Rock and Roll

We spent the week rocking and rolling!

We counted and sorted all kinds of rocks and minerals. We talked about their characteristics and made a list of descriptive words like- big, little, rough, smooth, shiny, dull, sparkly and so on.

We used those same descriptive words when we played "I Spy" with our rocks. One of us described a rock in our collection and the rest of us had to guess which rock was being described. 

 

We went on a rock hunt to add to our rock collection and to help us with our activities for the week.

When we got back to our play yard, we scrubbed our rocks with toothbrushes.

We had fun drawing, coloring and writing with rock crayons. They're great for "little hands" to control.

We talked about how we live on a great big rock called earth. We recreated an earthquake (several actually!) by placing a board on top of some pillows. We each built a building with blocks and then the earth began to rumble. We shook the board and pulled at it to make a "crack in the earth". All of our structures fell. We built structures again, this time paying closer attention to how they were built. We made stronger foundations creating more stability for them. When another earthquake occurred, they withstood much more and some even stayed standing.

One of our favorite activities this week was painting rocks. We dropped our rocks in a salad spinner, added some paint and started spinning. The results were amazing. 

Using a cylindrical container, we dipped some small rocks in paint and dropped them in. We added a piece of paper and got busy rocking and rolling our containers to some rock and roll music. The products were quite interesting.

After reading "Sylvester and the Magic Pebble", 

we sat in a big circle to play a rock game. One person sat in the middle with his/her eyes closed, as those in the circle sang and passed a magic rock from one to another.  When the song was over, the person in the middle had to guess who might be holding the magic rock. 

  
Rock, rock, how you wander,
From one place and to the other.
Is it fair, is it fair,
To keep poor ____________ sitting there?

We read a book called, A Gift from the Sea by Kate Banks.

It's about a boy who found a special rock but didn't realize how very special it really was. The book told the history of the rock from way back during the time of the dinosaurs. When we went on a rock hunt, we all found one very special rock. We took turns describing our rocks and telling a bit about their history.

My rock is large.
It has a little bit of silver
and a little bit of black
and a little bit of orange.
It's kind of an "A" shape.
My rock feels bumpy.
I think it came from a planet-
a kind of silver planet or a bumpy planet.
It has orange bumps all over it. 

My rock is little.
It is red and shaped like a triangle.
It came from the ocean.

My rock is big.
It is black and shaped like a triangle.
It came from outside...from Susan's house.

My rock is little.
It is purple with stripes on it.
It is circle shaped.
It came from the jungle.
We found rocks in the jungle.
It's spooky in the jungle.