We started the week with our trip to the MoMA! After looking at pictures of the works of art for so long, the kids finally got to see them in person. We started our journey in the sculpture garden where the kids gave me the opportunity to explain to them why we can't touch the art!! We had fun looking at the sculptures, Monet's Water Lilies, Seurat, Klee, Orozco, and the grand finale, van Gogh's Starry Night. The kids were most excited to see this and were captivated by van Gogh's swirls and motion. By the end of our trip, one of the kids said " I'm gonna make art you can touch when I get back to school". It was so hard for the kids to keep themselves from touching, but they really did an awesome job. My main goal for them was exposure, and the more exposed they are to the diversity of creativity, the more open minded they become.

We continued to focus on art in the classroom as the kids made their own collages, fashion pieces, still-lifes and sculptures. One of the teachers donated mounds of packaging Styrofoam pieces which were scattered all over our rug. Some of the kids sat for almost all of freeplay building and taping the pieces together. I brought in 2 cacti plants to observe, and some of the kids wanted to draw what they saw. From there, we talked about still life paintings and arranging objects in front of us to draw. We read stories about color mixing, and by now the kids know fairly well how to mix primary colors to get secondary colors. We also talked about songwriting as a form of art because we are going to have a special visitor coming in to work with the kids on writing the lyrics to their very own song. This unique experience has been set up by Michael Stack, Darby's dad, and the kids are really looking forward to it. We talked about what we'd like our song to be about and decided to write about making new friends for next year but remembering our friends from this year and all the memories we had together.

On Thursday, Joe Bondy, Sarah's dad, took us on a tree walk/sing-along trip in central park. The kids loved being out in nature as they soaked up a bunch of fun facts. Joe pointed out and discussed the Elm, cherry blossom, pin oak, goji, and pine tree. The kids learned about how tree branches get the water they need, how to determine how old a tree is and about the relationship between trees, aphids and ants. After finding a flat and grassy area, we stopped to sing, dance and skip along to Joe's guitar. We finished our expedition at Safari Park and then headed back to school for lunch.

On Friday, we had fireman Tommy come to visit us! Tommy told us all about fire safety like 'stay low and go', 'stop, drop and roll', and 'don't hide, go outside'. He showed the class the different parts of his uniform using me (ah!) as a model. That thing weights 80 pounds! And, before he left, the kids got to try on his hat and mask if they chose to.

We also spent lots of time on Friday making goo! Finally... art you can touch.

I hope you all had a great weekend and I'm looking forward to seeing you Thursday or Friday for conferences.