Dear Studio Blue,
We learned about feelings. We tried out some new blankets for meeting time while we practiced being calm. A few of us explored in the park one day. We thought about how to help others when feeling scared or sick and we tried the rubber bands in a new way on the wall (and lots more, of course!).
Practicing Being Angry
We have begun talking about feelings! Blue Bird told us that a long time ago there was a boy in Studio Blue named Jay. Jay wondered what it would look like to be angry. So he looked at what other people did when they were angry, and then he practiced being angry.
Blue Bird asked us what it looked like to be angry, and we showed her with our faces and with our body. Here's what we did with our faces and arms.
Then we read a book about feelings:
The Color Monster.
The color monster
has a different color
for each feeling.
We noticed how color monster held its arms when it was angry.
We also had a chance to be calm, like the green color monster. Mark sang a song about taking a break. Here's how the song goes:
Some of you lay back on your pillows – you were taking a break! We gave everyone a pillow, then passed out cozy calm blankets that were heavy, and felt them (so soft!) as we listened to Peace Like a River, Twinkle Twinkle, and May There Always Be Sunshine (Alice's request!).
“Of course I get angry. Of course I get sad. I have a full range of emotions. I also have a whole smorgasbord of ways of dealing with my feelings. That is what we should give children. Give them ... ways to express their rage without hurting themselves or somebody else. That's what the world needs.” – Fred Rogers
A Walk in the Park
A small group gathers at the cubbies after reading The Color Monster. As Diane, Augie, Dax, Ferdinand and Jemima head out the door, Dax tells us,
Dax: I am frustrated.
Augie: Why you being frutrated?
Ferdinand also wonders, Why you being frustrated? 
Dax: I keep getting frustrated at my house and Studio Blue.
We walk through the playground, where Karen is playing with Studio Purple. Karen asks us where we are headed. We tell her that we are thinking about different feelings and what they might look like on our faces. She asks us to show her. Dax and Ferdinand show Karen what frustrated might look like and Jemima shows us a face which she later explains is her funny face.
Out in the park, we find and collect pine cones, pieces of bark and other natural materials. We play on and around Elizabeth Tubergen's Double Grave, and then stop and gather together to look at the sculptures in Aaron Curry: Grove, from a distance.
I am wondering about these sculptures. How do you think they look?
Ferdinand: They look angry...and sad.
Dax: Let’s go there.
We cross the road to take a closer look.
Dax: That and that angry and not sad, it’s a little hitting their feet.(He stomps his feet a bit)
Which one has feet?
Dax: This one have feet and that one have feet and that one have feet. And that is the woods we going in.
Ferdinand, which ones to you looked angry?
Ferdinand: Those two. And that one and that...all of them!
Dax: It’s so long and big, that like a tree.
We walk closer to one of the sculptures and stand together, looking up at it. (Homewrecker)
Ferdinand: Yea, because it has drips.
Dax: See? This like a rainbow flooding and flying around (he spins).
And drips. That is a drip right there. That is a drip right there.
Ferdinand: Yea, that face is pointing that way. Yea, because it looks angry.
What tells you it is angry?
Ferdinand: Look at its face. Look at its eyes.
Dax: That is angry.
Next, we gather under Ugly Mess, taken aback by how tall it is.
How does this one look?
Ferdinand: Sad.
Jemima: Eyes. Nose. Circles.
Augie: That one.
How does this one feel?
Sad.
Why?
Augie: I don’t know
Dax: I love my pinecones.
Dax: It’s so big, big, big.
Ferdinand: And a long neck.
Dax: Let’s see that blue one.
Augie: That other one.
The last sculpture we look closely at is Blubat.
Augie: He’s upside down.
Dax: These are the feet. That is the head.
Augie: I’m scared of this sculpture.
Are you pretending to be scared or are you really feeling scared?
Augie: I am really scared of it.
What’s scary about it?
Augie: It’s shaped like an oval.
Augie continues, It’s shaped like an oval on that sculpture, it’s making me scared.
What do you think about this sculpture, Jemima?
Jemima: I’m scared. I’m hiding.
Dax and Ferdinand, could you help us for a minute? Augie and Jemima are feeling scared of this sculpture and they feel like they want to hide from it.
Ferdinand: Well, we can tell you where we can hide. We can tell you where you can hide. In the forest!
Would that make you feel better?
Augie: Yes!
They all joyfully run into the grove!
Dax notices a path. There’s a path right there.
Dax notices a large tree that appears to have a doorway to the inside. Let’s go in my house!
When everyone is under the gigantic tree, surrounded by its enormous branches and pines, Ferdinand adds, This is my house too!
They all are inside the house finding pieces of nature to collect, cooking, and settling in this space as a group.
Ferdinand: I’m looking out the window…to the tractor.
Soon, we go deeper into the grove and climb up the woodchip hills and then settle again by Ferma, where Dax serves everyone hot cocoa.
Dax: Hot cocoa for you. Hot cocoa for you. Hot cocoa for everybody!
They get up and walk around together. Soon, Ferdinand says, Let’s go back to our hot cocoa!
Everyone agrees!
Every Picture Tells a Story
All these plays were happening at the same time.
Here are some things you had to say:
Cassie: It’s a X (on top of structure). It’s a hospital (the X representing the cross that indicates it’s a hospital)
Alice: They’re together! (Her bird and Kairan’s, in the blocks)
Arlo: This horse is angry.
William: We captured these.
Arlo: It’s an animal doctor. This is the nurse room. (What happens there?) They get shots. This is the sink where they get cloths wet and they put them on your knee.
Kairan: These blocks make sure it’s quiet (putting blocks on top of a structure of Vivian’s and Cassie’s that had babies inside)
Arlo: Here’s the door. Here’s the pathway outside. Next to the doctor there’s a toy store.
Pedagogical Praise for the Versatile Rubber Band:
Beginning math skills are being learned as children experiment with how far they can stretch and explore the difference between smaller and bigger rubber bands. We see children experimenting with which rubber band will go around which blocks, which don’t fit and which are too loose and fall off. This week some children discovered that the large rubber bands fit nicely around our largest blocks, and in doing so, found that they can trap birds and plastic animals inside. That led to the task of spacing out the rubber bands evenly to eliminate any gaps large enough for a plastic animal to fall out. Motor skills were developed as they figured out how to hold the block down while using both hands to wrap the rubber band around it.
Along the way is social/emotional growth as they discuss their plans, cooperate, imitate, and learn from each other. An idea initiated by one child morphs and becomes something more complex as another child tries it out and reveals new possibilities.
Another new development this week was that we took down the gears on the wall and replaced them with a map of the sculpture park with a hook at each sculpture/landmark. By stretching rubber bands across it, it allows them to engage in mapping, a way to physically connect the representations of the places they frequently visit. (Furthering what was introduced with the mapping book in which Blue Bird and Crow used different ways to fly from Studio Blue to the Silver Car.)
