A Glimpse into our Days - The Riley Notes
ART
The first few weeks of school have been full of exploration of the art room while focusing on one project - Who am I? In an effort to get to know each other, figure out how we exist together and investigate the art room we all have been working on a piece (of any kind) of art that shares something about ourselves. This open format lets our young artists create where they are comfortable. Given time to think, plan and execute we had some incredible pieces presented this week. Here are a few examples:
Andy designed and crafted a model ship out of popsicle sticks and feathers named “Pride” in remembrance of “faded friends.” Aya painted a brightly colored self portrait of her "older self "which included her mother, sister and dog. “I like spending time with my family”. BC’s project evolved over the two weeks and formalized in a vast amount of energetic color and energy overlaying a smiley face. “I have lots of energy and I like to smile.” Raven made a fancy hat that shows her love for color and fashion. She learned that “fashion is not just about what it looks like - it’s how much you like it.” Anthony’s project was about making and giving hearts to others. He recorded all the hearts that he made on a piece of paper. “Hearts don’t just mean love - they mean friendship, kindness and happiness. They are another way to show you care.”
~Anna
ELECTIVES
Fun Songs with Ginger - We are learning and exploring songs to use our voices and bodies (at times) in hopes of writing some of our own.
10’ Plays with Michelle - We are working on creating a short play of our own.
Bas-Relief with Leith - We are creating clay sculpture to hang on the wall
Campus Projects and Compost with Craig - It’s compost time - we are building a composting system for campus.
Soccer with Anna - We’re slowing down to dive into the rules, plays and skills before we get on the field. We’ll be exploring the different positions and the basic rules of the game to bring lots of soccer to campus this fall.
NATURAL SCIENCE
With Kyle and Libby
Science class has started off swimmingly, quite literally! Our curiosity was piqued by the abundant life within the Hideaway stream. We ran experiments to test which method was best for catching frogs, then shifted our focus to the bizarre water striders, which led us into a couple weeks of learning about buoyancy and water tension! The children were challenged to make their own positively buoyant object and an object held up by surface tension. With the leaves around us beginning to change, we are starting to shift focus to plant and soil science!
The older students are diving deep into the exciting world of chemistry. Starting with a basic understanding of hydrogen ions, we explored pH in a variety of ways. The most exciting experiment thus far was making our own pH indicator with red cabbage, and using it to find the pH of eight different household compounds. We are solidifying our knowledge of phase changes and beginning to understand the complex world of atoms and molecules.
CULTURAL STUDIES
The first few weeks of Cultural Studies have been about orienting ourselves on our campus and learning a framework for studying culture. The core framework through which each class will be looking at culture puts "worldview" at the center with "place", "norms", and "values" as the three main lenses. We have started by mapping our campus and developing some basic orienteering skills and will be using maps, and the choices humans make when drawing them, as important representations of place, norms, and values that shape worldview. Already, this has led to a primary practical application of cultural studies: conflict resolution and understanding each other's differences. ~Kyle
ENGLISH LANGUAGE ARTS and THEATER
The year is off to a galloping start! Getting reacquainted, meeting new members of the Riley Community and setting into a new school year. The ELA classes have been a mix of literacy based games, some light assessment activities, journal entries and choosing independent reading books. The highlight, though, has been, in three of the groups, creating our own Mad Libs! We have been writing stories, either in pairs for older children or as a class with the younger children. When all groups have finished, we hope to share them with the community so that the fun can be had by all!
Theater classes have been started with warm up and gross motor games that require elements of imagination. Following games, some light scene work has happened with the younger children and we are starting to explore Shakespeare with the older children. Reading and listening to his works, most of them for the first time, has been of interest to many of the children to my frank surprise. These are children who can relish and rise to a challenge and what they do with the works of the Bard remains to be seen. Stay tuned! ~Michelle
LOWER SCHOOL
In the Lower School we’ve been focusing on the themes of mindfulness and gratitude. We meet daily in a circle and have discussions, play games, and read stories before our work time. During work time we’ve been practicing many skills in our journals, all of which can vary depending on where each child is at developmentally. There is always room for extra challenges and variations depending on the needs of each child. Our work time lately has been focused on the following skills: careful handwriting with proper spacing between words, the proper use of uppercase and lowercase letters, counting by 5’s and telling time, and beginning additional problems. We are also beginning to learn French during circle time several times a week through simple songs, call and response, and stories.
