May Highlights
At Niños del Sol we celebrate both the American Mother's Day in May and the Costa Rican Mother's Day in August. It's fun having an extra day to celebrate family.
Mother's Day was certainly the highlight for May. Now that I can't ruin any surprises, have a look at our projects. Creating our gifts offered both an artistic and academic experience for our students.
Here we are enhancing our fine motor skills with jewelry making. Students picked out their own color schemes and earring styles. We learned about symmetry in the process.
To incase our lovely earrings, each Explorer also made a travel jewelry case and cards for their mothers. The folding card included a mother's day poem in Spanish and the purse was cut, sewn and braided using felt and string. For many it was their first time braiding.
While Innovators were learning about the composition, size and movements of the Sun, Earth and the Moon, they made representations of those 3 solar bodies. First, students shredded and mixed a modeling dough made from recycled paper and then formed the dough around different size bowls. They then researched the interior layers of each object. Though they were not accurate to size and ratio, students painted the insides and outsides to match the outer layer and the inner layers. The bowls made beautiful Mother's Day gifts!
Architects were learning about the interdependence of animals, plants, non-living things and humans in environments. Students made small terrariums to show some of these interactions. They first started growing cacti and separating plants from our garden. Then, they made a special soil mixture to plant their cacti in. Students then researched animals that live in desert environments and then created those animals out of clay. After painting the animals and placing them in the desert environment, students decorated their soil with special rocks and a bow. The terrariums will continue to grow at home as gifts for moms!
