, milk jugs, and other materials you brought in! The children have named our cardboard town Blossom City and have filled it with many wonderful constructions.
The Blossom room was under construction this past month as we built towers and bridges, made blueprints and marshmallow buildings, and learned all about architecture. The children were invested in the topic as they wanted to focus on their questions of “How do we build stuff?”, “Why do people make buildings?” and “Why do we use concrete and excavators?” In the process of answering these questions, we learned about the different types of materials and machinery that go into buildings and the various purposes for buildings.
We also took this opportunity to develop some of our other skills. We worked on measuring as we discovered how to use measuring tapes and rulers—an essential skill for every construction worker. We also practiced looking for shapes as we inspected different structures. We learned that the inorganic world around us is filled with many different and complicated shapes, not just squares and rectangles.
We ended our study by drafting and building Blossom City. The class first talked about all the buildings they thought were essential to have in a city. We then discussed other ideas that would need to be built that were not buildings– roads, parks, etc. Once we had some excellent ideas, we made a blueprint of our plans and then constructed them! Blossom City has its own Growing Tree, a dirt bike trail, delicious restaurants, and two hospitals! These little architects have worked hard to make a city that they are proud of.
Along with the building and architectural skills our classroom has focused on, we’ve also seen a significant development in expressing our emotions. We worked on recognizing and naming our feelings throughout the year and had more time to express them in new ways—through collage, sculpture, or drawing. We’ve seen an advancement in how they can communicate their feelings and a growth in how many complex emotions they can identify. These Blossoms keep growing, which is a joy to see.
We are looking forward to more sunshine and seasonal changes (fingers crossed) as we begin a garden exploration for May. Our study will build on the wonder and knowledge many of your children gained in the Branch Room. We will investigate a plant’s life cycle, the pollination process, crucial garden critters, greenhouse gardening, and the countless uses for household plants and herbs. We are excited to get our hands dirty and discover where our curiosity takes us during this study!
Thank you to everyone we connected with for conferences! It is always so nice to pause and reflect on all of the growth your children have made. Please do not hesitate to reach out with any questions or thoughts. We feel so fortunate to work with so many amazing families!
As always, we are so grateful to you for sharing your creative, kind, curious, clever, capable, and caring children with us this year!
“Architecture starts when you carefully put two bricks together. There it begins.”
-Ludwid Mies van der Rohe
All of the love,
Miss Madeline and Ms Stephanie
