That is a wonderful celebration of Autumn Thanksgiving...The Nature become incredible colourful, weather still quiet and nice. Thanksgiving 2015 came to us exactly like that.Why do not say "Thanks" to everyone around the World? Thanks my Family that you are and supporting me in this world, friends that you exist and we can have fun and share hard time together...Thank you Lord that we have this turkey and bread for our dinner. Many, many thanks for small thing those happen every day and make our lives bright and happy...
We celebrating thanksgiving with the book
Who are Indians? Why pilgrims said them "Thank You!"? - that were important points of our today's games.
Indians do canoeing!
Indians do fishing!
Indians do growing corn, pumpkins and apples!
And they brought roasted turkey for pilgrims who were suffering from hunger!
Those are our turkeys!
If you would like to see how we were hunting it, come and look tomorrow!
In our studio children exploring different materials. Today is time to play with rocks! Very special person brought to our studio very special rocks! Those are geological samples.... They are so beautiful - some shiny like diamonds, some sparkly like gold...we have a lot of fun observing them.
there are many options what to do with rocks but children decided to create Inukshuk.
Together with spring coming great celebration - Easter!
I was born in Ukraine, amazing country great artists and great arts.
One of them - Ukrainian Pysanka - Symbol of Life, Renaissance, and Renewal!
We continue to explore harvest and today we were talking about folk doll "Croupenichka" or "Zernovushka" - the doll which made by yourself with any kind of croups.
At the end of harvest time people collect different time of croups and created small doll with them inside. This doll symbolized richness of harvest pray for next harvest time.
This doll has several names: Zernushka, Zernovushka, Krupenichka, Sweetpea. And it may look a little different, depending on the area where it does. But the foundation of her total - inside dolls grain.
Values of cereals in Zernovushke:
Buckwheat - satiety and wealth, traditionally filled doll is this grain.
Rice - the most expensive grain, on a holiday;
Barley - satiety;
Oats - by force.
You can put all cereals. Also at the bottom of the doll would sometimes put a coin.
We were talking with my little children about the Bunny who stills a carrot and cabbage from our garden. We played the game "BUNNY" on the tune "Ringa, ringa roses"
Bunny jumping slowly,
Bunny jumping faster,
Ash a, ash a
Jump in hole!
Bunny's sitting quiet,
Bunny looks around -
If there hunter looks for
them!
At this moment "Hunter" walks around and looks who is not hiding eyes with hands! Everyone wants to be hunter!!!!
We decided to make a bunny doll and stuff it with croups. This doll has a great value for children as made by them self, safe and nice to touch in in little hands,
To make the process easier I used socks and plastic needle. For very young children I put string inside before but older children were able to do it by themselves with my help.
Look what we made!
The full workshop how to make a Zernovushka you can find here and here
My children were so exited to play with their bunny!
This weekend we were celebrating 146 Anniversary Confederation of three colonies into a single country called Canada, named Canada Day. It is actually Birthday of our wonderful country. So, we decided to discover more about Canada and were talking about what did happen in Northern North America many years ago, who did live here, what did do first people, how they were looked like, why does Canada have a red maple leaf on the flag. So many questions....we decided to explore many of them during the Summer and Fall up to Thanks Giving Day!!! So, let's start!
The red stripes on the Canadian flag symbolize the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, between which is Canada. White square recalls the Arctic snows in the north of the country, and the Maple Leaf, Canada's long-standing emblem - on its vast forests. Canada named the country of Red Maple Leaves, because here is a lot of special kind maple trees which have really red leaves and in spring people make Maple syrup.
Most common for Canada animals are Moose, Beaver, Raccoon and Skunk. Last one, but not least one presented only in North America, and nowhere else around the world.
May be, I will tell you something interesting about beavers....
They have very sharp teeth, so they can break huge trees and build the beaver dam; Beavers build Dams for food storage and protection. They build a dam to make an artificial lake, and then they proceed to build their lodge nearby.