In Science class we continue to work on nature journaling, and have been using the Kamana Guide of nature stories and activities for children. The current theme of the guide is Giving Thanks, with each story focusing on an animal and its message of gratitude. We are also learning what the animal tracks look like and the children are encouraged to sketch the tracks of that week’s animal in their nature journal. Gardening remains an important part of our Science explorations, and at this time of the year we are working on cleaning up the circle garden; weeding, mulching and eventually putting it to bed before the winter sets in. ~Hattie
MATH
The beginning of the school year in math is a time to refresh past learning and make goals for new learning. As the progressive and constructionist paradigms encourage and support children to have a voice and are given the opportunity to choose what and how they learn, it is also a busy time in math classes. Our heterogeneous classes have children of multi ages and skills. This blend gives children exposure to various learning styles, math topics from their past and future learning. Each child was informally assessed and “interviewed” to determine when their programs would commence this year. A binder for each child contains both work for independent work and that which we work together in either group or 1:1 with me. ~Ginger Lane
MUSIC
This year's music class will have an Afro-Centric perspective as we learn (through performance and play) about the roots of North American and South American music. Each class is playing with improvisation, steady beat, and call/response form through a variety of musical experiences, but for the first few weeks we are learning through a West African harvest dance "Kakilambe." We are learning how the way we dance together can be influenced by the way we work together; children are thinking through the work that must be done in order to have a harvest, and using that work (digging, sowing, watering, harvesting) to influence the motions of their dancing. But the dancing can't stand alone, so we are also learning to be drummers through the use of various hand drums. The drummers and dancers are learning to work together in a way that illuminates the importance of each person's role on the team.
The older learners have also been playing together as a steel band, an artform invented and developed in Trinidad and Tobago. Through the steel band, we are learning to read music, improvise melody and harmony, and understand different concepts in music theory. ~Kyle
MAGNOLIA + JUNIPER PROGRAMS
With Lindsay
It has been such a lovely month getting to know your children. We have a total of 9 children in the Juniper program. They sure are having a wonderful time together and I have already observed strong bonds between peers. So far they particularly love to search for caterpillars together and “bake” apple pies in the sand box.
Every few weeks we have a letter friend come out! Our letter friend helps us identify letters and their sounds. When a friend comes out we focus for a week or two on discovering all the words and sounds and opportunities that specific letter offers (B-lueberry muffins anyone?). The children sure are having fun with Ace the Anaconda! We do our daily weather and calendar with Ace. Gather time is our time that we come together as a group and do the weather, calendar, trace and write the specific letter we are on, and much more. We work with the letter in our journals and at the end of the year your child will bring home their journal from A-Z!
Children have had Music with Kyle and Art with Anna! They loved playing clap games and the conga with Kyle and creating their own pieces with Anna in Art. When children are not in their classes they are in the Juniper room working in their journals, playing math games, coloring, matching letters, and much more. So far we have studied Monarch Butterflies! The children have been very excited about this! We have focused our art, math, science and ELA around butterflies!
This week we are onto the season of Fall. We have been focusing on A for Acorns and A for Apple. The children enjoy going on nature walks and finding acorns! We also did a nature scavenger hunt that we have been doing for a few days now. We have a few more to find! Our topic with Fall has led the children to be interested in squirrels and why they are so busy this time of year. I love getting to know each child here and some have shown a great interest in cooking and baking so yesterday we made pumpkin/apple pie playdough and today we made homemade applesauce! We are also currently harvesting our mint from the garden to make tea.
Now that it is the end of the month the children have had a handful of classes. I love seeing the children come back from Art with all their creations. They just love to dance to the beat of the drum and today in Pottery class they went to find real clay with Leith and have a campfire in the rain! I'm looking forward to seeing what they create. ~Lindsay + Mia
In the Magnolia classroom we have been very busy! We started off the year learning about the Life Cycle of a Butterfly. The children enjoyed learning butterfly songs and doing butterfly yoga. We went on lots of caterpillar hunts and picked milkweed. In Art we made butterfly mosaics and 3D chrysalises. Now we have moved on to all about Autumn. We have been learning about apples, acorns, and all sorts of other fun Fall things. We enjoy going on Nature walks and looking for leaves and acorns to use in art projects. The children are learning how to care for living creatures by doing chicken chores everyday. We're always working on listening, sharing, caring and being kind to one another. Our daily routine of Gather Time has been quite a treat for the children. We work on learning days of the week, weather, seasons, months, and recognizing our names. We have just started learning Spanish during this time as well. We plan to continue learning more about Autumn. Our beautiful campus is the perfect place to observe this glorious season! ~ Tori + Susanna