Thane's Pizza

Spring 2019 (draft revised June 2021)

An important part of Kindergarten is developing representational skills. Children are artists in different ways and their skills develop at different times. Continued reflection and practice ensures growth and progress, but this looks different for every member in a learning community.

Thane recently shared his writing goal; to draw better. With the support of his learning community, Thane practiced and revised drafts of a pizza. 

Thane's Pizza

Thane was beginning a new How To Book; How To Make a Pizza. With his recent writing goal fresh in his mind, I offered him the opportunity to work on one pizza drawing each day, using a photograph to help guide his work. During our share following writing workshop, he would have a few minutes to present his pizza and look for feedback and support from his peers.

 

You need tiny dots to show the spice on the pepperoni!

Try drawing lines for cheese.

The crust should be thick. Draw one big oval and then a little oval inside.

You need straight lines across to show the slices!

 

As Thane continued to make adjustments to his drawings, we introduced a small ruler, helping him to draw straight lines across his pizza- the use of the tool helped him to show slices! His peers admired how his pizza had changed and was looking more like a pizza.

A peer offered to support Thane in using all of the feedback he had received from his writing community. A thick crust, circles for pepperoni, and slices in the shape of triangles. Using his tools and the gentle guidance from his peer, Thane completed his final drawing of a pizza.

We unveiled his pizza during his final share, comparing it to his original drawing. His peers cheered and applauded. One friend called out, your pizza looks delicious! 

The pride Thane felt in his work could be seen in his smile and the way he clutched his pizza drawing, holding it high above his head. Thane's Pizza is a story of persistence, growth, and how peers can help foster a love for writing and learning. 

 

 

poetry portraits

We are a community of collectors. We have collected things in the woods and on the playground, we have collected things for our fairy houses and for our classroom, we have sorted and counted our collections, and we have shared special treasures from home; from nests to colorful gems. 

At the beginning of the week we reflected on the many different things we like to collect. Some children talked about feelings, how we collect feelings of happiness and peace!

I shared that they are also word collectors. This year they have collected sight words, powerful words, new words, old words, short and long words. They have used their phonological skills to write and read these words. They have used these words to make the world better.

I read The Word Collector and invited the children to think of three powerful words to describe themselves. They planned their words, shared their words, and wrote their words twice; checking that they had all of the sounds in their words. 

 

 

 

 

They cut out their words to attach to the back of a wood slice; their canvas for their end-of-the-year poetry portrait.

 

 

We rewrote the poem we have been working with during our Avid Poetry Readers unit, using common Kindergarten sight words. Each child then wrote the poem one last time, to have a copy with their portrait. 

I can be a cloud,

A mountain or a stone.

I can be a river,

A small seed or a great tree.

But I am always me.

 

 

The words in the poem depict the many feelings, emotions, and parts of ourselves, connecting these feelings to the natural world. We have read this poem many times, we have searched for blends and digraphs in this poem, we have added sight words to this poem, we have explored movement and yoga to go with this poem. 

The children created self-portraits at the beginning of the year and reading portraits inspired by Oliver Jeffers in the middle of the year. They have worked through and learned from challenges and have grown as community members. Their poetry portrait is a celebration of their unique selves within our larger community. 

As we prepare to end our year together, we must end similar to how we began; celebrating and embracing who we are. This is a strong community, but the power in this community is because of the love, kindness, knowledge, and story each child has bravely and eagerly shared. Thank you!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

final workshops

In our final writing workshop the children shared their writing to make the world better with the first and second graders in Ms. Richardson's class. In their writing they stated a problem, used reasons to persuade their audience, and provided a fix-it idea.

We shared copies of the check list the Kindergarten writers developed and asked the first and second graders to use our check list to guide their support and feedback.

The children have worked hard on developing check lists based on the essentials in our writing units. These check lists are a way for children to demonstrate their knowledge and understanding and use their language and words to guide their writing.

 

 

 

In our final math workshop the children reread their journals and reflected on their goals as mathematicians. We noticed how our work has changed and progressed over the year; many celebrated growth in their number printing and use of new strategies. It was powerful to observe children read through their math journals one last time, thinking about what they felt proud of and what they are working on. For our share, each child read their math reflection to our community!