The deeper water in a dam allows the beaver to travel near its home protected from other animals and predators. After the dam is built, the beaver will also dig channels leading away from the new dam, to create safe transport channels for when it is gathering more wood to continue building its dam and lodge. Beavers usually use their tail as a paddle when they are swimming, but beaver use their tails to communicate!!!! by using there tails to tell other beavers that they are there or to tell them where the food is or even if there in danger they just slap there tail in water!
Hey! let's try to be beavers! We clapped with our hands different pattern on the floor and tried to repeat it again! Children even guess that different pattern might have different meaning!!!
First people.... How did they look like? Where did they live?
What is North American Indians Totem Pole?
What is Dream Catcher?
Can we build a Tepee?
There were so many questions...
We solved the puzzle "Red Maple Leaf"
But most interesting was play with rocks. Some rocks I collected during year in stores, but some of they I made by myself in special shape with Air Dry Clay. I needed a few flat rocks...
Who is Inuksuk?
Imagine walking across the vast tundra, and coming across a human-sized stone structure. Inukshuk (plural: inuksuit) means “likeness of a person” in Inuktitut (the Inuit language), and is a pile of (unworked) stones arranged by the Inuit into the shape of a human being. They are sometimes seen as representing the strength and determination of the Inuit people, who live in one of the Earth’s harshest climates and terrains.Used for thousands of years, the Inuit make Inuksuit to identifying routes, to warn people of impending danger, to mark a place of respect, or to remember a good hunting or fishing spot. Most every Inuit constructs his own stone figure at some point, and they are a distinct feature in the Arctic region. They usually are around the height of a human being (5-7 feet tall).
If you did read my previous post "Decoupage - what is that?" you know about my first and I think my last one...Maybe I my napkins were no so good, maybe paintbrushes, maybe glue wasn't good enough.....Finally I decided just copy the pattern from the napkin and got that box with the blue-purple flower.
Ok, I did it but I had in my head to introduce my children something very special not just painting flowers on the box.(Why on the box?because the little girl from my class once brought a few bracelets and necklaces and we were talking how she should keep them usually;.that is why we started with boxes) So I started to look for some special arts which were combine with flowers and leaves and were easy enough to make it for my grade 1 student. The first thing which came to my mind was Zhostovo painting. You can learn more about it here. It was gorgeous but I thought it will be hard for young children and I couldn't find any tutorial with print outs how to do that. Suddenly I found this blog where in humorous manner Owner is talking about her first try to do Petrykivka art.
That was insight!
"Petrykivka Style of Painting is a characteristic feature of Ukrainian decorative folk art that has been practiced for generations in the village of Petrykivka in the Dnipropetrovsk region."The art of "Petrykivka" or “Petrikovka” is an 18th century stylized form of painting floral and plant motives. “Petrykivka Style of Painting” is a remarkable artistic phenomenon of Ukrainian culture, and a characteristic feature of Ukrainian decorative folk art.
So we started to learn how to do Petrykivka painting. For my luck I found in internet this blog and trust me I was excited in the same way as my children! We also got great inspiration from this video
So, we started!
We started with "Pen test"))
We tied "light" touch and "press" touch of our paint brushes. We tried to make a thin lines and thick lines. We tried to combine thin lines with thick lines and finally we started to make a petals! WOOO-HOOO!
Michelle:" My lines look like a rain drops! I am painting rain!"
That was very good observation!
While children were practising to make different lines I made my firs Petrykivka painting. In memories of Zhostov painting I didn't use white plate, I coloured a styrol foam plate in red.
We were so excited and started to prepare plates right now! while plates were drying children created own designs.
Finally!!! Some children felt ready to do their masterpieces!!!
Masha is painting her jewellery box.
Shima prepares her wooden box with silver paint.
I printed a couple pictures with "Petrykivka" painting and we explored how Artist was painting those flowers and birds. We discovered every touch of Master and learn how to create flowers and ornaments.
Our first masterpieces!
This project took almost 4 weeks and we still continue to work on it. Many children who wasn't interesting in painting before join as in process and even older children such as Grade 3-4 were observing my Grades 1 and ask to join our team. Everyone is welcome!
