Our discovery table was filled with oranges- big ones and little ones. We had a scale for weighing, a balance for balancing them, and tape measures for measuring them. We used words like equal, balanced, weigh, measure, ounces, inches, big, bigger, little, littler, same, different... They traveled back and forth between science and dramatic play.
A sensory bin was filled with things for discovery and exploration- pom poms of all sizes, balls of different textures and sizes, ribbons and more. They all had one thing in common...they were all orange!
One of our favorite activities of the week was playing in orange water with orange juice bottles for pouring and mixing (an open-ended activity...great for eye-hand coordination and an awesome sensory experience).
we each picked an orange to investigate. We felt them, squeezed them, rolled them, threw them, smelled them, and thought of words to describe them. We also tried juggling them, just like the boy in the book. We tasted them too!
It's so fun to get new books in our classroom. This one- It's an Orange Aardvark! became an instant hit and was read over and over and over again!
After reading Oranges in January,
After reading it the first time:), we headed to the art table to use oranges for painting. We dipped them in red and yellow paint for a bit of discovery (together they made orange!) and orange paint, dropped them in box and let them roll! This worked all of our arm muscles, hand muscles and finger muscles. We tried to decide who the artists were- us or the oranges?
After reading the simple book, Orange, Pear, Apple Bear,
we made orange juice. What a fun experience! We were quite adept at turning the orange on the juicer. It was a lot of work for a very little bit of juice but we had fun and it tasted delicious.
It got a unanimous thumbs up!
YUM!
Keeping with the "orange theme", our lunch that day was very orange...
We used our orange juice peels to make a treat for the birds. We put a selection of dried fruit, seeds and nuts in a bowl and stirred them up. We added peanut butter to the bottom of the orange peel. It was kind of like glue, to keep the ingredients from falling out of the orange peel and then we sprinkled the mixture on top.
When we were done, we took them outside to put them around our play area. Now we have to watch for birds. Surely they'll enjoy the treats!
We loved the book, Big Orange Splot,
a story about creativity and individuality- it's okay to be different was the way we summarized it.
We used our creativity and individuality to collage with all kinds of colors and shapes on house shapes representative of Mr. Plumbean's house.
Orange play dough topped off the week. We had lots of other orange stuff to add to our play.
Oranges are quite a"peeling"!
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