IPS/Butler University Laboratory School

Provocation for storytelling: What stories can you tell with these materials?

Angela carefully chooses some natural materials to tell her story.

Friends work to create a camping story with our natural materials.

During my trip to the Opal School in Portland, I learned about story provocation with materials. There is much being done at their school around Story Workshop. Story workshop is a process where children are encouraged to tell stories with rich materials placed thoughtfully throughout the room and are also guided with some questions as a provocation. We have introduced some natural materials on a new shelf that have greatly intrigued the children, including seed pods, branches, shells, and other things. We encouraged the children to ponder using the materials to tell a story. There is a question in a picture frame on the shelf that reads, “What stories could you tell with these materials?” Some of their stories have been so rich and interesting. (as you probably can see from the pictures above.)  Miss Schmidt and I also encouraged the kids to tell stories about worms with clay and watercolors. The question asked of them was, “Do worms have stories to tell?” Their creations have been incredible. Such imaginative and passionate stories have arisen from this question.

David and Christian work on telling worm stories with watercolor.

Monica’s incredible worm story involving a bird of prey.

Messi had a very interesting worm story about a male and female worm creating an egg!

Mr. Beery and friends work with stop motion animation to create a worm story.

Tags: creativity, curious, project, Reggio, story telling

Ruth describes the life cycle of a worm.

Messi creates a worm.

Greetings! I am back from my professional development trip to Portland and I am so happy to be back! It was great to see all of the kids this morning and I got lots of hugs- definitely filled up my bucket. 🙂 The kids had lots of questions about the school I visited and what life in Portland, OR is like. We had many questions about what the children from Portland were like.

When I came in this morning, Da’Sean and Messi had news about the worms- they had eaten almost ALL of our leaves and newspaper in the compost bin. WOW! It took those worms only about a week to turn all of that material into rich, black, nutrient filled soil. The kids also remarked on the increase of egg cases on the worms- signs they have mated and are carrying baby worms! We pulled out a few worms to observe other changes. Miss Schmidt and I asked the kids to represent the changes in the worms using clay or various ribbons and string.

The more he eats, the fatter he gets! Ruth

And the longer he gets! Carriea

What if we twist those around? Its an egg case! They got an egg case! And when the eggs are inside, and when the case comes off it turns into… Messi

Its a cocoon and baby worms come out! Aidan

We knew that! Da’Sean

We all knew that! Tajanaye

My worms are gonna have eyes, but they don’t really have em. This one is long, this one is shorter. The long one ate more. Here’s an egg case! Tajanaye

I made five baby worms! How many hearts are there? Aidan

I made a little worm with five hearts. Regan

He doesn’t have hands or legs. He just has hearts! Aidan

It all starts with an egg case. Ruth

How many hearts are in one worm?

Carriea and Regan show off their worm and egg case.

Tags: collaboration, creativity, curious, garden, thinking

This is going to be hard for me to resist and hard for me to forget.  Lucas

This quote brings so much warmth to my heart. These words were spoken by Lucas during our worm dissection with the wonderful Mrs. Grotjan and Miss Robison. Lucas’ words embody the essence of Reggio inspired, project based learning and what our goal here is at the Lab School- facilitate a love of learning. Today, our studio teachers gathered small groups of friends to engage in a detailed worm investigation that included a dissection. It proved to be a fascinating and captivating experience for all involved! Tomorrow, more friends will participate in the activity. I can’t wait to see what about the investigation interests them and what observations will come. More documentation on this incredible experience is coming.

The worm is captivating!

Messi and Cameron work as scientists.

Hutton investigates.

Journey and her worm.

Tags: capable, curious, garden, project, scientific method

Exploring our new sensory table material.

“Mrs. Argus- a flower!” Hutton

Cameron and Kaitlyn do drawings of their grass heads.

The grass heads are getting some sun.

What a fabulous day. We have a new material to explore in our sensory table- dirt! We are also becoming familiar with some gardening tools while we play with this. Our friends were also enjoying doing observational drawings of the many plants and new growth around the room. Hutton even pointed out a blossom on a plant that has been in our room quite a while! Perhaps we will look into why this blossom just sprouted recently. We have also created grass people. These people look like heads that have been stuffed with pine shavings and grass seed. We dipped them in water and placed them upright on a sunny table in our room. We are hoping the grass will grow and look like hair! Each day, it will be the kids’ responsibility to document what has happened to their “head” and draw a picture showing any changes, just as a scientist would.

Tags: curious, garden, project, scientific method

Sascha brings in red wiggler worms from home. Her and Miss Schmidt add them to our bin!

Harper has a new mailbox! It is filled with mail.

Journey reads a beautiful writing about plants and herself.

Sascha draws what she sees inside the compost.

Da’Sean does an observational drawing of our compost bin. He is looking for any changes that have happened over the week.

Tags: creativity, curious, garden