IT'S ALMOST MY NAME

LEARNING STORY

“IT’S ALMOST MY NAME”                                                          JAKE and LOGAN

WRITTEN by SUZANNE SELF

PRELUDE

THE WORD ALMOST MAY SEND THE SUGGESTION THAT SOMETHING IS INCOMPLETE LEAVING A POSSIBLE NEGATIVE MEANING. THE WEBSTER DICTIONARY LISTS THE FOLLOWING SYNONYMS FOR THE WORD ALMOST:

PRACTICALLY

NEARLY

NOT QUITE and JUST ABOUT.

HOWEVER, THE PHRASE “IT’S ALMOST MY NAME” SIGNALED A NEW YEAR’S LEARNING CELEBRATION IN THE PRESCHOOL CLASSROOM. WITHIN THE FIRST HOURS OF BEING REUNITED AFTER THE HOLIDAY BREAK, YOUNG READERS WERE IN PURSUIT OF NEW LEARNING!

THE RECENT SNOWFALL LED ME TO INTRODUCE THE TYPICAL WINTER THEME, SNOW. WINTER WEATHER PROVIDES STUDENTS WITH AN OPPORTUNITY TO WEAVE MATHEMATICS AND SCIENCE LEARNING TOGETHER WHILE EXPLORING SNOWFLAKES AND MELTING EXPERIMENTS. AN INITIAL LEARNING GOAL WAS FOR STUDENTS TO LEARN THE PHYSICAL CHARACTERISTICS OF A SNOWFLAKE:

ALL SNOWFLAKES ARE MADE UP OF ICE CRYSTALS

ALL SNOWFLAKES ARE SYMMETRICAL AND HAVE SIX POINTS OR SIDES

LIKE FINGERPRINTS, ALL SNOWFLAKES ARE UNIQUE.

THE SONG, SNOWFLAKES PROVIDED STUDENTS WITH A CLUE TO THE QUESTION, “HOW MANY POINTS DOES A SNOWFLAKE HAVE?”

SNOWFLAKES FALLING, SNOWFLAKES FALLING

ALL AROUND, ON THE GROUND

SIX POINTED SNOWFLAKES, SIX POINTED SNOWFLAKES

ON THE GROUND, ALL AROUND

AT MORNING MEETING OUR BLUEPRINT PAPER (GRAPH PAPER) WAS LABELED WITH THE LEADING QUESTION. STUDENTS QUICKLY RESPONDED WITH A VARIETY OF NUMBERS RANGING FROM 5-10. ALL ANSWERS WERE DOCUMENTED. NEXT I DEMONSTRATED HOW TO DRAW A SNOWFLAKE USING ONE BIG LINE AND TWO DIAGONAL LINES AND STUDENTS COUNTED EACH POINT. THIS ACTIVITY PROVIDED THE STUDENTS WITH THE CORRECT ANSWER, 6. THEN EACH STUDENT DREW STRAIGHT AND DIAGONAL LINES (HIS OR HER REPRESENTATION) OF A SIX POINTED SNOWFLAKE ON THE BLUEPRINT PAPER. THE 10 SNOWFLAKES WERE COUNTED AND LABELED WITH THE APPROPRIATE NUMBERS. I COMPLIMENTED THE STUDENTS BY TELLING THEM THEY WERE AMAZING READERS AND WRITERS AND WAS READY TO MOVE ON TO OUR NEXT ACTIVITY, BUT LOGAN HAD A DIFFERENT PLAN!  HE WAS EAGER TO WRITE HIS NAME NEXT TO THE SNOWFLAKE HE HAD DESIGNED AND REQUESTED TO “STUDY” THE WORD SNOWFLAKE (“STUDYING” A WORD IS A TYPE OF “WORD DISSECTION “AND IS A COMMON OCCURRENCE IN OUR CLASSROOM). STUDENTS IDENTIFY LETTERS IN A WORD AND MAKE CONNECTIONS TO LETTERS IN THEIR NAME (EX. CAT HAS A “T” AND THE NAME TOM HAS A “T”. IF A STUDENT MATCHES ONE LETTER IN HIS OR HER NAME TO A LETTER IN THE WORD BEING STUDIED, IT IS IDENTIFIED AS A “SINGLE ALERT”, TWO MATCHING LETTERS IS DEEMED, A “DOUBLE ALERT” AND THREE MATCHING LETTERS IS DESIGNATED A “TRIPLE ALERT”! I TOOK ADVANTAGE OF THE TEACHABLE MOMENT AND LOGAN’S ENTHUSIASM AND ENCOURAGED THE GROUP OF YOUNG READERS TO “STUDY” THE WORD SNOWFLAKE. STUDENTS QUICKLY STARTED IDENTIFYING LETTERS IN THE WORD SNOWFLAKE AND CONNECTED THEM TO MATCHING LETTERS IN THEIR NAME. WHEN IT WAS JAKE’S TURN TO “STUDY” THE WORD SNOWFLAKE, HE ANNOUNCED WITH A BRIGHT GRIN, “IT’S ALMOST MY NAME”! HIS FACIAL EXPRESSION DISPLAYED A SENSE OF PRIDE. JAKE’S MESSAGE PROMPTED HIS PEERS AND I TO TAKE A CLOSER LOOK AT THE WORD BEING DISSECTED. JAKE MOVED TOWARDS THE BLUEPRINT PAPER AND POINTED TO THE “A K E” SEGMENT OF THE WORD SNOWFLAKE AND AGAIN AFFIRMED, “IT’S ALMOST MY NAME!” JAKE’S FRIENDS RESPONDED, “TRIPLE ALERT!” IN PRESCHOOL THE WORD SNOWFLAKE HAS AN EXTRA SPECIAL MEANING,

                           “IT’S ALMOST JAKE’S NAME!

JAKE EXPERIMENTS WITH SNOWFLAKES BY MELTING SNOW WITH COLORED WATER

LOGAN “STUDIES” THE WORD “SNOWFLAKE” AND ADDS HIS NAME TO THE BLUEPRINT PAPER